Week 1, Day 5: Seeing isn’t believing; How illusions reveal the truth

When Jacob woke from his sleep, he thought to himself, The Lord is definitely in this place, but I didn’t know it. (Genesis 28:16)

Thanks for letting me share some of my favorite optical illusions with you! Because most of us are so visually oriented, I wanted to start week one of Advent with optical illusions. They are a good way to start talking about consciousness. When we become aware that we are not seeing reality, but our brain’s best guess at reality, we become more aware of our own mental processes.

What is consciousness? It’s the collection of sensations, perceptions, thoughts, and feelings that make up your experience right now. It includes your sense of self, time, and memory.

We are rarely aware that we are aware, rarely conscious of our own consciousness. Instead we ride the wave of whatever thoughts or impulses arise in the moment: my to-do list, my hunger, my need for a nap, that conversation I wish had gone differently. We are aware of the passage of time, mentally dividing our day into chapters and scenes. But unless we sit down to meditate, or something (like seeing an illusion) jars us out of our usual way of seeing, we are not aware of this profound thing that is happening to all of us: we are aware.

This week I’ve used optical illusions to illustrate some of the ways we get perspective on our own consciousness: 1) we notice that we can’t perceive what is actually there, 2) we notice that we do perceive what isn’t there, 3) we become aware of how context changes our perception, and 4) we become aware that contrast changes our perception.

I believe the story of Advent and Christmas, like most sacred scripture, is meant to create a change in our consciousness, a shift in the way we see the world. It is meant to unmask the illusions by which we live, to make us more sensitive to context and contrast, to show us what is really there (like divine presence), and what is not (like human-made concepts of “deserving”).

This kind of consciousness-altering revelation is, to borrow a word from psychedelic culture, “trippy,” as encounters with God often are. We readily identify trippy Biblical images in Ezekiel’s wheels with eyes, Isaiah’s vision of God’s robe filling the temple, or John’s apocalyptic monsters and pregnant women. But the New Testament images of manger, cross, and empty tomb are likewise consciousness-changing.

Next week, I’ll turn from perceptions to automatic behaviors as we continue to explore Christmas and consciousness.

Prayer: Divine Light, light up our world and renew our minds. Amen.

—Rev. Dr. David Barnhart, Jr. 

If you’ve enjoyed the optical illusions this week, you can find more at the Illusion Index.

Bonus Christmas image from the article :

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