I have always been reluctant to talk about spirituality in scientific terms. There is already too much mixing of the two, often in ways that do justice to neither. Science concerns itself with the order of quantity, with things that can be measured, calculated, and demonstrated. Spirituality belongs to the order of quality. It concerns itself with the experiential nature of our lived experience, consciousness, and the qualities of our being. I don’t see why the latter should need validation from the former, as if a spiritual truth becomes more legitimate once we can attach a scientific explanation to it!
Having said that, there is something interesting about the language of vibrations and waves, which have always occupied an important place in both science and spirituality. And I think there is a useful way of looking at our lives through this language, provided we don’t confuse the two orders.
What I am talking about here is not physical vibration. There is no instrument that can measure the frequency of a thought, nor am I suggesting that prayer or meditation produces some particular number of hertz. I am using frequency and wavelength as spiritual analogies, as ways of describing different qualities of consciousness and different patterns of living. And I think the analogy can be quite practical.
The Frequency of Thought
If we observe our minds for a while, and maybe even for just one day, we notice that much of our thinking is repetitive. The same concerns, worries, desires, and imaginary conversations return over and over. We reopen cases that we have closed a hundred times, with the hope of a better ending. The mind seems to move in circles, sometimes at an astonishing speed, without actually going anywhere. The illusion of control, the insanity of it all, the idea that if I think enough it will get better this time, that thinking will improve the situation. Here I am not talking about solving practical problems, at which the mind is the best instrument we have; but rather, the repetitive, obsessive pattern of thinking which revolve around worries and matters out of our control, scenarios that exist only in our head and probably will never happen, at least the way we imagine them. And more than 90% of our thinking is just that, a lunatic gone wild!
We might think of these patterns as high-frequency vibrations. In general, worry, control, fear, etc.. are high frequency stuff of the mind, for they concern unreal matters. Reality doesn’t requires our intervention for its sustenance; it’s the unreal and the illusory that must depend on our compulsive thinking for its existence. My rule of thumb for discernment between what is real and unreal is this:
If you can get distracted from it even for a second, then it’s not real; you are keeping it alive by giving it your attention. When a sound or a call distracts you from your worries, and then you’re trying to find your way back to that train of thought, sometimes even looking hard “what was I thinking about?”, that means you are operating at high frequency mode (which requires a lot of energy) to give reality to something essentially unreal, a worry-construct. Not wonder most of us suffer general fatigue and exhaustion. It’s not really work and life demands; it’s the all-pervasive patterns of thinking that has enveloped all of our external activities.
In wave physics, frequency and wavelength are inversely related. The higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength. The lower the frequency, the longer the wavelength. And frequency is directly proportional to energy, so the higher the frequency, the higher the energy of the pattern.
Something similar can be imagined in the spiritual order.
A mind occupied with obsessive thinking, constant anticipation, worry, and the endless management of little problems seems to operate at a very high frequency. Its movements are rapid, repetitive, and confined. It moves from one thought to the next, one concern to another, without much space between them.
There is a certain rigidity to this state. Everything becomes particular, fragmented, and urgent. The mind loses sight of the whole because it is constantly occupied with its little pieces.
At the other end of the spectrum, we find qualities such as calmness, openness, patience, acceptance, and presence. Here the movements of the mind are less frantic. There is more space, more room for things to be as they are. We are less occupied with ourselves and more available to life.
We might call this a lower-frequency, longer-wavelength state of consciousness.
It is not necessarily a state without thoughts. It is simply a different quality of being.
There is also an interesting analogy here with wave-particle duality. Quantum physics states that our physical reality can manifest itself in two fundamental modes: wave aspect and particle aspect. Depending on the experimental setup, an electron can behave either like a wave or like a particle. Notice how the measurement setup is important in determining which aspect is to manifest itself. In analogy, our mindset, our spiritual posture, determines how reality which show itself to us, what aspects will be revealed in our daily lives.
Although in physics both aspects belong to the same reality, we might associate higher frequencies, symbolically, with the particle aspect of existence: localized, separate, and confined within definite boundaries. Spiritually speaking, this resembles the individual who is enclosed within himself, isolated and defined by his separateness and limited sense of identity. The lower-frequency, longer-wavelength end of our analogy, on the other hand, suggests the wave aspect of reality: openness, continuity, and connection with the greater whole. This also points to an important distinction between two ways of understanding existence.
In much of Western thought, the whole is understood as something made up of independently existing individuals. Another view reverses this relationship: the individual has no independent reality of his own, but borrows his very existence from the greater whole of which he is an expression. Spiritual growth, in this sense, is a movement away from the rigid boundaries of individuality toward the recognition of an underlying unity, movement from ultra-high frequency states of being to a more moderate band of more-relaxed frequencies.
Resonance
Another interesting principle from wave physics is superposition. When waves meet, their effects combine. Under certain conditions, waves that are in phase reinforce one another, producing a greater amplitude.
Again, I am borrowing the principle as an analogy, not proposing a physical explanation of consciousness.
Our patterns of thinking and living seem to reinforce one another in much the same way.
Consider someone who begins the morning by checking messages, scrolling through social media, reading disturbing news, and immediately worrying about the day’s responsibilities (all of which are high frequency activities for the mind.) Each activity seems to belong to the same general band of high frequencies. They reinforce a certain quality of consciousness: restlessness, anticipation, agitation, and the constant need for stimulation.
And once we are in that state, we tend to gravitate toward more of the same. A restless mind looks for restless activities. An obsessive mind finds more things to obsess about. We may even find calmness uncomfortable, because it is so different from the state to which we have become accustomed.
The reverse also seems to be true.
Meditation, walking, exercising, spending time in nature, meaningful conversations, reading, and certain forms of work can all belong to another band of frequencies centered around a lower-frequency. They tend to leave us more grounded, less preoccupied with ourselves, and more present.
And these activities reinforce one another too. A peaceful walk may make prayer easier. Meditation may make it easier to listen to another person or be present with others. A meaningful conversation may leave us less inclined to seek some compulsive distraction afterward.
This is what I mean by resonance. We tend to move toward things that correspond to our existing state of consciousness, and those things, in turn, strengthen that state.
The Frequency of Modern Life
Much of modern life seems designed to keep us operating at the higher end of this spectrum.
Doomscrolling is an obvious example. We move rapidly between unrelated pieces of information, each demanding our attention, each producing some little reaction. There is hardly any time for an experience to settle before another one replaces it.
Even entertainment has changed in this direction. Consider the editing of modern movies, with their rapid cuts, constant changes of perspective, and increasingly compressed sequences of action. There is an interesting technical discussion to be had about the frequency of visual changes and their effects on attention, but that is beyond what I want to discuss here.
The point is that much of what surrounds us encourages constant mental movement.
But we should be careful not to confuse physical speed with spiritual frequency.
Exercise, for example, may involve rapid physical movement, yet it can be a profoundly low-frequency activity in the sense I am describing. A long run, a demanding workout, or even physical labor can quiet the mind and bring us back into the present.
Conversely, someone can sit perfectly still while the mind races through a thousand imaginary problems.
It is not the speed of the body that matters, nor even the number of thoughts we have. It is the quality of consciousness that an activity produces and sustains.
God as Zero Frequency
We can take this analogy a little further, into metaphysics.
If higher frequencies correspond to fragmentation, restlessness, and the constant movement of the mind, and lower frequencies correspond to stillness, openness, and a greater sense of wholeness, then we might imagine God as the absolute zero-frequency state of consciousness.
In the mathematical relationship between frequency and wavelength, as frequency approaches zero, wavelength approaches infinity. As a metaphysical image, I find this beautiful.
God as infinite wavelength. Absolute stillness. No fragmentation, no movement from one thing to another, no becoming, no restlessness. Not one object among other objects, but the infinite reality in which all things exist. A wave with zero frequency, i.e. infinite wavelength, is represented by a flat line. Quite interesting that a patient’s vital signs monitor flatlines when they die, or rather merge with the infinite source!
Of course, this is not a scientific description of God. It is an analogy, and like all analogies, it has its limits. But it suggests something important about spiritual practice.
Perhaps the purpose of prayer, meditation, and other spiritual disciplines is not to produce extraordinary experiences or to acquire something we do not already possess. Perhaps it is simply to bring our consciousness closer to that stillness, to gradually loosen our identification with the restless movements of the mind, not for the sake of transcendence but for a more beautifully and all-inclusive and loving immanence in the human form.
And since the world around us already pulls so strongly in the opposite direction, spiritual practice becomes a necessary counterbalance, not necessarily prayer or meditation, but any set of activities centered around lower frequency states of mind. Open connection with other human beings is one simple, universal way we can move toward lower frequencies, especially if they are themselves low-frequency persons, such as calm, spiritual, grounded people. Connections of this type can dampen sharp frequencies.
In centering ourselves around lower frequency activities, we do not have to withdraw from life. We simply have to introduce another quality into it.
A Practical Approach
What interests me most about this way of looking at things is that it gives us a very simple approach to everyday living.
We do not have to spend our days trying to stop thinking, forcing ourselves to be peaceful, or constantly monitoring our state of consciousness. In fact, that very effort can become another high-frequency activity: more analysis, more self-observation, more struggle. In general, constantly thinking about oneself, even if it is about self-improvement, is a high frequency, draining state of the mind.
Instead, we can begin by looking at the activities that make up our lives: Which activities leave us more restless, agitated, obsessive, and disconnected from ourselves? Which ones leave us calmer, more grounded, more open, and more available to the world?
We generally know the answers from experience.
Compulsive scrolling, constant monitoring of oneself and one’s life (dating ChatGPT, etc.), certain forms of entertainment, obsessive analysis, anything providing instant gratification, and habitual acting out may all reinforce the same restless state. They offer momentary relief or stimulation, but often leave us wanting more.
Our minds often tend to fool us by convincing us that we need these in order to relax and take a break, but we ourselves can judge better by simply looking at how we’re left to feel at the conclusion of a high frequency state of mind. I don’t know anyone who felt mentally refreshed and calm after a long scrolling session. According to research, people who go to sleep after hours of scrolling tend to have poor quality sleep and a more frantic state of mind upon waking up. An interesting fact is that modern visual media which has moved toward higher resolution images is made of actually high frequency digital signals. No wonder too much and too frequent of an exposure to screens can be so agitating to the mind, and this is only the purely the physical aspect of such exposure.
Other activities, such as mindfulness, exercise, a walk outside, good reading or film, attending a gathering, helping someone, or simply doing some ordinary task with care, may move us in the opposite direction. Everyone can sort through their own experiences and tell apart high vs. low frequency activities, and then make a decision to center themselves one way or the other.
The important thing is not to turn this into another project of self-improvement, with endless rules and measurements.
We can simply begin to make more room for the lower-frequency activities and gradually reduce the higher-frequency ones, especially those we already know are doing us the most harm.
There is also a reason prayer and meditation occupy a special place in this picture. Unlike most activities, which direct our attention toward some particular object or experience, prayer directs us toward what we understand to be the ultimate reality, whether we call it God, the Absolute, or something else. Of course, we have the Lord’s prayer but there is also Atheist prayer, and a million other kinds: a meditative state in which one concentrates one’s being on an ocean of light is a form of prayer, for it shoots for the highest possible wavelength, the infinity. So, let’s take religion out of anything I say, though you’re welcome to look at it all from that lens too.
In the language of our analogy, prayer is an orientation toward zero frequency, toward that which is beyond the restless movements of the mind.
And perhaps this is why prayer can be useful even when it does not seem to accomplish anything. Its purpose is not necessarily to change our circumstances or make us feel better immediately. It is to gradually orient our lives toward a different center.
Finding Our Own Band
I suspect that the quality of our lives depends a great deal on the general band of frequencies in which we spend most of our time.
Not every moment, of course. We will still fall into worries, have responsibilities, difficult conversations, and periods of agitation. These are unavoidable parts of being human. But there is a difference between occasionally entering a restless state and making that state our permanent home.
We can begin to change that home, not necessarily by fighting the mind, but by changing the things with which we surround it. And there is no need to be particularly ambitious about this. We can start with one or two activities that consistently disturb us and one or two that consistently bring us back to ourselves.
Over time, the different activities may begin to reinforce one another. What initially required some discipline may become more natural. We may find ourselves less interested in certain distractions, not because we have successfully suppressed our desires, but because they no longer correspond to the quality of life we are beginning to inhabit.
Perhaps that is one way to understand spiritual transformation. Not as a dramatic event or a sudden acquisition of some higher state, but as a gradual change in the general frequency of our lives.
Less fragmentation. Less obsession. Less struggle.
More space, more presence, more stillness.
And perhaps, through all of this, a little closer to that infinite wavelength which was never really absent in the first place.
