Pictures on a Screen
The objective world appears so convincing and hypnotically alluring that few people ever question its reality. The whole production of life works in the same way as a camera projects a film onto a movie screen. In fact, life on earth is the greatest movie ever made and one that’s set to run for an eternity of time.
The creative process is a remarkable feat of genius. Sensory perceptions are projected onto the screen of sense which, not unlike the film projector, is dependent on light as its creative source. Beginning in eternity, the idea of existence is beamed through the gradations of the psyche into the sensory world. This spiritual light is infused with the energetic idea of the earth and represented by the billions of cells within the human brain, each having the potential to manifest as a particular life form.
So what gives the sense of motion in the world? This is achieved in the same way that early cartoon animators created the impression of movement when the separate images were run in a sequence. Similarly, the brain converts each frame of existence into a seamless motion of images with a minute adjustment after every last frame. This is retained as an impression in sense, giving the appearance of continuity within the projection of the world.
What’s often cited by some spiritual teachers is that the world’s an illusion and so everyone is free. If this were so, nobody would ever suffer again from the negative demands of their emotional self. Moreoever, when someone is riddled with disease and in severe physical pain, it’s certainly no illusion to them. An illusion appears in the mind of the observer, not in the actuality of the world where we must all strive within the projection to overcome the challenges and trauma of living.
The world of actuality differs from the realm of reality. Actuality relates to life on earth within the projection in sense. Reality is an unalterable state of being out of existence. Together, both worlds combine as the potential of our entire life experience. This amazing two-way system of inner and outer realities functions within the evolutionary imperative as the cyclic process of life and death. The reality of us all is far more enduring than our transitory life span on the sensory earth. Human beings are not just persons with a name or occupation, but universal life resonating at a terrestrial frequency suitable for sensory perception.
The film in our vehicles that projects our own movie is our self-made nature being lived out in the present. When the film ends, the body dies – but then there’s always the sequel. The idea in the spiritual life is to break the need to be a player in the ever-running movie of life to realise completion as freedom from time and the need to exist.