The Unconscious Mind

By Alan B. Densky, CH

A Simplified Explanation

The unconscious mind can be likened to a video and audio recorder. The conscious mind does our reasoning, thinking and communicating. The conscious mind points the video and audio recorder at that which we wish to learn and remember. Basically, everything we have seen, touched, smelled, heard or tasted, is recorded in the unconscious mind.

The conscious mind is the playback unit for many of these recordings. Example: A young child touches the handle of a hot pot on a stove. The hot handle causes pain. The child jerks his hand away and feels the pain. This is seen and felt so it is recorded in the unconscious mind. Each time the child touches a hot pot on the stove, he experiences the same reaction.

After several repetitions of the above, a behavior pattern (conditioned response) is formed. From that time on, when the child sees the pot on the stove, information from the unconscious mind, the recollection of pain is projected back into the conscious mind. The child does not touch the pot again. Thus, the unconscious mind does not reason. It merely accepts information, stores that information, and releases it for later usage. The input to the unconscious mind controls the output from the unconscious mind. Only information which has been put into the unconscious mind can be retrieved from it.

The unconscious mind is the seat of your emotions. If you feed in a sad thought, a sad emotion will be projected into the consciousness. If you feed in a happy thought, a happy emotion such as joy will be projected into the consciousness. If you worry, consciously you will be feeding this negative into your unconscious and tension will be projected into the muscles of your body.

From these examples, it is quite easy to intellectualize that you have control over the way you feel because your feelings are based on your thoughts. The attitudes that you establish toward particular situations in your life will give you more precise control over your feelings and reactions to these situations.

Example: Imagine that you have an old junker of a car, which you have run into a tree. No one is hurt. You can afford a new car easily. Your attitude is likely to be, "Who cares. That car was ready for the junk heap anyway." So you would experience no tension or upset from this accident.

However, if you have a new car and have a $1,000.00 deductible collision clause in your insurance policy, your attitude would probably be, "This is horrible! This is awful! I can't stand it!" This attitude is fed into the unconscious mind, resulting in tension and depression being projected into your body and consciousness.