The balance between the active and passive aspects of our waking consciousness and its effects on our creativity brings up another important point: consciousness is linked to all aspects of our being—our physical bodies, our five senses, our emotions, and to our thoughts—but cannot be fully reduced to any one of these things. Still, we can use any one of these alone or in combination to begin exploring consciousness directly. We can, and do, manipulate the shape of our window of consciousness by using the molecules found in food and other substances, by using sensations, by using the movement of our bodies, and by using thinking itself to alter our conscious states. If you have any doubts, watch carefully what happens when you eat a piece of chocolate, or receive a massage, or walk outside after sitting at a desk all day, or read a poem that moves you. The way in which each of these experiences enters your field of awareness is very different, but all of them alter your consciousness in one way or another.
Even more dramatically, notice how your consciousness shifts during trauma, orgasm, the birth of a child, or the death of a loved one. These later experiences pry at the very foundations of our sense of existence, and like the sky, and the space, and the entire cosmos dwarfing our egoic control tower, they reveal the vastness of consciousness that is always available, if only we are able to let go. When we are able to fully embrace the profundity of these experiences, they can electrify our creative capacities, offering us a precious glimpse of the teeming mysteriousness of the creative universe that surrounds us.
As the salmon was meant to swim and the meadowlark was meant to sing, our consciousness is our most defining feature, a feature worthy of both celebration and active engagement. By deepening our own experiential understanding of the awareness consciousness affords us, we begin to fully claim the rarity and preciousness of our human lives. By better understanding the vehicle through which we experience the world, we better understand the world itself. Cultivating a relationship with consciousness allows for greater perspective and depth of experience. In effect, we lessen the influences of our own hidden fears, idiosyncrasies, and habitual patterns, and begin to engage the world more directly, more intimately, more compassionately, and more creatively.
Next time, I’ll begin outlining more specific steps you can take to enhance your natural creativity by become a connoisseur of consciousness. In the meantime, ask yourself how you experience 1) your awareness, 2) your awareness of your awareness, and 3) your awareness of your awareness of being aware. Go deep and we’ll check in soon!
Austin Hill Shaw is a creativity expert, author, writer, architectural designer, and mapmaker of creativity across art, science, and religion. He specializes in helping others tap into and utilize the creative life force in everything they do. He can be reached at austin@austinhillshaw.com.