I Am Jack. Am I Now Here? (1/3)

"I shall try to explain how consciousness can be studied.

• Take a watch and look at the second hand,
• trying to be aware of yourself,
• and concentrating on the thought, 'I am Peter Ouspensky,' 'I am now here.'

Try not to think about anything else, simply:

• follow the movements of the second hand
• and be aware of yourself,
• your name,
• your existence
• and the place where you are.
• Keep all other thoughts away.

You will, if you are persistent, be able to do this for two minutes.

This is the limit of your consciousness.

And if you try to repeat the experiment soon after, you will find it more difficult than the first time.

This experiment shows that a man, in his natural state, can with great effort be conscious of one subject (himself) for two minutes or less.

The most important deduction one can make after making this experiment in the right way is that man is not conscious of himself.

The illusion of his being conscious of himself is created by memory and thought processes.

For instance, a man goes to a theatre. If he is accustomed to it, he is not especially conscious of being there while he is there, although he can see things and observe them, enjoy the performance or dislike it, remember it, remember people he met and so on.

When he comes home he remembers that he was in the theatre, and certainly he thinks that he was conscious while he was there. So he has no doubts about his consciousness and he does not realise that his consciousness can be completely absent while he still can act reasonably, think, observe."

P.S.

What's the point?

If I can only stay conscious for two minutes or less, that should terrify me!

I don't want to hide from that terror. That doesn't make it better.

At the top of my to-do list is to find a way to be aware of my existence.