Holographic Self-Witnessing in the Holomovement

The film “My Octopus Teacher” brought the work of diver and See Change Project co-founder, Craig Foster, to the attention of a wide public. His relationship with an octopus brought a new dimension to our understanding of these mollusks.

In a recent NY Times article, Foster describes a recent incident in which an octopus actually “mugged” him underwater and not only stole his camera, but turned it on him and filmed Foster pursuing her. He writes: “The intriguing images she captured … had a profound effect on me. After many years filming octopuses, …for the first time I was seeing the world—and myself—from her perspective.”

In many ways, there is nothing more effective for personal growth than seeing ourselves through a new lens, or from the viewpoint of others.  

Actor and author Rainn Wilson, in his most recent book “Soul Boom,” imagines another rather humorous way of witnessing ourselves through the thoughts of aliens watching us from afar. Wilson writes:  “I find the idea of looking at humanity through an alien lens to be infinitely refreshing. If one pictures a more advanced life form monitoring our news and media, … it opens up a whole new say of visualizing our preposterously misguided and backward ways.”

If we could just see ourselves from someone else’s eyes, whether an octopus or alien, it does indeed give rise to a more humble and down-to-earth perspective of who we really are.  

Transformation Begins by Self-Witnessing

It could be said that this trend towards self-witnessing was to some degree set in motion with the landmark conscious film “What the Bleep Do We Know.” Released in 2004, this movie tracked the comments of mystics and quantum physicists, mixed with the tale of the protagonist Amanda, who is deaf and was searching for her own ability to see herself through the lens of an anxiety-prone photographer.

The film was recently shown in honor of its twentieth anniversary at the Illuminate Film Festival in Santa Barbara, in which the Holomovement was a key sponsor. Following the screening, I was invited to participate on a panel with Holomovement Core Synergist Mariko Pitts and Will Arnzt, the film’s creator and co-director.

Will made mention of this self-witnessing component in the movie, and I responded that for me, this self-witnessing was the main message of the film. It was Amanda's determination to witness herself, and her eventual ability to do so, that leads to her personal transformation.

Self-witnessing is, of course, what gave rise to Homo sapiens. This happened in the same way that holography occurs. There is a reference beam that bounces off an object, like our conscious mind, which splits the beam. The new beam created is then somehow reflected, as if bounced off a mirror, and then reconnects with the reference beam, creating an interference pattern that is a hologram.

The hologram produces a new dimension, such as seeing the effect of three dimensions in a picture on a flat piece of paper. Likewise, our consciousness perceives this interference pattern of our self, and we comprehend who we are in every aspect of ourselves: thought, word and deed. Just as each pixel in a hologram contains the entire image, no matter how small the part, the central character in "What the Bleep Do We Know," was able to see herself as a whole and transform into a new sense of her entire self through self-witnessing.

In our panel conversation, I also shared that "This is the process the Holomovement hopes to inspire in all of us.” Will seemed pleased and was kind enough to say that this was an example of how it was time for the work that started with “What the Bleep Do We Know?” to continue by “passing the baton” to an undertaking like the Holomovement.

Mariko thanked him for the kind comment, and also pointed out that the baton is being passed to all of us. The Holomovement aspires to light a torch in everyone, so that light can be passed to others.

Awakening to Our Collective Consciousness

Homo sapiens may have self-reflective consciousness, but it is not enough to help us remember as a collective that we are all part of the whole and to act with love and respect for the good of that whole. Unfortunately, we have been culturally conditioned over human history to believe that we are separate entities, and that the only thing that really matters is the individual self.

Such a perspective is psychologically and spiritually toxic, and has led us to the current civilizational chaos that challenges our species today. Our survival will need to come from awakening to our interconnectedness, "igniting a critical mass of collaborative action serving the good of the whole."

The time has come for an evolutionary leap. We must expand the holographic effect of our individual consciousness to include collective consciousness.

We can call this the Holomovement effect. The object—the mind—that is splitting the reference beam of source consciousness is no longer an individual, with its faults and shortcomings, but rather the collective mind, with the combined wisdom of the whole.

It is not sufficient to simply know that we are conscious. Often times, the more we think we know from an individual standpoint, the less we understand about the whole. It's time to let the beam of primordial spirit flow through us and reflect not what we think we know about our tiny self, but rather what we see in the holistic spirit of Oneness.  

The dawn of self-reflective consciousness came about because our hominid ancestors suddenly perceived themselves as conscious individuals and became Homo sapiens, and it was a miraculous sensation of self-awareness. The new dawn of this transformative era will now arise because we shall collectively discover ourselves not only as a new species, but with a new genus too.

The Dawning of Holo Universalis

We are not arising as thinking apes, we are coming into being as visionaries of the whole. The genus rising is Holo rather than Homo, and the species, well, how about universalis?

Let’s get outside of ourselves and witness who we really are from a new perspective. Whether it takes a mighty mollusk to steal our camera and turn the film on us, or imagining a conversation from aliens laughing at our immaturity, or a transformational moment when we realize that what we know lacks the knowledge of the whole—whatever it takes, let’s do our best to see ourselves through the light off the reflective lens of Holo universalies.

This light of the Implicate Order of the Holomovement is calling us back from whence we came. It's reminding us that if we get outside of our boxes of individual souls struggling for survival, we can find hope in a vision reflected in our mind’s eye as the divine holograph of our spirit in the glorious light field of Oneness.

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