Several years ago in the opening module of my Temenos Touch training, one of the students asked, “Is what we are doing magic?” In terms of how most people view ‘materialist reality’ then the answer is yes.
For those of you who are interested I highly recommend Real Magic: Ancient Wisdom, Modern Science, and a Guide to the Secret Power of the Universe by Professor Dean Radin. As he writes, to sidestep expected prejudices, magic can be reframed as the academic study of the full capacities of consciousness in light of the rising interest in informational descriptions of reality.
He notes that the Hermetic cosmology, also known as The Perennial Philosophy or the primordial tradition, has existed throughout the ages, and all of the tremendously diverse religious traditions of the world have emerged from this. This Perennial Philosophy contends that reality consists of a single Universal Consciousness, known by many names: The One Mind, the Divine, the Tao, Brahman, Allah, God, Source and so on.
Radin refers to this as consciousness with a capital C. In Hermeticism, C appears in two complementary aspects. One form is a manifested, primordial, ‘plastic’ energy, sometimes referred to within the alchemical tradition as the One Thing. The other form is a non-manifested, transcendent element known as the One Mind. The One Thing reacts to and is shaped by the One Mind.
When we focus on the similarities of the different schools of the Perennial Philosophy, we find that three simple ideas keep popping up:
- Consciousness is fundamental, meaning it is primary over the physical world.
- Everything is interconnected.
- There is only one Consciousness.
Radin is pleased to conclude that those three ideas are the basis of real magic. And because of new science coming through he says, Throughout science and scholarship a basic principle of the Perennial Philosophy – that consciousness is fundamental – is slowly becoming acceptable to talk about. This is after several centuries when anything metaphysical was not to be spoken of within scientific communities.
The ripples from this work need to spread, which means we need to talk about consciousness, both local and non-local, we need to own it as science, as integrated healthcare, as the future, not hide it as something illogical or frightening or indefensible or dark. As Bernardo Kastrup eloquently wrote in an entire book: Why Materialism is Baloney! More on that the next time. And for those interested, there is lots more information on the Institute of Noetic Sciences website.