Think Outside the Box
Text and Photography: Caroline Hargreaves
It begins with the simple questions of love and attraction. We have all experienced it. We have all asked the questions of; How does this person feel about me? Do we have a connection? Is it possible that every time I think about him, he thinks about me too? Is our love of the same intensity? And every time I get a rush of joy through me, does he feel the same way?
The question I am asking myself is whether or not there exists an invisible connection between people despite of distances, and also time for that matter? This leads to many interesting questions. Can our emotions be guided by outside forces, not only in our direct environment as many alternative theories argue, but also in our expanded social relations- not only through people that we know but also those who know of us? If this were true, then our entire basis of function would be altered, because it would imply that our individuality would no longer exist- drawing on ideas from e.g. Spinoza (the idea of the universe as one functioning entity) and Eckhart Tolle (leaving the idea of the self behind and embracing a common identity). We say that everything is connected. But to what extent?
Kant was wise when he understood that there is simply a part of life that human beings do not have the capability or capacity to understand. Something that is outside our frames of senses and perceptions that we are bound within. We are constructed by a four-dimensional conception, but I can see us moving beyond that. Again, these ideas are very old, we just have to provide new words to the vocabulary. 
God = Love = Life = Light, the absence of darkness. All religions stem from the same fundamentals. All religions have some kind of actor who has discovered truth and experiences which are largely associated with something mystical; the sole explanation is that these connections lie beyond our everyday comprehension. Right now, the only thing I can say for certain is that I exist. I exist through interactions of energy. I exist beyond the four-dimensional concept of depth, width, height and time, a framework which human beings have placed upon themselves in order to make sense of our existence. Time is overrated. “If by eternity is understood not eternal temporal duration, but timelessness, then he lives eternally who lives in the present,” Wittgenstein wrote.
He knew, already then, decades ago. We just have to open our minds again and step outside of the structures we have grown too big for. The conclusion is then, that everything is connected beyond the bounds of what we can perceive. Connection is energy. Energy is light. Light is the source of everything good and the concept of unity which we are all drawn towards. The thread of thought that started out as a question of love in it simplest form, ended as love at its most complex. Please- move beyond your senses. This is a request for expansion.
Caroline Hargreaves is an Editor and Photographer for the Magazine. She is Norwegian and studies International Relations at the University of St Andrews in Scotland.
