I have read several books now on string theory.  Now, I will tell you that I am not a physicist by trade, but I like to think of myself as an armchair physicist.  I've figured this stuff out through osmosis, for the most part.  I've read the following books on the subject, related to it in some fashion or the other:

1. New Theories of Everything by John Barrow
2. Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku
3. Entanglement by Amir Aczel
4. Fabric of the Cosmos by Brian Greene
5. The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
6. Hyperspace by Michio Kaku
7. Physics of the Impossible by Michio Kaku

Also, I've spent a lot of time on the Super String Theory website.  I don't profess to understand all of the mathematics of the theory, however, I do understand the implications of what it means.  In my free time, I watch a lot of the science channel and read about this subject because I believe it will be one of the single greatest discoveries in human history, as important as the theory of relativity and uncertainty principle. One of the fascinating aspects of this theory is its attempt to describe the geometry of our universe and how we exist in 11th dimensional space-time.

I've read numerous descriptions of higher dimensions.  It is impossible to visualize what the extra dimensions look like as we are not able to conceive of things beyond three dimensions.  This would be the same as a 2-dimensional being trying to understand the concept of 3-dimensions.  This is one of the reasons people do not get excited about the overall discovery.  It is difficult to get excited about something you cannot understand.  The image to the left is a called a Calabri-Yau shape, named for the mathematicians who figured out the equation that describes the geometry.  It is meant to show how all of the dimensions would look visually, but as you can see, it looks like a jumble of intersecting planes.

The way I try to visualize our universe, as described in the super-string community as M-theory, or Membrane Theory, or Brane Theory, is that we are living on a soap bubble.  All of the matter and energy that make up our visible and invisible universe is a manipulation of the surface of the soap bubble.  There is nothing, null, void, in the interior of the soap bubble.  Matter is created by twisting up the strings, or threads, of the fabric that makes up the entire membrane.  I'm sorry I cannot offer a better analogy.  But, the other important aspect of this is that all of the fabric of the universe is interconnected, similar to the tapestry woven by the three Fates from Greek Mythology, Lachesis, Clotho and Atropos.  Which in essence means that we too are all interconnected.  Its not enough for you to cognize this point, it is important to understand what it means. It means that all of our collective realities do affect one another.  When we pull on the fabric of reality, it pulls away from other areas, like when two people are fighting over the covers on a cold winter night.  The blanket doesn't really stretch as much as pull away from the other person. We cannot new blanket by simply pulling it, we just use what's already there, hence we cannot create matter and energy, it must come from what's already in the universe.

By now your brain is probably oozing from your ears, as mine was when I first started down this rabbit hole. But the fundamental truth still remains that our universe is shaped in such a way that all of our lives, and the lives of beings living on other planets far across the universe, are all interconnected and are one.  And what's even more fascinating is the fact that instinctually we must know this, due to the way we interact with our environment and one another.  People have been writing about the other dimensions for over a 100 years, and before that we wrote about them in other more abstract ways before we actually knew that they existed, and before it was heresy to mention the other dimensions. 

Of course, all of this is simply my way of viewing a very complex problem.  There are not true answers to this at this time, hence the on-going study of strings, membranes, gravity, wormholes, black holes, entangled atoms and consciousness' part in all of this.  But for now, I will leave you with this to think on before my next post when we will discuss where the soul resides in all of this.  At least, my view of where the soul resides.

In order to fully realize one's potential, you need tools to do so.  A lot of things are intuitive about the human condition if you can quiet the noise around you, but as we all know, that is not easy.  I am a bit ADD when it comes to normal activities. I like to be challenged all the time, otherwise, I'm looking for the next...

Sorry.. got distracted.

As I was saying, it is very hard to focus on the self when there are so many other things around you, vying for your attention; family, work, hobbies, television, traffic.  I've tried many different methods to try and organize my life, and I've found that organizing your life is as individual as you are.  While you can read on how others do it, it is always best for you to pick what works for you.  Some people learn at a different pace, some people work at a different pace.  Everything goes back to how you and your brain process the world around you.  So here are a few tools I've used or use:

1) Hemi-sync: I was introduced to the Hemi-sync method many years ago by a friend of mine who is actively involved with the Monroe Institute, developers of this process.  Hemi-sync is a method by which your brain is synchronized, both hemispheres, by listening to sounds produced using a binaural beat. In essence, you are put into a meditative state, without the rigorous meditation that religious practitioners employ, such as Buddhists.  The Monroe Institute is located in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and offers classes on how to utilize this method.  I have used it with great success and I have noticed a marked difference in my ability to process information and manipulate my personal reality.

2) Spiritual Questing: Whether you are a Christian, Buddhist, Hebrew or atheist you will spend a good percentage of your time understanding your own definitions of "spiritual".  This can be your personal philosophy or ethics, but it is an important aspect of who you are.  One good method for this is to involve yourself with a group of people who share your common "spiritual" outlook so that you can get insight from others on how to process your own belief system.  Of course, this also requires a certain amount of self-examination.  I approach my consciousness methodically, creating a plan for where I want to be with myself.  This will be different for everyone, but the key is to develop a plan for what you want to understand and how you intend to get there.  It is also good to understand the other belief systems around you because one observation you'll quickly make is that no one system can claim that it is definitively "the" belief system, despite overzealous claims by devotees.

3) Journaling/Blogging:  One of the reasons I started this blog was to chronicle my own exploration of self.  Keeping a journal allows me to reflect on the discoveries and mistakes I've made over time.  Life is nothing more than a series of trial and error.  Keeping a journal of your thoughts is a good way to remember where you've been and to keep notes on where you would like to go.  I've actually purchased several small notebooks that I can carry in my satchel for those times when I am no where near a computer.  I have many journals filled with my personal explorations. [If you have a blog you would like to share with others, please send the link to me and I can add it to my blogroll]

4) Music: There are very few people that I've met that do not like music.  Everyone has their own tastes.  I have a very diverse taste in music, however, there are definitely artists and genre's I listen to when I am in my reflective moods.  I often us the Meta-Music, a Hemi-Sync music derivative, when I am laying in bed reflecting at night.  During the days, I listen to classical, new age, or sometimes, grunge.  Each person will be different.  But like setting the mood for a romantic evening, it is also helpful to set the mood for an inner journey.  Music is a great focus.

5) Books:  You can walk into any bookstore and find a "self-help", "inspirational", "religious" or "philosophy" section.  These books are often focused on a particular subject and offer an opinion, just as I am doing now.  I am very leary of buying any sort of self-help book because in my opinion, they are just as clueless as I am and what works for one person, may not work for another.  So choose wisely.  Most of the books I use to focus my thoughts are not even self-help.  Here are a few books that I feel have great spiritual/philosophical value: [ranked order]

1. Illusions by Richard Back
2. Meditations by Marcus Aurelius
3. The Little Prince by Antoine St. Exupery
4. The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
5. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
6. Relativity by Albert Einstein
7. The Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
8. Animal Farm by George Orwell
9. The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter
10. Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku

For today, I will leave you with those tools to reflect and give you some ideas of how to begin the journey of understanding your universe, your reality.

Today, I would like to discuss the first amendment, whereby the US Congress is prohibited in creating a law that impedes our right to speak freely.  Now, I think this is an excellent amendment, probably one of the best.  We should not be restricted from or be provided with abridged material for our intellectual consumption.  However, the subtext in this amendment, implicit in the society of the 1700s, is that one should chose their words wisely.  We have all, at one time or another, probably made poor judgement in something we said.  We are human after all, but that does not relieve us from the responsibility for the repercussions of our commentary in any venue.

How many issues have arisen due to someone mindlessly speaking to a large group, or how many people with skewed senses of priority have spoken to large crowds and led them down a dangerous path?  All you need to do is stop one moment and look around you.  Watch the news, read a book, listen to your colleagues at lunch or listen to yourself when talking with friends.  Our words do affect one another greatly. Words can give one inspiration and they can also cause pain.  We can incite a riot, or rally a team to win the game.  It is one of the greatest gifts our species possesses, the power of communication.

"For millions of years mankind lived just like the animals. Then something happened which unleashed the power of our imagination. We learned to talk." -- Stephen Hawking

But, with this power of communication comes our responsibility to say the right things.  Watching the news at night, especially the "cable" channels, CNN, Fox, make me pretty depressed with the state of affairs.  We are marketing misery, murder and mayhem.  We publicize for the world all the most terrible aspects of our country.  And to anyone listening beyond the boundary of our solar system, eons hence, will think us a violent, unfeeling, miserable and destructive people. Over the course of a week, I reluctantly watched the evening news. I wanted to count how many "positive" stories there were to "negative" stories.  After a week, I determined that there are 5 "negative" stories on the average news station to every 1 "positive" stories.  Death, murder, robbery, destruction... and ohh, its fluffy! 

Why would anyone want to watch movies like "Saw", "Hostel" or "The Strangers"?  You can turn on any news station or watch one of the 500 crime shows on our television.  Law and Order, how man versions of this show do we really need before we admit we have a problem?  What's the addiction here?  Then of course, we have Forensic Files, Cold Case Files, The Files of Dale Hinman, we sure love the word "files".  But, we have to remember that we are the ones asking for these shows, we continue to watch them.  So one can't rightly blame the media or the media moguls, they are just giving us what we want. It has to end with us.

Do we really want to be this unhappy all the time?  At the end of the day, we've created this reality of Paris Hilton, Reality TV and violent news.  We want our speech to be free so we can talk about anyone we want, intrude wherever we want, and quench our appetite for unhappiness.  Why is this? What is all this doing to our children?

If we were to be a little more cognizant of what we say, how we say it and what we allow others to say.  The power of free speech is a right, just like the right to bear arms.  We should treat words as carefully as a firearm, because in the end, it can have just as devastating effect.