Perception - The Reality Beyond Matter

How do we imagine our reality intuitively, by default? How do we perceive reality according to our basic understanding? Do we actually experience a certain reality outside of us? How does perception of reality work? What do consciousness and perception of reality have in common? How do Kabbalists describe the perception of reality? How can we access a higher level of consciousness, and through it a different perception?

We can think about the world like this: there is me and there is everything and everybody else. We are in a body, in a world and everything around us is also made of the same stuff—matter. And this whole material cosmos is where everything is happening.

There is this something called “matter” that evolved through billions of years, and at some point, this matter evolves into special “biological machines” called "neurons," which in turn create a conscious experience.

And in this material cosmos, we exist together with planets and galaxies, as well as with rocks, plants, animals, and other people. I perceive and interact with all of this “matter” living together in this entire cosmos that existed before us and will exist after us.

This is the intuitive story we are all familiar with, we think that this is where we are. This story makes a lot of sense, agrees with our senses, is easy to visualize, and it works with time, space, and history.

Still, this is only a story.

Actually, no human being has access to the outside reality since we have no idea what is “out there,” outside of us. We think we are in a body and the world is external to us. But as Baal HaSulam, the great Kabbalist, describes, while we see a wide world around us it is only within our own interior, as if a certain photographic machine projected a certain external world for us through a mirror. In short, whatever we see “outside” is only within our own minds. Baal HaSulam wrote this in his article, "Introduction to the Book of Zohar," for those who want to perceive spiritual reality.

Baal HaSulam does not tell us any more than what “regular sciences” have already concluded. We believe that we see a reality that is outside of us, but in truth, we are closed inside this box where our brain is, with the five physical senses acting as if they were windows toward an external reality.

Intuitively, we think about colors, smells, and sounds traveling through the air until we let them in and perceive them through our five senses.

But our senses are not really openings. Instead, some sensory information is hitting these sensors, then these sensors send electrical impulses to the brain, and then the picture we call reality is created in the brain. We thus do not really know what is “outside,” as even Galilei described how everything we perceive resides in our consciousness and without this consciousness, the world we perceive would not exist.

So where are we?

According to Kabbalists, everything that we experience is a product of our consciousness. So it is not only about tastes and sounds, but it is also about all of “matter,” including our brain and our neurons and the entire cosmos including the very fabric of space and time, it is all a certain virtual reality experience we have and we think we exist in this reality with all of the matter we seemingly perceive.

But if we understand that reality is what we perceive from within our own senses, through our own mind and consciousness, then all of it—including time and space—is perceived only within us.

Kabbalists refer to the perceiver as a “vessel”: the vessel of experience, the vessel that perceives reality and it is this vessel that holds all of our perception of reality. So both me and whatever I perceive around me are still within my perception of reality, produced within my perception, within the vessel that experiences reality.

Kabbalists research their own vessel of experience/perception. This is why Kabbalah is an empirical practice, a method. Kabbalists do not believe or imagine that something exists outside. Even when they refer to the Creator, they refer to an experience within that vessel.

When we focus on researching our own vessel of experience and studying what we are and how we perceive reality, then we can find a way to recalibrate our own vessel of experience until we can experience the same reality—but in a different and deeper way. And that is where we can access a different, higher level of consciousness.

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#kabbalahinfo

[Diggsiii]

Basically we are the Universe experiencing itSelf.

everything is perceive from inside us, meaning nothing outside exist that isn’t within.

I'm within you, and you are within me, and we are within each other. We are all one. lol trippy.

[thesoulmateconnection]

We are the feminine that is in the masculine. When we choose to be unconditional love we find our identity which is in the other. We get out of our small self. Treat the other the way you would want to be treated and experience God.

[Adaerus]

Yes, all reality is perceived in own consciousness, but we would not have sensory inputs from our receptors if there was no pattern outside of the brain (mind). The difference between real and hallucination is that hallucination lacks sensory input. So if whatever model we create in our minds about what reality is that is not tethered well onto the external patterns those models are akin to hallucinations.

[hujiko]

This has alot of clarity. I appreciate this magnificently.

[thethirdview]

This perfectly narrated what I have been discovering through direct experience. I’ve been under an illusory spell my entire life. But the spell is being lifted.

[abundant]

Where you are in imagination, is where you are.

[marykavanagh]

New subscriber
I believe im in a body and cannot feel the emotion of love for myself or anyone
Any advise how to alter this numb feeling to love
Please

[spiralsun]

Wow, this was very short and very impressive. A great combination for succinct meaning to propel the gears ⚙️ of thought. Thank you.

[hychap]

Unity is a multitude no fewer than 2..

[Hydroyouwasagooddog]

I see what you are saying it's all in our brain but what about our sense of balance we get from hearing and sight? Can you explain how walking is a illusion of our senses? Edit or I mean how walking is inside the box.

[koikitchen]

"you are the Universe experiencing itSelf" -
but -
"If a tree falls in the woods and no-one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?"

Yes, it does; it has to, because the vibration creates soundwaves - how then can we rationalise Galileo's quote?

It appears to be somewhat of a paradox; but one can look to Genesis - the Light, land and sea existed prior to perceptive animate life forms.

Might we discuss?

[TONEYSTARR]

Everything is numerical even the unseen Everything has numerical value We are math God is a number

[whiterabbit]

The vessel "I Am🏆" the Holy Grail. Found within ❤️. Look within, find Him ✝️. 💡

[sap]

B''H, Christ, Jesus, Amen. כלי

[escopuga]

Hᴇʀᴍᴏsᴏs ᴠɪᴅᴇᴏs, ᴄᴏɴᴛᴇɴɪᴅᴏ ғᴀsᴄɪɴᴀɴᴛᴇ.
( ˘ ³˘)♥︎

[NeterRafi]

But the Material world is Maya, an illusion