Understanding Your Conscious and Unconscious Minds

So much of what we do is with our conscious mind - we are aware that we are doing these things - yet the unconscious mind is busily at work in the background. For instance, we think consciously about what we are going to say when we write a speech but our unconscious mind is minding our physical store. It makes sure our heart beats, that we breathe - it keeps our bodily functions going without our having to think consciously about those things. Most of us don't think about and/or don't know much about our unconscious mind but it is very important to who we are and how we go about living our lives.

Here are some different ways our "two minds" work.

Consciously our mind works in a linear fashion. It takes things a step at a time even if we sometimes make cognitive leaps. What we are not aware of is that our unconscious mind works holistically. It is keeping our entire body balanced and functioning.
The conscious part of us processes sequentially while we get our intuition from the unconscious mind. When we learn to trust our intuition we sometimes get great insights into the world around us.
Then we have logic versus creativity. This is related to right and left brain functions but our unconscious is driving our creativity while our conscious is driving our logic.
As I mentioned in the introduction paragraph one mind is responsible for verbal language while the other is busy running our bodies. This frees us up to think about what we are doing and experiencing instead of thinking about what we need to do to stay alive.
Our conscious brain is responsible for mathematics while our unconscious brain focuses on our emotions. That is why emotions are so hard to understand sometimes. They can be buried where we are not aware of them.We have all had the experience of all of a sudden becoming emotional and wondering where that came from - now you know.
Now that we have been through a few of these guess which brain is responsible for analysis? Right. And the unconscious is responsible for storing our memories. That's a good thing too - imagine what it would be like if we had to be aware of where in our vast file cabinet we put our memories!

Most of the time our two brains work together in tandem not in opposition. The more aware we get of both being active the broader our view of the world becomes.

Lynn Banis PhD, MCC is known as America's High Performance Coach. She specializes in helping women. executives and entrepreneurs make the most of their opportunities and potential. Her years of working with small and large businesses has given her a depth of knowledge that is invaluable to her clients. You can reach her at http://www.discoverypointcoaching.com or at her email address listed on the site. Also check out Lynn's other businesses: Coach Academy Texas, a cutting edge coach training company; and Turnkey Coaching Solutions, a coaching program management and contract coach staffing company.

Lynn' coaching membership site is at http://www.discoverypointcoaching.com/blog2 Come check it out!

Spiritual Enlightenment - Understanding Consciousness

You have probably already heard all of the Spiritual Enlightenment sayings like "Consciousness is all there is," And "Advaita means - not two."

And although all of these things are true, the words themselves filed away as knowledge, don't get you any closer to Spiritual Enlightenment.

So in this article, I am not only going to help you understand consciousness, I am going to give you the direct experience of consciousness, so that by the end of this article you will be able to experience a state of nondual consciousness which can lead to Spiritual Enlightenment.

Then all that is left for you to do is practice staying in this state of consciousness, or rather, practice stopping yourself from leaving your natural state. There is nothing complicated about it. Once you have the direct experience of consciousness then it is up to you to grow in nondual awareness through practice.

First, before we go any further, I would like you to forget everything you know about spiritual enlightenment, consciousness, nonduality, advaita and all other spiritual knowledge you have tucked away. Throw it all out because it is useless for what we are going to do.

You can have it all back after this article if you want it. But if you want spiritual enlightenment, you have to learn to experience this moment fresh and new, without relating it to what you know. Because it is what you know that stops you from experiencing pure consciousness.

And rather than getting into some intellectual advaita essay on spiritual enlightenment, let's get our feet wet and experience pure consciousness:

Right now, in this moment, take about 20 seconds, close your eyes, and notice your thinking. You are not to change your thinking or seek a certain thing out, you simply are to close your eyes and notice your thinking. Do this now.

On the surface, it seems that you cannot notice the process of thinking, because you are the one thinking the thought. The thought arises about what you had for lunch and suddenly you are re-living having lunch. There is no noticing happening.

So when you try and notice your thinking, thinking either stops, or you get involved with the thinking and there is no noticing.

On the surface, you could conclude from this observation that you are the thinker of your thoughts.

But in truth this is a false assumption. Look closer.

Close your eyes again and notice the thought arising. Start in a space of no thought and watch the thought arising.

Do this now.

If you practice this and really allow the thoughts to come and still remain noticing the thoughts, you will see that thoughts arise by themselves. You are not thinking the thought, the thought arose by itself. You were noticing no thought, a thought arose and you noticed it arise. Another thought arose, or many thoughts arising at once and you are noticing it happening.

You are not doing the thinking. The thinking is happening by itself.

This in itself is a state freedom. It is the beginning of Savikalpa Samadhi. It is when thoughts arise and you remain completely detached from any involvement with them- a state of witness consciousness.

What usually happens when you are not conscious is that the thought arises and instantly you identify with that thought. Instantly you claim "I thought that thought, it is my thought, it defines me." And then you make the thought important and are involved with it.

The thought arose, you took responsibility for it and you defined yourself by it. The thought is about you, your life, what you saw on TV, what you read, what you know, what you did. The thoughts are personal. You are identified with the thought. You think "I am sad" and sadness becomes your identity and it becomes your reality.

But once you learn to watch the thoughts, the thoughts become impersonal. They no longer define you or bind you. You are free from the involvement with them. They can arise and disappear and you remain as consciousness in a state of unconditional peace. Very blissful.

I do not expect you to see this immediately. But at some point in time if you do your best to try and notice your thinking, you will come to a point where thoughts arise and you realize "I did not pull that thought up myself, it arose by itself." You will have some thought come out of left field and it will become clear. "I did not just think of purple pigs, that thought came all by itself."

Sounds silly but this is a huge step towards spiritual enlightenment. Because suddenly you no longer define yourself by your thoughts. You see you exist completely free of the mind. Thoughts are arising all on their own without your involvement.

If you are interested in understanding consciousness, this is a very important point. Because if you see thoughts arise by themselves, then what are you? You definitely are not the thinker of the thoughts, but you were conscious of your thoughts. You were aware that thoughts were happening.

Try this now: Close your eyes and don't have any thought. Just for a second, don't have any thought. What is there?

Do this now.

So what is there? If there was no thought, your eyes were closed, you were just blank? But you were aware of the blank, yes? You were there, noticing that blank.

So you see the same conclusion comes from watching thoughts, or watching no thought. Whatever the situation, you were conscious of it.

And in fact if you really look, there is no you there being conscious, there is you as consciousness! Consciousness and the sense of "I am" are one and the same, they cannot be separated.'

To go one step further, you cannot separate, you, this moment and consciousness.

So forget understanding consciousness, you are consciousness!

Now it does no good to believe this, to file this away in your knowledge of spiritual enlightenment. You have to practice it. You have to in this moment and in every moment, remain as consciousness,here and now. To be aware of consciousness itself.

The only time you will feel you are not consciousness, is when you are identified with the happening, you are identified with the thoughts arising. You are personally involved in the thought.

You have to look closely here. Because consciousness has not stopped when you are involved with your thoughts but the action of identification with the thoughts distracted you from the essence that is always here, consciousness itself. Because if consciousness was not present, you could not remember, "I was identified with my thoughts and emotions."

And a side note here: It is not that you should not have thoughts or emotions. It is very important that you allow whatever is here to be here. Trying to control the thoughts and emotions will only lead to stress. So allow it all to come and go.

In this allowing, you are conscious of it. It does not mean you have to identify with it or become involved with it. You can watch it arise and disappear without ever holding on to anything.

It is not about some cold experience of advaita consciousness where you separate yourself from what is happening. It is allowing life to be as it is in this moment and being aware of it, and as you grow, being conscious of consciousness itself.

So whatever is here, allow it to be here and notice it. And be aware of the noticing. Because really if you look, you are not noticing it, noticing is happening. Just like thoughts are happening or not happening.

You can remove the thoughts, you can remove the emotions, you can even lose identification with the body, but the noticing cannot be removed. You can see whether there is thought or no thought, you still exist. Consciousness always remains. Resting in this state of pure consciousness will lead you all the way to spiritual enlightenment.

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Holistic Life Through Understanding The Vaster Consciousness

It is interesting to note the way in which we cognize things and come up with feelings and emotion with regard to various items in the world. Understanding these in relation to a wider field of awareness leads to confidence and peace.

The sequence in the wider field seems to be as follows: There is the expansive consciousness that may be called the Universal Consciousness. When it functions through the brain (which is the physical organism), it issues out a stifled form itself that functions as the mind. So, we can write:

Universal Consciousness ==> Brain ==> Mind

This indicates that the perception by the mind is always influenced by the brain as a repository of memories and as an interpreting medium through the accumulated knowledge. The brain also carries the genetic conditioning apart from the conditioning by circumstances in which the human being finds himself. This causes the mind's cognition and interpretation to be a matter of conditioned output and so it leads to improper understanding of what there is really. One of the inevitable outcomes of this warped awareness is the arising of the ego which is essentially a product of thought.

Thus, if we can go back on the above process, we begin to get a glimpse of the unspoiled consciousness as evidenced by the following three ravishing experiences that human beings have gone through over the years:

1. OBE (Out of Body Experience)

2. NDE (Near Death Experience)

3. Satori (Spontaneous Expansion of Consciousness)

The above three have also demonstrated the significant fact that consciousness can function without the brain being involved.

Some examples of expressions from those who have gone through the above are given below.:

OBE: Dr Reynor Johnson, an English Physicist, Melbourne University, Australia, collected many cases of OBEs and some of them were reported in the book 'Leaving the Body' written by Scott Rogo. One of the correspondents to Dr Johnson conveys some very interesting perceptions during his OBE. He says that while he was out of his body at about 11 PM, he floated over a moor feeling very light, lighter than air. He glided past clouds on that moonlit night. A cool wind was blowing. The life in the clouds and in the wind was within him too. He was filled with glorious life. The sensing of the past, present and future all melted away and the eternal now was felt in that dimension. He wondered if that is what the dead experience, then how much more alive they are than we are here!

NDE: There are many near death reports that talk about the expansion of consciousness while the body is lying lifeless on the earth. One of them, written by Victor Solow, and published by the Reader's Digest (October 1974) says the following:

"A recurrent nostalgia remains for that other reality, that condition of indescribable stillness and quiet in which the 'I' is part of a harmonious whole. The memory softens the old drives for possession, approval and success."

The movement of awareness from the mind to consciousness is clear from Victor's rendering of his experience.

Satori: This is a Japanese word that denotes the state of Enlightenment. In Sanskrit, it is known as the state of Samadhi. Some people get into that state, always in an unexpected and impromptu way. They attempt to describe that ineffable state but don't find the right words. A German, Kurt Friedrichs, who had such an experience describes it in the book "What Vedanta Means to Me" edited by John Yale. It is as follows:

One afternoon at low tide on the west coast of the island of Heligoland, as he was climbing over the seaweed-covered rocks in order to have a rest beneath an overhanging cliff, washed out by the surf of many centuries, a spiritual ecstasy suddenly took possession of him. The waves breaking at his feet and the endless surface of water stretching away to the vanishing point all of a sudden threw him into another sphere of consciousness. He felt that he himself was surf, sea and infinity. Time, space, body-consciousness - everything was blotted out, drawn up into an absolute consciousness of light and bliss.

Once we understand the above relative aspects of consciousness, brain and mind, we move into the esoteric aspects of life with their touch of true spirituality. That lays the right foundation for holistic and peaceful living. The associated field of awareness forms the theme of this website.

Gopalakrishnan T. Chandrasekaran received his doctoral degree in Coastal Engineering from the North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA in 1978. He served on the research and teaching faculty of universities in India, the US and Kuwait. His book "In Quest of the Deeper Self" is the outcome of his philosophic reflections and his wish to share the outcome with others. He is a member of the International Association for Near Death Studies, Durham, NC, USA; lives in Kodaikanal, a hill town in South India.
Blog: http://nde-thedeeperself.blogspot.com

Understanding the God Consciousness Gestalt and Evolution of the Soul

Two words we will be using often in this discussion are (Hierarchy and Gestalt). For our purposes, Hierarchy will mean the stratified organization and layering of consciousness based on it's abilities, maturity and development. Gestalt will mean an organized and united whole that equals more than the sum of it's parts, and cannot be defined by knowing and categorizing the totality of it's components. When we think of consciousness in light of what we know and see in our everyday activities, we are presented with evidence that some living forms seem to possess more developed abilities than others.

This leads us to the assumption that we are the living epitome of consciousness expressed in human form. We assume that we are the top of the pile of living consciousness, with all other living forms below us. Of course, the word "living" itself is arbitrary, as we all tend to draw our own line of demarcation between what is "alive" and what is not alive. We attribute consciousness to things that are alive, that move, that think, reason, etc. In other words we like to consider ourselves and some animals as possessing consciousness.

If we were able to trace the evidence of consciousness downward on the scale of "living things" we would be amazed to learn that birds, insects, flowers, grass, bacteria and even the cells that compose the human body have their own and value oriented type of consciousness. Their consciousness is not equal in egotistical development as ours, but it is not less in quality, it simply has not developed in the same way as our reasoning mind consciousness. The natural instinctive consciousness of the animals serves them well for their necessary interaction with nature and the environment. We humans are part of a beautiful tapestry of consciousness composing a system of reality rising out of need and developed with a purpose. All consciousness contained within our realty has it's purpose and that purpose is to BE. What we don't understand as yet is that EVERYTHING possesses it's own type of consciousness.

Consciousness is even somewhat aware of itself in the ubiquitous electron, the atom, and even the cells and molecules are aware of their motion within a life form. The American Indian knew only a few hundred short years ago, that there is consciousness in the tree, the rock, the river and mountains. It is rather easy to accept this premise in light of other spiritual enigmas that confound us. Unfortunately with the evolution of our precise physical manipulation in a three dimensional reality, it became necessary for us to focus intently on physical performance of the biological form and we lost some of the intuitive truths that were inherently ours from the beginning. These truths are not lost, they just became buried deep within our psyche waiting to be activated again, to bring about the natural blending of the physical reasoning mind and the inner knowledge that still awaits activation.

So if we were to attempt to stratify and categorize consciousness, we would probably put ourselves near to top of the ladder with a huge gap between ourselves and God. Why would we assume that there are unending gradations of consciousness below ours but seemingly none above ours until you reached that ultimate "God Reality"?

The truth is that there are countless gradations of conscious entities above us of such psychic sophistication that we could only contemplate them as godlike psychological structures and their reality would not be translatable in words. There exist countless very mature, sophisticated entities that we cannot perceive and never will be able to perceive. These are the entities, some of which have experienced Earth reality at sometime in the distant path, have evolved through Earth reality and gone on to other more challenging worlds. Because we cannot perceive these entities with our Earth tuned senses does not mean they do not exist. They exist more assuredly than you or I do in an actuality that is so evolved that even if I were able to explain it, you could not understand. To these "super entities" Earth reality was once their kindergarten just as it is now ours. Earth is the beginning playground for new consciousness. We are here to learn, create, experience, yes, make mistakes for sure, but to learn from our mistakes and create again and again, improving all the while.

Now finally, there is therefore a PYRAMID GESTALT of consciousness with newer consciousness on the lower levels, evolving and moving upward within the pyramid structure as they progress. Of course the very top of the pyramid is ALL THAT IS (GOD). This Prime Being is composed of all consciousness below on the pyramid structure. Conversely speaking if we were to carry that thought to it's logical conclusion, in some very real way, your existence NOW on the lower levels of the psychological pyramid structure speaks of your very real connection with Top of the pyramid. Everything is connected and part of another everything.

Everything is part of something else. Nothing in the Universe stands alone. You are a part of this Pyramid Gestalt, this Hierarchy of consciousness that and between you and All That Is are unimaginable sophistication that you can hardly envision. The fact that you are part of countless entities above and below you as they are part of entities above and below them. "I use the term above and below, when the meaning is more advanced in consciousness development". I am saying that within this Hierarchy, you are part of something else, that is itself part of something else and so on forever. In entity development there is no better or best, there is just more advanced, mature, developed, but all are of the same quality, as they came from the same Source.

This kind of psychic oneness should not in the least bother you or make you in any way feel insignificant. It is quite like the following analogy. You live within your family at the same time you live within your city or county. You also live within your country and live on your continent and there is no contradiction, no jealousy of one above the other even though you are part of all simultaneously. The entity of which you are a part, scarcely notices you, but it's development depends on the structures upon which it rests and give it strength. You are a part of grander entities, and you don't even notice it. You are evolving in that direction yourself, and as your position on this pyramid of consciousness increases in depth and awareness, so will it increase maturity and psychic sophistication.

If you have been anxiously awaiting your unification with God, forget it. You are already as closely connected as you will ever be. As you increase and become more, All That Is increases multitudinous amounts multiplied by the number of all consciousness on this earth. From this you can see that as you increase, All That Is increases exponentially. As an example, as you progress an inch, All That Is progresses a million miles in terms of distance as an analogy. All That Is experiences through all entities beneath itself including you, as you to are also an entity of considerable worth and always becoming more. All That Is doubles itself in nanoseconds. So as there are countless layers of consciousness below yours, there are more above yours also. There is no huge gap between yourself and God and there are others that have gone before you. The more sophisticated and evolved the entity, the more entities involved with it and a part of it.

An entity can perceive dimensions of reality that are not yet as not as developed as it's own, but cannot perceive dimensions that are more evolved.

My name is W. Allan, single male 62, a resident of Naples Florida. I graduated from Washington University in St. Louis and have in the past, written a column called SECRET REALITY which was carried by spiritual and metaphysical magazines. I have recently started a blog to publish my work with the intent of incorporating expanded versions of my blog in book form. You can contact me any at my e-mail address: beachinguy@hotmail.com You may also read other articles at my blog at: http://answersbygod.blogspot.com and have a small company recording and selling CD's of the sounds of nature from my web site at http://www.naturesong.net Published author and writer of Spiritual columns (Secret Reality) and books. Owner of a Naure CD company (NatureSong), recording and distributing nature sounds CD's to retail outlets including a wide variety of bird song CD's and over 36 different sounds of nature. All of our nature sounds and bird songs are continuous, ambient sounds of nature without music.

Understanding the God Consciousness Gestalt and Evolution of the Soul

Two words we will be using often in this discussion are (Hierarchy and Gestalt). For our purposes, Hierarchy will mean the stratified organization and layering of consciousness based on it's abilities, maturity and development. Gestalt will mean an organized and united whole that equals more than the sum of it's parts, and cannot be defined by knowing and categorizing the totality of it's components. When we think of consciousness in light of what we know and see in our everyday activities, we are presented with evidence that some living forms seem to possess more developed abilities than others.

This leads us to the assumption that we are the living epitome of consciousness expressed in human form. We assume that we are the top of the pile of living consciousness, with all other living forms below us. Of course, the word "living" itself is arbitrary, as we all tend to draw our own line of demarcation between what is "alive" and what is not alive. We attribute consciousness to things that are alive, that move, that think, reason, etc. In other words we like to consider ourselves and some animals as possessing consciousness.

If we were able to trace the evidence of consciousness downward on the scale of "living things" we would be amazed to learn that birds, insects, flowers, grass, bacteria and even the cells that compose the human body have their own and value oriented type of consciousness. Their consciousness is not equal in egotistical development as ours, but it is not less in quality, it simply has not developed in the same way as our reasoning mind consciousness. The natural instinctive consciousness of the animals serves them well for their necessary interaction with nature and the environment. We humans are part of a beautiful tapestry of consciousness composing a system of reality rising out of need and developed with a purpose. All consciousness contained within our realty has it's purpose and that purpose is to BE. What we don't understand as yet is that EVERYTHING possesses it's own type of consciousness.

Consciousness is even somewhat aware of itself in the ubiquitous electron, the atom, and even the cells and molecules are aware of their motion within a life form. The American Indian knew only a few hundred short years ago, that there is consciousness in the tree, the rock, the river and mountains. It is rather easy to accept this premise in light of other spiritual enigmas that confound us. Unfortunately with the evolution of our precise physical manipulation in a three dimensional reality, it became necessary for us to focus intently on physical performance of the biological form and we lost some of the intuitive truths that were inherently ours from the beginning. These truths are not lost, they just became buried deep within our psyche waiting to be activated again, to bring about the natural blending of the physical reasoning mind and the inner knowledge that still awaits activation.

So if we were to attempt to stratify and categorize consciousness, we would probably put ourselves near to top of the ladder with a huge gap between ourselves and God. Why would we assume that there are unending gradations of consciousness below ours but seemingly none above ours until you reached that ultimate "God Reality"?

The truth is that there are countless gradations of conscious entities above us of such psychic sophistication that we could only contemplate them as godlike psychological structures and their reality would not be translatable in words. There exist countless very mature, sophisticated entities that we cannot perceive and never will be able to perceive. These are the entities, some of which have experienced Earth reality at sometime in the distant path, have evolved through Earth reality and gone on to other more challenging worlds. Because we cannot perceive these entities with our Earth tuned senses does not mean they do not exist. They exist more assuredly than you or I do in an actuality that is so evolved that even if I were able to explain it, you could not understand. To these "super entities" Earth reality was once their kindergarten just as it is now ours. Earth is the beginning playground for new consciousness. We are here to learn, create, experience, yes, make mistakes for sure, but to learn from our mistakes and create again and again, improving all the while.

Now finally, there is therefore a PYRAMID GESTALT of consciousness with newer consciousness on the lower levels, evolving and moving upward within the pyramid structure as they progress. Of course the very top of the pyramid is ALL THAT IS (GOD). This Prime Being is composed of all consciousness below on the pyramid structure. Conversely speaking if we were to carry that thought to it's logical conclusion, in some very real way, your existence NOW on the lower levels of the psychological pyramid structure speaks of your very real connection with Top of the pyramid. Everything is connected and part of another everything.

Everything is part of something else. Nothing in the Universe stands alone. You are a part of this Pyramid Gestalt, this Hierarchy of consciousness that and between you and All That Is are unimaginable sophistication that you can hardly envision. The fact that you are part of countless entities above and below you as they are part of entities above and below them. "I use the term above and below, when the meaning is more advanced in consciousness development". I am saying that within this Hierarchy, you are part of something else, that is itself part of something else and so on forever. In entity development there is no better or best, there is just more advanced, mature, developed, but all are of the same quality, as they came from the same Source.

This kind of psychic oneness should not in the least bother you or make you in any way feel insignificant. It is quite like the following analogy. You live within your family at the same time you live within your city or county. You also live within your country and live on your continent and there is no contradiction, no jealousy of one above the other even though you are part of all simultaneously. The entity of which you are a part, scarcely notices you, but it's development depends on the structures upon which it rests and give it strength. You are a part of grander entities, and you don't even notice it. You are evolving in that direction yourself, and as your position on this pyramid of consciousness increases in depth and awareness, so will it increase maturity and psychic sophistication.

If you have been anxiously awaiting your unification with God, forget it. You are already as closely connected as you will ever be. As you increase and become more, All That Is increases multitudinous amounts multiplied by the number of all consciousness on this earth. From this you can see that as you increase, All That Is increases exponentially. As an example, as you progress an inch, All That Is progresses a million miles in terms of distance as an analogy. All That Is experiences through all entities beneath itself including you, as you to are also an entity of considerable worth and always becoming more. All That Is doubles itself in nanoseconds. So as there are countless layers of consciousness below yours, there are more above yours also. There is no huge gap between yourself and God and there are others that have gone before you. The more sophisticated and evolved the entity, the more entities involved with it and a part of it.

An entity can perceive dimensions of reality that are not yet as not as developed as it's own, but cannot perceive dimensions that are more evolved.

My name is W. Allan, single male 62, a resident of Naples Florida. I graduated from Washington University in St. Louis and have in the past, written a column called SECRET REALITY which was carried by spiritual and metaphysical magazines. I have recently started a blog to publish my work with the intent of incorporating expanded versions of my blog in book form. You can contact me any at my e-mail address: beachinguy@hotmail.com You may also read other articles at my blog at: http://answersbygod.blogspot.com and have a small company recording and selling CD's of the sounds of nature from my web site at http://www.naturesong.net Published author and writer of Spiritual columns (Secret Reality) and books. Owner of a Naure CD company (NatureSong), recording and distributing nature sounds CD's to retail outlets including a wide variety of bird song CD's and over 36 different sounds of nature. All of our nature sounds and bird songs are continuous, ambient sounds of nature without music.