CHOICE (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 70 x 100 cm)
WHO WOULD THEY CHOOSE
If aliens chose to whom to talk No necessity for intelligence nor resources Governmental approval not required Their superior awareness, interested in The poetic and artistic capacity of humans
If animals chose with whom to live No need for domestication nor exploitation Business profit not required Their unconditional love thankful for The compassionate and caring capacity of humans
If plants chose by whom to grow No requisite for pesticides nor fertilizing Industrial control not required Their exceptional frugality appreciating of The responsible and modest capacity of humans
If gods chose for whom to care No demand for confessions nor fees Religious punishment not required Their divine grace, inclusive of The spiritual and free capacity of humans
THE RIGHT WAY (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 120 cm)
CAPITALISM IS GREAT
Shit, how can I pay? Follow economy! Inherited through money, approved by aristocracy, capitalism is right. The shitty artists into ruin; they are not realistic about the right way. Serving beauty doesn’t pay!
Hell, how can I say? Follow politics! Merited through rights, approved by meritocracy, capitalism is great. The hellish comedians into shame; they are not serious about the great way. Serving humor doesn’t pay!
Fuck, how can I convey? Follow media! Gained through voices, approved by mobocracy, capitalism is good. The fucking musicians into oblivion; they are not important for the good way. Serving inspiration doesn’t pay!
God, how can I thrive? Follow science! Achieved through tools, approved by technocracy, capitalism is correct. The godly naturalists into sickness; they are not advanced about the correct way. Serving nature doesn’t pay!
Damn, how can I realize? Follow religion! Granted through membership, approved by theocracy, capitalism is fine. The damn spirituals into condemnation; they are not chosen for the fine way. Serving the soul doesn’t pay!
Man, how can I help? Follow the state! Legit through power, approved by bureaucracy, capitalism is fair. The manly selves into oppression; they are not conform with the fair way. Serving freedom doesn’t pay!
TORN OUT BY WAR (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 80 x 100 cm)
TORN OUT BY WAR
I walk in an unknown, dust burnt by the sun, street, a busy one, and blocks in a line. Traces of war on walls, the street’s potholes, slow the convoys, and directed arms. Keeping the steady pace, to meet at my place, aimed to displace and cover my face. Shooting and hellfire, despite the scene so dire, I’m back to inquire, and I do see her. I could shoot as well, an angel from hell; they don’t yell and then repel. Torn out of this dream, no way to remain; I hope you’re fine, and we’ll return. A better time, peace, less shooting at least, conquered the beasts and where love wins. Strong to not lose faith, don’t give in to fight, a temporary night, and we’re alright.
ARE YOU SURE (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 50 x 70 cm)
ARE YOU SURE?
According to Buddhist teaching, we all go through life with blinders on. We might be hiking along a forest road coming to a shack, one of those inviting oases, and we spot a rope rolled beside the entrance, but we mistake it for a snake. This provokes thoughts associated with that perception. We know that there are working tools like ropes used by foresters but start to ask whether there are also snakes. Concern about our safety in the face of dangerous animals in the woods arises. Should we avoid the area, and should we protect and arm ourselves? We spin a web of thoughts that are not necessarily based on the first sight of the thing initially interpreted falsely. Further distortions of thoughts follow, and all combines into creating a biased view. Having gotten the idea that forest huts are infected by dangerous animals like snakes, it impacts our behavior overall. We pay attention to this seemingly looming danger and see even more evidence that our fear is justified. We might stop taking walks in the woods and approaching shacks at all. The initial misperceptions got hardened, which impacts how and what data we collect. The vicious circle is perfect.
(I do not expect this text to be (easily) accessible to people, especially to who have not read previous texts on Awareness Intelligence. It is also not posted for likes. It is part of my practice and a gift to publish it without oversimplification anyway.)
Changes in a person’s life situation can rearrange one’s mental socio-temporal schema in such a way that new coherences emerge. One may coherently consider the self in the whole range of time to create temporal coherence. Or, one may add the intra-personal to the already prioritized inter- and extra-personal in the present to attain social coherence. Thereupon, a person may become enabled to follow coherently through on the chosen/valued temporal or social focus, which might represent a form of versatility and agency. Indeed, agency can be understood as the deliberative, reflective activity of a human being in framing, choosing, and executing their action toward a valued goal in a way that is not fully determined by factors and conditions other than their own understanding and reasoning.
Creating more coherence and, therefore, also more agency might be a learnable capacity. For instance, perceived self-efficacy develops through changing one’s patterns of thinking, which could be of the like of, for example, the above-illustrated changes in one’s socio-temporal mental schema.
All possible types (i.e., temporal and social) and sub-types of coherences (i.e., on all three respective levels of each of the temporal and social dimensions) could be observed in the schemas generated by the studies in Awareness Intelligence. Also, the research shows that temporal coherence may be a precondition for social coherence as the latter only existed together with its temporal occurrence: social coherence did not exist in isolation. In any case, both social and temporal structures are crucial for mentally modeling the world and for becoming a temporally integrated and socially whole agent in life.
Wisdom could be defined as the consequence of applying intelligence for the benefit of the broader good that is attained through adaptation to pre-existing, interaction with current, and creation of new surroundings, all in the sense of equilibrating limited and expanded time. Applied to a socio-temporal worldview as presented for the first time in the studies of Awareness Intelligence, these elements of wisdom would be temporal coherence through learning from the past, interacting with the present in a socially balanced way, and solving problems to creating a future for all. Further, wisdom emerges from balancing intra-, inter-, and extra-personal awareness and engagement. In terms of the socio-temporal framework, this stresses the benefit of social coherences. In that sense, the ability to reflect on and mentally cover the whole socio-temporal scope of the world makes Awareness Intelligence.
WIE SOZIO-TEMPORALE KOHÄRENZ HANDLUNGSFÄHIGKEIT UND WEISHEIT BILDET
(Ich erwarte nicht, dass dieser Text (leicht) für Leute zugänglich ist, spezielle nicht für diejenigen, die keine früheren Texte über Bewusstseinsintelligenz gelesen haben. Er wird auch nicht für Likes gepostet. Es ist Teil meiner Praxis und des Geschenks, ihn sowieso ohne Vereinfachung zu veröffentlichen.)
Veränderungen in der Lebenssituation einer Person können das mentale sozio-zeitliche Schema so umordnen, dass neue Zusammenhänge entstehen. Man kann das Selbst im gesamten Zeitbereich kohärent betrachten, um zeitliche Kohärenz zu schaffen. Oder man kann das Intrapersonale dem bereits priorisierten Inter- und Extrapersonalen in der Gegenwart hinzufügen, um soziale Kohärenz zu erreichen. Daraufhin kann eine Person in die Lage versetzt werden, den gewählten/bewerteten zeitlichen oder sozialen Fokus kohärent zu verfolgen, was eine Form von Vielseitigkeit und Handlungsfähigkeit darstellen kann. In der Tat kann Handlungsfähigkeit als die abwägende, reflexive Aktivität eines Menschen verstanden werden, der sein Handeln in Richtung eines geschätzten Ziels in einer Weise gestaltet, wählt und ausführt, die nicht vollständig von anderen Faktoren und Bedingungen als seinem eigenen Verständnis und Denken bestimmt wird.
Mehr Kohärenz und damit auch mehr Handlungsfähigkeit zu schaffen, scheint eine erlernbare Fähigkeit zu sein. Zum Beispiel entwickelt sich wahrgenommene Selbstwirksamkeit durch die Veränderung der eigenen Denkmuster, die beispielsweise den oben dargestellten Veränderungen des sozio-zeitlichen mentalen Schemas ähnlich sein können.
Alle möglichen Typen (d. h. zeitliche und soziale) und Unterarten von Kohärenz (d. h. auf allen drei jeweiligen Ebenen jeder der zeitlichen und sozialen Dimensionen) konnten in den Schemata beobachtet werden, die durch die Studien in Bewusstseinsintelligenz generiert wurden. Die Forschung zeigt auch, dass zeitliche Kohärenz eine Voraussetzung für soziale Kohärenz sein kann, da letztere nur zusammen mit ihrem zeitlichen Auftreten existierte: soziale Kohärenz existierte nicht isoliert. In jedem Fall sind sowohl soziale als auch zeitliche Strukturen entscheidend, um die Welt mental zu modellieren und ein zeitlich integrierter und sozial ganzer Akteur im Leben zu werden.
Weisheit könnte als die Folge der Anwendung von Intelligenz zum Wohle des Allgemeinwohls definiert werden, die durch Anpassung an bereits vorhandene, Interaktion mit der aktuellen und Schaffung neuer Umgebungen im Sinne eines Ausgleichs von begrenzter und erweiterter Zeit erreicht wird. Angewandt auf eine sozio-temporale Weltsicht, wie sie in den Studien in Bewusstseinsintelligenz ein erstes Mal vorgestellt wird, wären diese Elemente der Weisheit zeitliche Kohärenz durch Lernen aus der Vergangenheit, Interaktion mit der Gegenwart in einer sozial ausgewogenen Weise und Lösung von Problemen, um eine Zukunft für alle zu schaffen. Darüber hinaus entsteht Weisheit aus der Balance zwischen intra-, inter- und extra-personalem Bewusstsein und Engagement. Im Hinblick auf den sozio-zeitlichen Rahmen betont dies den Nutzen sozialer Kohärenz. In diesem Sinne macht die Fähigkeit, den gesamten sozio-zeitlichen Bereich der Welt zu reflektieren und mental zu erfassen, Bewusstseinsintelligenz aus.
SUNSET / SONNENUNTERGANG (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm)
SUNSET
The sun is to set Just on my face So I can let A kiss to amaze How was the day I can’t even say Anymore Explore Your night
SONNENUNTERGANG
Die Sonne geht under Auf mein Gesicht gedrückt Ich lasse darunter Ein Kuss, der entzückt Wie war der Tag Kein Wort ich vermag Nicht mehr Komm her Du Nacht
BIRDS (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 40 x 40 cm)
Like a bird, you can let your thoughts fly across the infinite topology of awareness. But be wary; to have a birds-eye view on the wholeness of the world can be intimidating; too much is it also a threat to poles of powers everywhere. The flight routes of free birds guided by the universal intelligence of nature can’t be predicted precisely even by the most advanced artificial intelligence, which presents an issue to the desire to control. To ignorantly look up and take a side is encouraged, while shame is imposed on those who, full of awareness, don’t belong and choose their own way. I wish you a lot of strength; you need it to choose deliberately and fly in freedom.
CYBORG / SPIRORG (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 100 cm)
The glorified vision of cybernetic organisms aimed at “improving” humans through electromechanical devices and software algorithms is a mechanistic approach that reduces humans to machines. Instead of a cyborg-like facade and mind, developments would be desirable, through which the human beings learns again to express their inner authentic, unique, creative and colorful true self with courage as an expression of their liberated souls. Back to nature, art, and love. Let us be spiritual organisms; It would be for the good of each and all.
TEACHING PLANT (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 100 x 150 cm)
Plants can feed themselves. Humans need the help of plants because only they can process the nutrients of the soil into food. Humans have to compensate for their lack of natural intelligence with more complex structures. If plants were to economize as ‘intelligently’ as humans, humanity would depend on plants’ grace. The plants are unconditionally gracious, though. We know that plants can process information, communicate, and (re-) act. Do the plants know more? Why are they ready to plunge into ruin because of and with us? Is that how nature teaches us to love?
In this regard, two poems:
SOUL EARTH
Who mocks the soul but adores the sky, adores the idolatry of a heavenly origin, the megalomania of a cosmic meaning, and the aloofness of a higher purpose.
Who adores the body but mocks the earth, mocks the responsibility of an earthly connection, the humility of a planetary nature, and the groundedness of a profound liability.
Who adores the soul and the earth, indeed, responds to the heavenly origin with an earthly connection, humbles the cosmic meaning through a planetary nature, and grounds her higher purpose on a profound liability.
PLANTS ARE STUPID
Plants are stupid.
They organize to turn earth into food, provide to the needy without being asked. Plants are stupid.
They share their parts and live on, provide in abundance without demands. Plants are stupid.
They cooperate for reproduction and growth, provide of harvest without a price. Plants are stupid.
LIFESPAN I & II (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 70 x 50 cm)
LIFESPAN I & II (M. Sager, 2021. Acrylic on canvas, 70 x 50 cm)
Lifespan Development: Cultural norms or personal needs?
Which one would you choose to visualize your life? They may seem quite similar and yet be very different. Both go along nine stages of a lifespan but in different directions and different coloring.
Birth
Kindergarten, school
Work-life
Marriage
Having children
Building/buying a house
Career/Personal development
Retirement
Death
Do you experience different timing, sequences, or different qualities of life stages? Or do you even have different ones than what is socially customary? Maybe there’s indeed a need to rethink the concept of conventional lifespan development. There will still be falling in love, having children, and many other aspects (not to forget spiritual ones). But because today many young people worry about their life ahead, adults struggle with seeing meaning in it, elderly living in apathy long after they’ve stopped to lead a functional one, and then regret or denial on the death bed. Shouldn’t life be more joyful? Without giving prescriptive answers, the following considerations from lifespan psychology may provide some additional perspectives.
When and how one progresses with what personal development step varies a lot between cultures. Even within a particular culture, if not suppressed completely, different life paths can be observed as well. However, the vast majority within a culture chooses to conform with an established “norm.” But do these norms meet the personal desires of a human being, and do they take individual developmental needs into account?
Developmental neurobiological processes are more influential in early life stages (i.e., childhood), but cultural and social learning effects increase at later life stages.
Individuals in Eastern cultures relate in a more interdependent way than a more individualistic Western understanding of the self. At the same time, though, it was found that even in the East, the desire for some autonomous identity is a universally inherent human feature. Similarly, Parental over-control frustrates children both in the US and China.
19th and 20th century Western and Eastern artists were analyzed, and it was found that Eastern artists tend to arrive at their artistic peak achievement later in life, reflecting the Eastern tradition to emphasize the process to excellence rather than the more Western focus on originality and delivery.
Low self-esteem is linked to depression and reduced subjective well-being. Still, on the other side, heightened self-esteem risks degenerating to narcissism and the need to be better than others, which results in separateness. Instead of such a discriminatory pathway to self-worth, Eastern philosophies, such as Buddhism’s mindfulness practices that promote self-compassion instead, are hopefully more and more (re-)discovered.
Mainly, lifespan development focuses on behavioral and material aspects, while it still discards concepts of expanded consciousness such as the already decades-old self-actualization theory. Also, statistical analysis prevails, and more qualitative research might help understand individuals’ life journeys better and add to a more person-centric and contextual perspective in studying lifespan development.
Economically developed regions, sometimes referred to as Western countries, make up only 20 percent of the world population, while developing economies’ population is even disproportionately continuing to grow. At the same time, economic development in the Non-Western, often collectivist societies is likely to dramatically influence the outcome of related cultures. Therefore, psychology needs to focus more on where the big changes and populations are to understand human development.
To further integrate all relevant aspects of human development, a closer collaboration between life-course sociology and life span psychology seems to be a further promising aspiration. Like the emergence of culture and art marked a new era of Homo sapiens some ten thousand years ago, maybe breakthroughs in understanding human lifespan development related to culture may define the next evolutionary steps of humanity.
I am convinced that more answers lie in how people manage to develop independently of the good opinion of others. In the past, critical thinkers were persecuted and hanged; today, these are considered heroic philosophers. Is it still worthwhile to stand up for something against the resistance of the mainstream? Surely. I believe that this is precisely one of life’s goals: to express one’s ideas, create, and put service to something bigger above one’s own desires.
LEARNING FROM THE INTRA-PAST
M. Sager, 2021
Acrylic on board
50 x 70 cm
Learning for life, for one’s own identity, is learner-led and requires conditions of personal freedom; this also applies when learning from the past. The free Self (one’s intrapersonal level), not culture, societal history, religion, and judgment of others around us, teaches us about our true Self.
There are three main obstacles to self-reflective learning from the intrapersonal past (or short in Awareness Intelligence terms, ‘intra-past’)
Obstacle 1: Focus on inter- and extra-personal aspects of the past
The extrapersonal level of the past can be defined as the societal scope beyond interpersonal relationships, including the historic narratives we get during raising, enculturation, and religious education. In the worst case, traditions, beliefs, religious scripts, etc., strictly adhere to fundamentalist attachment. Especially older people sometimes show a propensity towards retrospective non-self-related thoughts. One explanation is that age can cause a weakened ability to recall individual (intrapersonal) past experiences. But others possess the cognitive ability and stick to the non-intrapersonal aspects in creating their worldview. Societal pressure, lack of personal freedom and agency, and learned mechanisms to defend privileges are possible reasons. In any case, a strong emphasis on family history and ancestral heritage usually holds an individual back from updating one’s self-concept meaningfully as advantageous for adaptations to current and future situations. It is to hope that we create the conditions for individuals to be closer to themselves, which is the only way to become closer with humanity overall.
Obstacle 2: Exclusive mindfulness in the intra-present
See upcoming painting
Obstacle 3: Over-identification with the inter-present
CIVILIZED TO DEATH I – III (M. Sager, 2021. Oil pastel and acrylic on canvas, 60 x 80 cm
“Many of us have been convinced that we carry the darkness within us, in our selfish genes. “It is simply human nature,” we’re told, “to rape and kill and enslave—and anyone who thinks otherwise is a foolish romantic.” This messaging not only offends our decency and dignity, it insults our intelligence. The depiction of human nature embedded in the narrative of perpetual progress isn’t science; it’s a marketing campaign for the status quo.” – Civilized to Death (Christopher Ryan)
‘Civilized to Death’ counters the idea that progress is inherently good. Chris Ryian argues that the “progress” defining our age is analogous to an advancing disease, but he does not deny the benefit from specific achievements. For example, child mortality has decreased dramatically. However, already in ancient times people lived well into their seventies once they surpassed the age of fifteen.
The ones constantly striving for more (as defined by our socio-economic system) and the so-considered wealthy and happy ones carry like all of us the same burden of perpetual dissatisfaction from the unhealthy structures and related human estrangement. Connections make people happy, and status and wealth often even come with isolation. Maybe due to the Corona measures put on us, the system favors the rich again in this aspect, as the resources and space available allow them to maintain a social environment more easily. The people told to stay in their tiny homes and away from their workplaces and closed public recreational opportunities can’t.
Nevertheless, this book is very timely, fair, and balanced. It does not ignore the signs of civilization heading towards a culmination point of destroying itself (as all high cultures have in the past). On the other hand, the author encourages a positive outlook that appreciates every individual’s humanity. Unfortunately, the capitalist system cannot successfully support us in living up to our potential and a truly vibrant life.
‘Civilized to Death’ does not only rely on a vast collection of scientific study results but convinces through well-illustrated arguments and impressive observations. By comparing ours to pre-historic life, the picture favors the genuine and content foraging societies. In contrast, the life our ancestors have preferred over hundreds of thousands of years (and still did/do when being offered/forced into civilization), contemporary men appear like disturbed creatures living in a self-designed zoo. If people don’t hoard and possess and instead have free access to natural resources (because these are not yet misappropriated and made scarce by the economic system, there is no reason to fight wars.
While we have learned to see the world from a scarcity point of view where we protect our feeling of never having enough, foragers felt rich given the abundance they saw available around them. Of course, their consumption was much less (and so was obesity and related diseases). Therefore, today’s high world population isn’t the issue at hand. Also, the small forager communities did not concentrate in cities and nations. They were characterized by inclusive, appreciative, and egalitarian structures that met their desire for anti-authoritarian co-living, collaboration, and mutual help.
The book offers many eye-opening findings and logical explanations for why progress in the wrong direction is not the gift that is sold to us. The tremendous amount of money in this world wants to grow, and personal growth seems to be coupled with such an understanding of richness. That’s why people accept being sold countless myths (not to say ‘lies’) and buy into the narrative of perpetual progress.
If we are interested in living a conscious life that respects us holistically as fully, healthily functioning, and enjoying human beings, then this is a fantastic read. The book connects the dots in an interdisciplinary way, and it courageously clarifies what many of us feel in our guts. There is hope for chances to correct the history of wars. We must look back far enough and learn from the times before the spread of our all-consuming civilization that constantly tries to fix its self-created problems with commercially driven symptom fighting. I hope you enjoy this enormous treasure trove of healthier alternatives attainable for everyone, society, and the future of all humanity and the planet.
We are treated and coached all the time. That is good for the gross national product; but is it also for us? Doesn’t the ever-increasing over-pedagogy of the young and over-treatment of the elderly mean that our upbringing and education do not make us self-effective individuals?
Torn by our loved ones
Listening to everyone means having to bend over the top. Looking back and planning ahead at the same time is difficult, especially when it comes to the interpersonal level. And for most people, it’s about the relationship level. Should we let them draw us into a drawer and hold us back?
Only your own past counts
The way we look at family and friends is actually always the cause of problems. Expectations, inadequacies, regrets, fear of being alone, etc. That is why our thoughts in the past should stay with ourselves. Only with us, because we all got everything we need as human beings. During the first nine months, nobody had to tell us how we were going to develop.
The meaning of a larger whole
Thoughts in the future should be less on the intra- and interpersonal level. Yes, we will lose everything one day, and we cannot insure ourselves against death either. Neither can we protect others from it; that’s part of life. What we can do, however, is to leave something other than rubbish and weakening structures for the planet and the next generations. Service to a larger whole is ultimately the only deeper meaning in life.
What a significant purpose of life: Life isn’t about learning to fit in somewhere; it is about creating somebody new.
Socio-cultural identities
Of course, you may want to stay social and cooperative with people in your life. However, with time, the nature of these relationships might transform as your awareness regenerates. Separation from yourself and others means, in a psycho-spiritual way, that you let go of your identity, which is based on social conformity and cultural beliefs that would be misbeliefs in a different culture. You also must let go of attachment to others’ judgments, which are opinions only and have little if anything to do with truth. By distancing yourself from the idealized role you have learned to assume during all the years of education, socialization, and enculturation, you begin to see who you really are.
Don’t waste your thoughts on interpreting equipment, façade styles, and fashions. They are not relevant to our true selves, and they go as fast as they came. We are not our social personalities. Clinging to our social identity and old ways of thinking about ourselves makes us, in any case, matter less than we deserve. Artificial rules that protect selfish interests are not natural laws of life. So don’t take them so seriously!
Children are dependent on the care received from their parents and other adults in the culture they are born into. For them, inter-psychological learning, the influence of other people is unavoidable. Their survival depends on following their caregivers. Such dependencies should not exist anymore later in life, though. An adult person can re-build their own identity intra-psychologically. There is a possibility, even a necessity to recognize your socio-cultural independence. It is a trap to let others’ opinions and beliefs define one. Therefore, such an awareness allows you to free yourself from backward-related definitions of your person by others.
Losing one’s identity
When I moved abroad and ended up being on myself in a completely different culture, there was nobody and nothing anymore that would have supported and validated my identity at that time. For my new environment far away from my former social networks, jobs, and possessions that had defined me to a significant extent for a long time, too, I then was left to be just an unknown foreigner. Therefore, I could not and did not have to live up to any story anymore. What an opportunity. I’ve realized how foolish it had been to build one’s personality too much on the unstable ground of externals.
Meanwhile, having left most of the external things and values behind, there has remained one true identity-giving source: The inner self that connects all of us on a deeper human level. I’ve found this true self when mentalizing back to before I had grown into an adult body, before I was associated with a particular social status and related privileges, and before I started to hold on to a variety of achievements and acquisitions. Then, literally as an alien in a foreign country, I became aware of what was left, what will always be left, and I mentally returned to the core of whom I am: The consciousness that is all and my origin of life. For all my life, I was looking for happiness. Then I found meaning. And when I accepted meaning, happiness became meaningless. That’s when I started to really enjoy life again; joy through the effort to create awareness-intelligently an identity instead of blindly assuming one that’s tried to be assigned to me. That’s also when I better understood what it means to be an artist.
When you experience meaninglessness, low motivation, and urges to give up, it is helpful to check the extra-future element and probe its awaring, for example, as follows. Ask yourself: Am I creating in line with life, the life that continues in all human evolution beyond my family, my party, my nation, my race, etc., or do I identify with such social constructs on which can’t be hold on to in the perishable physical world? If it is the latter, feelings of meaninglessness could stem from such a misidentification. One might feel that clearly when losing somebody close when having lost a job, or being rejected from a social group. We must die to our ego during a lifetime voluntarily. As we shift from socio-cultural group identity to a universally valid life membership, we will have found our purpose in life as well. The ego cannot be overcome by disabling the mind (as sometimes advertised in meditation classes). Selflessness is achieved by thinking awareness-intelligently about the egoless self, through non-transactionality in meeting others and focusing on a mutually beneficial future in all humanity’s interest.
Achieving a symmetrical, congruent (awareness-intelligent) identity
We can clearly feel that we separate mental awareness from bodily sensations and instead picture the wholeness and infinity of life. We can change our way of thinking. The most profound, impactful, and sustainable way to change is to change the layer from where thought arises: awareness. The human condition is no longer dependent on social identity alone. It learns to integrate the three modes of the intra-past, the inter-present, and the extra-future into increased and undivided awareness (for the detailed explanation, see https://mathias-sager.com/tag/awareness-intelligence/). As our thoughts and actions become more symmetrical (and our business and private cards more congruent), life will never feel like a lie again.
Becoming a genuine leader is founded on mastering self-leadership and being at peace with oneself and the world. To serve as a role model, one must be ready to give up their title and position. Too dissonant can a professional identity become with the aware self. How could one ever enjoy people who admire rather their title-based authority and social status rather than knowing about their creativity, vulnerability, and loving character in the first place?
It can look the same, but not at the same time. Green, greensand, ochre, umber, blue, turquoise. Land and water, summer and winter. Compiling it all into one at once, that’s how I show you the world. I love you, child of the soul.
Is it the shore of a lake or the coast of an island?
The view towards the water. Watching the depths of the psyche. Both fascinating and frightening. Overcoming the fear of the hidden, that’s how I’d like you to understand the world. I love you, child of wisdom.
Is it to float or to dive?
To immerse without the need to walk on water, meeting intuition and inspiration. The conscious and the unconscious. Blurring, transcending the physical boundaries, that’s how we can connect across the worlds. I love you, child of the muse.
