A modern spiritual framework from Brazil

Brazil is a country of stunning natural beauty and exhilarating cultural diversity.  Some people refer to Brazil as the India of the west in reference to its deep spirituality and diversity of religious traditions.  Catholicism is the official and dominant religion.  The African inspired religions of Umbanda and Candomble are evidenced by the ubiquitous presence of roadside offerings to diverse deities and spirits, who may be benign or malign depending on the intended result of the faithful.  Psychic surgery is practiced in football stadiums before thousands of people. Millions follow Spiritualism, based on the work of Frenchman Allen Kardec, which includes spiritual healing sessions, mediumship and a prolific literature about the role of spirits and personal spirit journeys (projections of consciousness, astral projection). 

It is from this background that the 1980s saw the arising of a new approach to understanding the spiritual experience in the shape of projectiology, the study of the projection of consciousness or out-of-body experience, and conscientiology, the study of consciousness.  Founded by a previously prominent Spiritualist, the medium and medical doctor Waldo Vieira, projectiology and conscientiology were created to approach the spiritual experience without any religious reference.  Their foundation is experimental, i.e. people are urged to pursue projections of consciousness, work with their energetic body and develop and analyze psychic experiences.  It is also academic, in the sense of being a technical and research based approach to understanding consciousness and pursuing personal growth.  Since the 1980s, projectiology and conscientiology have spread from Waldo Vieira’s living room, where it started through a series of lectures, to most major cities and towns across Brazil. 

In Brazil today, there are many different organizations devoted to teaching and further developing this experiential approach to consciousness research and a substantial campus has been developed at a town called Iguassu Falls. At the so-called Center for Higher Studies of Conscientiology people can take a vast array of workshops to develop their psychic awareness, attend regular lectures with Dr Vieira and other experienced instructors, access one of the world’s largest libraries on psychic phenomena and spiritual growth and conduct self-research in the numerous laboratories designed to facilitate psychic development. 

Beyond the shores of the spiritual melting pot of Brazil, conscientiology is still in its infancy, but the remarkable success it has enjoyed at home is a direct result of the positive impact it has had on people’s lives. This suggests that it will eventually find its place as a new tool for personal growth and self-understanding in the rest of the world.

You can access educational opportunities in conscientiology in many countries and online from anywhere in the world through the International Academy of Consciousness (IAC). Courses offered through the IAC focus on practical skills, such as mastering your bioenergy and inducing projections of consciousness (OBEs, astral projection), and provide in-depth information on topics such as non-physical dimensions, life before birth and after death, the different bodies in which we manifest and our evolutionary journey across life-times. For more information check out their website http://www.iacworld.org/english/courses/courses-events