Throughout his entire existence, a person strives to understand the world, to know himself, the meaning of his existence. But cognition happens extremely slowly, because every time, faced with something unknown, a person resorts to the bad habit of giving his own explanation for everything. Due to the imperfection of his perception, with his explanation he completely confuses what he intended to comprehend. And his exorbitant ego, with the desire to seem smarter to others, and especially to himself, than he really is, creates in him the conviction that the confusion of thoughts that has arisen in his mind is the only correct idea of ​​the world. The desire to appear smarter reflects only a hidden inner conviction that he is dumber than he could be. This idea of ​​improving oneself once again testifies to the imperfection of a person’s thinking, since he can be neither better nor worse, but only who he is.

Anyone who does not create clear beliefs in himself about how everything should be in the world he perceives sooner or later comes to the conclusion that the world is not at all what it seems. And this pushes him to the idea that perhaps he is not only a body. And if a person is not only a body, then what else? It starts with this question self-knowledge - self-exploration. Self-exploration develops the ability to distinguish the true from the illusory, allowing you to know your true essence.

But why can a person often not distinguish illusion from reality, why does he see the world differently from what it really is? Where is the deception? What is the imperfection of a person’s worldview? How do material worlds arise in human perception from the invisible energy that fills space? And what makes a person believe in imaginary them world how real?

Energy the whimsical play of its waves like computer program creates a virtual “perceiver” who in his imagination perceives the intricacy of countless threads of energy vibrations as objects and events material world. Such deception arises due to the imperfection of human perception organs. Peculiarities of human perception lie in the fact that he does not have such devices that could directly perceive energy in the form it is. Eyes, ears, smell, touch, taste buds - these are only devices that perceive energy flows and convert them into electric currents like a CCTV camera, microphone, etc. All perception occurs only in the mind, where these electrical signals arrive. But, if you look at it, the mind itself is nothing. The mind is just impulses of biocurrents in certain places of the cerebral cortex. These impulses are deciphered by a program that can be called a “perceiver” and which is configured in a certain way from vibrations of the same energy. The virtual “perceiver” is a program consisting of biocurrents, which the program endows with virtual feelings and emotions, which are also biocurrents in the cerebral cortex.

It turns out that a person is a virtual spectator and actor who simultaneously watches and participates in a virtual show of a virtual movie on a virtual screen of a virtual cinema, which he himself records on a virtual tape recorder of his memory. The “perceiver” only transforms in his imagination the invisible energy permeating space in such a way that he perceives what is happening as the material world. The emotions that arise during perception in the “perceiver” force one to believe in this illusion as reality, and daily repeating events allow the conviction of the reality of what is happening to take root in the memory. This is how a person’s faith and beliefs in the reality of the material world created in his imagination are formed. But the memory itself, where beliefs and convictions are stored, is also virtual.

Everything is only energy - an endless intricacy of countless threads of infinitely varied vibrations (rotations, waves). But then, what is energy, who creates it, who is the creator of all this infinite? People different countries and religions, trying to explain this, call the source of its origin differently: Infinite Consciousness, Great Creator, Brahma, God, Krishna, Allah. But no concept of the mind can explain energy, because it itself is imagined by the Infinite Consciousness and exists in It as a future wave on a completely calm surface of the ocean.

Stanislav Milevich

What is a person? What do we mean by humanity? What makes us different from all other living beings? Brain capacity, speech or upright posture? Or maybe kindness, mercy, humane attitude towards living beings? Love? Soul? After all, many of us believe in the existence of some imaginary entity that is unique to humans. The essence thanks to which we are loved and can love, which is given to us from above. Perhaps it makes us human?
Who knows? There are thousands of opinions, often contradictory, sometimes logical, sometimes not so much. I think I have one more thing.
I believe that the most important characteristic of a person is imagination. None living creature does not have the same wonderful ability. No one except a person can imagine something that does not exist, cannot create something new, beautiful or terrible, but previously unprecedented. This is the strength of man, his advantage over other living beings. Thanks to this, entire civilizations were created, incredible weapons that can defeat any enemy, ingenious medicines that destroy aggressive microorganisms and amazing devices that give us so many possibilities. And all this is imagination.
However, everything on earth has two sides. And the imagination, which opened so many roads for us, at the same time became our cage.

Surely, during the period of time when the transformation took place ancient man V Homo sapiens, the world was aggressive towards the creatures living in it.
That is why the ancient people living then had to acquire the maximum number of devices. And imagination was one of them. Thanks to their imagination, people created their own world around themselves, changing it to suit their needs, protecting themselves from external threats. But over time, not only human culture emerged, but also a system of frameworks and restrictions. Man became the fittest, most powerful creature on the planet, and therefore he needed means to protect himself from his own kind. Imagination also played a significant role in this. Creating restrictions, people relied on certain moral prohibitions, on imaginary gods and spirits. And if in those days disobedience to the laws could end in the execution of the offender or his expulsion, now everything has changed a little. Man has surrounded himself not just with primitive rules of behavior, but with real multi-level moral restrictions. Man created society. But in the process of improving social skills, instincts also evolved. From a rather primitive instinct of self-preservation, which helps in emergency to save ourselves from the threat of physical death, in the process of the formation of humanity a similar instinct appeared that helps us protect ourselves in a situation social danger. Social fear also developed in parallel. A person rejected by society, in principle, can survive, but social fear forces him to do anything to be accepted. Therefore, the outcasts are shunned so as not to become the same. That is why there is such a thing as conformism. People, despite their intelligence and limitless possibilities, remain for the most part social or, to put it differently, pack animals. And most of their actions are aimed at strengthening their position in society, at meeting its requirements. Those who are more talented, who are more active, who are more “human” become their idols or leaders if they set such a goal for themselves. And these people, with more imagination, and because of this more “humane”, can become loners or exiles and live without a pack, individually.
In fact, everything that surrounds us in our human world, all laws, all hopes, all this is just an illusion, our imagination. It makes us human, gives us a sense of protection, allows us to live on and not go crazy in this incredibly, disgustingly huge and dangerous world. This illusion is a kind of screen that helps us pretend that we are civilized, that we control ourselves and our animal nature. Although in fact, even though imagination makes us different, makes us human, this does not negate the fact that we still live, obeying the demands of our instincts, improved by social evolution.

Hello, my dears!

If you have no moral and ethical objections, today I would like to reflect a little with you again.

Vladimir Kush "Metamorphosis" / Vladimir Kush "Metamorphosis"

The other day I found myself at a production of Hamlet, and suddenly something that I had often overlooked caught my eye. Here is Hamlet in the cemetery, jumping into Ophelia’s grave and shouting about forty thousand brothers in Pasternak’s translation:

I loved
Ophelia, and forty thousand brothers
And all their love is no match for mine.

Tell me, what are you capable of in honor of her?
I want to know what you would decide on?
Did you cry? Did you tear your dress? Did you fight? Hungry?
Did you drink vinegar? Have you eaten crocodiles? All this
So can I. Have you come to shed tears?
Jump into the grave to ridicule me?
To be buried alive? So can I.
Did you lie about the mountains? Millions of acres
We go to the mound so that the sun burns the top
And Ossa turned into a wart!
Have you thought about taking it by mouth? So can I.

Previously, this seemed terribly significant and beautiful to me. And suddenly I saw it from a different point of view: wasn’t it you yourself, dear man, who brought her to the grave with your unclear speeches and wild antics? Wouldn't it be better not to frighten her with gibberish, but to talk to her as to a friend, as to a loved one? And she would have been alive, perhaps, and her father would not have had to be killed, and her brother - a very worthy gentleman - would have remained safe and sound?

Vladimir Kush "Theater of Nero" / Vladimir Kush "Theater of Nero"

But no, we need drama all the time, we need to break dishes, scream, slash, play terrible passions. And so it is in everything. We choose to exist in an imaginary dramatic world, where we attribute meaning to events and information that is completely incompatible with the real state of affairs. For any reason we come up with fantasy worlds.
That's what I want to talk about today.

There are imaginary worlds that exist quietly, calmly and do not bother anyone. Here Gogol’s Manilov sits and imagines how everyone goes to visit each other. He sits, okay.
There are, however, others, no more real, but which oh-ho-ho, how they influence our lives. For example, jealousy - for a person or for God, or for an idea, or for money - can seriously change a person’s life or even deprive him of his life. For example, a man gets it into his head that the woman he considers “his own” is showing signs of attention to someone else, takes the instrument of production and goes to explain to her that she is wrong. But she, poor thing, didn’t even think about anything like that - the man invented something for himself that doesn’t really exist. But things can’t be improved. The situation is described by the same Shakespeare in the play “Othello”.
Or someone in the church will decide that women who heal with herbs and give birth in villages are witches and threaten the Christian faith. The result over five centuries is two hundred thousand tortured and burned people.

Vladimir Kush "Crusaders" / Vladimir Kush "Crusaders"

Or someone else will decide that so-and-so is plotting against the power of the workers and peasants, and the result is many hundreds of times more terrible. How many people have died solely due to the fact that some invent something for themselves that does not actually exist, and act as if the world they invented for themselves is real.
So imaginary worlds may not be so harmless.

Here's how it happens as described in the Bhagavad Gita:

The one whose attention
Captivated by the objects of the senses
Becomes attached to these objects;
From attachment desire develops;
And if this desire is not satisfied -
Anger appears;

Anger breeds wrong
Perception of the situation;
Then the person forgets
How it really was
Accepts what he came up with
For objective truth
And loses his mind;
And this leads to death.

And then there are the imaginary worlds of art - literature, poetry, theater and cinema. By reading books and watching movies and TV, we, without noticing it, absorb the rules of behavior and ideas about the world.

Vladimir Kush "Book of Books"

It is generally accepted that by immersing ourselves in literature, we escape from life, immerse ourselves in an imaginary world in order to escape from the problems of the present at least for a while. But I don’t agree - we can’t escape ourselves anywhere, and in any world provided to us by art, we pay attention first of all to what is most important to us now. We see ourselves all the time.
We watch a movie or read a book, and if the hero of the movie or book evokes our sympathy, we naturally want to be like him, to do the same in order to achieve the same success. And we immediately transfer what we saw in the imagined world to the real one. And this impact is not just massive, but covers almost the entire population of the Earth. This is easy to see by watching how very young children learn the rules of life in society. We are taught life through the example of worlds imagined by someone. This is called culture or civilization.

There are other interesting things. Here is the modern philosopher Boris Groys writes about painting:
“Museums have now taken a central place in the cities of the civilized world, like temples new religion transforming a person into a personality, into individuality.
Everyone strives to create an original mask, and then these masks hang in the museum, demonstrating the immortality of the human personality. Every time we go to a museum, we worship this process, which transforms the body of life into a body of culture and bestows that little immortality of which our time is still capable.
The mask is the true body of the artist, in contrast to his mortal body, rotting in the ground, like the true body of the theorist - the language of his theory. Personality, the guise acquires immortality, although immortality is only historical.”

Vladimir Kush "Fauna of La Mancha" / Vladimir Kush "Fauna in la Mancha"

So I read this and think about the difference between the imaginary and the real, and I immediately remember: “Eternal does not mean lasting forever, it means being outside of time.” Very often we hear that people like Faust dream of immortality, and if personal immortality is impossible, then at least the immortality of a family or a deed, or at least a name. We cannot cope with the idea that we, our loved ones, may cease to exist on earth, while the life around us will continue. It’s a shame to the point of tears - I know from myself, I’ve experienced this. Only here again we are talking nonsense: we don’t want immortality, we want to know that now, at this moment, our life is full of meaning. And this happens when we come up with something to do and gather ourselves around it, or when we consciously feel everything that happens to us.

But there are also imaginary worlds created by music. They are special in that we perceive them bypassing the analytical capabilities of the brain, that is, they act directly. As Tolstoy wrote: “Music made him vividly aware of the opposition between something infinitely great and indefinable that was in him, and something narrow and corporeal that he himself was.”

Vladimir Kush "African Sonata" / Vladimir Kush "African Sonata"

What about music and art? What about our constant thoughts about the past and the future? The past exists only in our memory, and everyone has their own, because everyone remembers their own, and everyone’s memories are different. Stephen Hawking proved that there is no common past. And there is no future yet. And we don’t pay attention to what is here and now, because all the time our thoughts are somewhere else. How are these not imaginary worlds?

So it turns out that our behavior in real life is constantly determined by imaginary worlds that we do not know how to handle at all. At the same time, each person has a true essence within himself - the timeless and endless presence of God in the heart, which we are not taught to notice, but without which we would not be living beings.

Vladimir Kush "Among the Trees" / Vladimir Kush "Behind the Trees"

As a matter of fact, the Bible, the Tao Te Ching, the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads, the Koran, all the other holy books and teachings of mankind always say one thing: stop thinking in the clouds, stop counting only your own benefit, stop distract yourself from what is happening, life is what happens to you at this very second. So, finally, turn your full, undivided attention to her. Start living without procrastinating. Everything that really happens to you happens in this moment. And only in this moment can you do something.

What is enlightenment or self-realization or salvation? This is when we suddenly notice that imaginary worlds are imaginary. And suddenly all that remains around is what actually exists. This is where ours begins real life.

So what should we do? But here we need to decide for ourselves - we were given free will and there is no escape from it, which means that no one can decide the main thing for us. It's not easy, I understand. I sometimes deal with this kind of complexity myself. And I always notice the same thing: when you do something good for someone, there is much more joy in your soul than when I feel good myself. Only what we give remains ours. And it doesn’t even matter who is enlightened and who is not. Because in the end we are all one. The same Almighty looks from the eyes of all people in the world.
And that’s why I somehow remember: when the Monk Ambrose of Optina was asked: “What does it mean to live according to your heart?”, he answered: “Do not interfere in other people’s affairs and see all the good in others.”

Hi all. I want to share my story. I'm already 21. It started from childhood. I am quite active, kind, smart man, always among acquaintances, friends, etc. Let's just say people are drawn to me, but of course there is a certain amount of strangeness in me, sometimes I go into oblivion and may not call or talk for weeks, or even more. But I think everyone is used to it. Is it normal to believe in imaginary friends or your own world, etc. as an adult? I'm serious. Loneliness is unbearable. And we are all alone. And when you believe that you have your own world, then life can be easier. I have an imaginary world in my head. These are not just a couple of imaginary friends, I have been inventing this world throughout my life. New characters, new plots are introduced, all connected to each other. There are about 5 permanent characters that my universe revolves around. They are like family to me. I fantasize, invent, talk with imaginary friends.... But I naturally distinguish between reality and fiction. Sometimes, before going to bed, I think if I could make a plot out of all this for a book... I have my own script in my head. Completely opposite of my real life. I take some individual situations from my life and always redo everything in my head exactly the other way around. There, everything I dream about in life has already come true. It's all there. I'm happy there. I understand that everything that is there cannot be brought to life... From very early childhood, I began to talk to myself out loud. And now I’m 21 and I still do this. I can imagine a fictional character next to me and talk to him. Aloud. I constantly talk to myself, to my imaginary friends all day long. And the worst thing is, I can't make friends, I have good relationship with everyone, but they are not as interesting as those in my head. In fact, I am happy living in that world, I smile imagining and improving it, but I cannot live like this any longer, it distracts me too much, but at the same time, the only thing that gives me great joy. I don’t understand the reason for my detachment from people, I’m sociable, but I don’t like people, I even seem to be afraid of them. I don’t have any problems at home, my parents don’t give a damn about me, but at the same time they let me decide for myself how to live, within reason, of course. There are often scandals with my father over trifles, we haven’t even touched each other since we were 10 years old, he’ll come, I’ll say hi, and go back to the room. As a child, I had no friends, everyone bullied me at school, maybe this was the beginning of the creation of my world... People have everything brightly interesting, some goals, plans, friends, but I am not interested in living. No. I don't think I'm crazy and my place is now in a mental hospital. I study normally at the institute, communicate with people... I have pets. But in my head I have a completely opposite life. I'm happy there, but not here. What kind of mental product is this? I constantly feel depressed. I don’t trust strangers and people I barely know. Only here... there are things that I cannot tell anyone. I just can’t, that’s all. Experiences, various fears, I keep all this to myself. Gradually, all this accumulates inside, and in the end it becomes very difficult to endure all this... And then they appear - imaginary friends. I always talk to them when my heart is consumed by melancholy and I want to speak to someone... but there is no one. I can express to them everything that has accumulated in my soul, discuss any problem, without fear that someone else will find out about it or that they will laugh at me. When I'm alone, I talk to them out loud. In public, I conduct mental dialogues. By communicating with myself in this way, I overcome the loneliness that constantly weighs on me. Although there are so many real people around... Sometimes my imaginary friends advise me of something useful that I simply would not have thought of on my own. They cheer me up when I'm sad. They calm me down when I'm scared. They force me to do something. Scold for bad habits. Although I understand perfectly well that in fact they are all figments of my imagination. It's just that it's somehow easier with them. I don't know if it's normal to have imaginary friends at that age. But I need them, otherwise I'll just go crazy. I don’t even know what to do about it((Psychologists and psychotherapists infuriate me. Because they try to play the role of “good friends,” although it is clearly visible from them that they only care about the next amount from your wallet. And a lot of time is spent on all these dreams, and strength too. Even now, when I’m writing this message, I’m tempted to talk to one of my so-called “friends.”

Sometimes it seems that the whole world is my fantasy. Too often, frankly speaking. And it’s so painful to realize that you are surrounded by your made-up world: with made-up names, friends, made-up events. Very often we add to this world what happens to us in real life, but it just looks somehow stupid against the backdrop of past, invented beautiful events.
I often notice that such people are very self-absorbed. They feel much more comfortable in their own world than in the real one, real world. And these people are very weak. They cannot withstand the pressure of the public, everyday problems and simply close themselves in their imagination. There are no problems for them, there are no certain people. There is only what they truly love and what they want to have, but for some reason they do not get. And very often it happens that these people simply disappear before our eyes.
Here they were, but here they are not.
No, of course, they exist, but they become so invisible that they get lost among people. And to get lost in the crowd is to lose yourself. This is what happens. Gradually but surely, these people are losing themselves. Your thoughts, your appearance, your personality. They try to adapt to the person they have imagined for themselves. And very often, if not always, this leads to complete collapse. It is simply impossible to live two lives equally. One of the lives will still outweigh and you will be very lucky if it is real life.
I don’t argue, there are people who are able to withstand this, who are kept afloat by their own fantasies, not allowing them to drown. But there are so few of these people that it is almost unnoticeable. I often see people walking down the street, and they simply don’t understand where they are going! Either they need to turn or go straight. They just walk, immersed in their thoughts, in their emotions. And they don’t care about anything when they are in their own world.
Most often these people are children. Because of any problem, they plunge deeper into themselves, closing themselves off from outside world, from external problems, not realizing that this is just their imaginary world. They use this as a means of protection, not noticing that they are being drawn further and further into their fantasy. More often than not, this is the key event in their lives.
I don’t argue, I also had a world where there were no annoying people buzzing like flies, there were no pressing problems. But one incident pulled me out of there forever. This event proved to me that no matter how good it is in the imaginary world, real life takes place here and its events do not depend at all on what you imagined. It's just very difficult to get out of there. Difficult, but possible. And if everyone tried to live at least for a day real life, he would understand it.

“Are these tears of sadness or tears of joy?
- Aren't these the same tears?
- Yes... Why does everything that starts so promising end in disappointment?
- Not for everyone.
- For everyone who has imagination. You can achieve a lot in life if your needs are small. The moment you allow yourself sweet dreams, you risk finding yourself under their rubble.”