How Slowing Down Produces More

Posted on October 24, 2020 by Richard Kaufman

Why Connecting to the Quantum Field Can Help You Make Quantum Leaps in Your Filmmaking and Film Project

by Carole Dean

“My brain is only a receiver. In the universe there is a core from which we obtain knowledge, strength, inspiration. I have not penetrated into the secrets of this core, but I know that it exists.”

Having trouble finding and identifying your audience? Use the quantum field to connect with them and share your story

Who do you think said this? He was alive 100 years ago. He was a physicist. Who do you think knew there was a quantum field, a shared consciousness of energy and knowledge from which we are all connected, and that his brain was a receiver decades ahead of anyone else?

He’s one of the many great minds whose knowledge and insight I share with our fiscally sponsored filmmakers to help them reach their full potential. Keep thinking on the answer to this mystery man and I will tell you.

Saturday morning has become my favorite time of the week. This is when we meet with our fiscally sponsored filmmakers in our Saturday Film Funding Guidance Class. Over the last two years, we have expanded our knowledge of who we are, how gifted we are, and how to unleash our creativity. We have read and studied how to use information on the power of our minds from books like The Field by Lynn McTaggart, Real Magic and The Conscious Universe by Dean Radin.

Currently we are enjoying Quantum Spirituality by Amit Goswami, a brilliant physicist. Let me share some of this insightful book along with examples of how to use his teachings to help make your film and your filmmaking career a success.

The Human Condition and How to Get Out of It

“Some ways to get out of the human condition”, Amit Goswami writes, “are non-locality, discontinuity and tangled hierarchy.

“For us to Internalize information is the signature of a quantum experience. The external world of our experience, by the necessity of manifesting is approximately Newtonian and deterministic, detached from the casual world of choice. We want to look to our internal experiences, the subtle world, to find our way back from the physical machine aspect which is our running our lives to the casual creative aspect of ourselves.

“It is important to know that Non-locality is signal-less instant communication. Instant communication means communicating with yourself, it is oneness. The quantum world view says we human beings have the potential of being one with everybody else using this non-local communication. Naturally cultivating non-locality will help shift your me-centeredness towards the Universal quantum self.”

Finding and Using Your Universal Quantum Self

When you’re making a film that has a worldwide aspect you will want to learn how to use this universal quantum self. This is necessary if your film has an essence for a worldview that you want to share with other people. You’ll want then to connect with them (your audience) using this universal quantum self.

Perhaps your film is an exposure of something that society needs to know about or it is a biography of a loving kind human. These films you may want to share internationally. If your film has an essence that fits a worldview then you might be able to use this idea of the interconnectedness to reach your audience.

How? By taking the essence of your film into your meditation and asking to connect with your world audience. Take that energy of your film, the feeling of the film, with you and ask for the universe to connect you emotionally to your audience.

Begin to resonate and feel that energy of your audience. Ask daily for the universe to connect you with your audience. Perhaps by saying:

I am my audience
I am connected to my audience or
I am expanding my audience daily

One of these could be your daily mantra.

Attaching Your Audience to Your Film

Follow that up with posting online information of one or two lines about the essence of your film.

Post something about the purpose for the film.
Post the benefits of the film.
Ask friends, family, and fans to re tweet for you.

Perhaps even take some of your interviews or any footage you have shot on your film and make short one-and-two-minute videos. Post those on a new YouTube account and drive people to your website where they can join your community to help support you and your film. On your website, gave them a gift for joining.

Now more than ever we need to get connected and these are ways you can get your audience connected to you. People want to hear about your film and your job is to tell them.

Raise Your Energy from your Navel Chakra to your Heart Chakra

“In the brain”, Amit says, “your me-centeredness expresses itself as activities in the brain areas that neuroscientists identify as belonging to the self-agency. The reinforced memories of ego-persona that feed your ‘me’ are stored in these areas.

“In the body your self-centeredness expresses yourself as vitality tied up to the navel chakra-the welfare of you and you alone. Narcissism. Or for women, in the heart chakra. Too much neediness, needing another to attach to.

“Practices like giving, giving unconditionally, obviously take you away from the thoughts of the Me-personas. This is recommended and it also raises the energy from your navel chakra to your heart chakra. Giving is just one practice; another practice you can do is the practice of not taking yourself so seriously – humility. Still another one is forgiveness. All of these practices can also help when getting self-respect instead of self-indulgence.

“In the quantum world view, moment can be continuous which is familiar to you, right? Like moving cars, moving ants all move continuously in your experience. The physicist Niels Bohr discovered in 1913 that when electrons jump from one atomic orbit to another, they jump discontinuously without going through the intermediate space. Such a quantum leap is allowed in the quantum worldview. It is via these quantum leaps of thoughts and feelings that you learn to make positive emotional brain circuits to balance negativity.”

Making Quantum Leaps

Let’s talk about these quantum leaps. I see them all the time from people who go to college, graduate and make a quantum leap into a very good job as an acquisition person or a producer for Netflix. These things are possible. It happens to some people but not all. The question is how do you make it happen to you?

Let’s think about how you create your vision for yourself or for your film. For your film, you create a platform, that is your deck for a feature and a proposal and trailer for your documentary. You outline how you will take this idea that is now only a vision to a completed film.

How can you use Amit’s information to improve this process?

The majority of documentary films take six years to make and two years more to distribute. How can you break that record? Feature films sometimes take five to ten years. How can you finish faster?

The idea is to make a quantum leap from concept to completion. Some of this can be done with:

The power of your mind
Meditation
Connecting to the right people
Finding your audience
Attaching yourself to money and people and information that will move you forward

I know this is hard work, and it takes unrelenting determination. Most importantly you cannot lose faith. If something doesn’t work, you must be prepared to back up and try it again. Or try something new or different because you know your future is waiting for you.

You know it’s up to you to find out how to get through these obstacles by going over them or around them. Or by finding new ways and often, going outside of the box is the best solution.

Sometimes the Funding Comes from Your Audience

In my experience, the way people get money for their films is they connect with others of like mind who love the concept of their film. People who love the subject matter and who want to see the film made.

Finding people with money is the most important thing to do and sometimes you need join organizations or groups. Sometimes you need to donate time to a charity to get in the same room with wealthy people before you can begin to share your ideas with them.

How can you meet them? Consider how you might meet them on common ground. Perhaps that is taking care of animals at a rescue shelter. Perhaps that is a wildlife reserve, perhaps that is an organization to save and protect the oceans.

Consider finding a nonprofit you can donate time to, something that is either in line with your film or something that is in line with your heart. Then consider donating some of your precious time to a charity that will allow you to meet wealthy people. You will be doing what Amit says is important to raise your energy by giving unconditionally.

Focus on the “Be” in Do-Be-Do-Be-Do

Amit says that “the creative process is do-be-do-be-do”. “Do” is when you go out of your way to help someone. The “be” which is like in “being” is hard for us. Our tendency is to do-do-do. To make room for ‘be’ you need to engage with concentrated meditation focusing on an object. This slows you down.

Then between your thoughts you will have gaps. I always get a kick on the London metro whenever the train comes to a stop the loudspeaker warns, “mind the gap.” That’s what you do, you mind the gap between the thoughts. The more you mind the gap, the more extended the gap gets.

Where do you go when there is a gap in thought? In the unconscious of course. Giving your much-needed unconscious processing. The unconscious is much better at sorting out the new from all the potentialities that you have created through your conscious processing, especially when they get a chance of expanding using your ‘be’ time.”

I truly agree with Amit. I find that my daily meditation in the morning and in the afternoon helps me slow down enough so that I do hear the information that comes in the gap between thoughts, it’s meditation that helps me “get it.”

“It” can be the slightest hint of something, or it may be an answer to a question you ask. It may be a flash of the future; it may be a message from someone. It is always an important piece of information.

And the more often you catch it, the more you stop what you are doing, I mean when you literally stop and pay attention to it and take the time to process it, and take the time to honor it and accept that it is real and important, that’s when you can incorporate this information in your life. The more you stop and recognize and respond to these messages from the gap, the more you will get.

I highly recommend you pay attention to the little thoughts that are between the brain chatter…trust me, that is your quantum self talking to you.

Who Said That?

So, did you decide who that was who made the statement, “My brain is only a receiver. In the universe there is a core from which we obtain knowledge, strength, inspiration. I have not penetrated into the secrets of this core, but I know that it exists.”

This is from our beloved Nicola Tesla. He knew how to reach the quantum field and make those quantum leaps. I think you go into the quantum field often in filmmaking. This is where you get your knowledge, strength and inspiration.

Carole Dean is president and founder of From the Heart Productions; a 501(c)3 non-profit that offers the Roy W. Dean Film Grants and fiscal sponsorship for independent filmmakers. She hosts the weekly podcast, The Art of Film Funding, interviewing those involved in all aspects of indie film production. Her new class “How to Fund Your Film” is available on Vimeo on Demand. She is also the author of The Art of Film Funding, 2nd Edition: Alternative Financing Concepts. See IMDB for producing credits

Connecting to Your Higher Self

Posted on October 21, 2020 by Richard Kaufman

How to Find and Listen to That Little Voice Inside You to Eliminate Negativity, Stress, and Allow Your Creativity to Flourish

by Carole Dean

Every other Saturday at 10 am we have Film Funding Class for our fiscally sponsored filmmakers. These are some of the kindest people in the world, intent on educating themselves and moving their films forward. They allow me to share books with them on the power of our minds.

Some days I get on a roll and I don’t want to stop. I work too hard and end up exhausted. After reading Amit’s work, I intend to recognize when my energy is getting depleted. I will immediately stop, meditate and take my vitamin C.

This week we are studying Quantum Spirituality by Amit Goswami. There is a wealth of information in it aimed at moving you to a higher consciousness and improving your ability as a filmmaker.

From the massive amount of exercises and information Amit has in this book, you might want to read only one chapter a week and integrate that into your life. Perhaps you could take a year of reading and integrating. With this approach, you could become a much more enlightened being with a better understanding of your incredible human potential.

I highly recommend Quantum Spirituality. Here are some of the highlights that will help you thrive in life and your filmmaking career.

Realizing a Transformational Journey

Amit tells us about setting the stage for a transformational journey. He talks about the chakras and their importance. He shows us where, via a map, they are located on our body.

“The brow chakra: the initial vital function is rational thinking for which the organ is the prefrontal cortex, right at the back of the forehead. The associated feelings are clarity of understanding when the energy moves in, and confusion with depletion of energy.”

This is very important for filmmakers to know. Filmmakers work long hard hours and often hit this depletion of energy. One thing that can help you is to find a quiet spot to meditate for 20 minutes and get back on track.

They say 20 minutes of meditating is like one hour of sleep for the rest it gives your body. Dr. Linus Pauling said Vitamin C is a healer and that it helps clear your mind you when you get tired. It has been proven that people do better with tests and under stress after taking vitamin C.

Amit goes on to say, “With further opening, this brow chakra is the one that funnels the intuitive energy associated with the archetypes that are attracted to you. This is why this chakra is called the third eye or the eye of intuition. The associated feelings of archetypical exploration are satisfaction, when energy is gained, and despair when energy is depleted.”

Communicating with Your Audience

Amit teaches us how to recognize signs from our body and how to restore our balance.

“This brow chakra is an important chakra for all of us because we need to be connected to our intuition.”

We are all blessed with psychic abilities, we learned that from Dean Radin in his books, and using those abilities is very important for each of us because we are connected to the universe and to each other.

For filmmakers this is important because you need to tap into people to know what they want.

You want to tap into what your audience likes and learn how to communicate with them. What better way to get in contact with your market and your audience then through your own intuition?

Always trust that little voice.

Building Positive Emotional Brain Circuits

Amit proposes that we need to loosen the structure of the ego by developing more authenticity as to who we are and what we’re doing. We need to understand the chakras in the body where we experience emotion and the mental thought that accompanies this. We want to pay attention to what we feel.

He believes the science of the chakras is also very important. When doing yoga, he suggests that you need to focus on the chakra for each yoga position. Yoga will benefit you even more when you add this newly learned behavior to your life.

All of the practices he talks about are effective to building positive emotional brain circuits. These are good to help balance our negativity in general situations of emotional management. (Here, I think he means so that we don’t lose our cool and are able to handle a lot of stress.)

This is perfect for filmmakers who are learning to shoot with COVID-19 rules.

Imagination and Preparation

“Creativity begins,” Amit tells us, “with the stage of preparation according to creativity researchers, three “I” words play a huge role even before that: inspiration, intention and intuition. Inspiration is what we experience when, with or even without reason, the quantum self touches us, and we feel expanded.”

Amit calls this — A beginning of curiosity.

“As we make an intention for such visits more often, it is then that we become aware of our intuitive faculty and the law of attraction: the archetypes are attracted to us. And now the word begins in the form of the four stages of creativity. As “I” words they are imagination, aka preparation, incubation, insight, and implementation aka manifestation.”

An Academy Award winning producer I know uses this “I” word, imagination, before each shoot day. At night, she imagines the next morning. She goes through everything from hearing her wind-up alarm clock along with the call from the front desk to wake her up. Then she imagines everything that should happen until she is on the set and the first shot is made.

It is in the imagination phase that she discovers anything she may have forgotten to do or say to someone. She catches her mistakes before they happen using her imagination.

Grist for the Unconscious Mill of Your Mind

“Focused imagination and preparation: preparation firstly consists of catching up on existing knowledge and extending it through imagination.”

For filmmakers, this would be doing your research using your creativity and your imagination to extend your idea and expand it to be fully creative.

He recommends that you read voraciously. Read the good books, read current materials on archetypes, read whatever you can get your hands on, and imagine, imagine, imagine. The idea is to generate new and divergent thinking, ideas that will act as fodder for the second stage of incubation which is unconscious processing.

Amit also suggests that you “listen to lectures by people of transformation, go to workshops, talk to like-minded people. Always to generate new grist for the unconscious mill of our mind.”

Clean up the Thoughts in your Mind

He wants you to watch your mental preoccupations; if your mind is preoccupied with old stuff, clean it up.

“Clean up your unconscious,” he advises. “I am putting on a new persona to feel good about myself. So, we need to clean up our persona and eliminate inauthenticity as far as we can in our present state.”

And he recommends that we meditate.

“Many people believe that meditation is a complicated technique to be done for hours on end, but this needn’t be the case. If you’re new to meditation start off easy, 10 to 15 minutes a day of a simple technique is enough in the beginning.”

Here is his sample meditation:

“Sit comfortably wearing comfortable clothing. Close your eyes and relax your body. Start off by paying attention to your jaw. Like almost everyone you’re likely to hold tension in this area so place your attention on relaxing your jaw.

“Then relax your belly, your shoulders, the muscles around your eyes, and allow your shoulders to drop. Take a deep breath or two and the muscles all over your body will start to relax. Now place your attention on the following mantra, you can coordinate the mantra with your breathing, say AUM as you breathe out and focus on staying present.

“This meditation is called concentration-meditation. It is focusing on an object. You can use your breath and focus simply on the breath or focus on a lighted candle.”

Amit states, “The mind needs discipline while the heart needs freedom in order to explore the new. Usually we’re in the opposite situation, our mind runs freely around without control, but our heart is locked away closed to any contact with new reality.

“To change this status, we have to train the mind and bring it under control by means of practice on concentration and to learn to let the heart express freely without the mind interfering. The best way to strengthen the heart is via the exploration of love.”

Think of some of Clint Eastwood’s films like his Oscar winning Million Dollar Baby. That was full of love. You left that theatre with love in your heart. Love is contagious.

Slow Down the Mind to Hear the Thoughts in the Gap

“It is said in these spiritual traditions,” Amit writes, “that meditation appears spontaneously in the mirror of a mind that reflects a heart full of love. The practice of concentration is relatively easy to build into a success when we love what we’re doing. If the exercises are done in a flat and boring way, without putting heart into them, success will not come easy.

“In this way the daily practice of mental concentration is very important for your health. Even if you practice a little each day the constant practice is a very important aspect of the mental training, first because the nature of the mine is to change, and this consistency in practice is helping to regain control over the mind.”

He provides a Zen story that describes the lesson of it all.

“A student went to his meditation teacher and said, my meditation is horrible! I feel so distracted, my legs ache, or I’m constantly falling asleep. It’s just horrible.

“It will pass, the teacher said matter of factly.

“A week later the student came back to his teacher. My meditation is wonderful I feel so aware so peaceful so alive is just wonderful.

“It will pass the teacher said matter of factly.

“And indeed, although my day-to-day experience would differ as described above with time, I found that there was more space between my thoughts, my mind was slowing down. “

This is exactly what you want because, “slowing down the mind allows the information from your extrasensory perception to make itself heard.” Deepak Chopra has always said, “listen to the voice in the gap between your thoughts.”

However, when your thoughts are moving rapidly it’s hard to hear your little voice. When you slow down your thinking, the little voice becomes easier to hear and that enhances your intuition.

I have found that the more I use my intuition the stronger it becomes and the more information I get.

It’s as if they know I use it and then they give me more information. I always feel like I am being guided,

I know that I am never alone.