THE NATURE OF YOUR MIND

Can People Live In Space -like you’d need to colonize Mars?

In 1875, one of the world’s first ecologists gave Earth another name -Biosphere 1.  A hundred years later, man made Biosphere 2. This $150 million dollar glass and steel compound was created to determine if a colony of people could inhabit a self-contained structure simulating the ecosystem of our planet.  A two-year experiment was designed for a small group of people to eat, live and exist exclusively within a dome that might one day be used in future space colonization. Everything was to be strictly but naturally supplied from within.

I grew up with this grand venture being hosted only ninety minutes down the Interstate.  Yet, for all my years in Arizona, I have never been to the space bubble.  At the time of its conception, people from all around the world were interested in this trial and its possible implications of living in space independently.  My interests during this period were placed elsewhere so I was never overly excited about taking a tour of Biosphere 2.

Visit to Biosphere 2

This interest changed and I recently entered the totally enclosed structure by ducking and climbing through submarine like hatches with my wife.   The air was noticeably thick with humidity.  The walls were filled with thousands of windows offering plenty of natural sunlight but still I felt confined like I was in a giant hamster cage.  It was unlike any other arboretum I’d ever visited.

Our tour guide shared, in a tone of scientific regret, that the first group of inhabitants had to work very long hours with over half of their time dedicated to survival.  I thought it funny thinking about the group of original scientists who wanted to immerse themselves in their endless experiments but were constrained to be –farmers.  While our earliest ancestors fought wild animals and the elements for their existence, this group slept in soft comfortable beds and ate in a kitchen with every modern item to assist them but they were also starving.  I thought about, how much time people spend trying to exist.

In America, I expect we spend at least 50% of our time dedicated to survival. Many people of the world spend their whole day hoping to earn enough to eat -and still falling short.  Deductively, the inhabitants of Biosphere 2 had created the same problem(s) as the people of Biosphere 1 in trying to get enough.  The farmers of Biosphere 2 had lots of troubles, one of which we have now identified –their lack of food. The other predominant problem was with each other.

The Real Problem with Failure of the Bioshere 2 Experiment.

The residents of Biosphere 2 had enormous challenges in working and getting along.  The issues became so severe that it could be described as the world’s first reality TV show.   For millions of years mankind has struggled to cooperate with one another and in this experiment it didn’t take the full two years for this problem to be highlighted again.  In Biosphere 2, enemies were only accepted and tolerated in lieu of their overall collective need, to cooperate on the most ineffective scale, just so everyone could eat.

Will There Be a Biosphere 3?  A inside tour of the mind.

I have recently decided to take a tour of Biosphere 3, which I have defined as my mind. Technically, Biosphere 3 isn’t exactly a sphere but neither is Biosphere 2.  Biosphere 3 is absolutely the epicenter of where I live and I have historically have had no more interest to visit it than I have to tour Biosphere 2.  After all, I’ve been too busy trying to survive.

The mission of my experiment is to tour my mind and learn how I might connect more to the flow of life.  I figure I’ve been getting along probably to the same poor extent as the first residents found in Biosphere 2, and I am going to change that.  I understand that I have become me based upon the perceptions that I have created in the stories, choices and teaching within my persona.  To be fair, I can easily acknowledge that I haven’t toured Biosphere 3 much in the past precisely for one reason.

Truly observing myself has been considered dangerous to my identity.  So, I’ve spent all my time protecting who I think I am.  After nearly a half million hours of consciousness, it feels insane to observe what has been the very basis of my entire identity.  I am not grossly unhappy about who I think I am, quite the contrary.  This makes this exploration feel even more unsafe.

My fear is, what if I discover something that isn’t me?  

What I mean is, what if I am someone different than who I think I am?  Inevitably, this would mean change of the largest kind, and instantly up comes the flood of familiar resistance.   I am about to tour Biosphere 3 opening the hatches into my mind and it already smells musty.  Innocently, I must find out who I really am and even why I’ve created my current identity the way I have.  If I am just a product of what has been handed down from previous generations then my soul really didn’t need to incarnate here for that.

Sitting in a formal lotus position I am prepared to take a newer kind of meditative tour.  I’ve meditated many times before but I’ve never explored anything beyond trying to quiet the noisy processing of my mind.  I never thought of using meditation as a multipurpose tool like my daily journaling and channeling. So here I sit, excited to put forth questions as to my true identity while also appreciating the choices and perspectives that have comprised me and who I think I am.

Integration the Two Spheres. (Outside with Inside.)

Ultimately, I have already made the (future) decision to change whatever observations of me that aren’t in alignment with the real me.  I have been practicing with Source in this way for quite a while.  There are many things I know on the Spiritual level that I am still implementing into my being.  I am already bumping into my impatient self and who I think I am with its resistance.

As I closed my eyes to meditate, I could hear again my mile-a-minute mind chatter that this whole experiment is stupid and that I should immediately quit.  Since this was only my first breath I continued forward in spite of the warning.  Like Biosphere 2, the landscape of Biosphere 3 is distinctively categorized into sections and areas.  I wonder if the residents of Biosphere 2 really needed signs to identify the ocean from the desert.  This very thought would be one of my first discoveries of myself.

The Signs

In consciously observing the flow of nature and my being, it is oftentimes so subtle and hard to see how one thing connects with another.  In Biosphere 2, everything had a posted sign.  When I walked the copula, I thought the “Ocean” sign to be silly when in fact I was obviously staring at it. I brushed this aside, thinking that all these signs must be for the kids or tourists but not for the scientists.  I couldn’t imagine why a scientist would need a sign telling him or her of such mundane things.

I’ll bet your house doesn’t have signs for the; kitchen, master bedroom, or pool as all these places are pretty obvious.  I became further aware that indeed every word, number, thought and understanding is a sign.  In observing myself in meditation, it became instantly apparent that I had become the signs.  They weren’t just words describing a location or experience within my mind/body or Universal ecosystem they were laced with feelings and emotions as if everyone would agree with my signs of identity.

What is This Space Inside?

Sitting from my new position in observing myself, even I didn’t like or agree with all my signs.  It was official; I was in the danger zone.  I expected this kind of dramatic internal reaction but instead I felt calm as if to say within, interesting.  There wasn’t any alarm bells or resistance, I was just observing.

In this same peaceful state I knew why I, and everybody else, had such difficulty in communicating and getting along.  My identity had become so enamored in creating itself it just assumed everyone was processing in the same way.  Studies of the brain show how the mind creates specific patterns or even “paths” based upon previous experiences.  In this way, the alphabet as I know it, had been altered beyond the agreed characters, sounds and eventually their meaning.

If my identity is interfering on such basic levels then in space exploration terms, “Houston we have a problem.”  The me I think I am is so in the way that I can’t see, hear, or know anything.  I am aware of this concept but I’ve never actually felt it.  In my experiment to take the tour of Biosphere 3 I am actually amazed that I have made it this far.

Spinning My Perceptions

In observing my who I think I am identity I now find it hard to imagine that I’ve been able to connect to anything. Like everyone else, I assumed, these signs all meant the same thing to everybody.   In every case, even though we are all using agreed upon rules to communicate, we in fact, don’t agree.  In politics we spin; facts, stories and the information disseminated to present the picture we want others to see.

I suppose like some politicians or actors, I got lost in this perceived identity.  I understand that in connecting to the flow of life it is impossible for me to be disconnected – even in my who I think I am state.  But I feel I am emerging as a whole new me. The real me.

The Ego (Feeling Separate, Alone and Not Understood) Was the Problem for Biosphere 2 and IS the problem for Biosphere 3.

I am just beginning to recognize how my identity is absolutely the very core of these two basic problems in my trying to survive and get along with others.  Now, I can only imagine my new interactions without this false identity creating all its self-imposed interference. Finally, I can really hear the truth of what is being said versus having to unwind all the propaganda that I likewise have been sending. It allows me to know.

This removes my struggle to express and be known.  It completes any need that I have in taking a position, continuously created by my who I think I am state.  This removes the competitive positions always being created by my mind.  I am no longer separate.  If my short exploration of Biosphere 3 has already provided me this much insight into furthering my connections with Universal life, then next time you see me don’t be surprised by my new t-shirt that says, “tour guide.” Get your personal tour here.