Our consciousness shapes our world and our world shapes our consciousness.
1
Our girl Jane often makes peculiar decisions based on a thinking driven by different factors varying from fear, to love, to even extreme logic; and in the beginning she has no idea of the injustice she puts herself through because of her lack of understanding of her problem itself.
2
Listen, then,
Jane Eyre, to your sentence: to-morrow, place the glass before you, and draw in
chalk your own picture, faithfully; without softening one defect: omit no harsh
line, smooth away no displeasing irregularity; write under it, ‘Portrait of a
Governess, disconnected, poor, and plain.
Afterwards,
take a piece of smooth ivory – you have one prepared in your drawing-box: take
your pallette, mix your freshest, finest, clearest tints; choose your most
delicate camel-hair pencils; delineate carefully the loveliest face you can
imagine; paint it in your softest shades and sweetest hues, according to the
description given by Mrs. Fairfax of Blanche Ingram: remember the raven
ringlets, the oriental eye; – what! you revert to Mr. Rochester as a model! Order!
No snivel! – no sentiment! – no regret! I will endure only sense and
resolution. Recall the august yet harmonious lineaments, the Grecian neck and
bust: let the round and dazzling arm be visible, and the delicate hand; omit
neither diamond ring nor gold bracelet; portray faithfully the attire, aërial
lace and glistening satin, graceful scarf and golden rose: call it ‘Blanche, an
accomplished lady of rank.
4
And was Mr.
Rochester now ugly in my eyes? No, reader: gratitude, and many associations,
all pleasurable and genial, made his face the object I best liked to see; his
presence in a room was more cheering than the brightest fire. Yet I had not
forgotten his faults: indeed, I could not, for he brought them frequently
before me.
5
This sequence illustrates Jane's conscious behavior towards a single element, which in this case is appearance. When she first sees Rochester she feels the connection but wishes to suppress it because she knows that they could not have a real relationship, which is a constraint put on Jane by her world. Thus, she unfairly compares herself to Blanche Ingram. Later though Jane begins to consent to her feelings towards Rochester.This is consciousness breaking down a barrier to achieve a greater understanding of something.
6
She need
neither needed to fight her age, nor submit to it; she was of it, yet remained
herself. Now, therefore, she could write, and write she did. She wrote. She
wrote. She wrote.
7
I have no way
and therefore want no eyes.
I stumbled
when I saw.
8
In both the cases of Orlando and Gloucester their adventures ended with them expanding their conscious thinking. Orlando did so through her writing and becoming one with her world. Sadly for Gloucester, he did so through the loss of his eyes, which resulted in his realization of his child's deception. Jane too goes sequentially through a growth in her time at Gateshead, Lowood, Thornsfield, and at the Moor House. In this time she encounters many challenges as well.
9
It drew aside
the window-curtain and looked out; perhaps it saw dawn approaching, for, taking
the candle, it retreated to the door. Just at my bedside the figure stopped:
the fiery eye glared upon me--she thrust up her candle close to my face, and
extinguished it under my eyes. I was aware her lurid visage flamed over mine,
and I lost consciousness: for the second time in my life--only the second
time--I became insensible from terror.
10
I can but
die, I said, and I believe in God. Let me try to wait His will in silence.
These words I not only thought, but uttered; and thrusting back all my misery
into my heart, I made an effort to compel it to remain there--dumb and still.
All men must
die, said a voice quite close at hand; but all are not condemned to meet a
lingering and premature doom, such as yours would be if you perished here of
want.
Who or what
speaks? I asked, terrified at the unexpected sound, and incapable now of
deriving from any occurrence a hope of aid.
11
The sheer terror ^
The loss of hope and the overwhelming fear or shock of a dire situation creates the conditions for one to lose consciousness. Jane is put on the brink of death as she lies at the door before the Rivers household. The only thing that sustains her is her conscious sense of hope; but as that begins to decay Jane no longer can differ between what is in her mind and what is real. These moments of psuedo-consciousness are also when we truly stretch our minds, just like when Jane saw the "vampyre" she was already in a state of half dream.
12
There is a
kind of sleep that steals upon us sometimes, which, while it holds the body
prisoner, does not free the mind from a sense of things about it, and enable it
to ramble at its pleasure. So far as an overpowering heaviness, a prostration
of strength, and an utter inability to control our thoughts or power of motion,
can be called sleep, this is it; and yet we have a consciousness of all that is
going on about us; and if we dream at such a time, words which are really
spoken, or sounds which really exist at the moment, accommodate themselves with
surprising readiness to our visions, until reality and imagination become so
strangely blended that it is afterwards almost a matter of impossibilty to
separate the two. Nor is this, the most striking phenomenon, incidental to such
a state. It is an undoubted fact, that although our senses of touch and sight
be for the time dead, yet our sleeping thoughts, and the visionary scenes that
pass before us, will be influenced, and materially influenced, by the mere
silent presence of some external object: which may not have been near us when
we closed our eyes: and of whose vicinity we have had no waking consciousness.
13
Control of
consciousness determines the quality of life.
14
15
I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet.
16
Do you think
I am an automaton? — a machine without feelings? and can bear to have my morsel
of bread snatched from my lips, and my drop of living water dashed from my cup?
Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and
heartless? You think wrong! — I have as much soul as you — and full as much
heart! And if God had gifted me with some beauty and much wealth, I should have
made it as hard for you to leave me, as it is now for me to leave you. I am not
talking to you now through the medium of custom, conventionalities, nor even of
mortal flesh: it is my spirit that addresses your spirit; just as if both had
passed through the grave, and we stood at God's feet, equal — as we are!
17
He--for there
could be no doubt of his sex, though the fashion of the time did something to
disguise it--was in the act of slicing at the head of a Moor which swung from
the rafters.
18
Through out Jane's adventure she learns to become more independent. She breaks away from being controlled by Mrs. Reed, Rochester, and even St. John. Her growth in consciousness shapes her world because she is able to take charge without needing others to guide her, yet she still is shaped by her society and environment akin to the experiences of Orlando.
19
Still
indomitable was the reply--I care for myself. The more solitary, the more
friendless, the more unsustained I am, the more I will respect myself. I will
keep the law given by God; sanctioned by man. I will hold to the principles
received by me when I was sane, and not mad – as I am now. Laws and principles
are not for the times when there is no temptation: they are for such moments as
this, when body and soul rise in mutiny against their rigour; stringent are
they; inviolate they shall be. If at my individual convenience I might break
them, what would be their worth? They have a worth – so I have always believed;
and if I cannot believe it now, it is because I am insane – quite insane: with
my veins running fire, and my heart beating faster than I can count its throbs.
Preconceived opinions, foregone determinations, are all I have at this hour to
stand by: there I plant my foot.
20
Jane makes the conscious, but never the less painful, choice to leave Rochester and learns that she is at times the most important person in her life. Ultimately, her world and her consciousness do not have to be at war. They can shape and guide one through life as demonstrated by Jane's experiences and growth as an individual.21
This
Consciousness that is aware
Of
Neighbors and the Sun
Will
be the one aware of Death
And
that itself alone
22
Our consciousness is a powerful tool that sets us free. It encourages our learning and promotes the establishment of the self. But...
How truly conscious are we of ourselves, our actions, and our world?
How truly conscious are we of ourselves, our actions, and our world?
23
I
am now all ready
To
wing my mystic flight
To
the future worlds
Of
Existence-Consciousness-Bliss
Infinite.
Sources:
1.
Commentary/Analysis
2. Bronte, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. 3. New York: W.
W. Norton & Company Ltd., 2001. (137). Print.
3.
YouTube. YouTube, n.d. Web. 23 Apr. 2013.
4.
Bronte (125)
5.
Commentary/Analysis
6.
Woolf, Virginia. Orlando. Orlando: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2006. (196).
Print.
7.
Shakespeare, William, and Alan Durband. King Lear. Woodbury, NY: Barron's,
1986. (173). Print.
8.
Commentary/Analysis
9.
Bronte (242)
10.
Bronte (286)
11.
Commentary/Analysis
12.
Dickens, Charles. Oliver Twist,. New York: Dodd, Mead &, 1941. Print.
13.
Csikszentmihalyi, Mihaly. "Quotes About Consciousness." (226 Quotes).
N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Apr. 2013.
14.
Steinberg, Saul. Cover. New Yorker 18 Oct. 1969: n. pag. Web.
15.
Mohandas Ghandi. Source unknown.
16.
Bronte (215-216)
17. Woolf (1)
18.
Commentary/Analysis
19.
Bronte (270-271)
20.
Commentary/Analysis
21.
Dickinson, Emily. This Consciousness That Is Aware. N.p.: n.p., n.d. Print.
22.
Commentary/Analysis
23.
Sri Chinmoy, Twenty-Seven Thousand Aspiration-Plants, Part 124, Agni Press,
1989.
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