What does it mean to be conscious?

[Mystik]

I hear this term sometimes in the spiritual community. I'll hear things like "it's good to be around others who are conscious." What exactly is a conscious person and what separates them from someone who isn't conscious. Also, if I'm not sure if I'm conscious or not then how do I get to be conscious?

Conscious = aware, awake
Do you have heightened awareness of your surroundings/immediate environment? Are you "in the moment"/present?

[Mystik]

Not sure what you mean by heightened awareness of surroundings/immediate environment. I do think about things and seem to be aware of things that most people aren't. I don't really know how to explain it though.

There can be many aspects to being awake/aware. The most obvious one is not being half asleep where you are, i.e. able to "drink in"/take in everything around you. Being fully present in the now is another key one - not thinking in the past or future....just totally being where you are.

[psychoslice]

To be Conscious simply means to be Aware, or Awakened. To be truly Awake is to Realize that we are all One, there is no separation, in fact its no even been One, because to be one is to say there must be more than one, so we are That which Is.

Being Conscious means to be aware of yourself and everything around you in the Physical world.But you also have psychic awareness this is different and has to be devoloped slowly.Psychic awarness,is being aware of the energy that is all around and within you,it is the awarness of a much deeper nature.

[IsleWalker]

In my book, everything is conscious (as in a consciousness)--aware of itself and capable of interacting with other consciousnesses and capable of choosing whether to interact or not--on all levels, physical, energetic or space (spirit). That's what the Universe is--consciousnesses interacting.

When we are contracted (physical) it is not as easy to interact (but possible, of course, with other physical things; less easy with energy or spirit). When we are energy is when physical is interacting with spirit. Space is the most expanded form of consciousness, so many (or all) consciousnesses can coexist in the same "space".

Things "dead" and alive all have consciousness in my book. Those elements of things that make up our bodies--copper, manganese, salt, etc.--are all elements of consciousness that have chosen to cooperate with us in this body, each capable of interaction and making choices. Most things are cooperatives of conscious elements.

Lora

[lemex]

duplicate post

[lemex]

It seems (to me) there is understanding, good explanation and agreement, but not the experience, or are people still saying no or are we still arguing. I mean I can understand and agree with what has been said.

Originally Posted by Mystik

I hear this term sometimes in the spiritual community. I'll hear things like "it's good to be around others who are conscious." What exactly is a conscious person and what separates them from someone who isn't conscious. Also, if I'm not sure if I'm conscious or not then how do I get to be conscious?

All people are conscious (except when they are medically unconscious). Consciousness is simply being aware of ones self (self-aware) or, to put it another way, recognising one self as separate from anothers self.

On spiritual forums, it seems to be used in a context to mean spiritually conscious (spiritually aware) or, to put it another way, recognising oneself as spirit.

Or psychically aware (I prefer energetically aware) or, recognising oneself as energy.

But, the word consciousness is used in many spiritual books, and, sometimes (not always), people learn all the lingo from books, but don't really understand what it means. So it's always worth checking with the person using the lingo, to find out what they mean by the language they use.