The Conscious and Unconscious Mind
There is a great deal of discussion about the above topic. Some question whether or not the conscious or unconscious minds even exist. The fact is that if one were to examine the human brain, you would not find either of these things in it; however, most of our thinking can be attributed to one or the other of these “minds”. What are the conscious and unconscious minds? One way of explaining this is by the “Iceberg Analogy”. That is to say, the tip of the iceberg, the part that we see, is not what sinks the ship; it is the 90% that is under that water, that we cannot see, that does this. It is much the same as for the conscious and unconscious minds. The 10% is our conscious mind, while the greater 90% is our unconscious. A rough idea of what these two minds are responsible for can be found below:
Conscious Mind: This is the most limited part of us; it is the part of the mind that allows one to be aware of things. Things in one’s immediate awareness are in one’s conscious mind. The conscious mind has the ability to analyse things, to make judgement about what is right or wrong. It is the part of the mind that limits us and tells us what is possible.
Unconscious Mind: This part of our mind is a storehouse for all of the experiences we have had through out our lives: one’s experience, learning, manner for interacting with one’s world, and one’s automatic functions. The unconscious mind is not as rigid or as analytical as the conscious mind. More importantly, it is not as limited as the conscious mind. This is the part of the mind that hypnosis is meant to work on. It responds to experiential communications, is capable of symbolic interpretation, and tends to have a global view.
