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SUTRAS
THE KEY TO THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE
71
Yet when we direct our attention towards these fleeting moments, they automatically become more intense. We now know what to expect and thus perceive them far clearer when they occur again. Simply directing our attention causes these moments to last longer so we can observe them more consciously. - Accepting the insights Total Perception offers us as our own (svamitva) - means to recognize and admit that we really make use of a method that comprehends highly complex, multi-layered situations with lightening speed; - and that we can purposefully use the insights we gain to steer our life more consciously.
Once we fully accept that our consciousness is really capable of expanding - even if only for brief moments, - conscious expansion automatically becomes part of our growth-process. Accepting this by itself widens the scope of our experiences.
As long as we separate us from the events we perceive and regard ourselves as uninvolved, we have no systematic access to this instant and highly comprehensive way of gaining insight. We can only explore deeper dimensions of an event if we stop distancing us from what we observe.
Only then will we begin to recognize how deeply these brief insights into more advanced states of consciousness can stimulate our growth. Only then will we become able to detect and explore the new dimensions these experiences enliven within us to their fullest. We speed up this process when we familiarize us with the mechanics of this type of expansion.26
Though our present society displays a demonstrative openness towards all phenomena of consciousness, deep down below, it tends to regard any real expansion of consciousness as impossible. Despite the many books describing experiences of higher states of consciousness, we hold it quite out of question that we ourselves might experience something similarly fantastic. This needless atti
26 see sutra 20 for the mechanisms of external knowledge
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