Altered state of consciousness

[Brother]

The concept of an altered state of consciousness​

To understand what an altered state of consciousness is, let's first turn to authoritative scientific sources. Let's open the all-knowing Wikipedia and treatises on psychology. An altered state of consciousness (ASC) is a qualitative transformation of subjective experiences and psychological functioning of an individual in comparison with certain norms of behavior, fixed by him or by outside observers. Subjective experiences are unique individual characteristics of thinking and perception of the surrounding world by each person.

Altered states of consciousness, which are of a short-term nature and arise in a natural way, are inherent in the psyche of healthy people. ASC in sleep is a physiological need of the human body. And now I propose to dispense with abstruse terms and formulate a more accessible definition. Altered consciousness is a state in which significant changes are observed in a person's thinking and perception of the world, in his physical and emotional sensations, in behavior and intellectual abilities. In my opinion, it sounds simpler and clearer. Altered states of consciousness are subdivided into:

• spontaneously arising as a result of physical activity, listening to monotonous speech or music, experiencing stress or sensations of acute pain;
• artificially caused by taking psychotropic drugs or by changing the respiratory rhythm;
• psychotechnically conditioned accompany hypnotic trance, meditation, religious rituals.

The trance state of consciousness: how to enter​

One of the types of ASC is a trance state of consciousness. It is generally accepted that trance refers to the area of supernatural manifestations of the human psyche. In fact, you and I experience a light trance state almost daily, without even noticing it. Remember how you felt when you:

• are passionate about an interesting book or movie;
• listen to your favorite music;
• “Automatically” you follow a familiar route or drive a car along an empty road, while mentally immersed in yourself;
• are in a state of emotional or mental stress;
• doing creative work or other favorite activity;
• you feel euphoria from traveling to other cities and countries, from contemplating works of art;
• doing sports, dancing.

In all of these cases, our consciousness concentrates on some one sensation or thought and is disconnected from the "insignificant" surrounding reality. The state of deep trance, otherwise called "the highest degree of awareness" is achieved through meditation or hypnotic influence.

Varieties of an altered state of consciousness​

Learning theory is great! But I think that any phenomenon is easier to comprehend if we consider specific thematic examples and understand their essence. Forms of altered states of consciousness:

1. Hypnotic influence - ASC, arising as a result of the targeted influence of the hypnotist or through self-hypnosis. It has an intermediate position between wakefulness and sleep. In a state of hypnotic trance, a person is able to remember and rethink the events of the past years, get rid of psychological trauma, gain control and get rid of addictions.
2. Sleep as an altered state of consciousness is the only natural way provided by human physiology. During sleep, all organs and resources of the body are restored. In a dream, a person can literally see the solution to his problem.
3. Meditation is a process of gradual relaxation of the physical body, focusing on the sensations of your body, your own breathing, or on a specific object. As a result, the mind is "unloaded" from negative experiences, an uncontrolled flow of abstract thoughts, irritants of the surrounding world. In a state of meditation, a person is able to mentally ask a question in the surrounding space and get an answer to it.
4. Exposure to psychotropic substances. It's no secret that alcohol, nicotine, and narcotic substances have the most detrimental effect on the human body. First of all, brain cells are destroyed, therefore, a person's consciousness does not just change - it degrades to hallucinations and mental disorders.
5. Coma is one of the varieties of impaired consciousness, in which a person has no connection with the surrounding reality, mental activity stops. It occurs as a result of severe brain damage during trauma, inflammatory processes, poisoning.
6. The "Shamanic Journey" is an ancient way of comprehending parallel levels of reality located outside the limits of the perception of physical senses. Implies moving to a different energy spectrum. The experience and knowledge accumulated in an altered state of consciousness contribute to new and unusual insights in the spiritual search and help in solving the problems of a person's everyday life.
7. Pathological condition of a person. The state of altered consciousness is observed as a result of prolonged fasting, dehydration, lack of sleep or complete lack of sleep, increased body temperature.

Positive and negative aspects of entering the ISS​

Altered states of consciousness and the ways of entering them have a beneficial effect on a person only in the case of their natural manifestation and a positive effect on physical and mental health. The state of light trance from playing sports, creativity, or from connecting with nature allows you to get rid of negative experiences and stress. Thus, attention is switched from unfavorable circumstances to another sphere of perception, where the human psyche relaxes.

The state of altered consciousness through deep sleep, meditation or hypnosis enables people to draw information from their subconscious. And you and I know that human subconsciousness directly interacts with the energy-informational field of our universe. Thus, you yourself can get the information you are interested in, program the events of your life, and even get rid of ailments. In the event that a person tries to change his consciousness with the help of alcoholic or narcotic substances, the result of such experiences will be tragic. At first, a person will feel an incredible expansion of consciousness and see the versatility of the universe in the brightest colors. It will seem to him that he has risen above the "gray routine", that the level of his intelligence is many times higher than the level of "primitive people".

All this is temporary and ends with the complete disintegration of the personality. I humbly apologize for such a comparison, but expanding your consciousness and comprehending the secrets of the universe through the use of "drugs" is the same as trying to warm up in the cold, peeing in your pants. It will be warm for a couple of minutes, but then ... The use of narcotic substances is justified only in the case of drug anesthesia of the patient during surgery.

How to enter an altered state of consciousness​

Well, let's get to practice! To master the methods of entering an altered state of consciousness, it is necessary to learn how to change the wave vibrations of the brain. Brain rhythms are directly related to the processes in our mind. There are 4 levels of brain radiation:

1. Beta Wave is the natural state of waking consciousness. The frequency range of brain radiation ranges from 14 to 37 rhythms per second. Respiratory rate from 12 to 18 breaths per minute.
2. Alpha Wave is a passive state of dormancy in the brain. A rhythm commensurate with meditative and hypnotic trance, daytime dreaming. The frequency of brain radiation is from 8 to 13 vibrations. Respiratory rate from 7 to 11 breaths per minute.
3. Theta Wave is a state of REM sleep: mental images rise above the level of our subconscious. Access to supernatural experiences and visual perception of images outside of everyday reality opens up. The level of "Shamanic Journey", a sense of unity with the universe. The frequency of brain radiation is from 5 to 7 rhythms, breathing is from 5 to 6 breaths.
4. Delta Wave is a state of deep sleep when a person is under general anesthesia or unconscious. It is characterized by immunity to any stimulus. The frequency of brain radiation is from 0.6 to 5 oscillations. The respiratory rate is extremely low - 2 to 5 breaths per minute.

And now - the fun part!

Ways to enter an altered state of consciousness:​

1. As you sit in a calm, secluded environment and close your eyes, feel a deeper level of inner silence. You move away from the sounds and phenomena of the surrounding world. Feel the relaxation of the muscles of the body, concentrate on pleasant images. Do not try to abruptly cut off the flow of thoughts: this can cause a reaction that is opposite to relaxation. Take the position of an observer of your thoughts, do not try to evaluate them. Create a stream of smoothly flowing consciousness in your head. Now you are ready to move from the harsh everyday materiality to a more subtle worldview.
2. From the entire stream of thought, choose the image that is most attractive and interesting to you. After making sure that the chosen image is the most harmonious for you at the moment, start wrapping it in layers of thought forms. The finally formulated thought form will give you a feeling of complete inner merging of images and feelings with the information field of the universe. (A thought-form is an independent living structure created by the thoughts of a person. It already exists in the astral world, but has not yet been embodied at the material level. A person generates it with his imagination and feeds it with personal energy).
3. Now take a look around and get a feel for the psychological area that you have created. With the highest concentration on the selected object, you will feel how your concentration smoothly moves into a kind of "parallel" space. Don't try to grasp the details. Follow the stream calmly. In case you have a feeling of fear or discomfort, weaken your psychological concentration. Get distracted by the details of the physical world. Gradually and carefully adapt to the changes that are taking place.

 

[Tomcat]

What can illusions tell us about the workings of consciousness?​

To the question "What are illusions?" there is no strict answer. There are a lot of illusions, and their occurrence can be explained from the point of view of different scientific disciplines.
For example, there are visual illusions, the reasons for which lie in the laws of physics: mirages, the halo effect, and the like. Such illusions are captured by the camera.

There are illusions related to how our organs of vision are arranged. A blind spot is an area in the eye where there are no retinal receptors and where nerve fibers and blood vessels are located. The presence of a blind spot allows us to experience the illusion of the disappearance of an object in the event that we look at the image of two figures, covering one eye with our hand. At a certain distance from the image, one of these figures will fall into the blind spot area, and we will stop seeing it until we change position.
Look with your left eye at the right cross, covering your right eye with your hand. Move in and out until the image disappears.

The most interesting are illusions that cannot be explained by the work of the body or physical phenomena. They are related to how the psyche and cognition work. Discussions about the causes of their occurrence are still flaring up. Such phenomena cannot be recorded by a device - a photo and video camera, and the work of physiological organs and systems cannot be fully explained. They are called cognitive illusions.
These often include illusions of magnitude: the famous illusions of Müller - Layer, Ponzo, Ebbinghaus, Oppel - Kundt, and so on. In all these illusions, objects of the same size appear to be different to us. Moreover, even the knowledge of the equality of two segments or two figures does not save one from optical illusion.

The Mueller-Lyer illusion

Since ancient times, scientists have tried to solve the riddle of the illusion of perception. For many centuries, hypotheses have been put forward about the causes of the appearance of the moon illusion. It is known that the Moon at the horizon seems to be much larger than at its zenith, but the camera does not record such a difference. This is not surprising: wherever the Moon is, its size remains the same, and the distance to the Earth does not change enough to turn from a small disk in the sky into a giant bright ball on the horizon.

For the camera, the Moon is the same size regardless of its location in the sky

There are many attempts to explain, related to the direction of the gaze, the work of the eye muscles when looking up and forward, with the role of objects that are on the line of sight when looking at the horizon and not at the top, the position of the body relative to the line on which the object is located, and so on.
Alas, all these explanations today cannot be considered sufficient. In addition, scientists would like to find a uniform explanation of illusions, to reveal at least some general patterns and mechanisms of their occurrence, to build a single classification. However, this has not yet succeeded - there are more questions than answers.
Of course, the search for the causes of illusions, factors for their decrease or increase will allow us to better understand how our perception works, how we know the visible world, what mistakes we make in the tasks of determining the size, visual search, when detecting and recognizing objects and why we make them. how to help a person avoid such mistakes, reduce the magnitude of the illusion, or, conversely, increase, for example, in order to disguise.

Ponzo illusion (upper left corner) and its modifications

It is very important to understand that visual illusions are just one example of how our consciousness can change the world around us. An amazing phenomenon that reminds us that we do not always see what we see. We are surrounded by an incredible number of objects, they are located at different distances, at different angles, their shape can be very complex, multidimensional. At every moment of time, a person has to choose what will be consciously and what will not, and how that part of reality that has entered consciousness will be realized and interpreted. What will be not real, but perceived by us form or size, and what should happen in order for what remained unconscious to become conscious?

Delboeuf's illusion

Illusions of perception can serve as a unique material with which you can explore the patterns of the work of consciousness. After all, the illusion can be more or less. Sometimes it depends on such unexpected things as units of measurement - you can estimate the difference in centimeters, grams, or even in parrots, as in a famous cartoon. In addition, in certain states, people cease to experience illusions; the assessments of objects causing illusions may differ if they are assessed verbally, verbally, or motorically by grasping the object or drawing a line of appropriate length. How we perceive the size of an object sometimes matters more than the actual size: there are experiments where the effectiveness of hitting a target was higher only because it seemed larger. Knowing about the existence of such illusions.