Page 53 - Timelessness and the Reality of Fate

The Secret Beyond Matter 51

such as right, left, front or behind exists. That is, sound does not come to you
from the right, from the left or from the air; there is no direction from
which the sound comes.
The same is true of odour. Just as a rose will appear as an image in the
centre of vision, so will its fragrance be sensed in the centre of smell.
Whether the source of the odour is near or far, and whether the odour is
sour, sweet, acrid, pleasant, etc. are likewise matters for the brain to inter-
pret.
The "external world" presented to us by our perceptions is merely a col-
lection of the electrical signals reaching our brain. Throughout our lives,
these signals are processed by our brain and we proceed without recognis-
ing that we are mistaken in assuming that these are the "original" versions of
matter existing in the external world. We are misled because we can never
directly reach matter itself by means of our senses.
Moreover, it is again our brain that interprets and attributes meaning to
the signals about the "external world" and we assume to be dealing with its
original. For example, let us consider the sense of hearing. It is in fact our
brain that transforms the sound waves in the "external world" into a sym-
phony. That is to say, we
know music as interpret-
ed by our brain, not the
original music that exists
outside. In the same
manner, when we see
colours, what reaches our
eyes are merely electrical
signals of different
wavelengths. It is again
our brain that transforms
these signals into colours.
The colours in the
"external world" are
unknown to us. We can
never have direct experi- We see everything around us as
coloured inside the darkness of our
ence of the true red of an
brains, just as this garden looks
apple, the true blue of the coloured from the window of a dark-
sky or the true green of ened room.