Can you hold consciousness in your hand? Or point to it?
No. But that’s a puzzle in itself. After all, how can something that we all experience be so hard to grasp? So difficult to explain? So mysterious that it resists all attempts to define it, to calculate it, and to measure it?
We know that consciousness is a thing. But what else do we know?
Before we try and answer that in full, one thing that we can’t dispute is its infinite power when it comes to change work.
And that how as a hypnotherapist or hypnotist, your understanding of this power underpins everything you do – as you’re constantly working with people who are in various states of consciousness.
So, What Is Consciousness Then?
Rene Descartes famously wrote, “I think, therefore I am.”
That’s possibly the shortest and most succinct definition for consciousness you’re ever likely to find. But it might surprise you to know that it wasn’t even his idea.
Descartes’ phrase appeared in his 1637 work entitled Discourse on the Method. However, Aristotle said pretty much the same thing almost 2000 years earlier, sometime between 384 – 322 BC:
Whoever said it first, the problem still remains.
It tells us what it is, but not how or why it occurs. We can’t isolate a part of the brain and say that’s where consciousness comes from.
According to Wikipedia, consciousness is:
“The state or quality of awareness… being aware of an external object or something within oneself.”
Stuart Sutherland’s entry for the word “consciousness” in the Macmillan Dictionary of Psychology concludes with the phrase:
“… to be conscious it is only necessary to be aware of the external world.”
That’s a pretty basic and straightforward description. And yet, it isn’t enough to satisfy everyone. Many people think the question “what is consciousness?” is unsolvable. There are two reasons why they think that way, which are:
1. Because we might not have enough brainpower to figure it out
2. Because we’re part of the consciousness we’re trying to define and are unable to maintain an objective perspective on the issue
Keep Reading to know how hypnosis experts at Hypnosis Training Academy explain Consciousness and check out these 8 cool videos at HypnosisTrainingAcademy.com that explain the unexplainable and answer the question that’s puzzled some of the greatest minds in history.
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