Forming Consciousness

June 21st, 2007 Fred McVittie Posted in Consciousness, Creativity, Feeling, Illumination |

Creativity, at all of the levels at which it operates, is marked by a particular state of mind in which new formations of knowledge are allowed to seep into consciousness. In terms of artistic or inventive creativity this seepage is variously referred to as ‘insight’, ‘intuition’, ‘illumination’ etc, and has a set of emotional and experiential properties attached to it which are familiar to anyone who has ever had an idea. These feelings are of relief and excitement, of strength and connectedness, almost akin to the feeling of love and sexual arousal. Having an idea, particularly a really really good idea, raises the heart rate, raises goosebumps on the skin (particularly the scalp, as if one’s hair is about to stand on end), dilates the pupils of the eyes, changes the skin’s conductivity, and affects muscle tone right across the body. At the level of biochemistry, there is an adrenalin rush which readies the body for a response and a wave of neurotransmitters across parts of the brain. It is significant that the formation of this emotionally-charged knowledge precedes consciousness, and that its emergence corresponds to a particularly intense conscious state. In fact it may be more accurate to consider that this knowledge does not emerge, or seep, into consciousness at all, but rather that it is itself constitutive of consciousness.