“There is almost a sensual longing for communion with others who have a large vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendship between those engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality impossible to describe.” -Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Consciousness Hacking Madrid is a community exploring technology as a catalyst for psychological, emotional and spiritual flourishing. It’s an inside-out perspective on how technology can serve us by changing our relationship to the world, rather than the world itself. What if we aimed our scientific and technological efforts toward researching and catalyzing peace, compassion and unconditional love on a massive global scale? Can we create new forms of technology or leverage existing ones to help cultivate calm minds, foster empathy, improve our relations with friends and family and rediscover our sense of connectedness among each other in the here and now? It’s hard to talk about the ultimate aims of Consciousness Hacking in the same way it’s hard to talk about the ultimate aims of spiritual traditions. What are we evolving towards as humans individually and collectively? What are the deepest, most profound, and transcendent human experiences? The pinnacle of human flourishing? Ultimately this is what Consciousness Hacking is striving to catalyze in the world. You could call it peace, happiness, unconditional love, compassion, awareness, awakening, god, enlightenment… These are all pointers toward a human potential that is beyond any religion, or tradition, or technology. It is a fundamentally human experience that we have forgotten, and we must work together as a humanity to re-awaken by any, and as many means necessary.

Science is increasingly recognizing what spiritual traditions have been advocating for thousands of years: through focused self-awareness we can fundamentally change our conscious experience. The keys to accessing profound joy and contentment in this world lay not in our external circumstances, but in our relationship to ourselves. Due to the intersection of four burgeoning forces —Neurobiology, Technology, Psychology and Pharmacology, we are creating a self-initiating culture unprecedented in human history. Neurobiology is mapping the actual mechanics of mystical and enlightened states —fMRIs and EEGs are decoupling mythologies from basic functionality. Technology like immersive VR/AR head-mounted displays, soundsystems and neurofeedback devices are allowing us to massively scale transcendent experiences once reserved for dozens or hundreds. Self-tracking biometric technologies capable of measuring different signals (brainwave activity, facial expressions, emotional tone of voice, skin conductivity, muscle tension, heart rate variability…) are becoming readily available as viable commercial products. The revolution in transpersonal and optimal Psychology has massively expanded our sense of ourselves and given us more space to consider who we could be and should be.

Consciousness Hacking is here to support the community of people exploring, building and disseminating new tools for the evolution of individual and collective consciousness. You do not need a science or technology background (and you are absolutely welcome to join if you have no interest in ever developing your own tools) but there will definitely be a major focus on these two areas as the hacking medium. Meetings will focus on sharing knowledge, existing projects or developing new ones, networking to raise capital and receiving community support for new ideas and concepts. This is the place to explore and present your ideas with a supportive group with a focus of helping bring them to reality. These will be the individuals, researchers startups, open source projects, collaborations and research labs, that will be producing the Transformative Technologies of our conscious future. Join us!