Download a copy of Paradigmatic Breakthrough:
 Essays in New-Age Philosophy here

In this article I’m going to look at paradigmatic breakthrough from a number of angles.

A paradigmatic breakthrough is a discontinuous movement from one contextualizing understanding or point of view that has come to pinch and restrict to another more acceptable one.

If the resulting shift in understanding, attitudes, desires, and constraints is lasting, we say we’ve had a paradigm shift. If not, we say we had an interesting idea.

An example was my enthusiasm, as an historian, for the notion of a “cooperative commonwealth.” For whatever reason, it never caused paradigmatic breakthrough whereas Werner Erhard’s “a world that works for everyone” definitely did.

The latter resulted in a lasting paradigm shift for me. I realized on March 13, 2015 that the phrase was a simple description of life immersed in the love of the higher planes.  There, the world works for everyone.

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A build-up of cognitive dissonance is what causes paradigmatic breakthroughs. No dissonance; no need for a breakthrough. We’re happy with our paradigm.

Only when it starts to pinch and restrict do we chafe and end up finding a new and larger contextual home.

A beautiful description of a version of this process comes from the afterlife journal of William James, which I read for New Maps of Heaven. (1)

He’s leaving far more than just a paradigm. He’s ascending from the Astral Plane (Fourth Dimension) to the Mental Plane (Fifth Dimension). But his description of the process is similar:

“I feel myself growing out of myself in a certain fashion. My adopted characteristics are becoming too small and cramped to contain my new growth and development, and I will move on most certainly to larger psychological quarters.

“It is not only the physical body we outlive, but the psychological house we have chosen. First after death we add new rooms and suites to accommodate our greater experience, but it is soon obvious that the entire structure has had its day. We must move out of it completely.” (2)

Perfect. Make appropriate changes and you have a description of the process behind paradigmatic breakthrough.

It can happen explosively or quietly. One is either pushing oneself to break through an obstacle or letting go into release. In the latter case we may not even notice we’ve had a breakthrough, but we probably notice the resulting paradigm shift.

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A paradigmatic breakthrough is an example of a spiritual realization. But not all spiritual realizations are or lead to paradigmatic breakthroughs.

Paradigm shifts are events in knowledge. Spiritual realizations may be events in knowledge but they usually involve every other part of our being as well.

Have we some examples of the points I’ve just made?

Yes. An example of a paradigm that proved “too small and cramped” for me was my Sociology Ph.D. at UBC. I’d finished my exams and was due to choose a dissertation topic. However at that moment, the 1987 vision happened and totally reoriented my life. (3)

But the University of BC at the time was gripped by the paradigm of empirical materialism. Only what could be seen, heard, touched, or tasted was real.

Enlightenment was at least not real unto itself and brought us into the discussion of other events that were not considered real (ascension of Jesus, Buddha’s enlightenment, angelic intervention, etc.).

Two departments (Sociology and Religious Studies) refused me.

But what I saw in that vision was more important than anything the university could offer me, then or for a lifetime, and so I left.

“It is soon obvious that the entire structure has had its day. We must move out of it completely.”

Precisely.

An example of a quiet paradigmatic breakthrough would be when I realized the price I was paying for having an underlying hostile nature.

I changed my vote on or around Sept. 30, 2020, from being hostile to being harmonious. (4) It took the form of a stand, rather than a realization; it wasn’t noisy or filled with lights. But it still led to a breakthrough and a paradigm shift regardless.

Have we an example of a blissful realization that did not result in a paradigmatic breakthrough?

Yes. On Sept. 28, 2015, I realized bliss (so, this was a realization) and the experience remained for several months. (5) It did not lead to a paradigmatic breakthrough. It resulted more in me wanting to sit quietly in the space and enjoy it.

Here’s an example of a blissful experience that did lead to paradigmatic breakthrough.

Bliss made possible my understanding of the 1987 vision. It lifted my faculties up to a place where I readily understood what I was seeing.

It led to many paradigmatic breakthroughs over the years.

Without bliss, I doubt whether I’d have had insights powerful enough to have caused paradigmatic breakthrough. The bliss of the vision was exceptional; it was definitely strong enough.

Have we an example of a realization that is not preceded by cognitive dissonance?

Yes. I realized (so, again, realization) the nature of love during an explosive heart opening on March 13, 2015. (6) There was no cognitive dissonance beforehand. There was nothing immediate I was doing which could be interpreted as causing the opening or leading up to it.

In a reading I had with him that very same day, Michael revealed that he decided the timing, strength, etc. of the heart opening and discussed the factors involved.  (7) So dissonance did not cause it; a celestial did.

Nonetheless, at the heart of every paradigmatic breakthrough is a realization.
I’d like to look at spiritual realizations as a class of phenomena in a separate article.

Download a copy of Paradigmatic Breakthrough:
 Essays in New-Age Philosophy here

Footnotes

(1) New Maps of Heaven at http://goldengaiadb.com/index.php?title=New_Maps_of_Heaven

(2) William James through Jane Roberts, medium, The Afterdeath Journal of an American Philosopher: The World View of William James. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1978, 159.

(3) I had an extended vision in 1987:  See “The Purpose of Life is Enlightenment – Ch. 13 – Epilogue,” August 13, 2011, at https://goldenageofgaia.com/2011/08/13/the-purpose-of-life-is-enlightenment-ch-13-epilogue/

(4) “From Hostility to Harmony,” October 2, 2020, at https://goldenageofgaia.com/2020/10/02/from-hostility-to-harmony/

(5) See “Submerged in Love,” March 14, 2015, at , “Activating the Wellspring – Part 1/2,” March 14, 2015, at https://goldenageofgaia.com/2015/03/14/activating-the-wellspring-part-1-2-2/, and “Activating the Wellspring – Part 2/2,” March 15, 2015, at https://goldenageofgaia.com/2015/03/15/activating-the-wellspring-part-2-2/

(6) I’m not surprised the experience happened that day. I’d have needed some explanation of what it was that just happened. The reading was like being given a handbook on the subject.

My cognitive dissonance had been around not being able to make sense of the literature on enlightenment I was reading.

The vision showed me the entire journey of an individual soul from God to God. It left me knowing for certain that the purpose of life was enlightenment.

That vision became my paradigm and will remain so until it begins to pinch and restrict.

(7) The passage is long but very germane. I’ll italicize the steps he says were influential in the event happening:

Archangel Michael: This occurs, not merely because you have asked for it, but because you (and this does apply to the collective) have done your, can we say, your homework, your due diligence.

What we mean by this is simply, think of it in spatial reality, time and space reality: you have created the space for this [energy of love] to, not only pass by you like a passing breeze or a rain, but to anchor within you because there is a sense of this spaciousness within thee. …

When one is clinging to core issues, to fear, to lack, to limitation – you know the list – there is not that sense, not only of spaciousness, but of acceptance, allowance, readiness and even permission. Because as you know, we continually say that we will never override your free will.

So, if the will, either actively or subconsciously, is actually choosing to still engage in the issues or the drama, then although we are standing at readiness and still penetrating you, that open door is not there.

S: So, the open door was there with me?

AAM: That is correct.

S: Did the exercise of bringing love up from my heart and sending it out through my third eye to the world play a role at all in this?

AAM: Yes, it did.

S: Could you talk about that for just a bit, please?

AAM: One of the strongest or the ultimate expressions of love, of willingness to not only participate in love but to be the love, is in the sharing. To say that you are love, or are loved, or you love this, that, someone… but [then] you keep it within you, you hoard it – and we do not necessarily mean that in a negative way – sometimes the feeling is so blissful you do not wish to actually take the next step quite yet, in terms of sharing.

[But] the ultimate experience is in this sharing. This is what we speak of when we speak of sacred union and partnership. How can you possibly be in any form of partnership with humanity, with the Star-beings, with us, with any being, if you are not sharing.

So what you do when you bring the love up and out, when you begin to send, to share, it is as if you have in fact activated what we call the wellspring. The visual you may think of is the volcano.

It is not that you empty out. It is that you discover that that wellspring is SO full and overflowing that it is a steady stream. That steady stream does not ever, ever (think of what I say!)… it never has to cease! (Archangel Michael in a personal reading with Steve Beckow through Linda Dillon, March 13, 2015.)’

As an aside, this exchange proves that our spiritual experiences are overseen and modulated by the celestials.