Where the Stream Flows: Consciousness, Transcendence, and the Hardest Question We Know

     James Keisman- Section 2

    When I first read Chapter 4 of Sick Souls, Healthy Minds, I had terrible trouble understanding what I was reading. But after a few passes I started to get what James was saying. I had a eurphoric realization. I had never seriously pondered what I was questioning until I came across his “stream.” The idea of unfolding one’s own mind—of consciously observing inner life—had long fascinated me, but I didn’t have language for it. Now I know “the hard question.” James believed consciousness comes to us as a stream: moving, flowing, blending, shifting at all times, even without us perceiving it.

    

A few weeks ago, after a long hiatus from self-reflection, I finally stopped and looked around at my own life. I was too ashamed to admit my downfalls, but what instilled real change was perceiving the “stream.” I realized I was living half-awake, like a zombie, even though I never recognized it. After a few extreme rituals and experiments on myself, I came closer to a part of my mind I never knew existed. Similar to Benjamin Blood’s nitrous-oxide “transcendence,” I forced myself to pause, perceive, and analyze my own experiences. Through this I discovered a partial answer to my life’s purpose: unwind everything I thought I knew about myself and delve deeper into consciousness.

That led me to other philosophers’ answers to the hard question of consciousness or their conclusions that there might be no satisfying answer at all.

The hard problem asks:

• Why does experience feel like anything at all?

• Why is there an inner movie? A witness? A feeling of “me” behind it all?

Here’s a video that introduces the hard problem:

James argues you can’t break consciousness down scientifically, not without losing what actually matters. As I prepared my presentation, I explored how other philosophers approached the same question and where they diverge from James’s stream.

Zapffe: Consciousness as a Tragic Over-Evolution

I found a video titled “The Existential Elk Theory – The Darkest Philosophical Essay Ever Written” on YouTube. It introduced me to a darker view of consciousness from Peter Wessel Zapffe. Zapffe believed consciousness evolved “too far,” making humans painfully self-aware.

His core idea: consciousness brings more suffering than benefit.

If James thinks consciousness can redeem us, Zapffe argues we might need psychological defense mechanisms such as isolation, distraction, anchoring, or sublimation in order to survive.

Ask yourself: Have you ever felt that increased awareness made life harder instead of better?

James might respond that awareness isn’t the issue. That being partially awake is. Zapffe and James point in opposite directions. Transcendence versus overload.

Nietzsche’s Übermensch - Consciousness as Self-Overcoming (my favorite philosophy)

Then I turned to Friedrich Nietzsche, whose philosophy resonated deeply with my own desire for growth. Nietzsche’s idea of the Übermensch presents consciousness as an act of creation, not just observation.

In Nietzsche’s vision, people trapped in herd-morality are asleep, a few awake individuals overturn common values and create their own.

To me, this feels like the ultimate evolution of James’s stream.
Instead of just witnessing the flow, we take the stream and shape it and turn awareness into action, intention, purpose.

Schopenhauer - Consciousness as the Surface of the Will

Arthur Schopenhauer proposed that the world is driven by a blind, irrational Will, and consciousness is merely a thin veil above this primal force. In his view, awareness is superficial, fleeting, unreliable, and the real engine is the Will itself.

Compared with James’s rich, meaningful consciousness, Schopenhauer’s view feels bleak and shallow.

Which feels more true to your own experience? Living in a meaningful flow or riding a surface wave over something uncontrollable?

Goff’s Panpsychism - Consciousness Is Everywhere

In Galileo’s Error, Philip Goff argues that consciousness is fundamental to reality. Not just humans or animals—but perhaps even particles have proto-experience. Consciousness isn’t a byproduct of complexity, it’s a basic feature of the universe.

This supports James: if consciousness can’t be reduced, perhaps that’s because it cannot be reduced. Perhaps our human stream is just a vivid version of a universal property.

What if reality is more like a tapestry of consciousness rather than a machine of matter?

If consciousness pervades all existence, then the stream isn’t just inside us, it runs through everything.

Illusionism - Consciousness Doesn’t Exist in the Way We Think

Then there’s the most radical view: consciousness as illusion. Some modern thinkers (like Daniel Dennett) say there is no “inner movie,” no witness just a brain telling itself a story. I personally, think this is not very plausible to me. At least a theory I like to not be true. 

This collides directly with James. Where James trusts subjective experience as the most real thing there is, illusionists argue subjective experience is the least reliable.

Which side do you trust more: direct subjective feeling or the brain’s story?

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James stands between mysticism, psychology, and existential hope. He refuses reduction and refuses despair. He argues that

The stream is real. The stream matters.
If we pay attention, the stream can save us. It did for me.

Do you agree? Is consciousness a mistake, a power, a surface, a universal property, or an illusion?
Is it even worth finding out? Is our own mind a burden to us? Is understanding ourselves necessary for humanities longevity? I think undoubtably, yes.

My Hope: Toward the Übermensch

In my own transformation, my waking up,I realized the stream doesn’t just pass through me. It gave me the clarity to envision something greater. I don’t just want personal peace or understanding anymore. I want humanity to wake up. I want us to strive for something like the Übermensch. I want us to use consciousness not just to survive but to thrive, to create, to evolve.

Maybe that’s idealistic. Maybe that’s naive. But if consciousness exists in some way, and if our stream flows, why shouldn’t we aim to uncover it?

-Final Reflection

When I forced myself to stop running and pay attention to my inner life, I glimpsed a possibility beyond the habits and routines that were draining me. I felt the current beneath everyday thoughts and realized: consciousness isn’t just a feature of my mind it just might be the foundation of everything meaningful.