Nathaniel Branden - The Art of Living Consciously: The Power of Awareness to Transform Everyday Life

A fem months after completing my previous book, "Taking Responsibility," I was at a dinner party, and someone asked me what I was going to write on next. I answered that I was about to embark on a book that would examine what it means to live consciously.

An older woman, her face lined with bitterness, frowned and shook her head disapprovingly. "Live consciously?" she said. "Not a good idea. Who would want to live consciously? Life would be too painful."

I asked, "Is it less painful if we live unconsciously and mechanically, without knowing what we are doing, and blind to opportunities to make things better?" But she did not answer.

Being a child can be very difficult. One commonly witnesses adult behaviour that is frightening, bewildering, inexplicable. One cannot make sense of it. Confidence in one's mind may be subverted. One's sense of reality may be undercut. Consciousness may be experienced as futile or even dangerous.

Rebecca L. was a thirty-nine-year-old leader of personal growth workshops. She saw herself as a person who was on a spiritual path and who had attained a high level of consciousness, yet as she was oblivious to the wreckage she had created in her family life. Her lofty view of herself was based on the fact that she was a student of the I Ching, took classes in Tantric Yoga, immersed herself in the litterature of the contemplative traditions, and had had thirteen years of Jungian analysis. She subjected her two teenage daughters to endless hours of psychological interpretations of their beahavior. At dinner she would invite her husband to tell his dreams, which she would then proceed to analyze. If any of her interpretations were challenged, she would respond with gentle compassion; if the challenge persisted, she became first irritated and then increasingly angry--until everyone retreated into sullen exhaustion. She could quote interminably from many spiritual masters and had no idea that in the privacy of their bedroom her daughters would sometimes talk about how pleasent life would be if only Mother would die. Her husband did not appear to indulge in daydreams; he merely barricaded himself behind his work and spent as little time alone with her as possible.

Inside their minds a deeper question struggles inartiqulately but is never asked: How am I to live in your world?


Sometimes, when we reflect on our life and on the mistakes we have made and regretted, it seems to us we were sleeping when we imagined we were awake. We wonder how we could have failed to see that which now stands out in such bold relief. Of course, this may be self-deceiving, in that hindsight always sees more clearly. At that earlier time, we may have been as conscious as we knew how to be.

However, sometimes our sense of having been sleepwalking through our existence reflects an accurate assessment. We know we were not mindful when we needed to be. Our awareness was diffuse or distracted rather than focused and disciplined. No doubt there were reasons, but reasons do not alter facts. In retrospect, we wish we had been more conscious.

http://isbn.nu/9780684810843

A conversation with Ken Wilber: www.nathanielbranden.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=22_27&products_id=102


Nathaniel Branden - Taking Responsibility: Self-Reliance and the Accountable Life

Dr. Branden provides a guide to self-realization through self-reliance and offers a vision of a society transformed by a new ethical individualism.

http://isbn.nu/9780684810836

www.nathanielbranden.com - www.libertariantv.com - www.en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Branden