Working with the Challenges of a Confused Mind

By George A. Boyd © 2021

There are many people who are confused today. They are under the thrall of conspiracy theories and false beliefs, filled with fear or hate, or give their devotion and dedication to someone who perverts it. We quote from one of our articles, “The 49 Archetypes of Disciples and Aspirants”:

“Some of the greatest challenges of modern civilization are dealing with the excesses of [these four stations of confused mental operation], in which malevolent agendas pervert reason, motivation, and values of those unlucky enough to be caught up in their nets of delusion…”

These four stations are:

Deluded Believer – This individual embraces conspiracy theories; false information clouds his or her judgment.

Terrified One – This individual is absorbed in doomsday or apocalyptic scenarios; he or she attempts to find a way to survive the impeding calamity. He or she may harbor paranoid beliefs.

Deluded Devotee – This individual worships a cult leader or demagogue. He or she allows this cult leader or demagogue to shape his or her beliefs, values, behavior, and choices.

Hate-filled One – This individual embraces a hate group or terrorist group. He or she seeks to eliminate those who are of other religions, races, ethnic groups, or cultures.

“People who are caught up in these mindsets of delusion may truly believe that they have discovered the truth. When challenged, they will tenaciously defend their beliefs and their leaders who disseminate these warped visions of reality.
For this reason, it is difficult to break people free from the thrall of these enveloping bubbles of belief to get them back into touch with their humanity and innate spirituality—to enable them to extricate their Self and their Soul from the illusions in which they are immersed…

We have treated the methods by which these delusional beliefs can be deconstructed in our article, “Getting Untangled from Delusional Beliefs,” which is our blog post for July 19. 2019. You may wish to read the entire article for an overview of this topic.

Those who want to go into these topics of belief construction and deconstruction in religion, cults, and terrorist groups more deeply may wish to acquire our book, Religions, Cults, and Terrorism: What the Heck Are We Doing? You may also enjoy our public webinar series on Cults and on Judeo-Christian religion, where we explore some of these topics in greater depth.

We will excerpt from this article to detail specific strategies how people can extract themselves from these delusional mindsets:

“You unravel these knots of belief through applying strategies that deconstruct them. These methods include:”

  1. Be willing to experience the world as it is without the filter of beliefs, metaphors, or symbols. The practice of mindfulness, being present and aware, helps you do this.
  2. Accept that people hold many alternative perceptions of reality. Seek to understand why they view the world differently. Studying the different strata of the Great Continuum of Consciousness and finding the different identity states that people embrace will assist you to understand this phenomenon.
  3. Take ownership of your projections. Notice if you are using symbols or events to project your desires on other people or the world. Tools such as process meditation and the Mandala Method help you trace your beliefs back to their origin, which gives you the option to re-own them and modify them.
  4. Use contradictory or conflicting evidence to arrive at a greater truth, a more complete theory that includes other viewpoints. If you hold truths hypothetically until you can fully confirm them, you will avoid the trap of tenaciously holding erroneous beliefs. Be willing to question what you believe as you gain new evidence. The Synthesis Method is a valuable tool for resolving conflicts between beliefs—it allows you to find a higher standpoint that allows you to integrate both perspectives.
  5. Dissolve your bubble of belief through experiencing your intentional consciousness (attentional principle), your loving heart (spirit), and your transcendent being (Soul) directly. Experience your body, your vehicles of consciousness and the levels of your mind directly, and relate to the world and other people from your authentic spirituality.
  6. Seek empathy, understanding, and compassion for your Self and others. Cultivate humility and recognize you do not have all the answers—you continue to learn and grow. Also allow others to discover their own truths. Don’t impose your beliefs and values on others. Share your discoveries in consciousness if they ask you about them.
  7. Take ownership of how you persecute and harm others and stop doing this. Take responsibility for your own actions, words, and thoughts. Stop blaming others for your shortcomings and failures; strive to improve yourself. Deconstruct the mindset that makes you believe you are under attack: embrace the beauty, harmony, and perfection of the universe as it is.

“We suspect that if those who hold these rigid belief systems of apocalypse, hatred, and conspiracy would utilize these steps, much of the political and religious strife in the world could be dissolved. We are not holding our breath that this will happen any time soon; but employing methods like this to deconstruct these mindsets would relieve a lot of the turmoil in our world today.”

“We teach methods one through five in our intermediate meditation classes, the in-person Mudrashram® Master Course in Meditation and the by-mail and online Accelerated Meditation Program.”

The inner scaffolding of these four types of the confused mind is constructed of a network of beliefs—beliefs that influence people’s choices, values, emotions, and behavior. It is possible for people to change these beliefs and extricate themselves from the hypnotic spell that these distorted doctrines and perverted ideologies cast upon their minds and their lives.

Those of you, who have gotten out of these life-consuming mindsets, but have lingering issues from your involvement in these groups and movements, may benefit from our Cult Recovery Coaching Program.