[PDF]Open Mind, Discriminating Mind: Reflections on Human Possibilities

OPEN MIND,
DISCRIMINATING MIND


ALSO BY CHARLES T. TART


Altered States of Consciousness: A Book of Readings
On Being Stoned: A Psychological Study of Marijuana Intoxication
Transpersonal Psychologies
States of Consciousness
The Application of Learning Theory to ESP Performance


Symposium on Consciousness (with P. Lee, R. Ornstein, D. Galin,
and A. Deikman)


Learning to Use Extrasensory Perception
Psi: Scientific Studies of the Psychic Realm


Mind at Large: Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers
Symposia on the Nature of Extrasensory Perception (with Harold
Puthoff and Russell Targ)


Waking Up: Overcoming the Obstacles to Human Potential


OPEN MIND,
DISCRIMINATING MIND


Reflections on Human Possibilities


CHARLES T. TART


1817
Harper & Row, Publishers, San Francisco


New York, Grand Rapids, Philadelphia, St. Louis
London, Singapore, Sydney, Tokyo, Toronto


OPEN MIND, DISCRIMINATING MIND: Reflections on Human Possibilities. Copyright
© 1989 by Charles T. Tart. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of
America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner
whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations
embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information address Harper &
Row, Publishers, Inc., 10 East 53rd Street, New York, NY 10022.


FIRST EDITION


Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data


Tart, Charles T., 1937-
Open mind, discriminating mind: reflections on human
possibilities / Charles T. Tart.—1st ed.
Pp» cm.
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
ISBN 0-06-250855-5
1. Transpersonal psychology. 2. Self-actualization (Psychology)
I. Title.
BF204.7.T37 1989
150-19—dc19 88-46008
CIP


89 90 91 92 93 KRUEG 10 9 8 765 43 2 1


My research and this book would not have been possible
without the generous aid of many people, including my stu-
dents; my wife, Judy; and Henry Rolfs of the Institute of Noetic
Sciences. I particularly want to acknowledge the love and sup-
port of my mother, Alma Tart, and the generous and selfless
contributions of my loyal assistant, Irene Segrest.


Contents


Introduction
Prologue: The King’s Son


Part 1: Dreams
1. Lucid Dreams: Entering the Inner World


2. Beyond the Dream: Lucid Dreams and Out-of-the-Body
Experiences


3. The Sun and the Shadow
4. Beginning Dream Yoga


ParT 2: Psychic Phenomena
5. Time: The Mystery Nobody Notices
6. Subtle Energies, Healing Energies
7. Subtle Energies: Life as the PK Target
8. ALB: The Misuse of ESP?
9. Firewalk

10. How to Use a Psychic Reading

11. Who’s Afraid of Psychic Powers? Me?


Part 3: Psychological Growth

12. Real Effort

13. Identification

14. The Game of Games

15. Aikido and the Concept of Ki


16. Living in Illusion


18


28
35


43
45
53
61
67
75


101


115
117
121
129
139
156


viii

17. Self-Observation

Part 4: Spiritual Growth

18. Selecting a Spiritual Path
19. Prayer


20. Altered States of Consciousness and the Search for
Enlightenment


21. Going Home
22. What We Believe In


23. Cultivating Compassion


Part 5: Meditation
24. Stray Thoughts on Meditation
25. Observations of a Meditation Practice


26. Meditation and Psychology: A Dialogue


Part 6: Death

27. Peace or Destruction?

28. A Dream of the Other Side

29. Altered States and the Survival of Death


Epilogue: The Tale of the Sands
Acknowledgments
Notes


Index


CONTENTS


165


175
177
182
190


208
214
224


243
245
265
279


317
319
323
333


361


363


365


379


Introduction


In 1987 my friend Jo Ann Norris, a founder and director of the Rim
Institute, Phoenix’s main growth center, called me to tell me about an
experience she knew I would appreciate:

One day Jo Ann’s four-year-old grandson Tabor lost a toy in her
house. Jo Ann and Tabor looked all over for it. Finally they saw it on
the living room rug.

As Jo Ann said, ”There it is,” and started toward it, Tabor suddenly
shouted, “Stop, Grandma! It might be an illusion!”

Taken aback, Jo Ann stopped. Then she asked Tabor how you can
tell whether something is an illusion or real. “You pick it up and shake
it,” replied Tabor. “If it’s still there after you shake it, it’s real, not an
illusion.”

"Where did you learn about real things and illusions?” asked Jo
Ann.

“In school.”

"In school?” asked Jo Ann, looking puzzled. Tabor was only four,
he didn’t go to school.

“Not regular school,” Tabor explained, “the school in my head.”

Grown-ups are so slow to get things sometimes.

This is an excellent allegory of the human situation. Many of the
things we desire and reach for in life are illusions. We need to learn
how to “pick up and shake” our ideas and attitudes, our concepts and
desires, so that we can distinguish the real from the unreal. We can
develop this inner wisdom by going to the school “in our heads.”


Closed Mind/Open Mind


When we think we already know everything important we stop
learning. When we stop learning we begin dying. I call this “the closed
mind.” How can you identify a closed mind? The closed mind:


INTRODUCTION


is insecure; the danger of new knowledge upsetting its balance
outweighs the joy of exercising curiosity

reinforces and guards the borders of the everyday world

takes either no risks or foolish ones

has forgotten the joy of using its powers, of testing its limits
flees from doubt in rigidity or fanatic belief, or poisons itself with
useless doubts

tries to control the universe too much from fear of mystery, and
so loses the marvel of existence

gives too much respect and power to authority and is emotionally
and inappropriately dependent on or rebellious to authority
wants approval from others rather than genuine feedback

gives too much power to the approval or disapproval of others
pursues pleasure at the expense of truth and avoids pain at the
expense of truth

has too much distrust of emotions as sources of information
fails to respect and maintain its body as a source of information
and joy


To learn how to discriminate truth from illusion—indeed to ex-
perience the joy of life—we have to dare and refresh an open mind.


The


open mind:


is curious

wonders what's beyond the everyday world

enjoys using its powers

enjoys testing its limits

respects authority but doesn’t take it too seriously or hesitate to
test it when it seems wrong

appreciates the feedback it gets from sharing its understanding
and experience with others, and takes that feedback as more in-
formation that may or may not help its understanding
recognizes its emotions as valid sources of information about real-
ity and itself, as well as possible sources of confusion
recognizes its body as a further source of information and joy,
and respects and maintains it well

recognizes its limits as current limits rather than absolutes

is willing to take calculated risks

cherishes and grows from its doubts

always takes its beliefs as working tools, not absolutes
appreciates living in a marvelous and mysterious universe


INTRODUCTION xi
Growing Beyond Our Present Limits


To be human is an incredible opportunity. We each have a creative
mind embodied in a fantastically engineered body, and we live in an
exciting, mysterious, alive world.

Although we live in a reality with laws of its own, our minds have
enormous powers to alter our perception of and reaction to that reality
and thus to strongly control the way we live in it. We have the potential
to live either in “heaven” or in “hell”—now, not later. Heaven is a
meaningful life with a touch of the eternal present that enlivens all.
Hell is pointless, stupid suffering. Yes, there are real problems in the
world, but the great tragedy of human life is that so many people waste
so much of their lives in useless suffering generated by their own
minds.

Modern psychological research has now detailed the long and ar-
duous “developmental” process we have all gone through in “growing
up.” In too many ways it squeezes out the light of life, inhibits our life
energy, and destroys the openness and the simple joy of being alive.
The result, as the philosopher and mystic G. I. Gurdjieff observed, is
that some of the “normal” people we see on the street are in fact the
walking dead, joyless automatons.'

Fortunately this deadening process is only partially effective for
most of us: That’s why I wrote this book and why you are interested
in reading it. A vital spark remains in us and we want it to grow. When
we enlarge our ideas of what we can be we create an opportunity to
grow beyond our present limits. Remember the four-minute mile? That
was considered “impossible” until one person ran it. Suddenly lots of
people discovered they could run it too—and faster.


_ The Waking Trance


This book is a collection of related essays from The Open Mind, a
periodical I published for four years. Publishing the periodical was part
of my own life experiment in staying open and learning new skills,
just as publishing this book is.” Both the periodical and this book were
written for people who want to keep questioning and expanding their
concepts about who they are and what their possibilities are. The in-
formation is intended as a partial antidote to the restrictive and nega-
tive views we are constantly given, which are reinforced i in us in the
course of contemporary life.

We are social animals. We want to be “normal,” to fit in with and


xii INTRODUCTION


be accepted by the people around us. Consequently we put ourselves
into a kind of “waking trance” in which we automatically give and
receive suggestions and orders to ourselves and others, and then we
believe them in order to “fit in.“ Many of these beliefs are depressing
when made clearly conscious: “Real happiness is a new car.” “God is
a stupid idea, long ago disproven by science.” “Get all the pleasure
you can now. Death is the end; you never know when it will get you.”
“Existence has no meaning, it’s all the mindless manifestation of phys-
ical laws and blind chance.” If you were conscious of suggestions like
these would you want to let them into the deeper parts of your mind,
to let them be the primary focus of your approach to life? Just to be
“normal”?


Exploring Human Possibilities


Although possessing the skills to be “normal” and handle the or-
dinary tasks of life skillfully is a necessary foundation for real growth,
I have never accepted the ordinary as the ultimate, and J have been
fortunate to find friends and colleagues who reinforced my vision with
their own explorations of human possibilities.

My interest about human possibilities began as a child, partly be-
cause I found the world so interesting, partly because of disturbing
experiences. Why did people hide their feelings and lie to each other?
Why was I sometimes punished when I expressed the way I felt? What
was love? Why were people, including me, sometimes cruel? And es-
pecially because of wonder: I can still recall awakening each morning
with the intellectual and emotional attitude, “Wow! Another day! I
wonder what fantastic things will happen today?”

Ordinary socialization processes made me more and more “nor-
mal,” however. By my early twenties I was overintellectualized and
emotionally constricted, a life-style that is, unfortunately, well suited
for a university professor. I had learned to awaken in the mornings
with the intellectual and superego-driven attitude of “What do I have
to accomplish today and what is the most efficient schedule for doing
it?” I was too busy, too filled with delusions of the importance of my
ego activity, to look around in wonder.

Yet the feelings of wonder and curiosity, and the belief that there
must be a better way than just “normal” for people to live, were always
in the background. My scientific career has always reflected these feel-
ings. I focused on such cutting-edge (and usually highly controversial)
areas as parapsychology, altered states of consciousness, hypnosis,


INTRODUCTION xiii


meditation, dreams, mind-body relationships, humanistic psychology,
and transpersonal psychology.

In sciences like physics or chemistry the personality and nature of
the physicist or chemist has almost no bearing on the discoveries made.
The force conveyed by a moving object hitting something is a product
of its mass and the rate at which you slow it down (deceleration), and
it doesn’t matter whether the physicist solving that particular equation
is a Nazi or a saint, a neurotic or a leader, a miser or a charitable
person. Many psychologists have long wished that psychology were
like that: an “objective” science independent of the human qualities of
researchers. Some of my earliest research showed me that, for better
or worse, this is seldom true: The researcher is usually an important
part of his or her psychological research.* Pretending you aren’t just
makes you more susceptible to fooling yourself, whether your “re-
search” is a formal project in a laboratory or an attempt to understand
your current life situation.

So while I have tried to understand and report on our possibilities
as objectively as possible, I have been deeply and personally involved
in many explorations. Take one human being, shake thoroughly with
repeated doses of encounter groups to loosen up feelings and remove
dogmatism, thoroughly massage and structurally integrate the physical
body with Rolfing to lessen physical blocks, occasionally remove both
the “top” and the “bottom” of the mind by participating in psychedelic
experiments, confront basic personality fixations with a variety of psy-
chological growth and therapy tools, stretch limits and toughen the
mind with scientific objectivity and Gurdjieffian self-observation tech-
niques, warmly nurture softer parts, mellow with basic Theravadan
Buddhist mindfulness and Tibetan Buddhist compassion meditations,
keep the body stretched and continually educated with Aikido practice,
remember that the growth “cooking” process is never finished, season
the whole process with a mixture of love, resistance, fear, stubborn-
ness, courage, and blessings, and you get . . . well, you get a lot of
the openness and curiosity of childhood back, combined with adult
skills, and much more.

This book is my way of sharing some excitement, some possibilities,
and some solutions to the human problems we all face in trying to
open our minds and hearts. My goal in each chapter is to stimulate
you to question your assumptions about yourself and to offer possi-
bilities for psychological and spiritual growth.

We will touch on many exciting ways to shake up our beliefs about
our limits. Part 1 is about recent exciting developments in dreaming,


xiv INTRODUCTION


including some ways to increase the quality of consciousness to make
dreams a time when we can explore our inner world. Psychic phe-
nomena also have the power to shake up our limited worldviews. Part
2 discusses some psychic possibilities from a variety of points of view.

Expanding the open parts of the mind is a matter of psychological
growth; we must open not just our intellect but our emotions, our
body, our spirit, our personal self, and our social self. Part 3 looks at
many facets of personal growth—our concepts of who we are, our
identities, the specific ways we can indeed live with closed minds in
a world of illusion.

In our materialistic culture it is easy to restrict our idea of growth
to personal growth, the ego’s growth. Such growth is vitally important
but many of us have never been too comfortable with this as an ulti-
mate limit. In Part 4, then, we will explore some ideas about spiritual
growth.

Ideas about psychological and spiritual growth are inspiring and are
necessary starting places, but what can we do in a practical way? The
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