I deeply care about the possible future of the two main dimensions of being human. The first dimension is ‘living’. The second one is ‘knowing’. Both are extremely rich potentials, and both are thoroughly interconnected. The last two decades of my life were filled with the observation and study of their possibilities.
Most of the time I wake up at five filled with a vibrating enthusiasm to start a new day of explorations and observations, mostly I relax myself for a few more hours enjoying the richness of the dreams that follow. Since I was a youngster, reflecting and contemplating about the mystery of life and knowing became the central driving force of my existence. As a ritual, I start my day sipping coffee while looking at the upcoming light through my garden. I love being absorbed by the play of the birds in this early glow. Nothing can make me more satisfied than being able to watch the flight of the different birds in the unfolding world outside. During those golden moments, the two topics of life and consciousness naturally express themselves.
Countless times my mind tried to define the exact meaning of those two words. I filled many notebooks with these contemplations. I humbly accepted the fact that I will never succeed. My life will probably remain a whirling dance around those two fundamental forces without ever being able to grasp them. And it makes me deeply relaxed to recognise that. During those sacred moments of examination my deep respect for living and knowing only grew. Those moments became for me the most beautiful fusions of poetry and science.
At the heart of centuries of cumulated sharp observations from the infinitesimal to the ever-expanding cosmos lies my scientific attitude. A microscopic world opened when Antoni Van Leeuwenhoek polished his first lenses to see the microscopic movements of cells and their exchanges in our body. When Nicolaus Copernicus started to stare into the depths of the darkness, the macroscopic world started to expand. Their curious passions became the ground of our modern science.
We are not stopping with their explorations. We will investigate the outer world ever more. Will it ever stop? Hypotheses about multiple universes, new dimensions and new fields are on the table. So, what is living? An exchange-process growing in complexity the deeper we look.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the observation of our inner world. Deep studies on the nature of knowing mainly started on what we call the Eastern side of this planet. In the East, they have a long tradition of thoroughly observing the depths of the power of knowing. Especially in the high mountains of the Himalayas many timeless wisdom traditions started to unfold. So, what is experiencing, or knowing, also called consciousness or awareness?
Finding out is humanity’s everlasting journey. The last word is still not said. In 2019, the European Brain project states: “One of the deepest unsolved problems in science is the nature of consciousness.” We can say that human existence is based on two core mysteries: the power to live, and the power to know.
What would happen if we could learn more about the interaction of those two powers? This search is the eternal journey of humanity. Can we perceive what happens when they fuse? We can. I believe that a new inner power arises from this mixture. It is something I call ‘our psychological power’ because it regulates and transforms the informative movements in our head, it also heals, guides, supports and nurtures them. It is a power that creates more integration.
I also believe that this psychological power is exactly what the world needs the most. More than ever our minds are restless, overloaded and confused. Especially now, in these highly challenging times we face. I believe that cultivating this possible potential is the master skill we need to cope with the unseen disruptions that lie before us: population growth, climate change, unpredictable leadership, growing intercultural violence, the colonisation of consciousness by artificial intelligence… How will we solve these countless disturbances coming to us without the clarity, receptivity and balance of our psychological power?
Life is so much more than we think it is. It makes me extremely grateful to be able to spend many more early-morning-observations on the interconnections between the flights of the small birds, insects, worms, millipedes, and all the different types of leaves gently whispering in the morning winds above my awakening garden.
I hope I can wake up many more decades filled with a compelling enthusiasm to see, hear, touch and mostly feel the abundance of the amazing life on this astonishing planet orbiting around in an ocean of moving and interacting energy, and this probably since a few billion years in a space of billions of light years. Nothing could be more wonderful and fulfilling. To know that I live. And that there always will be more to life.
So, I deeply care about the possible future of the two potentialities of life and knowing. I deeply hope that artificial intelligence will not colonise our consciousness. I deeply hope that we learn to care for life’s creative expressions to continue uninterrupted – unbroken. I believe that our deepest humanness comes from the possibility to feel the touch of the whirling dance around the mystery of the living love we are.
