Abstract
Perhaps the most fundamental function of life is creation of the environment. This paper describes the creative process from the metaphysical perspective of the Implicit Cosmology and explores some of its implications for practical living.
The creative process model is also used to explore the selection of potential futures, and how experiences are processed into the worldview.
Introduction
The Creative Process: Changes in reality are expressed via personality’s attention on an imagined outcome with the intention to make it so
The same basic steps are involved when making any kind of plan, no matter if it is the day’s activity or plans for a career. Even for something as simple as deciding what to have for dinner, a person must first turn attention to the subject and then imagine the options. Up to that point, all of the options are just potential futures for dinner which remain only concepts. However, once an option is selected and the necessary effort is made to produce dinner, the selected potential future becomes part of local reality.
As shown in the “Creative Process” diagram above, the functional areas of the creative process are:
Personality is modeled as the intelligent core of a life field. This is who a person really is while conscious self the “I am this” point of view which, during a lifetime, is generally the perspective of the human avatar. The Life Field Complex Diagram below shows the relationship between personality, conscious self, the human body and its body consciousness.
Personality holds the initial imperative to gain experience, and this informs the rest of the complex in the form of attention. As such, attention is based on the decision to understand. The Attention Complex is shown in the diagram to contain the processes involved in perception because none of them will function without attention. Think of this as the gathering of potential to do work.
Personality’s awareness of the environment is based on attention on what is of interest to it. If an external input has no interest to the Life Field Complex, it will probably be ignored. As such, an external threat perceived by the human would be of interest, as would something pertinent to personality’s objectives. All else is likely to be ignored. See: Perceptual Loop
Think of worldview as the life field’s database which contains personality’s perception of reality. When in an avatar relationship, it is shared with the human avatar, but inherits understanding from personality when it is expressed into the physical as an aspect. But at the same time, as is shown in the Functional Areas of Perception Diagram, information from the environment is filtered so that it only contains information from the environment that is passed by the attention Limiter, and that agrees with existing personal reality as determined in the Perceptual Loop.
Worldview can evolve if environmental information is sufficiently nonspecific to result in a maybe in the Perceptual Loop.
Based on First Sight Theory, perception is the result of the decision made in the Perceptual Loop as illustrated in the Basic Functional Areas of Perception Diagram. If the “Agree?” decision produces a “Yes,” the person will experience (perceive) the stimulus, probably more or less as it is. If the decision is “Maybe,” the person will more likely experience a version of what is intended based on worldview.
The Perceptual Loop acts as a filter that limits stimuli that might initiate the creative process. Once the decision to act is made, there is an iterative exchange between worldview and the visualization functional area which is driven by intention to act and directed toward a visualized outcome that agrees with worldview.
The process of perception is seen as an unconscious one and the Perceptual Loop is the governor that determines what emerges as perception.
It is necessary to have a clear idea of the desired outcome. More clarity in the visualization means a more specific outcome. Emphasis here is on “informed.” The visualized outcome is always based on current understanding. The more this understanding agrees with reality, the more realistic can be the imagined outcome. Think of this as the matrix around which the gathered potential will coalesce.
An imagined outcome without the intention to make it so is just a fantasy. Intention is a conscious expression “back into” the unconscious process. It is the motive force for expression, and based on a clear understanding of true desire (objective), can be a very powerful tool for living. Think of this as the force which will drive the accumulated potential toward the desired result.
The Intention Channel
The creative process manifests form into reality in some way. What is typically thought of as energy in the physical is better modeled as potential expression in the etheric, which is managed with attention, visualization and intention. Expression from the creative process is seen as the precursor to all physical energy, meaning that the imagined future exists as an etheric or conceptual thing that must be transformed into physical, objective form. During the physical expression of the intended result, physical action must be involved. The objective energy may be money, fuel or even labor. These first four steps are the actual creative process.
The outcome of any creative process will inevitably be experienced within the limitations of the physical body. It is important to note that the outcome is experienced as it is but how the person characterizes the experience, for instance like or dislike, will depend on how it is perceived.
Experience begins the learning phase in which the person begins to reassess expectations based on how the outcome is perceived.
The person’s perception of what is experienced is a function of the experience itself and the person’s worldview. The outcome is neither good nor bad. Note that understanding and progression are linked to worldview which is then linked to perception in the drawing above for the creative process. Also in the diagram, there is a box around both worldview and perception labeled “Filter.” This is to indicate that information passing through the filter (to and from perception and spiritual maturity and to objective) is “informed” by worldview.
Perception represents the person’s point of view.
From the perception of experience comes some degree of understanding. The objective is to understand nature as it is and not as the person is taught.
Notes
- The creative process is continuous and different aspects of a person’s life might involve entirely different and simultaneous cycles of the creative process. For instance, a person might have a long-term life goal to retire early while simultaneously be “programming” for a new car and planning dinner.
- It is useful to think of the creative process as a cycle as illustrated in the drawing above for the creative process. Each moment in a person’s life should be considered a snapshot of the state of these cycles. For instance, the intention of mowing the lawn might be abruptly changed with an unexpected rainstorm. At the same time, the potential future of adding more lawn (See the drawing for potential future, below) might become less likely. Perception of the situation from moment to moment will change intentionality and modify imagined objectives.
- The creative process can produce an objective outcome such as the building of a new home or a conceptual outcome such as a change in attitude toward an organization. Objective outcomes begin with a conceptual image.
- Attention amounts to the key that turns on the creative cycle. It is from the perspective of the conscious-self, and as such, the more aligned the conscious-self is with the etheric personality, the more the creative process will be aligned with nature.
- Perception is modified by worldview and that is the filter through which influence from personality, who we really are, must pass. Progression is a measure of how well personality is aligned with nature. It can influence perception, but there is a give and take of sorts as more understanding helps one better understand, which in turn, brings more understanding … all of this while aligning worldview to agree with nature. The effectiveness of the creative process depends on this alignment.
- The potential field for an event is characterized according to quality of attention, clarity of visualized outcome and extent of intention to make it so. The lifecycle model for an event is inclination to do something, visualization of what that might be, decision about how important it is when to do it and visualization of what the outcome might be. This is followed by the decision to act, visualization of the act which is moderated by the Perceptual Loop and worldview, and once perception is clear, expression of the act. The outcome might be a thought, an expression “sent” to another personality or an ideoplastic structure that eventually becomes physical.
Organizing Fields
The concept of fields is discussed in detail in the essay on etheric fields. It is a concept that is expected to become an important part of what is turning out to be a useful way of looking at reality. Fields are addressed here because they are amongst the influences of the creative process.
A life field, considered to be the fundamental element of reality, is an organizing field with an intelligent core represented in the diagram here as attention. The “top” organizing field for a physical organism can be described as a morphic field (see box below). Component parts of a physical organism such as enzymes and cell tissue might be common across many different organisms but the morphic field would be the same for the component. How it manifests in a particular organism is determined by the organizing morphic field.
The creative process represents the mechanism by which a life field expresses itself. From the perspective of that expression, a life field is a formative field. From the perspective of a physical organism, the top morphic field is a life field, as are the individual nested morphic fields. (Confusion here comes from an attempt to preserve existent work of Sheldrake while embracing a slightly broader perspective.) For a discussion of the human organism as nested life fields, see Personality-Centric Perspective.
Intention Field
Expression is in the form of an intention field. A way to visualize this is to think of the field as a thought ball that is “sent out” by your mind to the intended location. It contains the image as a matrix for formation or influence, the organizing rules, information about the “target” life field or ideoplastic structure and the expected outcome.
The factors that determine the effect of an intention field is clarity of the visualized outcome, strength of intention and what is intended. For instance, a casual glance toward a person will likely not amount to a very influential intention field, but an admiring stare will likely be of sufficient influence that the object of the stare might at least unconsciously notice.
This concept is directly related to intended order, in that the product of the intention field is formation of reality as intended by the creator personality. The intention field can be very influential as expressed by an experienced healer. In the same way, potential outcomes are thought to be influenced by clearly expressed intention fields. Think of this characteristic as the implementation mechanism of intended order.
Implications
An important exercise is to contemplate the Creative Process Diagram while imagining how each component might relate to daily living. It is likely that this is a basic process of life with numerous implications. Here are a few of the implications to consider.
Informed Visualization: People create their own reality but not in isolation. Society, the environment and even the physical body have an influence on what is created. Also, as with Sheldrake’s morphic fields, the creative process is always based on the past in a similar way that morphic fields represent “nature’s habit.” Visualizing what is desired will be more meaningful if what is visualized is “reasonable.” For instance, the typical life pattern includes education, marriage, career and retirement. Programming for a happy retirement can result in a strong potential future while programming for a happy retirement without first having a career is less supported by existent morphic fields. Our life lessons and future experiences are not so much in what we create as they are in how we react to what is created.
On Being Informed: Probably the most important thing we can do to further our spiritual progression is to be as informed as possible about our world and especially about what we intend to create. It is important to be aware that being informed about the world can actually retard spiritual progression if it is based on an erroneous worldview. For that reason, “informed” should be in the context of the entire creative process.
Also be informed about what is really wanted. For instance, is the objective a sports car or is it a dependable vehicle that will serve the family? Not being clear about this will scatter attention. Focusing on “neat to have” rather than on “need to have” futures can cause more grief than good.
“Informed” is used here to mean “based on or influenced by.” For instance, Objective in the creative process is “informed” by worldview and by the environment. In fact, the entire creative process is based on the usually subtle influence of worldview and external forces. By recognizing this influence, it is possible for a person to learn to manage how influential these forces are in the creative process. The more the influences are in agreement with the nature of reality, the more effective will be the creative process.
Life: In many respects, the drawing above for the creative process represents the expression of life. It represents perception of the environment, adjustment to the environment and efforts to modify the environment. All of this inevitably results in learning. In the context of chaos theory, life can be considered a fundamental fractal of reality and the creative process as the organizing field of reality. The above drawing depicts the functional area of the life field.
Worldview and Perception: We are born with a degree of understanding about the nature of reality which initially informs worldview. However, culture, parents, teachers, the media and religions quickly fill our worldview with popular wisdom based on local beliefs, prejudices and religious/academic dogma. It is for us to come to see reality as it is rather than how it is taught by learning to align our worldview with the nature of reality based on gaining understanding through experiences. In doing so, we progress by way of increasing understanding and it is understanding which determines our nature in the etheric. In effect, after transition, we will gravitate toward the “heaven” with which we are most in perceptual agreement. As such, what we do in this lifetime has a profound and lasting effect on the rest of our existence.
Worldview has substantial influence on perception; in effect, causing us to understand experiences as taught by the culture and perhaps not as they actually are. As we align our worldview with the nature of reality, our visualization becomes more in agreement with reality, making the resulting expression more consistent with what is supported by existent morphic fields.
Natural Law and Organizing Principles: When considering the creative process as a complex of organizing fields (Attention Complex), then it can be seen that it contains the principles which govern the process. This is the essence of what is traditionally thought of as Natural law. However, Natural Laws are usually considered immutable, but in this cosmology, the ordering principles are seen as being informed by the past (memory or “nature’s habit) but potentially evolved as creative responses to environmental influences are conceived.
Perceptual Agreement: As illustrated in the Basic Functional Areas of Perception Diagram below, perception is a function of external information filtered by worldview via the Perceptual Loop. Note that the two lines connecting Worldview and Visualization are labeled “Belief” and “Understanding.” Progression toward fulfillment of an inherited urge to understand the nature of reality is a function of degree of understanding gained through experience. However, the dominant influence for what the average person becomes aware of (perception) is belief. (When entangled with an avatar, human instincts are very influential as well.)
“Movement” in etheric space is directed by intention, but limited by what a personality is able to visualize. This, in turn, is limited by perception and the Perceptual Loop. Therefore, the ability to associate with any aspect of reality is seen to be limited by perception.
Life Field Complex: If the physical body is a person’s avatar, then the person’s personality is native to some aspect of etheric space. The path through which the person influences the avatar and experiences the results is by way of Personality as shown in the Soul Complex diagram
above. Worldview acts as a filter through which the influence and perception must pass.
The brown area in the drawing represents physical space which is the perspective for the avatar point of view (personal reality). With this in mind, it is useful to note that, in transcommunication such as mediumship and Instrumental TransCommunication, the communication also “enters” into the physical awareness by way of the worldview. See: First Sight Theory
Intended Order: Expression is the output of the Creative Process and intended order is the affect expression has on the environment. It is seen in action in many forms of transcommunication. In that, order in the form of recognizable images, objects or sounds “emerge” out of chaotic signals. In Instrumental TransCommunication, the physical process that enables this emergence of intended order appears to be stochastic resonance acting on chaotic, broad-spectrum energy.
Potential Future: People seldom focus on a single goal; but instead, skitter from goal to goal as interest and circumstances change. Each goal represents a potential future. As illustrated in the Potential Future diagram, there are many external factors which influence the future, but the individual can at least strive toward the most desired goal by managing attention.
As has been hypothesized in First Sight Theory, people psychically sense psi signatures related to everything in the environment. As is shown the Potential Future diagram, each potential outcome represents a potential field that is “gathering” in support of organizing influences. Clairvoyant senses (psychic or mediumistic senses, depending on the belief system) would potentially detect any one or all of the potential futures. Thus, the task is to learn how to growing probability out of many potential fields.
Credibility and Incredulity: The Basic Functional Areas of Perception Diagram the decision-making process that helps determine perception. It can be seen at work whenever a person is asked to believe something. In this model, the person experiences something such as a paranormal event and attempts to visualize what has been experienced in terms of worldview. If the experience is not supported by existent worldview, and the person has not learned to think beyond that cultural conditioning, then it is likely the experience would be rejected as impossible. In that case, the person would not perceive the experience, a response sometimes referred to as incredulity blindness.
Alternatively, the person might perceive the experience, but as partially modified by incredulity blindness or as “morphed” into something that does agree with worldview. For instance, an alien entity might register in the person’s mind as a rabbit (big eyes).
It is common for a person to witness very convincing evidence but insist that it must be fraudulent. In this case, discounting the experience would be a way of morphing it into an acceptable form to agree with worldview.
An inverse effect of incredulity blindness can be seen when a person tends to find paranormal where (probably) none exists. This might be described as hyperlucidity, as people with this tendency accept that they are experiencing phenomena, often against considerable testimony to the contrary by peers.
See also, the Villager-Explorer Effect in the Point of View Essay.
Venues for Learning: The creative process produces a venue for learning when a person thinks of a possible new experience, for instance, to buy a new car. Typically, the person imagines being in the new car and what it would be like to own one. Perhaps friends would be imagined in the situation so that the person can have a sense of how having the car would affect self-esteem.
An important process is begun when a person imagines a, let us call it a “Little Me.” Little Me is given a degree of self-determination. It is also given a directive to have a specific experience and an urge to understand certain aspects of the experience. Finally, it is given the directive to return a degree of understanding about the experience to the person.
The created venue for learning will remain a viable space as long as the person holds it in the imagination; however, the memory of Little Me’s experience will remain part of the person as an aspect of the person’s morphic field. In effect, Little Me and the person becomes a group entity, and the accumulation of Little Mes produced in the person’s imagining will accumulate to shape the person’s etheric personality. (It is possible the same Little Me is “resurrected” for each experience.) The influence of each Little Me will be a function of the importance the person placed on the venue (intention) and the meaningfulness of what Little Me returned.
The creation of a venue for learning is exactly what appears to happen for individual lifetimes in this venue of learning we call Earth. The question is whether or not there is a “big me” holding this venue for learning in its mind with the intention of learning specific lessons. Since this venue appears to be a consensus or collective space, it is possible that the organizing field for physical reality is the product of many such individual efforts to learn.
Summary
The Great Work of the Hermitic Wisdom is the transmuting of personality as immature lead into the gold of spiritual maturity. This is seen in the opening line of the Emerald Tablet, one of the few documents thought to actually come from Hermes: “It is true and no lie, certain and to be depended upon, that which is above is as that which is below; and that which is below is as that which is above, for the performance of the one truly great work.”2
The metaphysical Cabala is all about the path toward spiritual maturity and the Tarot.3 An example is Key 9 of the Major Arcana from the Rider-Waite deck: His beacon intimates that “where I am, you also may be.”
In John 14 of the Christian Bible, Jesus is shown to say to his disciples: “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” John 14-6. Here, Jesus is showing himself to his followers not as a deity but an example as the three aspects of the teacher: follow me that I am the path; follow me as the Spirit of Truth; and, follow me as I have lived. See Relating John 14 in the Bible to Metaphysical Concepts
Humankind has been told time and again that the path to wisdom, happiness and spiritual maturity is readily available to anyone who is willing to do the work. The creative process in this essay represents a knowable, doable path to agreement with nature. All one need do is realize the need to be informed, understand what “informed means,” learn to examine what is in worldview and accept responsibility for that which is created.
Happiness lies in how the person responds to the world much more than how well the person learns to manage the process. From this can be understood that there is no good or bad, only the degree to which a person is able to align perspective with the true nature of reality. All is potential progression no matter the momentary pain or pleasure.
References
- Sheldrake, Rupert, Morphic Resonance and Morphic Fields: An Introduction, www.sheldrake.org/Articles&Papers/papers/morphic/morphic_intro.html
- Hermes Mercurius Trismegiatus, The Emerald Tablet. This is from the translation from the Latin of Ficinus by Kircher, and into English by Dr. Everard, ethericstudies.org/contemporary-view-emerald-tablet/
- The Tarot: A Key to the Wisdom of the Ages by Paul Foster Case, Macoy Publishing Company, Richmond VA, 1947. Contact Builders of the Adytum (www.bota.org).
