Subject Vs. Witness

 

Having studied many different religions and philosophies for many years, I’ve landed on the meaning of Life: it is Joy.

And, after considering Joy and its benefits, I’ve found that Love is the only pathway to that particular prize.

Before I go further with this thought, I want to point out a common problem: most people tend to accomplish what they are most mindful of.

Why is that a problem?

It’s because we often focus on the wrong things. When I say “mindful,” I don’t mean that our dreams will necessarily come true; more likely, the things we don’t want will manifest instead.

In the ancient story of Job, we should consider his own words:

“The thing I feared came upon me. I was not safe, I had no rest, I was not quiet, yet trouble came anyway.” ~ Job 3:25, 26 (MCV)

There is a backstory that explains why these things happened to Job, but I think his own fearful thinking may have primed him for such a fate.

Your own, wonderful, human imagination is the vehicle that will take you toward fulfillment. This doesn’t mean you’ll get everything you desire, but more likely, your world will unfold right before your eyes in the way you expect it to.

Our mind is a thought-generator, and the thoughts we have are often guesses. As we sense the world around us, our mind uses experience to predict everything we perceive. As a result, we’re not just sensing the world and then sorting it out; we’re constantly pre-sorting everything we experience in real-time.

This means exactly what it implies: our expectations harden into fact during—not after—our observations.

There’s scientific evidence to support this, though I won’t try to explain what I don’t fully understand. Instead, I encourage you to consider words more commonly used in the scientific community and see if they resonate with your own experience.

One such word is superposition. In physics, it refers to the coexistence of multiple potential outcomes before we observe a particular event.

I don’t think it’s a stretch to suggest that our futures exist in a state of superposition. Until we observe the world around us, it has the potential to be one way or another. The other crucial component to understanding phenomena is the subject—the observer who shapes and is shaped by their perception.

This brings me to prehension. The term comes from the Latin word prehendere, meaning “to grasp” or “to seize.” Prehension refers to the way we take hold of our thoughts and experiences. But it’s more than just grasping; it’s the act of shaping how we interact with the world.

For example, when we experience something, we don’t passively observe it. We actively seize it, adding our own interpretations and expectations. It’s like a prisoner grasping the bars of their cell. Our thoughts are like prisoners, and prehension is how we hold them in place—how we shape our reality by holding onto specific thoughts and beliefs.

Zechariah briefly mentions the concept of “prisoners of hope,” and I find that idea especially helpful.

Before I drift too far—because I often do—I want to mention a few more words related to prehension: comprehension and apprehension.

•             Comprehension means putting everything together in order to take hold of it.

•             Apprehension adds memories of prior experiences to what we’re grasping.

If I haven’t already lost you, I’ll now attempt to tie all of this together in a comprehensive way.

“You’ve always had the power, my dear.” ~ Glinda, The Good Witch, The Wizard of Oz.

Near the end of every scene in our life stories, we often realize that many of the detours were unnecessary.

This is why, in the beginning of this chapter, I mentioned Love. The best-kept secret in the universe is that Joy is the ultimate object of the game, and that the only way to discover Joy is through your own lovely thinking.

“Think only on lovely things.” ~ Philippians 4:8 (Zipped MCV)

Our thoughts share space with our expectations. As we perceive the world around us, we see a version of it that has been shaped by our prior expectations. As creative observers, we experience the world based on the thoughts we’ve seized and locked in place. Our thoughts and beliefs alter the potential of what could be, transforming it into something concrete. Therefore, thinking on lovely things is a very good idea indeed.

I may have taken a long road to get here, but it was always my intention to make this simple and not difficult.

In summary, I’ll say this: We’ve heard of brain cells, so let’s use that as a metaphor. You are the keeper of your own prison—take hold of only good thoughts. When you set these captives free, a better world will always emerge. This is a case of Subject vs. Witness, where the witness has evidence relative to the case, while the subject may very well be involved. In this case, you are both the subject and the witness. Experience is the objectification of the phenomenal world, witnessed by the subject, who is evidently involved.

Perhaps I need to summarize this further:

Lock love into every cell of your own imagination.