Consciousness’ most important tool, thought, would be fatally crippled without memory. Lacking it, man would, every day, have to reinvent everything from scratch. Without a stable sense of continuity and awareness of the past, men would go to bed each night civilized, and awaken as savages, plus their sensation of having an inner permanent self would disintegrate.
All of the above is merely mapping of the common terrain. What is of interest to the specialized cataloguists is, (as always), the uncommon aspects of the inner landscape, areas not normally plotted nor visited. The few with that certain-itch hunger for a more expansive, a more revealing, informative and explanatory mental picture of life than life normally provides to mere day trippers. They want to understand all that can be understood – not have their consciousness’ innate opinions and beliefs either reinforced or denied, but to learn the actual, Big Secret (if there be one).
What they want, whether they realize it or not, is to have their head cleaned out so their eyes can see. In the struggle to this end, they too in the beginning operate under the dominion of ordinary consciousness’ perception of longevity and continuity being of unquestioned significance.
This results in the few-with-the-hunger, being initially and inescapably drawn to so-called schools which promise to feed their need, and whose credentials are the fact that there have been people pursuing their methods for x number of generations. With their present wise-men-instructors being part of an unbroken line going all the way back to its usually-considered, semi divine, or irrationally revered founder. This has an undeniable attraction over an organization that was started last summer, by some guy still alive, and in truth is of no particular consequence, unless you get stuck at this unavoidable entry point.
Feeling attached to anything of the past is ultimate anathema for the few. Even to things which purport to transport you there from; (as never fails: life makes things interesting).
J.