Quantum Physics of Belief – Creating Shared Values

For the past few weeks, I was writing about quantum physics and business research to explore the correlation between the science of consciousness and patterns in the business world, to suggest innovative ways of using this wisdom to lead and succeed in a business environment that is constantly evolving at a rapid pace. When we understand the degree to which we are connected with each other, we’ll pay more attention to what we do for each other. This is called Creating Shared Value, or CSV. The shared value model is based on the idea that corporate success and social welfare are interdependent. A business needs a healthy, educated workforce, sustainable resources and adept government to compete effectively. For society to thrive, profitable and competitive businesses must be developed and supported to create income, wealth, tax revenues, and opportunities for philanthropy.

It is fascinating to see the emerging scientific research revealing the connectivity between us humans, as well as our bond with other living beings. The evidence of physical connectivity that has been proven to exist between separate beings is undeniable, and the proof of a connected memory that we all share is compelling.

Exploring the sciences of cosmology, biology and genetics help us to better understand the deep human connection to nature. Cosmologists explained how being human is an extension of the original energy that emerged from the eruption of light that occurred nearly 14 billion years ago in our universe. As the universe expanded and cooled the actual components of our bodies emerged. These components exist throughout the planet in various species and forms ranging from water to rocks. Biologists discovered that all complex life developed from an original symbiosis of four different bacteria. Three of these bacteria were incorporated into the first nucleated cells, and the fourth was the one that gave them mobility. These nucleated cells eventually fused into more complex forms including plants, fungi and animals. Biologists also described how all higher eukaryotic organisms, which are organisms containing one or more cell with visibly evident nuclei and organelles, from flowering plants to insects to humanity are thought to have descended from a single ancestral population that lived about 1.8 billion years ago. A genetic comparison between humans and other primates highlights the similarities. The typical human protein has accumulated just one unique change since chimps and humans diverged from a common ancestor about 6 million years ago. Geneticist David Suzuki speaks about how humans literally are our environment. The air that we breathe; the water that we drink; the sun that generates energy in plants that we eat; and the soil that grows these plants; all exist as elements within our physical bodies. The components of nature all exist within us.  We, humans see through our eyes that plants, animals and even rocks are separate, but if we look into a magnifying glass all of nature exists in an energetic molecular dance of chemical reactions and recombinations.  We are connected to all aspects of nature, we are one being, so what we do to others literally is what we do to ourselves. Let’s extend this pattern to business research to see a connection, if any.

There is an amazing amount of research that shows when a business engages in positive action in the form of practices that benefit society; it receives positive rewards in the form of profits. And it’s revealing that conventional researchers have not been able to determine why. By definition, a business must provide some value to society or it wouldn’t be able to generate revenue. But I am referring to benefits that go above and beyond, such as altruistic missions, environmental responsibility, and community involvement. “Social performance” is a commonly used term to indicate the degree to which a company benefits society.

Companies must take the lead in bringing their business and society together. But, most companies remain stuck in a “social responsibility” mind-set in which societal issues are at the periphery, not the core. The solution lies in the principle of shared value, which involves creating economic value in a way that also creates value for society by addressing its needs and challenges. Businesses must reconnect company success with social progress. Shared value is not social responsibility, philanthropy, or even sustainability, but a new way to achieve economic success. It is not on the margin of what companies do but at the center.

Here is an example of corporate social responsibility done right. Tyson Foods, a major company tying its corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts to its core mission has committed to relieve and ultimately end childhood hunger, and in the past few years been integrating social media into its hunger relief efforts. Tyson connected with the Social Media Club and began a string of extraordinarily smart and effective efforts to enlist the community. For example, it launched a campaign in Austin in which it agreed to donate 100 pounds of chicken to the Capital Area Food Bank of Texas for every comment posted on its blog. They received 658 comments in two hours and loaded up two trucks filled with chicken for the hungry. They repeated the success in Boston and San Francisco, launched a user-generated video contest in Minnesota and sponsored a day of service for its social media team. It’s noteworthy that with this philosophy, Tyson Foods was always more profitable than its competitors.

Pepsi’s Refresh Project funded 238 ideas for improving communities. The company’s “human right to water” program pledged more than $15 million for safe water across the world. Wal-Mart has pledged $2 billion in cash and food donations to food banks and, in 2009, it unveiled its Sustainable Product Index. Like Pepsi and Wal-Mart, many companies engage in a spectrum of corporate social responsibility initiatives and invest heavily in publicizing them. While the intrinsic satisfaction of doing good is important, CSR programs tend to be meaningful and sustained only when they align corporate financial needs (profit, revenue, growth) with social needs (people, community, planet).

Several cross-sectional studies spanning firms across different industries have correlated CSR performance with financial performance. The correlation is often positive, but there are also several negative and insignificant effects.

However, reviewing individual examples such as above can be confusing. But by using the technique of ‘meta-analysis,’ many studies can be statistically analyzed to determine collective results. A meta-analysis on CSR and its link to profits won the famed socially responsible investing, Moskowitz Prize in 2004. The study, compiled by researchers Marc Orlitzky, Frank L. Schmidt and Sara L. Rynes yielded encouraging data suggesting a positive link between CSR and increased profits. Their meta-analytic findings suggest that corporate virtue in the form of social responsibility and, to a lesser extent, environmental responsibility, is likely to pay off… CSP [corporate social performance] appears to be more highly correlated with accounting-based measures of CFP [corporate financial performance] than with market-based indicators, and CSP reputation indices are more highly correlated with CFP than are other indicators of CSP. This meta-analysis establishes a greater degree of certainty with respect to the CSP-CFP relationship than is currently assumed to exist by many business scholars.

This deduction has far-reaching implications, not only for business but also for us as individuals and nations. In business we hear so much about the need for sustainable practices, and there is a ton of effort spent trying to demonstrate the financial payback through physical means. Yes, I do believe that social performance can improve financial performance through physical means such as reducing operational wastes, building a positive image in the market, and attracting the highest caliber employees. However, I believe the most compelling reason that will convince business leaders to embrace social performance is found through looking at what new scientific research is telling us about how we manifest our world. The science and the business research both corroborate that what we do for others we literally do for ourselves.

Quantum Physics of Belief - Scarcity is a Limiting Belief

In the past couple of articles, we were exploring how our experiences form based on what we believe about the world. This week, let’s extend that concept to how businesses shape their profits. The accepted model of business in our society is rooted in scarcity, and thus presents a limitation to our experience of profitability. When we recognize this, we can become cognizant of these limiting beliefs and move beyond them.

We all know that in some way, our beliefs create our reality. Before a person or team can achieve something, they have to believe they will. Sure it gives them confidence to perform their best, but science tells us the very form of matter is influenced by our beliefs (see the earlier articles 1: Quantum Physics of Belief – Effects of Universal Consciousness and 2: Quantum Physics of Belief – Keys to Sustainable Success in this series.) In other words, in some way, what we believe is what reality becomes.

It follows that to be profitable, business organizations must believe that profits are abundant and achievable. Businesses operate within a social system and obtain their profits from external sources, so let’s assess how most businesses operate in this larger context and how their practices reveal their beliefs in the scarcity of wealth.

In the book The Science of Getting Rich published in 1910, Wallace D. Wattles wrote that ‎"People must be taught to become rich by creation, not by competition... every person who gets rich by creation opens a way for thousands to follow him/her and inspires them to do so." Now, science validates this and we will see how.

Most business leaders would say that it’s the goal in business to retain or acquire the maximum dollar amount in every business transaction. We would generally say that we are doing the right thing as business leaders when we are able to extract the highest prices from customers and pay the lowest prices to suppliers. But when we engage in business in this competitive manner, without consideration for the financial health of the other party, what does that indicate about our underlying beliefs?

These competitive practices reveal that we believe there is not enough for everyone to win, and therefore we have to make sure we are one of the winners. This demonstrates that we believe profits are not abundant, but rather they are scarce. We can easily recognize this at a personal level: think about when we act competitively versus collaboratively. We act competitively in situations such as playing in sports games where there are multiple players or teams but only one winner. We act competitively when we are a student in a class where only the top 10% will receive grade A. We act competitively when we are working for a company that periodically purges the lower performers. So, we act competitively when we believe that what we are vying for is scarce in that there is not enough for everyone.

In contrast, we act collaboratively when we believe that there is enough for everyone. We act collaboratively when we are engaged in a sport such as mountain climbing, where the goal is for everyone to make it to the top. We act collaboratively when we are a student taking a class in which there is no limit to the number of grade A’s given. And we act collaboratively when we are working for a company that has enough jobs for all employees. So, as a rule, we act competitively when we believe the object of our actions is scarce, and collaboratively when we believe the object of our actions is abundant. Therefore, striving to retain the maximum dollar amount in each business transaction, without regard to the other party, indicates a belief in the scarcity of wealth, which creates the condition of lower profitability.

Observe the belief systems that are prevalent in your business. Are they rooted in abundance or scarcity? Observe how your beliefs correspond to your reality and understand that the science proves that your beliefs came first and led to your experience. This understanding is the first step to creating greater abundance for your business.

The belief in abundance versus scarcity is relevant for any action in which money changes hands. This includes negotiation practices, employee compensation philosophies, and the degree to which competition is considered a threat. An organization’s belief about abundance is revealed to the extent they seek to protect their own interests more than the other party’s. If we truly believe in abundance, there is no reason to be concerned about personal protection at the expense of someone else. We know there is enough for everyone.

Physics experimentation shows us there is no fixed amount of wealth. Our consciousness is determining what we experience, so there is as much as we believe there is. Underlying this is a profound reality: there is no limit to the abundance that exists in the world, except for the limits that exist in our minds. As such, we can learn to be better at choosing how we perceive the world.

Science has proven that we are "wired to cooperate." Indeed, it is how we have survived as a species. It is probably true, that our future survival is also rooted in this principle. You wouldn't know it by looking at the condition of the world. How would the world be different if, instead of competing with one another on a daily basis, we actually sought to cooperate? Maybe too utopian, maybe a naive thought (I am about as competitive a person as you will ever meet) but a wonderful hope for the world. I am finding that as I apply the Axiogenic principles, I now compete to cooperate. It sounds weird, I know, but I am applying the same emotional energy to a different goal. It is quite satisfying.

Can you imagine if politicians competed to cooperate? And, wow! What a novel thought that would be? I believe that most politicians are good folks, who initially intend to do the best they can within their belief system. Not all, but most. The system corrupts them. Unfortunately, we are the system. Imagine if we were all focused on value, but all actually knew how to evaluate "value" effectively. What a different world it would be.

Quantum Physics of Belief - Keys to Sustainable Success

Last week, I started writing about using quantum physics and business research to explore the correlation between the science of consciousness and patterns in the business world, to develop theories about the effects of Universal consciousness. In that article, we explored how our experiences are formed based on what we believe about the world.

In most businesses these days, the leaders are trying to make significant improvements in order to move to the next level of success. Most leaders believe the way to accomplish this is by changing the business at the level of action, or form.  What that means is that the business leaders engage in process improvement, cost cutting and pricing optimization; to name just a few examples. Or they try to get employees more motivated so they’ll work harder. They are trying to drive success through action.

What is wrong with that, you might ask? Depends on one’s perspective; it might work in some cases. But, I believe that a successful turnaround will never result from action alone. As I have discovered through science, changing the success of a business, or any organization, must start with changing the consciousness of the people in the organization. Let’s look at the science behind one of these elements of consciousness: beliefs.

First, let’s consider the nature of matter. As I learned physics thru my graduate studies, I have found that Einstein’s special theory of relativity, E=MC², is key. Like many of you, I have known of this equation for years, but I never fully considered its profound implications. Literally it means that all matter is a form of energy, not a substance. The fact that matter is fundamentally energy means that objects are not static, but rather are dynamic and changeable. Furthermore, experimentation at the sub-atomic level has revealed that human beliefs influence how matter manifests. See my earlier article on the physics of belief for a detailed description of the classic Double Slit experiment and its implications.

We conventionally believe that the physical world operates objectively and is not influenced by us unless we take some physical action. We think our beliefs are formed based on how we experience the world. This scientific research tells us quite the opposite: our experience is formed based on what we believe about the world. We can use this knowledge to increase the likelihood that matter, and therefore events (which are interactions of matter) will unfold more frequently in the form that we prefer. That was what we discussed last week and now let’s see what it means in terms of practical implications.

The implications of the science are that trying to change business outcomes by changing physical action will never get us the results we desire. No matter how good we get at optimizing processes, motivating employees or pricing our products, these things will never be sufficient to achieve the outcome we desire. We must first shape the beliefs, or consciousness, of our business. It’s only when your business has a winning consciousness that events will unfold in the form of success.

So, if your business doesn’t have a recent history of success, how do you get people to believe it is successful? An obvious answer is to show that success of the business is imminent. Research shows that a message about a positive future will become strong belief when it contains certain elements.

First, the message must capture peoples’ attention and evoke their intentions.  People are inundated with data and input of all kinds, so it takes something special to get their attention. Blanketing people with more information, statistics and facts will not get their attention and influence their beliefs. Their emotions must be stimulated. In an earlier article, I discussed about a research showing that intentions do not always lead to behavior change in obtaining the desired results. This gap between what people intend to do and their behavior has been called the “intention-behavior gap” – where it was identified that emotion is the missing link in modifying behavior.

Secondly, those emotions have to be positive. Negative emotions, such as those rooted in fear, will just cause association with other negative thoughts and will never lead to positive beliefs about business success. Emotions are most easily evoked through images conjured up through vivid story telling. People think in terms of stories filled with images and feelings, so that’s the best way to influence the mind. Also, everyone has some degree of ‘show me’ in them, so they need some supporting evidence for the story through a real-life example that is credible.

Finally, people will only feel compelled to buy into a story when they see that it includes them, so they need to be shown how they are part of it.

Business research proves the power of organizational consciousness. We all accept the fact that a strong business culture is a pre-requisite for success. What we don’t understand is that there are elements of culture that influence matter itself, without the intermediary of action.  When a business has a winning culture, customers are naturally drawn to it, employees will increasingly make the right decisions, and proper solutions arise when needed.

Businesses that lack strong beliefs in success are energetically dead and will simply not make it in the long run. You will never be able to shift a business into success through action alone. We must first shape the beliefs, or consciousness, of our business. Positive beliefs coupled with strong emotions then stimulate the positive behavior change leading to sustainable business success practices. Business research confirms this and science provides the foundation.

Quantum Physics of Belief – Effects of Universal Consciousness

As promised, the next few weeks, I am going to use quantum physics and business research to explore the correlation between the science of consciousness and patterns in the business world, to suggest innovative ways of using this wisdom to lead and succeed in a business environment that is constantly evolving at a rapid pace. [I hope you will stay tuned to these series of articles and provide any feedback via email or in the comments section below on this blog. I’d greatly appreciate your comments / suggestions and your experiences with any of this.]

The role of physics has always been to teach us how this physical world works. We now know our conventional understanding is not the whole story. It seems the very word “physics” takes us in the wrong direction, as it implies physical as opposed to the realm of the mind (and spirit, by extension). But, I hope, by the end of this series (it will take a few months to cover all the areas that I have researched so far); you will understand that the two realms cannot be separated.

Let’s first, consider the nature of matter. As I studied physics thru my graduate courses, I have learned that Einstein’s special theory of relativity, E=MC², is key to understanding the nature of this world. Like many of you, I have known of this equation for years, but never fully considered its profound implications. Literally it means that all matter is a form of energy, not a substance. The fact that matter is fundamentally energy means that objects are not static, but rather are dynamic and changeable. Furthermore, experimentation at the sub-atomic level has revealed that human beliefs influence how matter manifests.

Here is a classic physics experiment: The Double Slit Experiment shows us that the form of matter follows what we believe about the matter. The experiment streams a bunch of photons into two boxes, and then they come out of slits on the other side of the boxes to project a pattern onto a screen. Here is the interesting part: if an observer is expecting to see waves and so looks at the pattern on the screen, the observer sees the waves and the pattern persists, but if the observer expects to see particles and looks in one of the boxes, the observer will find particles in the box. In other words, the observer’s expectations, or beliefs, determine whether the photon is a wave or a particle. This same concept extends into the world of larger objects.

The book Quantum Enigma (Physics Encounters Consciousness) written by Profs Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner of the University of California in Santa Cruz in 2006 offers credible information to show that there is no avoiding the fact that our consciousness has a physical effect on our world. This means that the events occurring external to us are being influenced by the contents of our thoughts and beliefs. Let’s look at how this phenomenon shows itself in the real world.

Intention is a projection of awareness toward a particular result with the belief that the outcome can be influenced. Scientific experimentation has overwhelmingly proven that human intentions significantly influence events so that they are more likely to occur in the direction of the intentions. Some of the most prominent experiments have shown that human intentions have the ability to alter the output of a REG, Random Event Generator machine.

REG machines generate a random sequence of heads and tails, and without the interference of intentions, they produce roughly fifty percent heads and fifty percent tails. Experiments have proven that humans can “will” the machines to create more heads (or tails) impulses by focusing their thoughts on the machine’s output. These REG experiments have been extensively carried out, using rigorous scientific study methods, and have included thousands of participants and millions of trials. The odds of the results occurring by chance are less than one in a billion, and the U.S. National Research Council has verified the results. Other experiments have provided solid evidence that groups can change the pH (acidity) level of bodies of water and biological systems in insects through specific intentions.

Before quantum physics, people knew that human beings were conscious. We knew that animals were conscious. Some of the ancient traditions, particularly some of the Hindu traditions, or the Vedic traditions of ancient Indian origin, speak in terms of everything being conscious. They speak about consciousness pervading everything. But, in this twenty first century and with quantum physics, we begin to see what might be called a new role for consciousness - something that we know happens, but remained inexplicable until we began to realize that what we were talking about was the action of consciousness.

What is a fundamental act of consciousness? It's an action in which something is perceived. Now, in ordinary physics, or in ordinary physiology, or in most of the classical realms of science, perception is something which is taken to be outside the realm of physicality. In other words, if you perceive something, you know that you see something. Light will strike your retina; you'll get an idea, or something will pop off in your brain, or something of that sort. But we never got the notion that somehow the act of seeing something was affecting what you were seeing or what you were looking at. But, in quantum physics, we have learned that when you are looking at very small objects, subatomic particles for example, the very action of looking at them disturbs them to such an extent that we never really get a complete picture as to what they actually are. Now, this has led me to think that consciousness may be at the core of this problem as to how perception can affect and change reality, and that maybe what we are doing when we are thinking or feeling or sensing or even listening to a conversation is using this action of consciousness, this fundamental act, which sort of what flips the switch - that suddenly alters the physical reality of, the human being.

Several theoretical studies provide an explanation of how our belief systems are impacting our experience of reality. String Theory says that all matter and energy is composed of oscillating strings, and it hypothesizes that there are at least ten spatial dimensions. The Many Worlds Theory proposes that these dimensions translate into parallel states of reality that simultaneously exists with what we perceive as our current reality, and a person’s belief system largely determines which single sequence of events they experience. These theories are work in progress, but they are at least the beginnings of an explanation.

Before you write off parallel universes as nonsense, consider the following. Multiple parallel realities would seem to imply that there are multiple versions of our physical world, and that doesn’t match our experience. However, remember that science says the physical world is fundamentally energy, so the existence of parallel universes doesn’t imply the duplication of substance, but rather implies that there are multiple fields of energy. Plus, it sounds like nonsense to say that we exist in multiple realities, whereas in our day-to-day reality, we experience that there is only one sequence of events occurring. The Many Worlds Theory explains this by saying that our brains are designed to perceive only one thread of experience through the parallel realities. This, in my opinion, brings parallel realities into the realm of reason.

Now, let’s talk about some practical implications. In science, our life experience is similar to a video game, where we are choosing which path through the game we are going to experience. Instead of making that choice through actions and selections on a video game console, we are making it based on our beliefs or our experiences. Let me illustrate with a real world example of a friend of mine.

Sandra is a wife and mother of three children, and they once lived in Chicago for several years. When Sandra tells stories about her experience in Chicago, they are all positive accounts about how she met the nicest and most helpful people. One of her favorite stories is about a time when she stepped off the EL (the elevated train; apologies to those who are not familiar with the Chicago Transit system) with some heavy packages and a strange young man offered to carry them home for her. She didn’t hesitate to accept his offer of help, and he did indeed carry the packages to her front door.

Sandra’s family gapes at her in disbelief when she tells these stories of a “friendly” Chicago, because they had an entirely different experience, and they never would have given their packages to a strange young man. Sandra walked the same streets and rode the same ELs as the rest of her family, yet she had an entirely different experience.

Sandra drew different experiences into her reality. She didn’t do anything different than the rest of her family, and she didn’t just put a positive façade on negative experiences. She went to the same places as the rest of her family, yet she encountered friendly and helpful people, whereas her family encountered rude and harmful people. Sandra was not just luckier than the rest of her family, but rather her beliefs and intentions brought her different experiences.

We conventionally believe that the physical world operates objectively and is not influenced by us unless we take some physical action. We think our beliefs are formed based on how we experience the world. This scientific research tells us quite the opposite: our experience is formed based on what we believe about the world. We can use this knowledge to increase the likelihood that matter, and therefore events (which are interactions of matter) will unfold more frequently in the form that we prefer.

[You may be wondering at this point what this has all got to do with any business environment. However, I need to lay down the fundamentals and set the stage to explore the correlation between the science of consciousness and patterns in the business world. In this article, having explored how our experiences are formed based on what we believe about the world; I’ll write more next week on turning around business practices using quantum physics of beliefs. See you next week…]

Science and Spirituality

Researchers of every age and branch of science are beginning to conclude that we participate more than we currently believe in creating our own health, or lack thereof.  Here is an overview of some of their research.

“All matter is energy”

 Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

“Treating humans without concept of energy is treating dead matter”

Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, M.D. Hungary, Nobel Laureate (1893- 1986)

“Future medicine will be based on controlling energy fields.”

Prof. William Tiller, Ph.D. (Stanford University)

“Diseases are to be diagnosed and prevented via energy field assessment.”

George Crile Sr., M.D., Founder of the Cleveland Clinic (1864-1943)

“Body chemistry is governed by quantum cellular fields.”

 Prof. Murray Gell-Mann, Nobel Laureate, USA

“All living organisms emit field.”

Semyon D. Kirlian, U.S.S.R. (1900-1980)

What is being demonstrated today in quantum physics is not a new thought, although sophistication in experimental design and research has given these older concepts new standing in science and is slowly trickling down into how the medical community views and treats disease.

New brain research, for example, has demonstrated that the placebo effect is not purely a psychological phenomenon as previously thought.

In fact it has shown just the opposite; that a patient’s beliefs stimulate the brain to manufacture a wide variety of bio-chemicals that impact the health of the body.

What people take to be miracles are nothing more than higher laws hidden from us. Scientists are coming to realize that this universe is not as solid as we thought it was. Matter is vibrating energy that appears to the physical eye as solid. Performing miracles is nothing more than tapping into energy and manipulating it by power of thought and spirit.

Medicine today is slowly evolving towards a more holistic approach to healing. A lot is being said about the mind-body connection - of healing the body by healing the mind. Meditation as a way to reduce stress and eliminate stress-related illnesses is being explored.

Quantum physicist Ervin Lazlo writes in the emerging concept of the new sciences that there is no separation between the physical world, the living world, and the world of mind and consciousness. 

Physical matter is vanishing as a fundamental feature of reality, retreating before energy. In this emerging concept there is no absolute matter, only matter-generating energy field.

Albert Einstein postulated that everything seen boils down to energy; that the atom was not the smallest unit comprising physical matter. He further stated that at the subatomic level there is no substance, only energy frequency.

This theory is widely accepted today in the scientific community and is consistent with other researchers in the emerging field of “energy medicine” who have postulated that you cannot have a disease that originates from substance, because at the deepest level there is no substance.

There is no totality of human experience in science as it includes only a part of human experience. Spirituality extends to supra-intellectual and other subtle planes of human consciousness as it denotes the pursuit of knowledge for the Infinite and Immutable which is beyond the ephemeral world of duality. Its domain is not only of matter but also of human life, feelings, emotions and consciousness.

For modern science, the center of gravity is outside of man himself; he is simply being treated as an object. Though science has wiped out many of his fears and uncertainties, it has also helped create in him new fears and uncertainties. This is possible only because he is ignorant of his inner self.

Spirituality is a science of values; the pivotal point on which depends the progress and survival of mankind. Experience or ‘anubhava’ is the only true source of knowledge. Belief and faith are spontaneous when one is made to experience what is sought to be taught or preached.

Scientists are not receptive to spirituality because it is not taught as a science of experience. A genuine mystic will fire the scientist’s intellect by the divine light of ‘atman’, which alone opens the door of inward search and tuning. He will then understand that we are a microcosm with the entire macrocosm within us. The outside world is only a manifestation of the immense world within.

Some of the greatest scientists have attributed their sparks of genius to spiritual inspiration. 

"I assert that cosmic religious experience is the strongest and the noblest driving force behind scientific research," ~ Albert Einstein.

Innovators have often confessed that their ideas were the result of some kind of "divine" inspiration. Some people live only to gratify their own desires and wants. But those who come in contact with a higher power discover that the greatest purpose of our life is to love and serve others. Scientists, for instance, devote their lives to better the lives of others. Thus, we find that the mission of both scientists and spiritual masters is one and the same. They are both here to find the hidden laws of nature, the higher power that created everything, and use their discoveries to better the lives of others.

Science and spirituality make for a mutual partnership. If those engaged in science spend some time in silence, looking within, they will get inspired to find answers to the questions they ask. Similarly, spiritual seekers, when they test hypotheses in the laboratory of their own body and soul, will find the answers.

So, one can safely conclude that science and spirituality are two sides of the same coin. The aim of science is to uncover the deepest spiritual truths, and the aim of spirituality is to search for the cause behind scientific fact.

Science seems to be in a perpetual state of believing it has the truth, despite its history of changing paradigms. This failure to accept the idea of "mysteries" is inexplicable, because there will always be a great mystery out there waiting to be discovered. The Universe is not so small, nor so simple as to lend itself to total analysis by a logical science. This does not diminish the value of science, but simply places it in an appropriate perspective. Science provides one type of insight into the workings of the universe, but not the only insight. The arts certainly provide another route to knowledge, and mysticism provides yet another. The combination of logical science (western science) and analogical science (science of correspondence) can help us to understand our role in the universe, and to appreciate the universe as the extraordinary multifaceted phenomena it truly is.

We live in the most intellectual culture that the world has ever seen. Yet our religions offer very little in the way of intellectual appeal, unable to successfully bridge this gap. Too often those who claim to represent spirituality in fact do not. This all too frequently turns people away from any consideration of the spiritual path, and leads many to believe that religion has nothing to offer. The techniques utilized by the science of correspondence offers considerable intellectual stimulation, and, if successful, eventually leading to a personal experiential understanding of spirituality. Ultimately, the transformation process which allows consciousness on the level of the spirit (the sambhogakaya – the body of bliss, or the body that experiences the fruits of Buddhist practice, the ananda-maya-kosa – the spiritual bliss) is the process of the spiritual path.

Today in the western world and elsewhere, too often one is told to have faith, and not to question. Ultimately, at some juncture, one may require a leap of faith, but that leap comes after years of pursuing and questioning, eradicating oneself of doubt. True spirituality requires questioning as does true science. One must not be deluded into believing one 'believes' when one does not and one still has many unanswered questions. Too often our 'spiritual' leaders cannot answer our questions because they have not had a spiritual awakening themselves and therefore discourage the asking of questions, telling one to have faith. This truly discourages a scientific mind, and can encourage a fanaticism, and fanaticism is not true religion, is not spirituality.

In the present technological world, while science is primarily logical in nature, the true spiritual perspective is primarily metaphorical in nature. Here, we need to keep in mind that these metaphors produce higher truths, and logic produces lesser truths. The science of correspondence is quite unlike our logical science. It takes us in a different direction and yields unique information about the nature of mankind and the universe. The science of correspondence has an aesthetic quality to it, is inclusive of all systems, is humbling, often appearing simple and naïve from our technological point of view, and tends toward long term solutions and a quality of patience. In essence, the science of correspondence appears to be more experiential in nature, producing direct knowledge of that which is being studied. This presents an apparent conflict with science - a difficult hurdle to overcome, since science is intellectual in nature, believing that intellectual understandings are supreme and free of bias or superstition. Science does not in the least trust direct experiential or intuitive knowing. In fact the only statement traditional science has made about "experience" is "don't trust it".

Although the end pursuit of science appears to be an intellectual comprehension of the universe, the science of mysticism is primarily involved with a direct knowledge of some ultimate reality, experience, etc., knowledge or wisdom which cannot be comprehended intellectually and therefore MUST BE DIRECTLY EXPERIENCED. It's a journey we must ultimately make on our own, hopefully with experienced teachers to guide us.

In the minds of many people spirituality is seen as unscientific, and thus as a load of babble that does not actually mean anything. After all, it cannot be proven scientifically speaking, and thus can only be wrong. No amount of math, or physics for that matter, can show the concepts proclaimed by spiritual people, so why even bother? I would not say that I am a highly spiritual person, neither particularly religious. However, I do believe in certain aspects of spiritual teachings, and at the same time, call myself a man of science. How can that be?

After studying several different scientific methods, as well as several spiritually inclined methods, for change and exploring the power of the mind, I have come to realize that both, spirituality and science are metaphors. A metaphor is defined as “an indirect comparison between two or more seemingly unrelated subjects”. So science is our metaphor for what we think is really happening, when in actual fact of the matter, we are only interpreting results and speculating anyway.

Furthermore, spirituality is often said to be quite in-congruent within itself, hence it cannot be taken seriously. Well, not to defend this, but let’s look at science. Newtonian physics might work well for explaining the things we can see with the human eye, big objects, and stars. Yet, on a quantum level, Newtonian physics is useless, and we enter the domain of quantum physics. These two mindsets and mathematical rules do not fit with each other. When combined, they give nonsensical predictions. So science within itself is in-congruent!!

Any metaphor has its application, and also its inbuilt boundaries. Yet we try to stretch certain metaphors to explain virtually everything, and thus go beyond their limits. This is true for science and also for spirituality. Each metaphor has its application and use, and as such we should make full use of them. The really intriguing question is what is your own metaphor or that of your friends, co-workers, because at the end of the day, all we do is live in our metaphors, and as you know, everything is a metaphor.

Connecting Science and Spirituality

I believe that it is possible to connect science with spirituality in meaningful ways that do no injustice to science or religion. The first and most obvious connection between the two is in a shared attitude towards truth. The spiritual seeker and the dedicated scientist are both concerned with universal truths that transcend cultural and physical relativities. For science these are called Laws of Nature. For the spiritual seeker these eternal truths are also known as the Laws of Nature.

Commitment to truth is well known in the scientific community but it is equally important for the spiritual seeker. "What is truth?” asked the 13^th century German mystic, Meister Eckhart. "Truth is something so noble that if God could turn aside from it, we could keep the truth and let God go", defined the 20^th century Swami Budhananda.

Is not Meister Eckhart's commitment to truth so appropriate for scientific investigation that any scientist would be pleased to emulate it? These are some basic connections that link science and spirituality in ways that perhaps do not build a marriage or a bridge, but do initially indicate the absence of a bottomless divide.

The present holistic approach can, however, be taken many steps further by asking some questions about the nature of science and of the scientific experience. What then is science? It seems that science is more an attitude than a method.

The attitude is one of testing interpretations of observed phenomena against further observations until one interpretation emerges as the best. Unfortunately, judgments about the best interpretation vary greatly.

To see science more as an attitude than a method is to find some small expansion of the conventional objective methods of science. Such as: controlled conditions, repeatability, falsifiability, predictability, quantification, control groups and location. These are non-core features of science even though they are frequently important.

The Gap

If science is an attitude rather than a method then the attributes of this subjective attitude should form the character of the scientific experience, the second question referred to above. The scientific experience is an experience normally seen to involve the so-called 'gap' between the physical world 'out there' and the world of thought 'in here'. If this gap does exist, as assumed by most science, then science and spirituality can never be strongly linked. If on the other hand, there is no gap then scientific experience will simply be a feature of subjectivity and a significant barrier preventing interconnection will be removed.

Today we tend to talk in terms of subjective experience rather than human sensibilities or transcendental apperception. But whatever terms we use, all investigations will lead to the conclusion that this framework is integrated and not divided. In other words, the processes of observation and of concept formation are entirely integrated. Nowhere is there a division between what can be called an inner and an outer world. The lack of evidence for such a gap, yet the continual assumption in scientific investigation that such a gap exists, reflects the problem of bridging science and spirituality.

Both science and spirituality come within the framework of human sensibility - of subjective experience - and this means that science is produced by the same general subjective processes as spirituality. To make the cohesion of this framework more apparent we need to take a broad look at the medium which links both science and spirituality. This is the medium of meaning. Both science and spirituality create meaning, and meaning is the ever present medium of subjective experience. The critical question at this junction is therefore, what do we mean by the term 'meaning'?

Scientific investigation is always about the meaning of something. This is the case in physics, chemistry, biology as well as the social sciences. While most practitioners in these fields may not see themselves as using and creating meaning; this is overwhelmingly what is happening. The kind of activity which is seen to occur between and within matter - particles, cells, tissue, organs, plants, animals, populations and the languages of these fields - is only the derivative signs of life. It is the meaning 'of something', created by the interaction of stable systems of relations, systems that are called, particles, cells, tissue and so on.

If life in the universe is to be found in the fundamentally relations of morphic fields, and in a derivate sense as the signs of life (through the interactions of forms within these fields), then the obvious conclusion to draw from all this is that the universe is alive at every level and in every substance and in every time and in every space. This conclusion comes from the logic that relations are omnipresent in the universe and this leads on to the inevitable conclusion that the agency of life, which is the force of formless meaning, is omnipresent in the universe. In other words, the visible universe exists within an infinite morphic field and so has meaning and consciousness at every point in space/time.

Consciousness

'Life' is a term with strong biological connotations while 'consciousness' is a term that has both psychological and spiritual uses. Life and consciousness come together however, in the present use of the meaning of meaning. It is proposed that meaning, in its fundamental and formless role has energy, force and agency. The nature of this energy and agency is consciousness.

The symmetry of meaning and consciousness implies that consciousness is the vital force that occupies the subjective field in which signs interact, scientific undertakings emerge and spirituality develops. In this view, signs, science and spirituality are features of consciousness and can be studied in terms of their relational architecture rather than exclusively and formally in their own separate terms. This means that consciousness is best analyzed as meaning which in turn is best studied in terms of relations.

The symmetry of meaning and consciousness also provides support for the proposition that meaning is not a shadow generated by the interaction of signs (as traditionally assumed). Meaning itself has movement, force, energy, and agency - consciousness. This is the same dynamic power which the Indian mystical philosophy of Vedanta calls ‘sakti.’ These are also the features we call life and thus being. Meaning therefore constitutes being-ness. A change of meaning will always represent a change of being-ness but it is also a change of consciousness.

What is interesting about this morphic field of consciousness (being-ness) is that it is infinitely expansive, which is to say that nothing exists outside meaning. In other words, nothing exists outside of consciousness. If this is true then the context of subjective experience, in which science occurs, is situated within the movement, force and agency of the ultimate reality of being-ness, that is, within the formless, morphic field of the meaning of meaning. From a spiritual position the ultimate reality is usually assumed to be God or cosmic consciousness. Enlightened souls such as Sri Ramana Maharshi often use the term 'the Self' to refer to this ultimate reality.

Famous for his methods of self inquiry, Sri Ramana Maharshi had this to say about this spiritual relationship: “The only permanent thing is Reality; and that is the Self. You say 'I am', 'I am going', 'I am speaking', 'I am working', etc. Hyphenate 'I am' in all of them. Thus I - AM. That is the abiding and fundamental Reality. This truth was taught by God to Moses: 'I AM that I AM'. 'Be still and know that I - AM God'. So 'I - AM ' is God.”

'I - AM' is the ultimate self-referral which it is possible to speak. The realized meaning of this self-referral implies a state of consciousness beyond words, a formless state of meaning beyond thought, a state of 'no-mind', a state of being where the individual self expands into the cosmic Self. This is a state of stillness beyond the defenses of the ego where meaning rests with the infinite and eternal symmetry of that stream of consciousness which 'I - AM'.

The evidence of formless symmetry within language, within non-conscious subjectivity, within love and throughout the entire universe at every point in space/time tells us that there are no gaps between inner and outer worlds because there is not inner or outer world. There is only one, undivided, interconnected, formless, unmoved agency of cosmic consciousness. The differences we see are the differences created by the derivative meaning of forms, the apparent relative autonomy of which has itself been created by the agency of formless meaning. We are therefore already connected to each other and to the environment without the need for conscious design. What is needed is a conscious design to re-learn about what is already there - to learn about coming home to what is already there.

The Bridge

The bridge connecting science and spirituality rests on a common view and commitment to truth that is beyond cultural relativities. The structure of this bridge is provided by subjective experience which is the context for both spiritual observance and scientific endeavor.

The gap between science and spirituality is now closed, for the scientist who seeks after symmetry walks a parallel path to the spiritual seeker who yearns for Self-realization. The scientist looks outwards to trace the origins of the universe to the symmetry that lies beyond matter. The spiritual seeker looks inwards to the silence of the recursive symmetries of Self-realization. While the paths are different, the goal of realizing the oneness of symmetry is the same for both seekers.

This concludes the series of articles on the Eleven Dimensions of Self Awareness and Balancing the Wheel of Life. From next week onwards, I will be writing more on the spiritual aspects of life interspersed with additional articles on how the advances in science are bringing together both the science and spirituality ever more closely. I hope you will continue to read these articles and/or forward to your friends/family that you think will like and add value to their lives. Namaste!