Welcome to Reality
SELF Guidance to Total Awakening
The Awakening World Society Foundation
The Great Misconception
You may think you are experiencing what is actually happening in the “real
world” out there. You may think you know who you are. But a major discrepancy exists between our experience of reality and what reality actually is.
We know that the Earth appears flat and the Sun appears to go around the Earth. But in reality, the Earth is round and revolves around the Sun.
It may seem that you are directly perceiving the world through your senses, but neuroscience shows that your perception is your mind’s interpretation of electrical signals in your brain. The world is not out there separate from you as it appears. It is actually in your own mind, your own conscious awareness. Your senses appear to be in your body, but in reality, the experience of your body is possible only due to your senses. Your mind may seem to be in your body, but in reality, your body is in your mind. You may not be awake to a much deeper reality of your own mind and consciousness.
We think we have a physical body with a temporary existence. But according to physics, our bodies are made of atoms formed in the first minutes after the Big Bang, over 13.7 billion years ago, or even earlier, as more recent discoveries suggest. The causal quantum dynamics that formed the universe are contained within your body right now. The true reality of your body is not that it is a physical, individual, ephemeral body, but that it is ancient, cosmic, and universal. There is a universal quantum-field reality of our body and brain that we have not been awake to.
You have been experiencing yourself as your mind and body, but in reality, you are the pure Awareness that is awake to your mind and body. Your real Self is the impartial seer of your mind — that which enables your mind to think. You are not your mind. You are not your thoughts; you are Awareness itself.
Awakening to your real Self happens within the innermost core of your being. An unmistakable spontaneous shift takes place from predominantly experiencing the changing aspect of yourself to predominantly experiencing the non-changing aspect of your Self. It is a shift from being the person you think you are (bound by thoughts, emotions, and experiences) to being the unbounded, silent, pure Awareness in which all experience happens. It is a permanent shift to being the unbounded peace, freedom, and joy of your real Self, no longer overshadowed by life experiences, however pleasant or unpleasant. It is waking up to who you really are.
Everything you have ever experienced in life, whether physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual, has only been experienced within and because of Awareness. Conscious Awareness underpins all experience. When you directly experience the true reality of your Self as unbounded pure Awareness itself, you live from that perspective. The doorway opens to a completely new dimension of life lived in peace, freedom, and completeness, advancing quickly toward full Enlightenment and a finer perception of life's deeper divine reality.
The reality is: You are Awareness itself, ever in the process of opening up to its supremely beautiful divine reality through the appearance of the body, world, and universe.