Appreciate Consciousness

William B. Turner
3 min readJun 16, 2024

Terminology is a bit difficult. Different teachers and different schools use the same words in different ways. I like to follow Ajahn Sumedho, who meanders sometimes, but whose exposition is usually admirably clear.

In particular, I try to use “consciousness” the way I understand him to use it. He doesn’t say it exactly this way, but in his usage, consciousness is the universal background condition that makes all else possible. Whether the idea is that the universe would not exist at all without consciousness, or we would have no way to know anything about anything without consciousness, is not important. Without consciousness, I would not be able to write this and you would not be able to read it.

Sumedho often points out that, if you ask a person if they are conscious, they have to say yes if they answer honestly. Anyone who is not conscious would not know that you had asked a question.

Ultimate or infinite consciousness as a necessary background condition for all else makes sense to me because it explains an aspect of my experience that is pretty counterintuitive, but I’m quite certain of because of how my life has gone. I’m quite convinced that part of my mind, my consciousness, has a grand plan for my apparently messy, unsuccessful life. No matter how close I veer to utter failure, even death, basic facts of my life have served to stave off the…

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