Like with any scientific model of our universe, we simplify reality so that we can understand it better. By looking at small ecosystems, we can understand how they coexist within larger ecosystems. Similarly, if we want to understand who we are, why we’re here, what life is, and the nature of existence itself, there’s no better place to turn than good old Pixar Animation Studios.

Every single story, novel, film, and TV show creates a fictional universe that has the same underlying principles. If we look at those principles, we can better understand our own lives and the real universe. I think Pixar allows us to do this most easily because it doesn’t try to look real. It’s not trying to trick us into believing this is the real world. With talking dogs, it’s very clear these dogs are just cartoons, and there’s no attempt to make us believe this is actual reality.

When we look at Pixar, we notice similarities across every film, and those similarities underlie the nature of reality. In every Pixar film, we have a single consciousness — the writer who wrote the film — who imagines the consciousness of many characters in the story.

These consciousnesses take the forms of animals, humans, mythological and imagined creatures, aliens, robots, and even cars — the whole spectrum of animated characters they’ve created.

Consciousness inhabits these forms. These characters we watch on screen are dropped into a reality. Each character has their own karma, based on what the Creator imagined came before the movie begins. There are many characters, each living out a reality shaped by what came before them and by what everyone else in that imagined universe did before the story started.

This is the nature of our reality: we are living in a conscious universe — one consciousness, with many consciousnesses inside it being birthed into life.

Each of us is playing out the cause and effect of what came before us, as well as everything anyone has ever done and how it affects this moment in our lives. When you see a dog, robot, or car in these Pixar movies, they use all of their artistic skill to bring a spark of life to these characters. That is what makes them feel real. There is a light and a glimmer behind the eyes of these creatures, cars, robots, and aliens that we all recognize subconsciously and intuitively. We recognize there is life in this creature, even though it’s just pixels on a computer screen. We sense a presence.

And that is the nature of life on this planet: there is a consciousness inside living things. It is not the body that dies. It is this spark of life that creates a point of consciousness to experience the world. We are all dropped into it, living in the effects of past causes while creating new causes and effects.

The beauty of Pixar is that by showing us a talking car, we intuitively understand what consciousness — a sense of self — is like. It’s not the body and it’s not the experiences. It is this point of consciousness, the center of awareness, playing its part inside the one consciousness of the universe.

The reason I say there is one consciousness — a sea of consciousness — is this: imagine an electrically charged environment. Whenever there is an electronic device that runs on electricity, it is brought to life when placed in that field. A computer turns on once electricity and the right circumstances exist to power it.

This is like the unifying field we all exist in. This is why the conscious perception of particles makes matter. This is why matter changes when consciousness is nearby. The only way waves of energy collapse into particles of matter when consciousness is present is because consciousness fundamentally impacts our universe. The universe is conscious. There is no other way for consciousness to affect energy and matter unless there is consciousness on the other side interacting.

There is a mysterious consciousness all around us that shapes our lives. When there is a physical body able to hold consciousness, that consciousness collapses down and creates a point of awareness.

This is why the universe looks like the map of a brain when we see the trails of dark matter and dark energy throughout it — resembling a neural network. This is why, when we look at the soil beneath our feet and see the mycelium networks of fungi connecting living things underground, they resemble neural pathways of the brain.

We see these neural patterns all around us because consciousness pervades the universe and has a will to live and experience itself.

And we can learn that from Pixar.