3.  The Effort Scale

Figure 1 Consider how a well-developed self performs effortlessly, and it is these accomplishments most fondly remembered in various cultural histories.

This graph illustrates the existence of the self. We will discuss the scale from two perspectives: first, by looking at the effort needed to achieve results using the body, the mind, and the self, and second, by looking at the level of regard to which people hold these various efforts. We will use the need to lift a heavy weight to compare body and mind.

1.  Body

When using the body, lifting heavy objects takes a lot of effort, and we can’t move them far if at all. How high a regard do human beings hold the moving of a heavy object, with all the effort involved? What impact does the effort have on our quality of life? Using the body to accomplish various goals and objectives is usually characterized by two things:

a) Low regard. These goals (like lifting, pushing, throwing, running fast, running far, climbing, seeing, hearing, shouting, swimming, jumping or any physical thing the body can accomplish without tools) are of a limited value. We don’t hold the accomplishments of the body in very high regard, nor do we think these activities ultimately make a major contribution to the quality of human existence. They are all low on the scale of regard.

b) High effort. Most of the activities of the body are characterized by physical exertion, sweat, and strain, and they require the body to be in good shape. They are high on the scale of effort.

2.  Mind

We notice it takes less effort to apply the mind to the same activity. To move a heavy object, we developed the lever, the inclined plane, the wheel, the pulley, the crane, and cranes on wheels. Our mind enabled us to use a lot less effort to move heavy objects a lot farther. Does this impact the quality of the human condition? Using the mind to accomplish various goals and objectives is usually characterized by two things:

a) Medium regard. By using the mind, we have taken all the things the body can and can’t do (like fly, stay underwater for months, talk to someone thousands of miles away, see atoms, and the like) and developed tools that successfully enable the body to do them significantly better. Using the mind to develop tools is much higher on the scale of regard. We might claim that the quality of life has been improved by all the tools the mind has developed. Where would we be without airplanes or electron microscopes?

b) Less effort. Most activities associated with using the mind (like thinking, problem solving, predicting, learning languages, and mathematical computation) are characterized by less or no physical exertion, no sweat or strain. Advances such as cranes that can lift houses, high-speed trains and cars that can take us faster than our legs can, telephones and televisions that help us see and talk across the world, farm machinery that harvest an abundance of crops without breaking our backs, along with a million other inventions, are all examples of how the mind can be used to improve our quality of life. Higher regard, less effort.

Those who invented machines to supplement the strengths and weaknesses of the body, those who epitomize the use of the mind, are thought of with greater regard than those who exhibited physical power. We would like to emulate the success of inventors for the fame or fortune it might bring. Still, accomplishments such as developing the printing press (Johannes Gutenberg), electricity (Benjamin Franklin), the light bulb (Thomas Edison), penicillin (Louis Pasteur and Alexander Fleming), assembly lines for cars (RansomE. Olds and Henry Ford), flight (the Wright brothers), and the telephone (Antonio Meucci and Alexander Graham Bell), while improving the general quality of life for many of us, didn’t make us feel more human or closer and more loving toward other human beings.

I am arguing that — even though those who have invented those machines are thought of with high regard — comfort, ease, and even extended life are not synonymous with happiness and true satisfaction in life. Are we happier today? Do we have more inner peace and more satisfaction? Do we get and give more love? It is highly arguable that we are happier today, but if we want to make a case for that, we must ask, Is our happiness attributable to our use of the mind that created these tools?

The names of the people who conquered the world, who epitomize the use of physical force, such as Attila the Hun, Genghis Kahn, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, Adolf Hitler, and Joseph Stalin, are generally not held in positive high regard but in negative regard. These people did not make us feel more human or feel a closer connection to other beings.

3.  The Self

As impressive as the feats of the mind are, they still are not held in the highest regard by humanity. I am referring to the impact an act or invention has on the quality of our inner life — our happiness, our inner peace, our getting and giving love. The highest regard is reserved for accomplishments that seem to touch a part of us inside — touch our hearts, our souls positively and move us to feel happiness and joy. Accomplishments that make us feel more human, feel a closer connection to other beings, come from the full development of the self.

Using the self to accomplish various goal and objectives is usually characterized by two things:

a)  Highest regard. Using the self is usually characterized by a care and concern for the health, well-being, joy, peace, and satisfaction of other selves, not by sweat and strain or brainpower. When we consider Olympic gold medalists or the Nobel Peace Prize winners, it is easy to see who we admire the most. It is the people who win the Peace Prize. We sense that these people cared about us collectively and made our planet a more loving place to live. Just some of the people most attributed with this type of endeavor are Moses, Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King Jr. They are also the most revered and held in highest regard. Their actions brought us closer to feeling our own humanity and a human connection to others. The touching of another’s self is the greatest power on Earth and can move humanity in ways that physical force, even intellectual force, cannot. We call these individuals developed — that is, they have become aware, they have used their awareness to create a loving vision effectively, and they are unconditionally loving. Those are exactly the qualities we strive to develop within each person using the Continuum Theory.

b)  Lowest effort. Using a developed self is effortless. In using the body and mind, we can measure an effort output. It can leave us exhausted when we exert our bodies or our brains. When we use a developed self, there is no level of exertion. It comes from being — allowing ourselves to be. We are not using the body or mind in order to create more creature comforts or things. There is no sweat and strain or problem-solving involved. It takes work to develop the self. It takes work to develop the body and brain. But it takes effort when you use the body and brain. When you use the self, it has a quality of effortlessness.

A developed self is needed by human beings to achieve happiness, peace, and fulfillment in life. This cannot be accomplished by using body or mind alone.

4. Intuition, or the Inner Voice

Inner wisdom, sixth sense, discernment, inner voice, gut feeling, inner child — these are all terms we use to describe that sense we all have of something within us that is a source of guidance, awareness, and knowing that we either listen to or ignore. I believe it is worthwhile to look at what these universally accepted and used concepts may imply, based on experiential observation and inductive and deductive reasoning.

Hundreds of books have been written about all of these concepts. The constant references made to these concepts show a widely held belief in them. My explanation below, of why people believe in these concepts, is relevant to my theory of self. It will also give you more food for thought regarding their source, which I believe is the self.

Is it possible that all these refer to something calling to us from deep inside? Are there many separate entities inside each of us, or is it possible we are talking about the same thing? If it is the same thing, why do we insist on calling it so many different names? Why can’t we just agree on one name? And when we say “same thing,” do we mean “same source”? If we do, or if it is, what is that source of awareness, guidance, and knowing that we unintentionally experience?

We have all experienced a certain type of knowing that seems to have little to do with information we have obtained through reading, schooling, talking to friends, observing, or any past experiences we may have had. We meet a person we never met before. They are smiling and friendly, but somehow we just don’t feel comfortable. Very often this discomfort turns out to be valid, turns out to have real basis, when something negative happens. If we didn’t listen to that inner voice, we now realize we should have.

The business or social dealings you entered into (despite your gut feelings telling you not to) usually turned out to be a big mistake. Because I like people, I am also guilty of not having listened to that voice that said, “Something is not right.” I have ignored it (magnanimously, I thought — after all, I don’t know anything about these people, so why should I doubt them?), only to regret my decisions. Almost everyone I have ever spoken to has made similar mistakes of omission, having not listened to that voice from within.

What happened to a client a few years ago is something most of us are familiar with, and studies with twins corroborate this story.

One morning, she woke up and said she had the worst night of her life. Her head ached; she had not sleep all night. She felt there was something wrong with her daughter, who was going to school on the other coast. She called her immediately, and sure enough found her daughter crying. The daughter was very down and had had what she reported as the worst night of her life.

This instance is far from unique. As a matter of fact, it seems to be all too common.

We often explain this type of phenomenon by calling it a woman’s intuition (thereby indicating that men seem to have less of it), gut sense (a feeling we all seem to get in the pit of our stomachs), sixth sense, intuitive cognition, discernment, feeling, hunch, idea, impression, suspicion. Roget’s dictionary defines intuition as “the power to discern the true nature of a person or situation: insight, instinct.”⁽¹¹⁾

These terms and phrases are not based on one or two situations that one or two people experienced. They are based on an almost universal experience all people have shared from time immemorial. In mainstream human development and psychology circles, we tend to discount phenomena, we tend to discount phenomena we can’t explain. Interestingly, we don’t do that in other sciences — nuclear physics, astrophysics, biology, chemistry. Even if we can’t prove it, we note it as a reality of that science. Astrophysicists have noted certain ways light behaves in space, and instead of discounting it have posited general relativity and the existence of black holes.

If we want psychology, philosophy of psychology, and human development to be more scientific, can we discount phenomena just because we can’t see or explain it? I don’t believe we can.

Next, we must ask ourselves from where this information that we only feel comes. Our intuition cannot be explained by simply calling it coincidence. The only way to explain these instances of knowing

and connection is to simply admit that there must be a connection between people that we can’t explain, see, or touch . . . yet. From a strictly materialist point of view, where there was no wire or physical entity connecting two people, there was no connection, and the pain the mother experienced at the same time her daughter was experiencing was just coincidental. But that is simply being silly. For the sake of pretending to be scientific, we will deny the limits of our understanding regarding finding out what in fact does connect us and inform us. By denying, we stop our search for the answer.

Because these experiences are universal, I feel it would be scientifically more honest of us to posit an explanation — a black hole — and pursue a line of questioning and research that may answer it. Which is what I did.

So let’s get back to the theory. Because body and mind are electrical, quantum, vibrating energy fields, I believe the self is as well. We perceive the boundary of the body and we think that what we cannot contact, especially at great distances, we cannot know. The self, being an energetic vibrating quantum field, is not bound by the body. As such, it can connect with other selves, other energy fields, and have access to information, even from large distances.

In summary, our personal experience with the existence of intuition, inner wisdom, sixth sense, inner voice, gut feeling, inner child, and discernment all points directly to a source of knowing which I believe is the self.