Connection
An Avatar.Global Resource
Connection
Connection occurs when your Bodily Ego unites, even if only briefly, with your own Spiritual Ego, or some other monadic location within the Fabric of Consciousness.[1] [2] Connection is the ostensible goal of Authentic Spirituality, and the explicit purpose of the Lightning Path. Connection leads to Connection Experiences and Connection Outcomess
Syncretic Terms
Connection > Altered State of Consciousness, Born Again, Descent of the Holy Spirit, Divine Marriage, Divine Union, Drawing Down the Moon, It, Lightning Strike, Mysticism, Salvation, Shamanic State of Consciousness, Starlight Vision, The Dreaming, Trance, Union
Related Terms
Connection > Connection Triggers, Fear, Grounding, Highest Self, Human Psyche, More-Than-Human, Mystic, Neurodecolonization, Numinosity, Perfect Contemplation
Physical Unit > Default Mode Network, Essential Needs, Health, Highest Self, Human Development, Merkaba, Needs
List of LP Connection Experience Types
Connection Experiences > Activation Experience, Aesthetic Experience, Birth Experience, Clearing Experience, Completion Experience, Death Experience, Deep Flow, Diminutive Experience, Dream Experience, Flow Experience, Forced Connection, Healing Experience, Nadir Experience, Peak Experience, Plateau Experience, Push Experience, Rebirth Experience, Restorative Experience, Union Experience, Unity Experience, Zenith Experience
LP Categorization
Process: Connection, Awakening, Activation, Ascension, Triumph of Spirit (i.e. union)
Foundation: Accountability, Atonement, Alignment
List of Connection Obstacles
Connection Obstacles > Egotism, Fear, Hypocrisy, Interference, Passion, Resentment, Three Poisons, Toxic Attachment, Undisciplined Mind, Wrong Action, Wrong Environment, Wrong Thought
List of Connection Frameworks
Connection Framework > Arica School, Baha'i, Buddhism, Eupsychian Theory, Gnosticism, Holistic Nursing, Jainism, Karma Yoga, League For Spiritual Discovery, Monastic Christianity, Neo-Hinduism, Sanatana Dharma, Shattari, Sufism, Taoism, The Lightning Path, Theosophy, Transpersonal Psychology, Wicca, Yoga, Zen
List of Connection Practices
This is a multi-cultural list of connection practices. Research is included where available.
List of Connection Appliances
Connection Appliance > Archetype Cards, Archetype Deck, Bible, Drums, Guardian Boards, Masonic Archetype System, Pathfinder Archetype System, Quartz Crystals, Sacred Pipe, Sacred Stones, Spirit Lodge, Tibetan Singing Bowls, Triumph of Spirit Archetype Deck, Triumph of Spirit Archetype System
List of Connection Supplements
Connection Supplement > 5-MEO DMT, Ayahuasca, Cannabis, Chloroform, DMT, Datura, Haoma, Kaneh Bosm, Kava, Ketamine, Kykeon, LSD, MDMA, Maikua, Manna, Nitrous Oxide, Peyote, Psilocybin Mushroom, Santa Rosa, Soma, Tobacco, Yaqona
Notable People who Have Experienced Connection
Mystics > Agehananda Bharati, Alan Watts, Bernard of Clairvaux, Emanuel Swedenborg, Howard Thurman, Ibn al-'Arabi, Julian of Norwich, Maria Sabina, Martin Prechtel, Michael Harner, Oscar Ichazo, Romain Rolland, Shihäb al-Din al-Suhrawardi, Thomas Merton
Studying Connection
When one connects, one feels connected to "something more."
Freeman suggests that "mystical experience entails not only an encounter with the other... but also the sense that "this encountered Other is larger than me, or comes 'before' me, that it embodies a dimension of reality that is prior to the more mundane spheres ordinarily inhabited."[3]
Connection Tools
Notes
The benefits of connection: "...indigenous shamans worldwide know that spirit power is basic to one’s health, survival, and ability to heal others. Without this power, one is not resistant to illness or misfortune." [4]
"Religious experience, the mystic experience, the peak experience, and all paranormal experiences may have one thing in common. They are the encounters with consciousness as such..."[5]
Stace called mystical experience "a psychological fact of which there is abundant evidence." He further went on to say that, "To deny or doubt that it exists as a psychological fact is not a reputable opinion. It is ignorance and "very stupid." [6]
William Harmless in his study, Mystics (2008), quotes Gerson: “The saints use various names to describe these interior forms of experiential knowledge of God … They speak of contemplation, ecstasy, rapture, liquefaction, transformation, union, exultation. They talk of a jubilation beyond the spirit, of being taken into a divine darkness, of tasting God, of embracing the bridegroom, of kissing him, of being born of God, of obeying his word, of being brought into the divine cellars, of being drunk in a torrent of delight, of running into an odor of his perfumes, of hearing his voice, and entering into the bedroom, and of finding sleep and rest in peace in him”.[7]
The Western Catholic church has worked hard to contain connection within cloistered monastic walls, but according to Lossky,[8] mysticism and mystical experience, specifically union with God, has remained a more "in the open" goal of the Church, something even layman could achieve (p. 19).
Connection is important because, as William James says, they are the foundation from which religion emerges. As Bender notes, practitioners reassert and reinforce this basic "narrative," when they assert that is religious experience which drives them forward towards spiritual practice. [9]
John W. Nevin felt that Christianity was "grounded in the living union of the believer with the person of Christ." [10]
Connection is often (always?) initiated via an Intent to Connect of some sort.
Connection experiences are "pleasing in and of themselves, but they also have been said to eventuate in long term positive changes, such as increased creativity and insight; improved intellectual, emotional, perceptual, and physical functioning; a holistic perception of the world and the self; a sense of objective understanding and wisdom; a naturally arising moral and ethical sense; and an experience of inner peace and freedom" [11]
St. Teresa of Avila, a medieval mystic Christian Nun, felt that everybody could have mystical experiences. [12] Underhill notes everybody is capable of connection: "It is a natural human activity" requiring no special talent or ability.[13] Contemplative Consciousness
Connection leads to expansion of Consciousness into the body, i.e., increased Consciousness Quotient.
The LP Connection Framework provides guidance on how to prepare for and facilitate stronger Connection.
Awakening and improvements in Acknowledgment, Atonement, Alignment, Activation, and Ascension facilitate stronger connection.
Connections may be characterized along five Connection Axes.
Connection may be facilitated with Connection Supplements (where legal in your area) and Connection Practices
The opposite of Connection is Disconnection. Connection Supplements enable controlled and metered reconnection.
Think of connection in internet terms. Like your computer/device connects to a website 'server, so your little self connects to your Self, Highest Self, or some other monadic location in [The Fabric of Consciousness]]. Make sure you have the right "web" address before you connect.
Connection is the ostensible and overt goal of Authentic Spirituality.
The ability to connect with Consciousness is a natural ability of the Physical Unit. It is facilitated via proper Development of the Physical Unit, or when the physical unit is damaged, via the use of Connection Supplements designed to overcome the psychological and emotional damage of Toxic Socialization. In this regard, Huxley notes that the ability to connect (what he calls mystical union) is "as all the evidence seems to show, a state which man [sic], as man [sic], has always had it in his power to realize..." (PP). Further Connection (what Huxley refers to as "direct awareness of the 'eternally complete consciousness,') is a "possibility occasionally actualized by some human beings at almost any stage of their own personal development, from childhood to old age, and at any period of the race’s history."
Proper development of the physical unit includes a socialization process, satisfies all Seven Essential Needs, and that teaches, encourages, and facilitates Right Action, Right Thought, and Right Environment.
Connection is thwarted by Wrong Thought, Wrong Action, and Wrong Environment, all of which lead to Disjuncture, Disconnection, and Disconnection Pathology.
Connection may be visually represented with the Water Glass Metaphor.
Further Reading
Sosteric, Mike. (RSGAS). The Rocket Scientists' Guide to Authentic Spirituality. St. Albert, Alberta: Lightning Path.
Mike Sosteric Lightning Path Workbook One: The Basics. Lightning Path Press. https://www.patreon.com/posts/lp-workbooks-and-91290808
Lightning Path Workbook Two: Healing. Lightning Path Press. https://www.patreon.com/posts/lp-workbooks-and-91290808
Lightning Path Workbook Three: Connection. Lightning Path Press. https://www.patreon.com/posts/lp-workbooks-and-91290808
Citation and Legal
Treat the SpiritWiki as an open-access online monograph or structured textbook. You may freely use information in the SpiritWiki; however, attribution, citation, and/or direct linking are ethically required.
Footnotes
- ↑ Sosteric, Mike, and Ratkovic, Gina. Lightning Path Workbook One: Basic Concepts. Vol. 1. Lightning Path Workbook Series. St. Albert, Alberta: Lightning Path Press, 2016. https://press.lightningpath.org/product/the-lightning-path-book-one-authentic-spirituality/. You can read the chapter where the concept is introduced online here
- ↑ Sosteric. “Mysticism, Consciousness, Death.” Journal of Consciousness Exploration and Research 7, no. 11 (2016): 1099–1118. https://www.academia.edu/30527026/
- ↑ Freeman, M. “The Priority of the Other: Mysticism’s Challenge to the Legacy of the Self.” In Mysticism: A Variety of Psychological Perspectives, edited by Jacob A. Belzen and Antoon Geels, 213–34. New York: Rodopi, 2003. p. 213.
- ↑ Harner, Michael. Cave and Cosmos: Shamanic Encounters with Another Reality. Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books, 2013.
- ↑ Ramakrishna, K. Rao. “Some Reflections on Religion and Anomalies of Consciousness.” In Body, Mind, Spirit, 68–82. Charlottesville, VA: Hampton Roads, 1997. p. 80
- ↑ Stace, Walter Terence. Mysticism and Philosophy. London: Macmillan, 1960. https://wudhi.azurewebsites.net/mysticism/ws/wts-mp%20-%20index.htm. Also Stace, Walter Terence. The Teachings of the Mystics. New York: Mentor, 1960
- ↑ Harmless, William. Mystics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. p. 5
- ↑ Lossky, Vladimir. The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church. New York: St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2002.
- ↑ Bender, Courtney. The New Metaphysicals: Spirituality and the American Religious Imagination. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010.
- ↑ Quoted in Hewitt, Glenn A. Regeneration and Morality: A Study of Charles Finney, Charles Hodge, John W. Nevin, and Horace Bushnell. New York: Carlson Publishing, 1991.p. 101.
- ↑ Havens, R. A. “Approaching Cosmic Consciousnes via Hypnosis.” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 22, no. 1 (1982): 105–16.
- ↑ St. Teresa of Avila. Interior Castle. Kindle. New York: Dover Publications, 2007. https://amzn.to/2GpC7NG.
- ↑ Underhill, Evelyn. Mysticism: A Study in the Nature and Development of Spiritual Consciousness. New York: Dover Publications, 2002. https://amzn.to/2C91xNY.