Wisdom Notes on Psychology

Layers of the Mind

The links in the table on the left take you to sub-headings on this page.

The mind itself has two main parts. There is the conscious mind which we are familiar with and which we use in daily life. And there is a hidden part that we are not usually aware of. The ideas in this book focus on the hidden mind.

From my exploration of my mind, it appears that there are two broad layers within the hidden part of mind: one of the hidden layers is focused on what is personal and specific to each person, whilst the other hidden layer is focused on what is universal to everyone. The terminology that I have adopted is that the hidden personal mind I call the subconscious mind, whilst the hidden universal mind I call the unconscious mind.

To make it easier to understand the idea of layers, I repeat some examples given in my earlier books to illustrate my use of these two terms.

The Subconscious Mind

This is personal and has several “sub-layers” or departments. For example:

a). We can have that which is just below the threshold of awareness, what Sigmund Freud called the preconscious mind. This is illustrated by “tip-of-the-tongue” phenomena, when we try to recall a person’s name or a particular word, and it just escapes us.

b). We can be affected, at a subconscious level, by other people: by their moods, attitudes and behaviour. In other words, other people can affect us subconsciously.
– If I am in a good mood and then sit for some time next to another man who is immersed in depression then I am likely to pick up some of his depression, while he absorbs some of my gaiety. He becomes cheerful and I become despondent. This has happened many times to me when I travel in crowded buses.
– I liked some aspects of my mother’s character and disliked other aspects. This leads to an interesting consequence: I might like or dislike an older woman if some aspects of her character subconsciously remind me of my mother.

c). We can have two or more personalities (or psychological identities). Only one of these is conscious at any time, the others being subconscious.

d). We may have hidden, or subconscious, memories of psychological traumas that were experienced in childhood. These memories are subconscious because we have “repressed” them (we refuse to accept their reality): the reason for repressing them is that they cause us sorrow if we, by chance, remember them. Even though they are hidden, we can infer their existence through the psychological effects that they still have on us. These memories can be at a deeper level in the subconscious mind than the examples above. During a psycho-analysis, memories that are in deep sub-layers are harder to uncover than memories in the more shallow sub-layers.

e). There are subconscious boundaries to the way that the person controls his/her behaviour. This is the region of social and moral conditioning (that is, behaviour that is controlled by reward and punishment). Such boundaries are usually instilled during childhood, when we absorb rules and values that shape what we are allowed to do and what we are not allowed to do. By contrast, boundaries that are accepted through social and moral learning illustrate the influences of free will, free choice, and the person’s sense of idealism (whether ethical, religious, New Age or similar).

f ). Past-life influences (within the perspective of reincarnation) are often very powerful. These arise from the deepest level of the subconscious mind. The usefulness of the idea of reincarnation is that it allows us to adopt the view that a person is part of evolution, evolving with each new lifetime on planet Earth. Reincarnation tells us where we came from before we were born on Earth, and to where we are going when our body dies (it is consciousness that reincarnates, and not the physical body). Reincarnation explains why there are great differences in the levels of development of various people.

The Unconscious Mind

This is impersonal and universal and also has several “sub-layers” or departments. For example:

g). Emotions originate here [¹].

h). The process of abreaction operates from here [²].

i). The psychological effects of symbols derive their power from the unconscious level. This effect is used positively in meditation and negatively in commercial advertising.

j). There are unconscious boundaries to the way that the mind operates.
– People at different stages of personal growth and evolution will have different boundaries. These kinds of boundaries reflect constraints on the power of the mind, and so they change as this power develops through personal growth. For example: a mythical absorption in reality is a typical aspect of aboriginal populations, and this gradually fades as the intellectual capacity of the mind develops over numerous lifetimes.
– Some people can access the higher regions of mind and have extra-sensory capabilities. Developing these capabilities is just a matter of training, just as the acquirement of scientific knowledge is also just a matter of training.

[¹]. I have three articles on Emotions on the Home page. [1]

[²]. For an in-depth study of Abreaction I have six articles on it on the Home page. [2]

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