Levels of Consciousness vs. Pure Consciousness

Alright, so today I’d like to address a point about consciousness.

In ego-land, we see ourselves as a being with consciousness, someone who has consciousness. If we get knocked in the head, we can lose consciousness. If we get on the spiritual pathway, we can raise our level of consciousness and become more conscious. There is my consciousness and your consciousness and they see different things. Heck, there are even people who are deemed unconscious, spiritually speaking.

Looking at this wording, we notice that in every situation, the word consciousness is used to point to something other than what we are. Consciousness is something we have, something that changes over time, something that can come and go. It is variable. It is something we want to develop, something to get more of, something to expand or improve.

It gives us a target to reach for, somewhere “out there” to arrive called a “place of higher consciousness” or whatever. Yet another goal in the future. We want to attain a certain level of consciousness. From this perspective, we are given something to seek and we can see that we are not there yet.

Now given all this, I would like to talk about pure consciousness itself, that which is ALREADY HERE AS IT IS.

In this moment, notice that consciousness is conscious of these words being read. Though the words are changing, consciousness itself isn’t.

Consciousness is conscious of one’s emotional state. Consciousness is not synonymous with one’s emotional state.

Consciousness is conscious of the degree of wisdom one has attained.

There is consciousness and then there is the degree to which consciousness is conscious of consciousness. Whether one is focusing on the world or whether one is looking within and noticing that they are conscious, consciousness is conscious of all of that just the same, it itself not changing.

Consciousness, pure consciousness, does it have any limits? Feel for them right now. Does consciousness contract or expand or is it conscious of all sensation and experience of both contraction and expansion? When there is the profound experience of “expanded consciousness,” is consciousness not conscious of that too? Experiences change. Consciousness doesn’t.

Are there different levels of pure consciousness or is consciousness itself conscious of how loving you are, how compassionate you are, what level of consciousness you calibrate at, and so on?

No matter what realizations have occurred, what experiences have been experienced, has consciousness itself changed or been affected?

It’s so easy, given how drawn into the changing world of form that most of us are, to associate unchanging consciousness with that which changes. These are all misconceptions.

Because we sometimes use consciousness to refer to unchanging awareness and other times we use it to refer to something that is variable, something that changes, something that comes and goes, this introduces a degree of confusion and misunderstanding as different people use the same word to point to different things.

I’d like to invite you to become more conscious of consciousness itself.

Notice that consciousness would be conscious of one’s effort to become conscious of consciousness.

When there is the pull to distract yourself and do something else, is consciousness still conscious of that? When you feel like you’re running away, does consciousness run?

When you’re in meditation, whether you’re doing a “good job” meditating or not, is consciousness conscious of all of that?

No matter what thoughts arise, what experiences happen, and if there is a “me” present or not, is consciousness itself not conscious of this whole game?

Regardless of how hard we try to be conscious, is consciousness not effortlessly conscious already?

Pure consciousness itself. Does it change?