Book Recommendations: Expanding Consciousness
Reading a good book is like installing good software -- we download new neural networks via concepts that shift our view of reality. In this age of endless scrolling and cheap junk food infotainment, I have been making a point to get back to reading.
I wanted to share some books that have been impactful in my life. I present an incomplete list of them to you here. May you be inspired and energized in your adventure of consciousness!
" Great men are they who see that spiritual is stronger than any material force; that thoughts rule the world" Ralph Waldo Emerson
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- The Holographic Universe by Michael Talbot
"If our universe is only a pale shadow of a deeper order, what else lies hidden, enfolded in the warp and weft of our reality? Bohm has a suggestion. According to our current understanding of physics, every region of space is awash with different kinds of fields composed of waves of varying lengths. Each wave always has at least some energy. When physicists calculate the minimum amount of energy a wave can possess, they find that every cubic centimeter of empty space contains more energy than the total energy of all the matter in the known universe."
This book comes to mind first when I think of paradigm shifting. It describes in great detail, with numerous examples, how the world is holographic in nature. It comes at the subject from a quantum physics lens but is still somehow easy to read- promise!
2. Power Vs Force: The Hidden Determinants of Human Behavior by David R Hawkins
"Force always moves against something, whereas power does not move against anything. Force is intrinsically incomplete, and therefore has to be constantly fed energy. Power is total and complete in and of itself and requires nothing from outside of itself. It makes no demands; it has no needs. Because force has an insatiable appetite, it constantly consumes. Power, in contrast, energizes, gives forth, supplies, and supports. Power gives life and energy. Force takes these away..."
This book gives a framework for understanding the spectrum of energy frequencies of life on earth (and probably beyond). The author very successfully quantifies the unquantifiable, giving us a famous chart you may have come across in your travels already. It is called the Map of Consciousness and I have found it to be a very valuable mental model for perceiving reality. The book is scientific and analytical but generally easy to read. The author says it raises your consciousness just by reading it and I think that is true.
3. Cutting Through Spiritual Materialism by Chogyam Trungpa
"The basic problem we seem to be facing is that we are too involved with trying to prove something, which is connected with paranoia and the feeling of poverty. When you are trying to prove or get something, you are not open anymore, you have to check everything, you have to arrange it "correctly". It is such a paranoid way to live and it really does not prove anything. One might set records in terms of numbers and quantities -- that we have built the greatest, the biggest, we have collected the most, the longest, the most gigantic. But who is going to remember the record when you are dead? Or in 100 years? Or in 10 years? Or in 10 minutes? The records that count are those of the given moment, of now - whether or not communication and openness are actually taking place now."
This book is one of the most refreshingly honest books on meditation and life in existence. It is the kind of book that you read when you are ready for it. I am so grateful I finally read it, and I will read it again. If you want to stop bullshitting yourself on the spiritual path, read this book.
4. Thought-Forms by Annie Besant + CW Leadbeater
"Each man travels through space enclosed within a case of his own building, surrounded by a mass of the forms created by his habitual thoughts, through this medium he looks out upon the world, and naturally he sees everything tinged with its predominant colors, and all rates of vibration which reach him from without are more or less modified by it rate. Thus until the man learns complete control of thought and feeling, he sees nothing as it really is, since all his observations must be made through this medium, which distorts and colors everything like badly-made glass."
Absorbing the main point of this book will fundamentally change and expand how you perceive reality. Thoughts are things! Thoughts have weight, shape, color -- thoughts have form. Knowing this, you will look at culture and your own mind through a new lens.
5. Egregores: The Occult Entities That Watch Over Human Destiny by Mark Stavish
"For those interested in the academic study of esotericism, the concept of egregores may simply be seen as a quaint relic of an earlier time, a holdover from our ancient past and therefore of little practical consequence. For those on the spiritual path, any spiritual path, being introduced to the concept of egregores is often a life-changing encounter. Instantly many old ideas -- and experiences -- are made clear, and a field of questions opens up before them. They re-examine their path in a new light and find that regardless of their being part of an organized group or a solo practitioner, large areas of their practice were under the indirect or direct influence of one or more psychic entities of which they were completely unaware."
An egregore is an autonomous psychic entity created by a collective group mind. This book explores this concept with many real life examples through history and present day. Reading this book gave me so much context for observing culture on all levels. Highly readable and valuable information.
6. The Mind: Its Projections and Multiple Facets by Yogi Bhajan, PhD
"I want to talk to you about your most important companion and its structure, the mind. Every human being that wants to excel and to develop the character and caliber that upholds the values of the soul needs a direct, fundamental relationship to the mind. You must have a basic practical understanding of the mind's conception, properties, Aspects, Projections, and 81 Facets. This is the minimum requirement to develop human sensitivity. So prepare yourself for an intense study. Not an intellectual debate, but an intelligent confrontation with your own experience."
This is another book you read when you are ready and can read many times over to receive different layers on different stages of the path. This book is comprised of transcripts of lectures, meditations and a chart which maps the 3 functional minds, 9 aspects, 27 projections and 81 facets of the mind. This book is life changing. When you realize the level of understanding the yogis have of the architecture of the mind, you can all of a sudden see how this knowledge is used by other parties against you. It is profoundly empowering to integrate this map of the mind in to your operating system so you can accelerate in to embodying whatever aspect you feel most called to. Furthermore, this book has meditations which can be used to balance and strengthen each of the 81 facets of the mind and so you actually have actionable tools beyond the intellectual frameworks. To have both detailed in one resource is rare.
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I hope this list inspires you to pick up some books and get lit. I plan on sharing some more favorite books in other genres, I already have my health and creativity books picked out to share with you soon!
