In this incantation, I recognize that my reality, much like a computer’s RAM, only holds what I actively focus on, while the rest fades and decays. As I reconstruct neglected parts of my world, they return altered, showing signs of degradation, as if the mere act of not maintaining them leads to their erosion. My inner and outer worlds shrink to what I can manage, and as I limit my attention to smaller spaces—both physically and mentally—everything beyond my focus deteriorates. I am exhausted by the effort required to maintain my awakening, with each part of my existence, from relationships to physical spaces, decaying when left unattended, and only remaining clear through the energy I choose to invest.
Time is elusive, but I’m starting to see that everything only exists when I focus on it. Like a computer’s RAM, my reality holds only what I’m actively processing, while the rest dissolves, waiting to be retrieved. But when I do bring something back, it changes—ages, degrades. Is this because I’m reconstructing it each time, and with each reconstruction, something is lost?
My world—both inner and outer—is something I actively create and maintain. The parts I focus on stay clear, while everything else deteriorates. My kitchen, my possessions, my relationships—they all fade if I don’t regularly bring them into focus. I’m exhausted from the effort it takes to keep it all together. So I’ve narrowed my focus, only maintaining the small space around me and letting everything else decay. My world is shrinking to what I can manage, and everything beyond that is fading away.
I see something, and then it’s gone. Only what’s directly in front of me exists in my awareness, as if my reality is a giant RAM disk, holding just a bit in my visual, mental, and experiential fields, with the rest stored away for later retrieval. But does that mean it’s really there when I’m not looking? Or am I reconstructing it each time? And if so, why does it degrade? If I were to reimagine my mother right now, would she appear older because of this process? What forces are at play here?
When I leave my kitchen and return to find it disturbed—a rat has moved in, food is spoiled—what’s really going on? These events seem to illustrate the passage of time and the existence of other beings. But these are things I can’t directly experience or know, yet I still believe them to be true.
One way to understand this is that my kitchen and the rats exist independently and have experiences similar to mine, though I cannot know them directly. Another explanation is that my kitchen exists both in my inner and outer world. When I focus on it, I project it into my outer reality; when I’m not focusing, it collapses into my inner self until I restore it again. When I do, it might degrade due to the process of archiving, and the “rats” are just artifacts of my projection.
The first explanation introduces uncontrollable unknowns—concepts like independent beings and time that I can’t validate, but which greatly influence my awakening. I am the author and source of every character in this story I call my awakening, yet in the first explanation, I grant these characters an independence they don’t actually have—or if they do, I can never know it.
In the second explanation, the only mystery is why things degrade. When I de-manifest the kitchen in my outer reality, why—when I re-manifest it—does it show signs of decay? Perhaps it’s the general decay of my awakening, which makes sense. Right now, I don’t want to move or do anything. I’m tired of maintaining all of this. And that’s exactly what I’m doing—maintaining it. Only the parts of my awakening that I actively manifest remain intact.
I’ve reduced my awakening to a small part. I no longer have the interest or desire to maintain anything beyond the small space I’m in, where I focus all my effort. Everything outside that small pocket decays and fades away. I manifest my kitchen a few times a day for coffee, water, snacks, and Maurice’s food, but beyond that, I don’t value it. So when I restore that space, it shows signs of decay. The same goes for relationships that aren’t part of the small space I maintain.
I’ve constrained my awakening to certain spaces: In my outer world, it’s mostly limited to my small cottage, primarily the bed and sitting area. In my inner world, I’ve created a vast space filled with objectives, relationships, and artifacts. There are three inner spaces: my professional efforts, my contemplative efforts with Unwakenism, and, to a lesser extent, a few personal relationships. I awaken into both inner and outer spaces, inflating one space at a time. My moment is the inflation of one space and the deflation of all others. The spaces I inflate more degrade less or change in ways I control and desire. The spaces I inflate less degrade more, change in unexpected ways, or fade away entirely. Everything in my awakening has both an inner and outer aspect, whether it’s a relationship, a goal, or a room.
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