Why is so little understood about the subconscious?

[RyanParis]

I hardly ever hear scientists or doctors say anything about the subconscious, except maybe when they talk about dreaming. Other then that, I hear nothing.

And then when I actually astral project and read Edgar Cayce articles saying dreams are journeys into the spirit world, it really does make me realize how little is known about the subconscious.

Why is so little understood about the subconscious? I think it's because we're normally only aware with our conscious mind, and realizing what's going on subconsciously would be impossible unless you're aware during it.

[CFTraveler]

Also (and setting aside ancient ideas and practices) the idea of the subconscious is fairly new as a 'scientific' theory. Both Freud and Jung introduced the subconscious as a 'hidden' part of our minds, and their ideas were first rejected. Then when Jung departed from Freud's ideas about it, he was rejected by Freud. So for a long time the ideas about the subconscious (and what it is for) have been clouded by prejudice and then obscurity, due to the difficulty of getting information that could in some way be considered 'objectifiable'.
Even in modern times, as you probably know, different psychological disciplines look at the subconscious differently, and to add to them, us metaphysicians add a layer to it, making it more interesting to us, and more exhasperating to them. :lol:

[Antares]

Here is a related interesting thread: https://www.astraldynamics.com.au/showthread.php?17782-Subconscious-not-as-helpful-as-I-first-thought&highlight=subconscious

Anyway, here's my theory on the so called 'subconscious' part of mind that I came up to after years of my own private, mostly subjective research:

First of all, let's make an assumption that there is ONE MIND only, not many. "Parts" of them are purely functional and subjectively perceived, but in reality there is no sharp borders between them, which means that they are fuzzy. Best described to really understand it is through energy: energy may take a very sharp, logical, fixed, focused and contracted form (in this it refers to the Geburah sephirot, if you know Qabbalah), or the opposite: expanding, distracted and fuzzy (Chesed in this case).

"Parts" of the mind may be considered as having certain parameters of the actual part of energy that is your mind, such as:

- frequency - when you change the frequency of your brain, you change also the frequency of your "radio station" to not just broadcast but also receive certain "impressions" for this particular part of reality (represented by this particular frequency)
- form - possibly infinite
- mode - as above, most known being: beta, alpha, delta, theta waves (in this case measured by the electromagnetic waves of the brain); there's also "gamma" but I know nothing about it and cannot tell if it's actually a seperate state, or just still a quicker version of the 'beta' state - if so, then I had experienced it with use of additonal "helps" (other than drugs): mind is then very fast and blowing, but as mentioned, I consider it still the "beta" wave on steroids

Do not stick to this names, they are just simple "observations", you can imagine and create a thousands of your own parameters of mind.
These are functions, and the mind itself is after all flexible. What makes it stable in the physicality is the nature of physicality itself, being stable. :)

To not go overly complex, let's return to the common division into the subconsciousness and consciousness (I'll skip other x-consciousness elements here):

- consciousness - the part of reality (energy - remember that everything is energy, including matter) to which you are 'oriented' to at the particular moment; physical body (in this case partcularly the brain) makes it fixed to be 'oriented' to the specific frequency at most of the time, unless you're sleeping (in other words, people who don't control their mind have help from their brains :) and when they physically die... well, they must reincarnate, or be very fuzzy and unconscious! scarry thing)

- subconsciousness - the part of reality (energy) that you are NOT 'oriented' to at this particular moment

Let's take past incarnations for example: can you access them consciously, or not? If not, you are not receiving anything from this part of your mind, but they exist: they are unconscious until you CONTACT this part of your mind. Then they become suddenly (more) conscious, but may be still a little fuzzy at first, just like you are trying to recall your dream.

Dreams are also an interesting example: you are switching between different frequencies when awakening (from the one that is conscious during the dreaming to the one that is conscious during the physical awake).

Another example: telepathy. Similarly, you are (un)conscious of the telepathic income under certain conditions.

In fact, what you are doing with your mind is that you are contacting certain parts of the reality. You're doing it intuitively - this is a natural ability. (You can master it, of course).

The most interesting, perhaps, element of any (sub)consciousness is memory. Accessing (contacting) experiences that have been stored 'somewhere' is what makes them conscious. As well as having difficulties in doing that may make you conscious of the obstacles, and of your consciousness! (Consciousness of consciousness, interesting isn't it).

[olyris]

The subconscious might contain our enemy, but is (s)he a better friend? In spirituality, yes way.

[Antares]

There were many psychological experiments conducted which proved without a doubt that subconscious mind is actually a "master" of this part of the mind which we call the concious. It precedes and filters what in the end the conscious mind perceives.

How come that the subconscious decides about what we 'see' (both physically, mentally, and in any other sense)? Any ideas?

And how does programming mind work? Why there is any programming needed in the unconscious mind, like with nlp techniques for example?

The good idea to determine this could be a research made beyond the physical body and then checked what happens. I remember Robert Monroe stating about facing strong emotions which he couldn't handle at certain areas when out of the body - which he wasn't aware of when in a 'normal' state. What are these emotions actually about, then? Where are they stored?

[wstein]

Because most scientists think the conscious mind IS the brain. The conscious assumes it is the person and thus asks all the wrong questions.

This is most clearly seen on the experiments to test free will. There are brain signals that appear before the conscious mind is aware of there being a choice. Thus scientists assume there is no free will (as the outcome was determined before the conscious mind acted). If they realized the subconscious is part of the mind and self, they would not reach such a faulty conclusion.

[Antares]

Yes, that makes lots of sense. However, according to the common belief, it is not just a one-directional relation, there is also the opposite situation possible: the conscious affecting (programming, directing, guiding...) the sub/un-conscious.

[Antares]

I've noticed that when entering a sleep state, or awake state, something changes in my memory access. It's like literally the mind's state determines what sort of knowledge is available to us, although we previously "stored" it in some "storage". I experimented with this a bit.

In fact, these are not just memories, but also processes: the different parts or levels of the mind have different functions... The logical (part of the) mind, for example, is very good in memorizing the details, but the experiments conducted with people trying to recall the details while dreaming were very poor - in other words, that part of mind does not "think" the same way!

Other experiences are stored in the "awaken" memory, and other - in the "dream" memory. That would explain why it is that difficult to remember the dreams, for instance; and those, who master this ability, teach that it's best to write down the dream just after awake - when the mind is still somewhere "in-between" the two states.

Interestingly, a language narrows our experiences. About the languages I wrote already here: https://www.astraldynamics.com.au/showthread.php?28793-World-businesses-and-the-society-designing&p=174518#post174518


Language is determining the way we think, as researchers like Chomsky state. It is a tool of the intellect.

A little child when does not know a verbal language yet, operates on many other "dimensions" in his or her mind. He or she can, possibly, easily transit from one to another. It is possibly the verbal language which restricts his or her mental abilities. Instead of relying solely on the verbal word, the imaginitive part of the mind possesses an important language - the ability to imagine and connect things, the one that needs to be developed equally to logical part. In order to switch to other dimensions, the imagination needs to be put much more attention to - because it's much closer to what we call "the dreaming state" and "the subconscious" mind, as many researchers and famous people, including E. Cayce, has stated.

[Antares]

People wonder why children learn languages so easily, and adults - not so much.

The answer may be very simple, if we have the understanding of the mind, memory and the specifics of the languages themselves. The memory works with use of patterns which are associated. Mathematically it might be presented as a set of graphs (elements having "connections" to other elements).

Memory is actually in everything, including physical memory of sensing. But ultimately it is "translated" into mental pictures somehow.

When learning foreign words, or grammatics, you may remember how things are associated. But the learner should avoid something which could be called a "flat" or "dry" learning: just e.g. reading words and trying to remember them. It's the worst method, yet the most commonly used. (It is interesting, btw, that schools require memorizing, but do not teach about using the memory effectively).

Memory is actually commonly thought of as "a storage". I'd say that it's a frequency: the frequency (containing mentioned pictures) to which you mentally connect gives you the "display" of the demanded image.

The unconscious part contains memories that you "forgot"; the conscious part, which might be - partly - unconscious ;), contains memories that you "remember".

Mastering memory means mastering and expanding your mind, in fact. I.e. making the unconscios - conscious.

[Antares]

Dr Ulrich Warnke, a German scientist who studied e.g. physics, biology, and mind, stated multiple interesting things, some of which confirmed my observations:


the unconscious precedes everything what gets into the conscious mind
the research revealed that everything what passes into the conscious mind always is first present in the unconscious
it is the subconscious which not just filters information, but also processes it and prepares, so that the conscious mind just "gets" the final, prepared outcome (the final idea), so that it not needed to process it itself that much
most of the time people live "automatically" - are not entirely conscious of what they are doing, and more importantly, are not aware why they are doing something in reality
the amount of information contained by the unconscious is enormously much bigger than those to which the conscious mind has access
there is a sort of censorship in the subconscious which largely limits what we are conscious of, one of the reasons could be protection, lack of preperation, inability to handle those information etc.
the above covers also so called parapsychic abilities, like those related to the third eye: it is still the access to the information from the unconscious, which is under the same or similar "regulations" as any other type of information that gets into the conscious mind

This seems to confirm what I wrote previously about the conscious, like a boat, "moving" through the unconscious "sea". I remember also a similar, interesting comparison made by an astrologer who stated that the emotional mind is like a boat on a sea during a storm.

A parapsychic ability is, therefore, simply a mind "trying" to access something consciously (and always existing unconsciously).

And one more thing, which is related to this subject: recently I became aware that many thoughts that come into my (other people) mind(s) are not originally mine / ours. I'm sure this is the case with any other person. I started to examine this and I think there is a "mental gap" between the thought that is "given" by a (typically) non-material being, and the one that is originally mine. Interesting, isn't it? Does anyone have similar observations?

[olyris]

The subconscious mind is the part of the conscious mind that has been conformed to habit - so if you roll a smoke your own way you are lucky, by this habit. Again, and if you garden with tact (mutual understanding) the plants will grow bigger, and you are wise. And if you shower with "folly" - master word - your skin and clothes will be as honest as you are. What is the habit that you most need to respect? It is writing? Then you are magical!

The social implications of the subconscious mind are naught - for to embrace is for the thinker.