Seeing time simultaneously

Ted Chiang’s speculative fiction story, “Story of Your Life” so captivated me that I went on my own speculative journey around a couple of its fascinating concepts. I’m not the only one who was inspired by this story; it was the basis for the 2016 movie ‘Arrival, directed by Denis Villeneuve. This astounding Oscar nominated movie for both best movie and best adapted screenplay is worth viewing even for a second or third time. The screenplay, written by Eric Heissner, is quite the feat, but reading Ted Chiang’s story is a profound experience that conjures possibilities in ways only the written word can.

In fact, the written language was that force and avenue through which the story’s extraterrestrial culture experienced its unique way of life. The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis was briefly mentioned as a foundational concept to explain this. I learned the hypothesis long ago while studying language learning for my teaching degree. The hypothesis suggests that a language influences one’s worldview or cognition and taken further in ‘language determinism’, that language actually determines how we think. (As an aside, I learn bits of physics, mathematics, biology, linguistics etc. all in any one of Ted Chiang’s stories, as he cleverly weaves complicated concepts into compelling fictional characters and scenarios.)

So as the linguist in the story is challenged to learn an alien language, she inadvertently learns their way of viewing reality. We get a glimpse into their ability to perceive a physical existence as a whole, simultaneously – including past and future, by the linguist’s experience. The aliens had a “simultaneous consciousness,” you see, and once exposed to their written language, the linguist’s own simultaneous timeline was intertwined into her consciousness and she began to have ‘memories’ of her whole life, even future memories. (That was the fun of figuring out the timeline by the end.)

Their “simultaneous consciousness” was reflected in their written language. Curiously, their spoken language was completely different, used only to converse, and one which the linguist found impossible to learn in the time allowed. It was the written language that held both an all-encompassing meaning and a felt-experience that was inherent, innate and contagious!

This simultaneous view from the written language was also used by the aliens to make “adjustments” to their reality. One such adjustment they wanted to make was the mystery as to why they came. I won’t give that away. Hollywood made their own very spectacular adjustment to the story, but just as spectacular is the whole possibility of experiencing simultaneity and using language to actualize.

The story’s protagonist, the linguist, didn’t adjust her personal life, even with the memories that revealed her future. What was most pressing was to help the aliens make the adjustments for their future. The relevant and activating memories she had (or had been given) would change both our world’s and the alien’s future in ways that a co-existent reality could occur. Compelling?

I feel a pull to connect the idea of simultaneous reality to Quantum Hypnosis, fully aware some may think it unrelated or superficial. Every time I experience a session, I can use what I experienced to actualize a future based on timeless memories I get. This occurs in both sessions I receive and give. I use ‘memory’ because we just don’t see images, we experience timelines in first person - we are that person. We are pulling from a kind of simultaneous field. We are experiencing in present time, a past or a future with deep feelings and insights. We come out with a certainty as we are speaking from having embodied memories.

I can’t say for sure if we are pulling from a field of consciousness that is personal or just something we need, at a particular time, from the field.

Some neuroscientists may considered all that just subconscious stories. But what instructive and impactful stories they are! We can use the insights from our experience to Know how it can feel to live differently in our ‘current life’. If we apply what we ‘see’ and ‘feel’ to the current life we live, we can alter our future, just as anyone can by adopting new habits.

I took my own quantum hypnosis experience seriously a few years ago and made ongoing adjustments from what I learned in my first and from other sessions I had for myself. The ‘memories’ always support my current life. And although my current external life looks mostly the same; I still live in S.F., still dance, am still stable in those many ways that I am, I am very different in both my inner life and in the many activities I now engage in. You may call it just the natural changes of time and interest. I emphatically would say it all came from that glimpse of the quantum fields. And it continues to change what occurs in my life, in my application or ignorance as well.

My naturally skeptic part can’t seem to ignore the remarkable results. It’s a reality that shines, In any case, reality could be all ‘made up’. Certainly we are creative. And I put all that aside and simply see a quantum hypnosis experience as a Gift of “simultaneous consciousness”.

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