How Not to Be a Crackpot

By George A. Boyd ©2023

Q: Why are there so many crazy, crackpot ideas that people believe in?

A: People believe in crackpot ideas—conspiracy theories and strange notions of pseudo-science, religion, and politics—because they are unable to verify what they believe. They will tell you they believe these things “on faith,” or because it is written in their scripture, or some person they regard as an authority has said it, or they got it as a revelation in an altered state of consciousness.

Verification is part of the discriminative aspect of the mind. When these inner “crap detectors” are working, they are going to deconstruct or correct these crazy notions. When these inner sentinels of the mind are sleeping or disengaged, people will drift into full crackpot mode.

What are these nodes of discernment in the mind?

  1. Sense perception – This constructs your “world picture”—what you see in your environment around you. Under normal conditions, this aspect of discernment will give you an accurate perception of what is in the space around your body and where your body is in relation to the objects around you. For example, you will recognize the stove and the dining room table in your house or apartment, and notice how far your body is from them.
  2. Reason – This is your reality-testing mechanism. It detects the truth or falsity of statements based on evidence. When people enter and remain in altered states of consciousness, this aspect of the mind shuts down, and people become susceptible to believing anything that is suggested to them. When reason is not operating, people are walking around in a hypnotic trance.
  3. Intellect – This is the part of your mind that can solve problems and model problems. To find out if something is true, you perform a test to see if the hypothesis you generate is likely correct, based on a statistical criterion you set. If your statistical test shows that something is likely true 95% out of 100%, you can deduce that it is probably true in most cases—while you can’t be entirely certain that you have proved your hypothesis, it looks like it is likely true. This is the method science uses to arrive at understanding of the world.
  4. Temple of Science – This is the collective repository of all of the tests and studies that have been done on any particular topic. When enough tests lend credence to a theory, scientific consensus accepts this as a current paradigm. For example, thousands of tests and observations have been done to verify the theory of evolution is likely correct.
  5. Illumined mind – When the Soul takes the Fourth Planetary Initiation, it fully awakens its Buddhic vehicle of consciousness. Through the heart and throat centers of this form, the Soul can detect the content of each nodal point the Soul has opened and of each Nadamic tone the spirit has purified. This generates discernment for the Way of the Soul and the Path of the spirit. Those that complete the Fourth Planetary Initiation affirm, “I am the Way and the Path.” This forms the foundation of spiritual discernment for the Planetary and Subtle bands of the Continuum.
  6. Interpenetrating Awareness – When a disciple awakens the Mahatma form on the Bridge Path, activating the medulla center of this form yields the highest discriminative awareness for all levels of the Continuum below this station on the Path. It gives instant knowledge for whatever information the disciple asks—this is like a powerful spiritual search engine that can access information about whatever spiritual topic the disciple wants to know.
  7. The Wisdom Mind of Satchitananda – In the heart center of the form of the ensouling entity of the seventh Transcendental Path, which we call Satchitananda, there is an intuitive switchboard that directly and objectively perceives the content of the mind for multiple parameters. These parameters are:
    • Knowledge of the element of earth
    • Knowledge of the element of water
    • Knowledge of the element of fire
    • Knowledge of the element of air
    • Knowledge of the element of Aether or space
    • Knowledge of the Experiential Mind, the field of memory for sense impressions and life events
    • Knowledge of Reason, the analytical and discriminative faculty
    • Knowledge of Ego (Ahamkar), the identification with the body, reason and life experiences
    • Knowledge of the Will, the principle of choice and arbiter of action
    • Knowledge of the Self: the field of the Knower, the instruments of Knowledge, and the Known
    • Knowledge of the Mythic Nucleus of Wisdom of the Subtle Realm
    • Knowledge of the Creative Nucleus of Power, the Soul of the Planetary Realm
    • Knowledge of the Omniscient Nucleus, the Monad of the Transplanetary Realm
    • Knowledge of the Compassionate Nucleus, the Astral Soul of the Cosmic Sphere
    • Knowledge of Omnipresent Nucleus, the Supracosmic Soul of the Supracosmic Sphere
    • Knowledge of the Omnipotent Nucleus, the Soul of the Bridge Path
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Violet Ray of Creation, T1
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Rose-Saffron Ray of Creation, T2
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Emerald Green Ray of Creation, T3
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Golden Yellow Ray of Creation, T4
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Royal Blue Ray of Creation, T5
    • Knowledge of the Path of the Rainbow Ray of Creation, T6
    • Knowledge of the Eternal Path of the Primal White Light Ray of Creation, T7
    • Knowledge of the Essence of Satchitananda

Nodes one through four comprise our personal and societal aspects of discernment; spiritual discernment arises from nodes five through seven. In the Subtle Realm—particularly the Lower Astral Plane—and the Psychic Realm, and the First and Second Planetary Initiations, sojourners through these realms do not have a touchstone to verify their experiences.

Much is constructed from the gossamer threads of belief and the tendrils of faith, and reliance on the veracity of sources from whom they learn these beliefs. Until they are able to subject these beliefs to the bright light of discernment, they will cling to these beliefs despite any verification they are true. Consequently, they gently drift into the intoxicating world of the crackpot.

The Boyd Crackpot Scale

We can characterize seven different levels of drift into crackpot mind:

  1. The individual is mostly sane, but harbors odd ideas about one to three topics.
  2. The individual continues to maintain relative sanity, but has odd ideas for four to ten topics
  3. The individual begins to shift from a rational stance to conviction about his or her beliefs, which cannot be verified; more than ten odd ideas make up his or her constellation of irrational beliefs. Those initially exposed to religious or political ideas may move into this posture. Here the conviction is not complete—the individual may be persuadable at this level to come back to reality, and may have some openness to examining his or her beliefs.
  4. The individual begins to rationalize and defend his or her irrational beliefs, and rejects evidence to the contrary; at this level, an individual has become immersed in a conspiracy theory or a system of pseudo-science, political, or religious beliefs. At this level, the individual will likely push back on any attempts to dissuade him or her of the fallacy of his or her beliefs—and he or she is “locked in” to the conspiracy theory at this stage.
  5. The individual begins to believe he or she is under attack or is persecuted for holding his or her beliefs. At this level, he or she begins to adopt paranoid ideation. Those for whom suspicion and mistrust begin to pervade their view of the world may develop a paranoid personality disorder.
  6. The individual’s beliefs start to condition his or her behavior, and he or she begins to act strangely in most situations. At this level, the individual may enter into schizotypal personality disorder.
  7. The individual’s beliefs become bizarre and delusional. He or she may hear voices that tell him or her weird things; he or she may hold beliefs that are totally irrational. At this stage, the individual has migrated into paranoid schizophrenia.

Your beloved, eccentric uncle or aunt—substitute whatever relative, friend, or co-worker that is in your life that demonstrates eccentricity—who has some odd ideas, is likely operating at level one or two.

People begin to drift away from reality at level three and four. These are the people in your life that are caught up in conspiracy theories, or have come to believe in the odd notions of pseudo-science, or have been convinced to believe in a religious or political ideology. Also, people that become involved in religious cults, or hate and terrorist groups operate at these levels.

At levels five through seven, the eccentric person in your life has begun to exhibit mental illness. These individuals need professional help—unfortunately, many of them are beyond the reach of even the most skillful interventions of mental health professionals. They will remain in the upper crackpot worlds, oblivious to rationality and reality, and will abide in these states until death liberates them from this continual hypnotic trance—or until their inner illumination ignites, to dispel the lies and delusions they have come to believe.

You can avoid becoming a crackpot through subjecting your beliefs to your personal and spiritual discernment faculties, and by not simply believing in ideas that you cannot verify. Start with the foundation of what you can verify:

  • Listen to the voice of wisdom within you.
  • Apply the criteria for discerning truth.
  • Hold any ideas you cannot verify as unproven hypothesis.
  • Analyze the reasoning that underlies claims and conjectures. If it is flawed, reject it.
  • Exercise critical thinking. Do not accept ideas without fully vetting them.
  • When your Illumined Mind begins to operate, allow it to reveal what is actually there in the inner worlds and not what imagination and magical thinking constructs.
  • Verify your intuitive impressions through examining them with the direct perception of your attentional principle.

If you will develop wisdom and discernment, you will steer clear of the pitfalls of crackpot mind.

What Is Illumination?

By George A. Boyd ©2023

Q: Spiritual groups talk about Illumination. What is Illumination?

A: When we examine the activation of the intuitive thread, the Antakarana, we note several different levels of heightened intelligence and intuition along this cord that connects the brain with the Soul:

  1. Intellectual brilliance – This is quick application of intellectual problem solving strategies. This operates in the Metaconscious mind.
  2. Creative association – This finds novel associations between ideas, and alternate perspectives for viewing phenomena. This is used in art, creative writing, and invention. This level operates in the Abstract Mind Plane.
  3. Intuitive sciences – This uses an symbolic array like Tarot cards or astrology to tease out meaning and insight in a structured Psychic Reading. This level draws from the Psychic Realm.
  4. Revelation – This seeks to interpret the symbolic and archetypal material in scriptures and Mystery School teachings. This level can be found in the First Exoteric, Mesoteric, and Esoteric Planetary Initiations.
  5. Synthesis – This ties together mental functions to create a big picture, which allows comprehensive understanding. This level is activated in the Third Planetary Initiation.
  6. Illumined insight – This is the downpour of knowledge of the Illumined Mind or Buddhi. When this dawns on the mind in the state of Samadhi, the inner teacher within awakens. Those taking the Fourth Planetary Initiation directly awaken their Illumined Mind.
  7. Jnana Shakti – This Ray of Light Fire awakens the intuitive stream (Antakarana) and reveals the insights embedded along this thread. Those who have activated their Monad and have been empowered at this level can send this Ray to awaken the Antakarana.

Illumination occurs when there is activation of the Buddhi at level six. Masters and their advanced disciples have the ability to activate Jnana Shakti to stimulate the innate Illumination that dwells within the Soul.

We train people to access their intuitive thread in the Jnana Yoga section of our intermediate classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.

The Six Levels of the Mind Beyond the Brain

By George A. Boyd ©2017

Our modern scientific worldview identifies the mind with the brain. There are, however, six additional orders of mind that dwell beyond this neural surface of cognition. These seven layers of the mind are shown below.

  1. In the waking state of awareness, it appears the mind is the activity of the brain. This is the empirical viewpoint that modern Science holds.
  2. In the next octave of cognition, you activate the astral brain. When this occurs, you become capable of lucid dreaming. Your imagination is enhanced. You are able to do astral travel and remote viewing. You can produce voluntary hypnotic phenomena through giving suggestions to your astral body. You can learn to perform psychic or impressional readings, which gather information not accessible through the physical senses. You become aware of other beings in their astral bodies and of the Astral Planes or worlds of dimension.
  3. At the next octave, you become aware of the lighted area of human consciousness embedded in the matrix of the unconscious mind. You become aware of distinct forms or vehicles of consciousness that have discrete functions that they carry out. You may begin to have experiences of the Kundalini awakening the etheric chakras. You may obtain glimpses of your Higher Self in peak experiences.
  4. At the next order of mind, you become aware that you are attention—a ball of mind-stuff—that observes the activity of the mind and the content of these vehicles of consciousness. You become aware of the thread of consciousness that allows your attention to travel through a series of focal points to deeper bands of the mind. You become capable of mindfulness and contemplation at this stage.
  5. When you move to the next level, you become aware of the Self, which integrates and coordinates the activity of all of the levels of your Conscious, Subconscious, and Metaconscious mind. You discover your volition, which enables you to take charge of your life and create your personal destiny. This is the stage of personal empowerment.
  6. Once you awaken your Superconscious mind, you become aware of the vehicles of consciousness that your Soul has activated. You rise into the vast vista of you your Soul’s consciousness, which grants intuitive knowledge about the vehicles of consciousness you have opened and the bands of the Continuum in which they dwell. It also stirs the unconditional love of the Soul, and the love and devotion of your spirit. It animates the higher abilities of your Soul at each stage of the Superconscious mind that you have opened.
  7. When your mind fully awakens, you realize the essential nature of your Soul and your Illumined Mind becomes fully active. This grants wisdom, understanding, highest discernment, the ability to become aware of every level of the mind (mandalic reasoning), and bestows Gnosis—where the Soul realizes its own true nature.

You normally experience the mind as the brain when your attention dwells in the waking state of awareness. At this level, habit largely governs your functioning.

The astral mind operates during the states of sleep, hypnosis, anesthesia and intoxication, and astral projection. Most people experience this state through dreaming, but have little control over their experience.

You typically tap into the etheric mental helix during deep sleep, when your attention is drawn deep into the unconscious mind. The causal body operates in this state: it consolidates your daily experiences into long-term memory and sets into motion the regenerating and recharging processes of deep sleep. You may also tap into this matrix if you practice hatha yoga, martial arts, or breathing meditations, or if you do exercises to awaken your Kundalini.

The state of inner alertness or mindfulness occurs when you collect your attention and become present at the entrance to the thread of consciousness that travels through all vehicles of the mind. This is the gateway to meditation.

Centering techniques enable you to unite your attention with the Self. This activates the entire personality, and enables your Self to operate its vehicles of consciousness at full efficiency.

You reach into the Superconscious mind through uniting your attention with your intentional consciousness, which we call the attentional principle, through the practice of Raja Yoga. You can learn to raise the Kundalini through the higher vehicles of consciousness of the Superconscious mind and stir then into full activity.

Through the practice of intuitive meditation, Jnana Yoga, you gain discernment and Gnosis. When you achieve the state of Superconscious Illumination, which is called Samadhi, you fully activate your Illumined Mind, which teaches you about the mysteries of the Soul and about matter, energy, mind, and consciousness.

We introduce you to your vehicles of consciousness, traveling along the thread of consciousness, and activating the Self—levels three through five—in our beginning meditation class, the Introduction to Meditation Program. We teach you how to access and awaken levels four through seven in our intermediate classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.

We encourage aspirants to familiarize themselves with these deeper layers of the mind beyond the physical brain. Meditation is the master key to unlock these other zones of the mind veiled to this surface mind of the cerebral cortex. We invite you to learn how to meditate with us, to transcend your brain, and experience these other six levels of the mind.

Reflections on Levels of Thought

By George A. Boyd © 2018

Q: There are certain coaches, eastern Gurus, and New Age teachers who state that there is no thinker, that thoughts “arise by themselves,” and that thoughts are a false story that veils the truth of our inner Divinity and perfection. Can you shed some light on this?

A: If you hold your attention in certain altered states of consciousness, this appears to be true. You have to keep your attention fixed in this altered state of consciousness, however, to maintain this perspective.

For this reason, these exponents of this view advocate that people do continual inquiries or process meditations, or keep their mind fixed or absorbed in this “enlightened” state. They may teach a number of techniques to keep you merged in this state, or they may have one key method to bring about this state of awareness.

If you simply notice the layers of thoughts you experience, you may discover that there are several different bands of thinking, some of which directly impact human life and others that transcend it and view it from a detached perspective. These 16 major platforms of thought are shown below.

Levels of Thought Directly Impacting Human Life

  1. Stimuli – These are thoughts that your contact with objects in the environment generates. They typically remind you of things you want or things you need to do.
  2. Reactions – These are emotionally laden thoughts that events or things people say trigger in you. These are your issues or “buttons” that express as upset, rage, sadness, or terror.
  3. Dreams or fantasies – This is where you imagine what you want to do, be, or have in your life.
  4. Logic – This is the activity of reason, which operates like a computer—making the calculations for your behavior, analyzing probable outcomes, and assessing the truth or falsity of statements. This aspect of your mind is responsible for reality testing.
  5. Schemas – These are associated thoughts that you organize into categories. These are integrated within the role identities of your ego. For example, if you are a bowler, you have all bowling-related thoughts compartmentalized within the capsule of your “I am a bowler” role.
  6. Task oriented thoughts – This is the activity of your concrete mind, which plans, schedules, identifies key points, and steps to completion of a project.
  7. Conceptual thought – These comprise the problem-solving and conceptual reflection functions of the intellect. You use these intellect’s cognitive strategies to learn, solve problems, and explore ideas.
  8. Emergent thought – These are mental impressions that arise within the present time, which come into conscious awareness—they seem to arise independently from the “thinker.” These enter the Conscious mind through the preconscious portal. They enter the Metaconscious mind in the state of being, where it seems that behavior and decisions happen spontaneously. They arise in the Superconscious mind in the wave of the present time on the Akashic Aether—the Soul’s thought and intention enters human life at this stage. Many process meditation groups, coaches, and metaphysical teachers consider union with the wave of the present time to be the state of enlightenment.

Levels of Thought that Do Not Directly Impact Human Life

  1. Psychic impressions – These images and ideas become impressed on conscious awareness. They arise from your vehicle of consciousness on the Psychic Plane, or they may be channeled from guides or spiritual beings from this Plenum. Typically, you need to enter into an altered state of consciousness—through hypnosis or meditation—to become aware of these thoughts
  2. Voice of wisdom – This marks the emergence of the teacher within, which gives you guidance for your life and answers your questions. This arises from your form on the Wisdom Plane. Your mind has to be silent and receptive to receive this thought stream.
  3. Inspired thoughts – These are revealed truths and insights that arise from your revelatory mind and from the Holy Spirit. You contact this level through contemplating the nucleus of identity of the First Planetary Initiation, the Moon Soul or Christ Child.
  4. Voice of the Mighty I AM Presence – These are decrees that you speak aloud or you hear as “power thoughts” that arise from the Mighty I AM Presence in your form on the Second Planetary Initiation. You must raise your attention to this level to be aware of this thought stream.
  5. Thought ministry – These are the higher mental activities that operate in your Manasic Vortex in the Third Planetary Initiation. These activities include contemplation of seed thoughts, visualizing blueprints for projects and organizations, creating mental synthesis and synergistic cooperation between people, actualizing the gifts of the Soul, enacting Soul Purpose, receiving intuitive guidance from the Masters of the Planetary Hierarchy, and participating in thought ministry through reception and transmission.
  6. Illumined mind – This downpour of intuitive knowledge arises from the Illumined Mind or Buddhi from your vehicle of consciousness in the Fourth Planetary Initiation. It purifies your attitude, reveals truths, uproots ignorance and superstition, shows the content of your vehicles of consciousness and the inner Planes, awakens the abilities of your forms in the Superconscious mind, guides your spirit and attentional principle on the inner Planes, and brings remembrance of your Soul’s essential nature.
  7. Attunement – This is the channeled Light from the Divine Spirit that purifies the inner vehicles of consciousness; promotes physical, etheric, and emotional healing; counsels and guides the attentional principle and spirit; awakens revelation and illumination; and bestows initiation to unfold the spiritual evolutionary potentials of the Soul.
  8. Samadhi – This is the direct, wordless experience of the Soul beyond thought. This confers Soul Realization and Gnosis.

Those that seek to put you into the state of enlightenment will typically ask you to attend to the upwelling of emergent thought in the wave of the present time (level 8). In this state of consciousness, it appears that thoughts arise without a self or a thinker—and that life is just unfolding on its own and the “mind” and its stories are just an overlay upon that perfect state of being.

We suggest it is important for you to become aware of each of the layers of thought and how they impact your life, or how they enable you to view your life from a detached, higher perspective. While it may be productive to do certain aspects of spiritual work from the wave of the present time on the Akashic Aether, we do not recommend that aspirants maintain that state of awareness beyond the time required to perform their process, inquiry, or contemplation; instead, they should ensure they return their attention to their fully grounded awareness again after their meditational inner work is completed.

Those of you who are interested in learning how to access these many layers of thought can acquire specific techniques that allow you to do so in our intermediate meditation programs: the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.

How You Can Become Illumined and Enlightened

By George A. Boyd ©2018

Q: What is Illumination? How do I become enlightened?

A: To understand how you do this, you need to understand something about the levels of mental functioning. To become enlightened, you have to move your attention to the core of your mind and unite with your Soul. But before you do this, you have to move through the other strata of mental functioning. So beyond the firing of neurons in your brain that instruments can measure, there are seven additional layers of mental functioning:

  1. Reason – At this level of the Conscious mind, the faculty of reason enables you to use analysis, deductive and analogical reasoning. With your reason, you are able to “test reality” to detect if a statement is true or false. You use this level of the mind when you investigate something or gather evidence to prove or disprove a hypothesis.
  2. Intellect – At this level of the Metaconscious mind, you are able to utilize problem-solving strategies to arrive at a solution to a problem. The intellect is capable of inductive, dialectical, and synthetic reasoning.Reflective and Receptive meditation – When you activate this connection to your Soul through the intuitive thread (Antakarana), you can ask the Soul questions and receive answers. So if you ask your Soul, “What is the purpose I am alive?” The Soul will give you an answer if this cord that connects your intellect with the Soul is functioning. You can also “sit in the silence” and passively receive guidance from your Soul through Receptive meditation.
  3. Psychic intuition – This type of knowing operates in your vehicle of consciousness in the Psychic Realm. Depending on your state of spiritual evolutionary development, this aspect of intuitive knowing allows you to read the “ethers”—the chemical ether (comprising molecules, atoms, and the subatomic unified field), the information ether, the resonance ether, the life force ether, the desire ether (e.g., the Law of Attraction), the thought form ether, and yet higher ethers up to the presence of the Soul. This form of knowing allows you to gather information about other people, so you can do “psychic readings.”
  4. Revelatory intuition – This type of knowing begins to operate in the First Planetary Initiation. It ostensibly reveals the meaning of scriptures, gives correspondences to metaphysical ideas, and constructs a philosophical framework through which you can understand the world. With sufficient acquisition of this knowledge from this source, you can begin to teach and counsel others about metaphysics and spiritual subjects.
  5. Illumined Mind downpour of knowledge – This aspect of the mind functions when you awaken the “Buddhic capsule,” the inmost mental stratum around your Soul. You can awaken this capsule through deep Raja Yoga or Kundalini meditation. When it is activated, there is a continuous downpour of intuitive knowledge, which shows you the content of every level of the mind, and reveals the Soul at the core of the Superconscious mind. This igniting of this deepest aspect of the mind is called Illumination or Samadhi. The discerning wisdom that operates at this level of the mind is called mandalic reasoning.
  6. Gnosis – This state dawns on the mind when you know the Soul from the Soul’s perspective. In Gnosis, you become the Soul. This state is also called Enlightenment.

Most people are familiar with layers 1 and 2—you use them at school and at work. Some people can also access layer 3, so they are able to ask a question to their Soul, and the Soul will give them guidance.

Usually people begin to tap into layer 4 when their Soul journeys onto the Psychic Realm; layer 5 appears when the Soul enters the First Planetary Initiation; and layer 6 dawns with the Soul takes the Fourth Planetary Initiation and it migrates onto the Buddhic Plane. There are spiritual practices that can enable people to prematurely activate layers 4 and 5—this typically results in distorted and confused information being disseminated.

You can learn ways to safely activate layers 3 to 6 in our intermediate meditation classes, in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program. We explore the deeper aspects of gaining illumination (layer 6) and experiencing Gnosis (layer 7) in the Mudrashram® Advanced Course in Meditation.

We encourage you to acquire techniques from intuitive meditation (Jnana Yoga), so you can begin to access the deeper layers of your mental functioning. We teach these techniques in our intermediate and advanced classes to help you reach the states of Illumination and Gnosis.