Difference between awareness and consciousness

[Miss Hepburn]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.

[Molearner]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.

Miss Hepburn,

I wait to be enlightened......:) But off the top of my head, I would say that awareness precedes consciousness. Sort of like saying that awareness is everything in one's peripheral vision and consciousness is the focus on any one thing in that field of vision.

[Miss Hepburn]

Miss Hepburn,
I wait to be enlightened......:) But off the top of my head, I would say that awareness precedes consciousness.

Sort of like saying that awareness is everything in one's peripheral vision and consciousness is the focus on any one thing in that field of vision.That was an excellent way to put it. Thank you! :smile:

[Unseeking Seeker]

***

Interesting thread MH ...

On my part, intuitively I tend to think of consciousness as our in-form presence, encompassing both separateness as well as unity.

Awareness, I equate with the That Oneness absolute.

(That’s the thing about language ... the word, the symbol is not the thing)

During meditation, the separateness aspect of consciousness recedes, allowing its higher vibrational enableability to seamlessly connect our presence with Universe awareness by dissolving into the divine stream of love. For reasons not known (to me), even though dissolved, becoming boundless Oneness Itself, the consciousness ... now awareness, is still distinct.

Upon reentering form, the consciousness vibrates at a higher octave but in most cases, I’d say, lower than the awareness frequency. This is the ascension process of consciousness until one day, in timeless time, to permanently become pure love awareness absolute.

Having even once merged with awareness, consciousness always knows that duality is an illusion of the ego or let us call it the separate self delusion. Being no longer deluded, consciousness recognises oneness. However, even so, recognising or knowing is not the actual becoming ... yet.

***

[God-Like]

Something I stumbled across a few months back when trying to explain this ..


The witness is not the person. The person comes into being when there is a basis for it, an organism, and a body. In it, the Absolute is reflected as awareness. Pure awareness becomes self-awareness. When there is a Self, self-awareness is the witness. When there is no self to witness, there is no witnessing either. It is very simple; it is the presence of the person that complicates. See that there is no such thing as a permanently separate person and all becomes clear. Awareness, mind, matter are of one reality in its two aspects as immovable and movable and three attributes of inertia, energy and harmony. Awareness becomes consciousness when it has an object. The object changes all the time. In consciousness there is movement; awareness by itself is motionless and timeless, here and now.


Ramana

[Miss Hepburn]

Wow, guys...Thank You for all your input!! Great stuff! :thumbsup:

[Moondance]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.

Yes, for most people they are practically synonyms. I reckon that it actually creates more unnecessary confusion to have this difference - but since it already exists here’s my take on it.

Consciousness is this common experience of self-reflective, attentive knowing/perceiving. This is disabled in deep sleep, under general anaesthetic, by drugs, by severe trauma to the brain etc.

Awareness is often used as a placeholder for the inexplicable living source, 'stuff' and totality of things.

For consciousness to present itself in any way that anyone has experience/direct knowledge of (or is in any way intelligible), some degree of sentience is required - usually involving a functioning nervous system/brain. This is not to say that a brain/nervous system creates consciousness but it could be said that consciousness is dependent on certain conditions for it to be the case. If certain areas of your brain were removed while you were reading this, pretty soon the consciousness of this page would cease to be. Also it's plainly the case that consciousness is limited in its range and in the type of frequencies that it can detect. (It doesn't matter how enlightened you are, you won't hear a 30 kHz tone, see ultraviolet rays or feel a meteorite smash into the surface of Mars.)

Some might argue at this point that it's not consciousness that has the limitation but the 'vehicle' of the body-mind/organism. This is not unreasonable. But this underlines the fact that our everyday ordinary experience cannot be said to be that of pure limitless awareness/consciousness since limitation IS involved. Perhaps it could be said to be Source/Reality (or pure awareness) presenting AS sentient limitation.

That which is the ground and be-ing of this creative play of manifestation is what the second category is pointing to. Ultimately what the true nature of this creative principle is, no one can say for sure since that which attempts to analyse and formulate it is itself a reflection contained within it.

When identity as a separate self is seen through and the vastness reveals itself, it doesn't come with a metaphysical formula. Right now, here it is - the mysterious vastness (or _____________ ) revealing itself moment by moment. Anything more is a formula, description or working hypothesis tacked onto this wordless realisation.

[iamthat]

Some interesting thoughts, and it comes down to what we understand by the terms awareness and consciousness. This understanding will be different for different people.

So some might claim that awareness precedes consciousness. Others might argue that awareness requires an object of awareness, that which we are aware of. And awareness is not possible without consciousness being present.

Or some might claim that awareness is motionless and timeless. I would consider this state as Being, which is different to both awareness and consciousness. Being itself is not aware, it simply is. There is nothing outside Being for it to be aware of.

Regarding the comment "This is not to say that a brain/nervous system creates consciousness but it could be said that consciousness is dependent on certain conditions for it to be the case. If certain areas of your brain were removed while you were reading this, pretty soon the consciousness of this page would cease to be." Reverting to the familiar analogy of a television showing a program, the program being broadcast exists whether the television is working properly or not. So consciousness exists regardless of the condition of the brain.

And we could easily substitute the word awareness for consciousness in this sentence without changing the meaning:

This is not to say that a brain/nervous system creates awareness, but it could be said that awareness is dependent on certain conditions for it to be the case. If certain areas of your brain were removed while you were reading this, pretty soon the awareness of this page would cease to be.

For me, Being individualises as consciousness, but this is not the ordinary everyday consciousness we are so familiar with. This is pure consciousness, the fourth state of Turiya, as opposed to the states of consciousness of waking, dreaming and sleep. And awareness is a product of consciousness.

But there are no right answers or wrong answers - it comes down to what we each mean by these terms.

Peace.

[Moondance]

This is not to say that a brain/nervous system creates consciousness but it could be said that consciousness is dependent on certain conditions for it to be the case. If certain areas of your brain were removed while you were reading this, pretty soon the consciousness of this page would cease to be.

Hello Iamthat

I see that you quoted part of my comment. I think that you may have missed my point - unless you actually believe that a person who has had their brain removed could be regarded as “intelligibly” conscious.

Of course the second category (which here we are calling awareness) can be said to be prior to the body-mind and brain since the organism is an expression OF it. But as I say, the true nature of this living source is inexplicable and ultimately beyond human cognition. The word ‘awareness’ is and can only be a kind of placeholder which sits alongside other placeholders such as source, oneness, reality, tao etc.

Whatever your preferred designation, I would suggest holding it lightly as they are all problematic eventually. Take awareness for instance. What do we mean by it. Is there a difference between awareness and the patterns/forms/manifestations it presents? Or is it of One Taste? If it’s the first then we have the primary duality. If it’s the second then where is the basis for insisting it is awareness (as opposed to what??)

Can you see what I’m getting at here. If all is of One taste - if it’s just SO - then to call it EITHER awareness OR energy (or whatever else) is arbitrary - it simply IS.

Here’s a kind of koan to ponder: Imagine that everything in the cosmos is yellow. Every object, form, process and event is yellow. Every thought, memory, idea and story is yellow. EVERYTHING is yellow with no exceptions…

There would be NO yellow.

If everything is awareness… there is no awareness.

There is just ______________________

[iamthat]

I see that you quoted part of my comment. I think that you may have missed my point - unless you actually believe that a person who has had their brain removed could be regarded as “intelligibly” conscious.

Again, it comes down to what we mean by consciousness.

The brain serves to receive information from the senses which the mind then interprets to understand the physical environment. If the brain is impaired then our ability to interpret our environment is impaired. If we regard consciousness as the ability to perceive and understand our environment then obviously consciousness would be impaired. If we regard consciousness as that which animates the physical form then consciousness is still present but it is operating through a faulty vehicle.

After all, if we accept the possibility of consciousness surviving physical death then the physical brain is no more, yet consciousness and intelligence are still present.

Peace.

[inavalan]

For me, "consciousness" is a non-physical dimension (similarly to x,y,z being physical dimensions). "Awareness" is our focus of attention on some range of the "consciousness" dimension.

[Moondance]

Again, it comes down to what we mean by consciousness.

The brain serves to receive information from the senses which the mind then interprets to understand the physical environment. If the brain is impaired then our ability to interpret our environment is impaired. If we regard consciousness as the ability to perceive and understand our environment then obviously consciousness would be impaired. If we regard consciousness as that which animates the physical form then consciousness is still present but it is operating through a faulty vehicle.

After all, if we accept the possibility of consciousness surviving physical death then the physical brain is no more, yet consciousness and intelligence are still present.

Peace.

Right, so a person without a brain (or very limited brain function) would not be conscious in any meaningful sense of the word - they certainly wouldn’t be conscious of their surroundings etc. That faculty which determines that a person/sentient being is able to have conscious experience (in any intelligible sense of that phrase) is what I mean by consciousness. Source (or awareness) is the creative animating principle behind life.

[iamthat]

Right, so a person without a brain (or very limited brain function) would not be conscious in any meaningful sense of the word - they certainly wouldn’t be conscious of their surroundings etc. That faculty which determines that a person/sentient being is able to have conscious experience (in any intelligible sense of that phrase) is what I mean by consciousness. Source (or awareness) is the creative animating principle behind life.

Exactly. It comes down to what these words like consciousness and awareness mean to each one of us. There is no right and wrong, but I tend to go with what inavalan says, that consciousness is non-physical and awareness is our focus of attention on some aspect of that contained within consciousness.

Peace.

[MikeS80]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.
I would say consciousness is the whole/oneness/unity that "shines" brightly and wide out of our two eyes, like a spotlight that is on top of a lighthouse that shines bright and wide out to the dark ocean/sea, while awareness is the not self realized ego individualizing and separating consciousness, like a little double A battery powered flashlight.

[JustASimpleGuy]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.

They are the same thing and here's the real difference: Unmanifested vs. manifested consciousness/awareness. A good analogy would be your face and your face in a mirror. Your face is unmanifested and its image in the mirror is manifested. Your face cannot see itself without it being reflected in a mirror. Similarly witness consciousness, Atman, Brahman cannot experience itself without Maya.

Why does the universe exist? Why are we here? :wink:

EDIT: In other posts I've labeled it witness consciousness vs. reflected consciousness but that's not accurate as consciousness isn't reflected but illumines.

[Miss Hepburn]

I forgot about this thread! Thank you for bringing it back up, my friend. :smile:

I read that consciousness is part of duality, was all...cuz there is 'you' and something to be conscious 'of'.
While Awareness - there is just the One, the Absolute, as Unseeking said.

Not too hard to understand!! I sort of get it. :tongue:

[zorkchop]

It is the tendency of the mind to strive to understand as much as possible in “either / or” labels or definitions. To understand the Whole . . . such definitions are rarely that easy.

Consciousness can be understood to be the whole sea of LIFE . . . on or at many levels. In a sense . . . consciousness can be understood to actually be . . . LIFE . . . and save for the understanding and inclusion of the spiritual force behind all of consciousness . . . Consciousness as LIFE would be very close to being very true indeed.

There are many layers or levels ( or whatever ) within consciousness . . . such as physical consciousness, emotional, mental, spiritual and yes . . . even beyond. Consciousness of Self ( mental or beyond ) . . . Consciousness of the Whole . . . there will always be an aspect of consciousness that is yet to be learned . . . no matter how great or how small. One cannot take Self . . . at whatever level . . . out of consciousness. Mind many times wishes to stop thought and then accept that it is beyond consciousness at that moment. That does not turn out to be true . . . although it certainly IS true by being mentally beyond conscious thought. There is a whole ballpark beyond . . . and one learns to certainly be “conscious” of it . . . or aware of it . . . to learn to live within it.

Each individual . . . actually all that exists . . . “swims” in this sea of Life. What you are aware of within this sea . . . would be your state of consciousness or simply what you are aware of within this sea. No one can be aware of all consciousness . . . and no one can be conscious of all of LIFE. There is always something more to “learn” . . . using simple words to suggest something quite profound.

But awareness also has multiple levels . . . and the understanding of a level of awareness as being “pre” consciousness would be accurate. This often takes the form of what we understand to be intuition. We can be “aware” of something going on but not quite be conscious of it. We can also be “aware” that it might be wise for us as an individual to develop and explore an aspect of consciousness . . . for self-growth and expansion.

LIFE’s great principle is growth . . . development . . . evolution if you will . . . or an unfoldment . . . from dark to light . . . from low to high . . . from outer to inner to outer again . . . from detrimental to beneficial . . . from the limited to the unlimited . . . etc. Lots of comparisons can be plugged in here . . . but the bottom line is . . . LIFE expands . . . from the lesser to the greater . . . however one wishes to understand that.

This might still sound too complicated . . . but to simplify a bit . . . we are all within the sea of consciousness and we are aware of certain facets within IT according to our individual development. We can choose to become more aware of aspects within this sea. The choice . . . is always an individual one.

[iamthat]

They are the same thing and here's the real difference: Unmanifested vs. manifested consciousness/awareness. A good analogy would be your face and your face in a mirror. Your face is unmanifested and its image in the mirror is manifested. Your face cannot see itself without it being reflected in a mirror. Similarly witness consciousness, Atman, Brahman cannot experience itself without Maya.

This analogy only works to a point. After all, we can feel our face without the need for a mirror, which suggests that our face is actually manifest.

So are consciousness and awareness the same thing? As always, it comes down to our own definitions of these terms.

Peace

[JustASimpleGuy]

This analogy only works to a point. After all, we can feel our face without the need for a mirror, which suggests that our face is actually manifest.

So are consciousness and awareness the same thing? As always, it comes down to our own definitions of these terms.

Peace

In the context of the face in the mirror analogy, it's about the face not being able to see itself without it being reflected in a mirror. Similarly consciousness cannot directly experience itself without illuminating something external and then experiencing that which it illuminates.

Consciousness and awareness are the same thing. The difference is whether mind is involved. Without mind it's unmanifested or witness consciousness/awareness. With mind it's manifested or reflected consciousness/awareness, though manifested is more accurate than reflected.

Another way to think of it is unmanifested/witness conscious/awareness is Consciousness/Awareness with a capital "C"/"A" and manifested/reflected conscious/awareness is consciousness/awareness with a small "c"/"a". The latter is the overlay of mind and its processes that gives the impression of body-mind as self. As far as I understand this is the only difference.

Now one might say consciousness is unmanifested and awareness is manifested but as you said it's just semantics as to how the two different aspects are labeled.

[Charles]

Thanks for the interesting discussion

[Ewwerrin]

Hi, interesting question.

Consciousness feels more like beingness (being and becoming) to me. And awareness feels more like direction/choice/freedom.

No idea why tho. They are very similar indeed. I guess every person who uses a word, gets to choose what they mean by it. Which is a funny realisation I am having now. It feels like this question is hinting/pointing at a deeper level of communication.

Thanks, everyone, for sharing all of your perspectives.

[JustASimpleGuy]

From a monk trained in non-dualism.

https://youtu.be/xFOoV47KLEw

Notice he uses consciousness and awareness interchangeably. He also makes the distinction between subject and object. Subject is unmanifested and object is manifested. Witness vs. Reflected. Non-duality vs. duality. So yes, in the technical language of non-dualism awareness = consciousness.

As a side note he talks about different objects one can use as a focus of meditation. Breathe, sound, smell, taste, thoughts, etc... Then there's open awareness meditation also called choiceless awareness or resting in awareness.

So the practice of meditation can be open or focused, and for all the focused forms of the practice there's something called the observer trap. This is an excellent reason to practice open awareness at least some of the time. It's an incredibly beneficial and powerful practice for those on the path of non-dualism.

[no1wakesup]

What do you think?
It's an interesting difference...I never understood it and used to use
the words interchangeably.

Awareness is the space you can perceive whether filtered through conditioning or fleetingly percieved within in gaps of no interpretation. Conciousness has no measurement yet allows Awareness to become in the first place