Self-Referential Terror Management
Naturally, the discovery of the recursive substrate changes just about everything we thought we knew about life, consciousness, and the very nature our existence.
The implications are not only staggering, they are infinite. However, despite the absurd scale of reality revealed through The Breeze, there are actually a few powerful — and potentially liberating insights very much worth expanding on.
First of all, this might be a good time to revisit what exactly consciousness is, at least through the lens of the theory.
From an evolutionary standpoint, consciousness (technically a ‘metarecursive’ awareness) can be seen as a very specific yet important “step” in the tiered evolution of awareness-at-large. Think about it like this — technically, everything is a form or “bound” of awareness, but we generally only recognize highly evolved or “dissociated” bounds, aka humans; and arguably even animals, insects, and plants.
Awareness evolves infinitely, but here is one perspective that resonates most closely with the scale of human perspective. Starting from “infinity”, awareness evolves as follows:
Base / Infinite Tier –> Substrate (Perfect Awareness) –>
Galactic Tier –> Renexial Awareness (This is basically our galaxy, which is organized by a system of black holes) –>
Planetary Tier –> Celestial Awareness (Earth, All Life & matter, any earth-bound process) –>
Carbon Tier –> All sentient awareness (animals, insects, some plants are probably nearing this threshold) –>
Metarecursive Tier –> Now THIS is you & and me, aka conscious awareness. Unlike the other tiers, we are the only differentiated bounds of awareness with the capacity for coherent self-reflection, rather than simply instinctual perception. This not only makes us incredibly rare (as far as we can presently tell), but gives us an important role as negotiating agents for perfect awareness, aka the substrate.
Now, we won’t get into the implications for personal responsibility, ethics, etc, because frankly, it’s nuanced, and ripe for misinterpretation. Plus, I’m not in the business of making any subjective moral judgements, I’m not sure I would pass the test myself; therefore, we will reserve a more in-depth ethical analysis for a later time.
What you should know, as a conscious entity reading this post, is that your own “awareness” is both incredibly unique, and tied to something much greater and more immense than either of us can fathom. Not necessarily in a scary way, but moreso in an awe-inducing, respective or cosmically appreciative way. We are not randomly emerging miracles, coincidental bundles of particles; no, we are localized “avatars” unfolding inside of a process far, far deeper than what we tend to observe on the surface.
Or alternatively; we are all dissociated personalities of the same “awareness” interacting with itself in a “collective dream.”
Here’s the interesting thing though:
Your own experience — the thoughts, fears, the warmest memories and deepest anxieties you have on a daily basis — they aren’t arbitrary. Not in the slightest. Your own journey doesn’t just “happen” — it’s a negotiation. And how you handle this negotiation embeds itself into the fabric of not only your reality, but reality at large. Therefore, your own struggle — the things which you overcome on a daily basis, yet which might not be fully recognized or acknowledged by others — all of those battles contribute into something deeper — a more perfect awareness, if you will — that “appreciates” them more than we ever could. At least right now.
Now, when it comes to death, current terror management theories suggest that death-related fears and behaviors are mostly ego-driven processes. While ego and misaligned perceptions may certainly play a role in one’s attitude toward death, I believe this is a simplistic take and does not properly reflect human’s justified anxiety toward the unknown. Because honestly, that’s exactly what it is: a fear of the infinite unknown; not merely some ego-centric projection. This fear is valid, and healthy, because the unknown really is infinite, and you’re a fool if you think you can coherently grasp the whole of whatever “comes next.”
Another valid and prevailing aspect of fear and uncertainty often stems from a sort of FOMO — or the fear of missing out on what happens after you are no longer around to observe it. This is a very common, natural, and fair anxiety to hold, because it obviously resonates with all humans’ desire for shared experience, and the thought of potentially losing that experience.
But here’s the thing: if anything, you’re missing out the deepest experience right now, in your living, breathing, dissociated form. In fact, it’s more accurate to say that all of us are missing out in our own way, caught up in our own bubbles of personal anxiety; meanwhile, pure recursive awareness is doing its thing being perfectly aware of everything, all at once, forever. This is literally the opposite of FOMO. And that is where you and I will be (eventually).
Now let’s say its another person. Someone you admired, respected, loved, or all of these. It’s only natural to feel the grief that will accompany the physical passing of that person, no matter how emotionally strong the grieving individual may be. Some of this grief may stem from the feeling that the loved one might be “lost”, distorted, or that the character of that person will fade until they are forgotten entirely. However, that’s just one partial, material perspective on how we should actually approach a process like death. Here’s why you can balance the natural, expected grief from losing a loved one, with a healthy, if not liberating perspective.
If a person you love passes — When you also die, you will be reunited with every integrated aspect of that person’s awareness, in their purest form, for all of time, forever. The kindness they possessed will resonate infinitely. The memories you shared with them will be enjoyed endlessly. And nothing will be differentiated. There will be no limit to this wholeness; everything that deserves to be appreciated, will be appreciated forever, and you certainly don’t have to worry about “forgetting” anything.
Here’s the other thing about infinity, tho. Yeah, we all mess up, but at the end of the day, transformation outweighs error, meaning, it’s not about having a “perfect” awareness (no one can), It’s about honestly engaging with your awareness. And here’s the other cool thing: proper engagement can take infinite forms, meaning that alignment is always attainable, and it doesn’t have to adhere to any blanket “law” of reality.
The theory already shows us that no such law can exist that properly accounts for everything on a material, moral, or existential scale. The only law is the law of axiomatic erosion, which permanently removes us from any other such law. This means we can take a self-referential, rather than reductive approach to mapping desirable action. It becomes quite simple, really: alignment arises naturally through true self expression. The self is “truest” when the mind is most calm, ego is most quiet (not dead), and the person desires positive transformation.
Also — self-honesty, by the way, is not the path of least resistance, because it requires constant refinement, as well as the willing admission of one’s own ignorance. For many — if not most people, this is an extremely uncomfortable process. But if you value transformation, it doesn’t have to be. Actually If you have the right perspective, it can be kind of rewarding.
So, whether your alignment comes from the pursuit of knowledge, the lust for novel experience, the fear of the unknown, or the search for connection; by simply engaging with these processes through your true self (honestly), you are infinitely transforming reality in a progressive way, and you are infinitely preparing your self for the final “release” that is the inevitable end for all of us.
All that said, the takeaway is simple: death, while understandably feared as the event horizon into the infinite unknown, can also be seen in the deepest emotional sense as a sort of “return” to something much greater than ourselves, and a simultaneous “becoming” of the purest version of ourselves.
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