Deep Sea Creatures

“We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard; because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.”

– John F. Kennedy

I think of this JFK quote often. It strikes a chord with me on several levels. I’d say my biggest takeaway from the quote is that it sets a goal. It sets a standard. How do you determine America’s superiority in intellect and ingenuity? Intelligence and ingenuity is subjective, but how can you make it measurable? How about being the first to land on the moon?

Going to the moon is exciting. We look up at it in the sky every night. It is something visible and tangible. The moon is above us and aren’t we always looking up and trying to "reach for the sky"? Where do we place heaven, after all? It is above us - above the fluffy clouds where we play harps. And where do we place the concept of hell? Ahem, it is "down there" somewhere.

So it is natural to be amazed and inspired by outer space and the universe. How far can we safely catapult a human above us and return him to earth? Are there any other life forms out there? The universe has no boundaries. In theory, we can keep going further and further.

But what about the ocean?

I was watching a documentary the other day about the Mariana Trench, narrated by David Attenborough. The Mariana Trench is located in the Pacific Ocean between Japan and Australia and is considered the deepest part of planet Earth.

I’ve heard it said before that we humans have explored every nook and cranny on Earth. They say there are no more frontiers to be explored. And I also have heard others say that the depths of the ocean remain the only frontier yet to be explored by humans. It is scary and dark down there and the pressure is unbearable for any life form. It is why we seldom go down there.

So that got me thinking.

The ocean can be viewed as symbolic of our minds. The surface level of the ocean is the conscious mind and the deeper you go in the ocean, the more you are dipping into the subconscious - that scary, dark place that you don’t want to delve too deep into or you will, literally and figuratively, explode.

Attenborough says in the documentary, “To dive here is to enter another world. As we descend, it gets darker and darker until 200 meters down, there is hardly any light at all.” He is talking about the Mariana Trench, but he might as well be talking about our subconscious minds.

He goes on to say, “Below 1000 meters, there is no sunlight whatsoever. The pressure in these black depths is immense.”

Sound familiar? Time for another JFK quote:

“All of us have in our veins the exact same percentage of salt in our blood that exists in the ocean, and, therefore, we have salt in our blood, in our sweat, in our tears. We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea - whether it is to sail or to watch it - we are going back from whence we came.”

Kennedy is saying that humans are like the ocean. Our bodies are constituted the same way as the ocean. We could say the same about our minds. The deeper we go into our subconscious mind, the darker and scarier it gets. The pressure is intense. It is just you and the darkness. You are alone down there. There is no radiant, warming sunlight. It is cold. It is depressing. All seems lost. There is no hope. The surface of the water is so far away. Everything that is good is above you. The air is lighter up there. Down here, you are being weighed down and getting crushed.

I believe that the human body (and mind) is a reflection of nature. We are one. We are an extension of nature. “Earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” We came from nature. We are nature.

So what does that awareness teach me? It tells me that we need to keep our heads above water. We need to stay in the sunlight. That is where optimism lives. That is where life flourishes. We need to stay optimistic.

We need to keep our subconscious mind as deep as possible. We want no part of it. We don’t want to live down there. We can’t live down there. We won’t survive.

What resides in the subconscious? Doubt, fear, low self esteem, grief, despair, self loathing. It is a dark place indeed. There is a reason all these things are locked away deep in the bowels of our mind. We have all heard people say he/she must have been “subconsciously” thinking so and so. Never is that subconscious thought a good one. It is always something like

“Subconsciously , he was hoping that person would mess up the presentation.”

“Subconsciously, she was hoping that gorgeous woman would trip.”

“Subconsciously, he wished she was dead.”

It is never good when a thought begins with “subconsciously.” There are creatures in the subconscious no one knows exist. One theory has it that the infamous Loch Ness Monster resides in the watery depth of Loch Ness and periodically peeks his head up to spook some unsuspecting people. Sure that may be all myth, but you get the point of what kind of scary, unknown creatures live down there.

We get a peek at our subconscious when we sleep. When we sleep, our conscious mind sleeps as well. But not the subconscious mind. Oh no. This is the subconscious mind’s time to party. The subconscious mind never sleeps. This is when we have dreams or nightmares because the conscious mind isn’t there to guard the door. Whatever is in the depths of our mind comes up to the surface, a la “Nessie.”

That is why we have such a hard time remembering dreams and quickly after we awake, the memory of the dream sinks further and further away. The conscious mind awakes with you and realizes that the subconscious escaped. The mind has sunk deeper and deeper as you slept. Slowly, as we awake, the conscious mind lifts our minds back up to the surface, shuts the door, and you wind up asking yourself, “What was that thing I dreamt about last night?”

The point is not to sink too deep into your thoughts and your mind. Don't spend too much time there. Actually, don't spend any time down there. You never know what you will find and you may be afraid of what you will find. There is a reason things are exiled down there and kept in the darkness. Your mind wants to keep your thoughts light and full of sunshine. That is where happiness is. That is where that tropical paradise is. That is where life is. That is where heaven is.