We tend to think we’re in control, but we’re actually under the illusion of control, we’re really a victim of circumstance. We’re like a small ship tossed about on the stormy waters of the ocean. We simply go where the wind and the waves take us.

If we can imagine ourselves as a marionette or puppet, we have 3 strings coming off of us to the puppet master. Our subconscious is the puppet master and those strings are our own thoughts, feelings, and actions. Our thoughts, feelings and actions are the way our subconscious can interact, control, and influence us. It’s our subconscious that we’re dancing to and how our subconscious controls us is through our thoughts, feelings, and actions.

Thoughts

Our thought process is useful because it is needed for the activities of the day, to communicate, plan, to do our work, etc. We use the thought process all the time and it is a very necessary thing. If we have an idea or are planning something we’re using our thought process. Thoughts drive daily activities and the overall scheme of one’s life.

We have 30 to 40 thousand thoughts a day, so our thought process is very busy. As useful as it is, it becomes something we have very little control over (we already experienced that if we’ve ever tried meditating and discovered how hard it is to stop and slow this process down) it becomes so overused and so overactive that it ends up becoming a distraction.

And it’s one of the reasons why we find our consciousness asleep, because we can’t really focus in the moment, because of all these thoughts being generated. It becomes a giant distraction and compels us to live with our consciousness asleep, trapped in a continual daydream.

Emotions

Emotions have an enormous control over us, overriding thought on occasion. We might think of our thought process as the most powerful, but we’ll discover that it’s actually the slowest. Our emotions are a lot more powerful, and we don’t give it a lot of attention to what goes on.

For example, there’s getting angry and lashing out at someone. That’s a really powerful emotion, and when we find ourselves under anger it easily overrides thought. It makes us do things we’re embarrassed or ashamed of, and make us say things to hurt those around us. We’ve all done silly things out of anger that we’ve later regretted. We’ve looked back on it once the emotion was gone and thought “oh no, what did I do, why did I do that? That was silly. I shouldn’t have done that.” But at the time the intellect is nowhere in that process because the anger had taken over and it was pure emotion that was calling the shots.

Thoughts come and go, but emotions can last much longer. A strong emotion like anger or depression or fear is like a really big elephant sitting in a living room. Once it walks in and sits down, there’s no way you’re going to move that thing easily. Thoughts can be seen as little butterflies or hummingbirds that just zip around all over the place. Thoughts come and go fairly quickly, but emotions last much longer. When an emotion settles in with us, it’s hard to move if it’s a strong one.

A lot of the things we feel throughout the day can actually come from external sources. They come from movies and television and sports and video games and music. As humans we find ourselves almost “addicted” to emotions by engaging in “entertaining” activities such as watching TV, movies, watching sports, playing video games, listening to modern music, etc. For example:

• As we’re watching a movie and we’re getting caught up in the action and drama we’re identifying with our emotions. People sitting around watching movies identifying with the actors and crying along with them are giving into their emotions.
• Video-gamers who enjoy all the explosions and gunfire and get caught up in the violence from video games are identifying with emotions.
• People who watch sports events and get caught up in the drama, getting angry, yelling and screaming, are identifying with their emotions. People who get into boxing, and MMA, and hockey because they like to watch the fights and the violence are identifying with their emotions.

Activities like watching TV and movies and sports, and playing video games and listening to music are so popular in our society because they artificially stimulate our emotions. Why would you cry over a movie? It’s not real. They’re actors. Of course we all know this, but we still want to experience that. Why would you be afraid of a horror movie? It’s on a television screen. It’s not real, but the fear is still there. It’s because certain aspects of our psychology want to “feed” themselves. We like doing all these activities because they artificially stimulate our emotions, which allow aspects of our subconscious to manifest and sustain themselves.

Actions & Instincts

Our actions are faster than our thought process, but slower than our emotions.  Think of a typist or musician. Their hands move on their own, but when they stop and think is when they make a mistake. Someone who is proficient at typing won’t have to think of where their fingers are going. It’s when they stop and think about what they are going to do next is when they slow down and make a mistake. If you try to put the intellect in its place and think “what’s the next step?” it will slow the process down. You won’t be able to be as dexterous as you’d be if you just let your actions do their thing.

The whole purpose of practicing is training your body to perform certain “actions”. Any physical skill or athletic ability from playing an instrument to typing on a keyboard to skating or skate-boarding to riding a bike to driving a car, to playing sports or learning martial arts or dancing, is a result of training the body to perform certain actions.

We all have physical habits that we have to study through self-observation. There are so many things we do that we’re not fully aware of.  Most of us aren’t aware of the habits which condition our lives. There are all kinds of different routines and habits that we have. For example:

• Every day when we get ready in the morning we probably do the same routine, go downstairs, put the coffee maker on, go in the shower, wash your body the same way, grab the soap with the same hand.
• While driving if you have your mind occupied you reach your destination and you realize “I’m already here and I don’t remember a good portion of this drive.” That’s how a lot of accidents happen. We drive the same route to work every day, make the same turns, we stop at the same intersections, to the point that we don’t even have to be there anymore. Our mind can be somewhere else while we let our “trained actions” take care of the drive for us.

We have all these routine habits that we do over and over again. Because so much our life is routine and mechanical, that’s one of those things that allow us not to be in the present moment. These repetitive, mechanical actions that we have allow us to remain with our consciousness asleep for most of the day. We don’t have to be aware in that shower because it’s routine. We can be worrying about work or thinking about the weekend while we get ready in the morning.

Sometimes we go into “robot mode”, and it’s not until when something out of the ordinary happens that we realize we’re not really aware. We all know when we’re not paying attention with awareness in a vehicle, that’s when we get into car accidents. If we’re walking down the street and not paying attention we could walk into somebody or trip on the sidewalk or walk into a telephone poll or something. It’s not until that happens that we realize that we’re oblivious to our surroundings, trapped inside our own mind.

We must observe the way we act, dress, walk and pay attention to some of these patterns. When we get ready in the morning and have a shower, we should actually be there having a shower experiencing the present moment, developing that consciousness. We should not be lost in a routine where we daydream, worry, plan, etc. Rather than being in a car driving and not paying attention, be actually observing what it is that we’re doing. If everybody who drives practiced self-observation we’d have a lot less car accidents and injuries and fatalities on the road.

We should start observing our movements when experiencing certain emotions. Notice they differ from when we’re excited, depressed, angry, or fearful. For example, biting nails, wringing hands, tapping fingers are the actions we have when we’re nervous.

In addition to our movements that are learned with practice (walking, riding a bike, sports), we also have instinctive actions. These are movements and motions that we don’t have to learn. They are given for basic survival virtually from birth. These include our reflexes and they are incredibly fast. We’re not even aware of a lot of these things.

If you’re about to fall, your hands automatically come out in front of your face. You don’t have to stop and think about that. A loud sound behind us makes us jump. Something falls and reaching out to grab it. These are instincts. We can appreciate how fast these are because we don’t even know it’s happened until it’s over.

We have various instincts as we are technically animals. There’s a lot programmed into us-survival, self-preservation etc. When an animal is hungry it will seek out food to feed itself. When an animal is thirsty it will seek out water. An animal will always act to defend itself from attackers. An animal will always act to defend its young. An animal will always go out at some point to procreate and continue the species. These are things that we share with the animal kingdom.

The problem is because of our intellect and free will as humans, our instincts get “perverted” or “corrupted” in a sense. A lot of the psychological problems that we have actually trace back to these various instincts. For example:

• When we overdo the “fight or flight” instinct we now get aggression and violent behavior, as well as various fears and phobias and anxieties.
• When we overdo the instinct to procreate the species, we get lust, pornography, prostitution, etc.
• When we overdo the instinct to feed ourselves we get into gluttony and forms of addition like alcohol, drugs, etc.

So a lot of the characteristics that we find in our humanity relate back to corruptions or perversions of our animal instincts. Because we have free will, we’re able to take these instincts to various extremes.

The Whole Package

We must not allow our life to continue to unfold mechanically! If we really want to see a positive change in our life, then we have to break some of the routines that we have. We really have to look at the whole process of being human as very mechanical.

Our thoughts are very mechanical. We have the same thoughts at the same points in response to the same circumstances. Our emotions are in many situations are mechanical. If someone insults you, then you get offended. If someone compliments you, you feel happy. Our physical activities are very mechanical. Think of everything we do from when we get up to when we go to bed. It’s just one giant routine after another. We’re like a train going around and around on the same set of tracks.

What we’ll eventually notice when we work with self-observation is that these thoughts that we have are related to the emotions that we have and are related to the actions that we have. It’s like a package.

We have to study our subconscious in our thoughts, feelings, and actions and instincts, the whole package. We have to observe everything that’s happening in each of these and how they’re influencing everything we’re doing. Self-observation refers to the whole picture. In any difficult situation you find yourself if in, check in with your thoughts, feelings, and actions. What are the thoughts related to this situation? What does it do to you emotionally? What does it cause you to do physically?

Many times you’ll find there’s a relationship here. You’ll be thinking certain thoughts, which will trigger certain emotions, which will produce certain actions. You’ll also find each of these has a complicated set of triggers and reactions, which are mechanical. Many thoughts, feelings, and actions that we have are simply a reaction to a circumstance. It’s like a mathematical formula, A + B = C. Part of self-observation is discovering that equation, observing the reaction, and seeing all the things that we put into place to create that reaction.

People typically overuse one of these 3 effects more than the others. The way you can look at this is: the thinkers, the feelers, and the doers. Odds are you belong to one of those 3 categories. The intellectuals are the thinkers, the academics. These are people that enjoy reading, learning, and taking courses. The emotional people are the feelers, the sensitive artists. These are people that enjoy watching a good movie, listening to music, going out to museums and art galleries. Then there are the doers, people that love physical activity. They like sports and fitness.

If you’re trying to figure out which category you belong to, ask yourself when something bad happens to you in your life, what do you do? Do you think about it and try to figure out how to get out of it? Would you throw something or punch a hole in the wall or go out for a jog? Or are you the person to lock yourself in a dark room, put on some sad music and cry about it for a while? As funny as that sounds, that’s really what a lot of humanity breaks down into, the thinkers, the feelers, and the doers.

We should try to balance the way our subconscious acts through us. We should try to avoid overusing any one of those 3 things. Once we figured out which one we’re overusing, we should make an effort to balance our use of thoughts, feelings, and actions.

Controlling Negative Emotions

When it comes to controlling these effects, you’ll find that your actions are the easiest to control. You just don’t do anything. The thought process is harder to control, but it is possible. Part of the process of meditation is controlling the thought process. It’s difficult at first, but with practice we can control it. Our emotions are the difficult one to control. Negative emotions and feelings like anger and anxiety and depression are really hard to control. That’s the really big elephant in the room that comes in and sits down, and you can’t move it easily.

Elephant Analogy

Here’s a story that leads to a tip on how to control some of these negative emotions. In the Hindu culture elephants were important. When elephant handlers came across an elephant that was difficult to control, they would place it in between 2 well-behaved “good” elephants. The “crazy elephant” would then start to do as it was told and behave.

In this story is a trick in which we can work with our negative emotions. We have to control our emotions with our thought process and our actions. We have to put our “crazy elephant” in between our two “well behaved elephants”. Our emotions are what we have hardly any control over. Our actions are easy to control. Our thoughts can be controlled with some work. So by understanding how to control our thoughts and actions, it can lead to controlling our emotions.

If we find ourselves identifying with negative emotions like anger, depression, or fear, we should lie down in bed or a chair, relax and make our mind go blank, i.e. meditate. Usually we have movements that accompany our negative emotional states. By lying down and relaxing we’re taking those movements away. We also have various thoughts associated with that negative emotion. Making the mind go blank then controls the thought process. The end result of those 2 is to cause the emotion to calm down as well.

Bully Analogy

After you’ve used the elephant analogy to “take away” your thoughts and actions there’s one more thing you can do to speed up the process in controlling the emotion. That is Letting go of Resistance.

Imagine that this negative emotion is like a bully. What does a typical school bully want to get out of his victims? Usually it’s some sort of reaction. By getting a reaction out of you, they know that they’re bothering you, tormenting you, and making your life miserable.

• They could be threatening you in order to intimidate and scare you and get you to break down and cry.
• They could be insulting you to tick you off and provoke you into starting a fight.
• They could be making fun of you or mocking you to hurt your self-esteem and make you feel insecure.

The bully gets his satisfaction by making you miserable, and so he’s going to keep on bothering you as long as you keep reacting to him. In other words, as long as you continue to show that you’re bothered by his behavior and want him to STOP, he will keep on going.

So what’s the solution here? You have to fully “surrender” to the bully. By this I don’t mean continue reacting like a victim. I mean show that you’re not bothered by his behavior, and you don’t want him to stop. Keep a straight face and don’t react to anything the bully says. Allow all of his mockery to “roll” off you like nothing. Allow the bully to keep carrying on and just knock himself out.

Eventually, the bully will tire himself out, as he’s not getting anything out of you. Therefore, he’ll probably get bored of you and give up.

It’s a very similar idea with your emotions. A lot of these negative emotions sustain themselves by your resistance to them. As long as you feel tormented, victimized, or “bothered” by these emotions and want them to STOP, they will keep going.

But when you fully surrender and let-go of resistance to the emotion, then it starts to lose its control over you. It’s like you are just sitting back and allowing the emotion to do whatever it wants to do, while you just “don’t care” about it; like you’re not bothered by it, and don’t mind it being there.

By doing this you are taking away the resistance that the emotion needs to sustain itself. Once you get this concept and start working with it, you’ll be well on your way to overcoming some of your worst emotions.

Putting it Together

After understanding these two processes you can put them together into a nice practice for the intent of controlling a strong negative emotion. Next time you find yourself overpowered by a strong negative emotion, try this exercise to calm yourself down:

1. Lie down in bed or sit in a chair, and get comfortable. You want to take away all the movements associated with this negative emotion that your dealing with.
2. Make the mind go blank, or meditate. You want to take away all the thoughts that are associated with this negative emotion.
3. Lay back and fully surrender to the emotion. Just allow the emotion to do whatever it wants to do and “don’t care” about it. You want to let go of all resistance that you have to this emotion.

Lying down and meditating allows you to come back and look at the problem or situation with a completely different light, which allows you to reach a lot more of a faster solution. By simply lying down, blanking the mind, and letting go of resistance, that’s enough to slow down your emotions. Then you can stay in the present moment and really examine the problem or situation for what it is and come to a proper solution, rather than acting out of anger or fear or depression.

The foundation for the subconscious is the dualism of the mind. The subconscious is sustained by the battle of the opposites. A lot of the events and circumstances of life are really mental forms with 2 poles, positive and negative.

We live our entire life going from one extreme to the other: pleasure, pain, like, dislike, amusement, boredom, success, failure, etc. Times of well-being and times of upset appear in all aspects of our lives from our relationships, health, finances, job, moods etc. Periods of happiness are always followed by periods of sadness.

Every thought we have has 2 polarities: positive and negative. This doesn’t necessarily mean “good and bad” but more like thesis and antithesis. Whatever thought we have, there’s an opposite of it. That’s how we’re wired to think. Every thought that enters our mind we can see as a duality to something else.

Typically, when a thought enters our mind we identify with one polarity. We associate with one aspect of a particular image or memory or situation or circumstance. For example:

• We’re excited about a new job we just landed. We’re eager to start gaining experience and happy to start making some money. However, that is just one aspect or polarity of this situation. We have to acknowledge the other polarity, which is having to sacrifice all our time and energy for work, leaving us exhausted and overwhelmed.
• We’re excited for a weekend road trip. We’re looking forward to the journey as we like to travel and we’re excited about our plans. The other polarity to this could be all the money that we’ll spend, and the exhaustion that we’ll feel once the weekend is over, sitting through that long commute back home. We’ll also have to unpack, which is tedious, especially when you’re tired.
• You’re happy and joyful that you just started dating someone that you really like. You’re so overjoyed and excited about all the fun times you’re going to have together. Your life seems to be going fantastic and you feel like you’re the king of the world. But you haven’t considered the other polarity to this situation: You have to meet your partner’s parents and interact with their family, which is intimidating, nerve-wracking, and stressful. You have to sacrifice time and money for your partner. You’re probably going to end up getting into arguments and fights at some point.
• We are faced with the memory or image of our significant other. We then associate with one polarity, which is beauty, attraction, desire, etc. That’s just one side of the coin. We also have to acknowledge the other side, which is repulsion, old age, unattractive. At some point they are going to grow old and age and lose their beauty.

By being human we only want to acknowledge one polarity of everything. We draw this line in the sand and say “I like this. I don’t like that. I only want to be over here. I don’t want to be over there.” By defining our own happiness we consequently define our own sadness. By defining our own pleasure we also define our own pain.

By reaching further and further to one side, we’re also reaching further to the other side. It’s like a pendulum that swings. The further you push it to one side, the further it will swing to the other side.

We must learn to live outside the pendulum and avoid the extremes by seeking the centre path. We must learn not to take part in the swing between extremes and not identify with either pole, the positive or negative aspects of anything. You must see events and circumstances of life revolving around you rather than participating directly in them. Instead of riding the pendulum swinging from side to side with it, you must watch it swing around you.

We must comprehend both sides to everything and stop identifying with only one side. When you become used to seeing things from outside the pendulum, at the center of the circle, then everything changes and you free yourself from the struggle of the opposites. Action free from mental dualism produces the awakening of the consciousness.

We firmly believe that we’re a single individual, but we’re actually a multiplicity. We do not possess a definitive individuality, but we are a psychological multiplicity. Our subconscious mind is not a single entity, but rather a sum of many psychological aspects or “psychic aggregates”. We rarely find ourselves as a single individual. Our personality is constantly shifting and moving as various aspects of our psychology express themselves.

We could say that within each of us there are many different people. We’re not the same person that we are at work as we are at home. You’re not the same person as you are with your significant other as you are with your in-laws or as you are with your kids or as you are with your friends. That’s what we do as humans. We’re like chameleons, constantly changing our colors to adapt to various circumstances.

We have different moods, behaving differently in different circumstances and situations, and around different people. The whole concept of a “mood” is just describing a particular aspect of our psychology. “I was in a really bad mood yesterday.” What that really means is “I was exhibiting a certain aspect of my subconscious” such as anger, frustration, depression or whatever.

We’ve all done something bad and looked back on it embarrassed, wondering why we did it. It could be getting angry and lashing out at somebody or doing something very silly or irresponsible. For example, we quit our job because of anger and regret it later when the anger is replaced by embarrassment.

Later you look back on it thinking “Why did I do that? What was I thinking?” The answer is the “you” at the time is not the same “you” that later looked back on it feeling ashamed and embarrassed. The fact is it was a different aspect of your psychology that was exhibiting itself.

When we identify with anger we get angry and act based on that anger, which means we lash out or we say hurtful things or throw things or punch holes in walls. When that aspect of our psyche is gone, it’s replaced by a different aspect that’s now ashamed and embarrassed of what’s it’s done.

Because of this concept we are always indecisive and changing our mind. For example, this may be a reason why a lot of couple’s “fall out of love”. One day we’re madly in love with somebody. This was “the one”, but the next thing we know we’re over that person and now love somebody else. Every time we change our mind that’s one aspect of our psyche replacing itself with another.

Another classic example is going to the fridge for a snack and reaching for a chocolate cake, and then something else comes to your mind saying “I could really go for a bag of chips right now”. Then you can’t decide between the cake and the chips. This is an example of 2 opposing aspects of our psyche. We’ve all done stuff like that before.

The idea of being hypocritical and contradictory is another aspect this concept. When we judge someone else and say “I would never do that” and then the next thing we know, we find ourselves doing just that. Perhaps in high school we criticized someone we knew for doing drugs or drinking underage. Then sometime later we ended up giving into peer pressure and did drugs at a party. That was one aspect of our psyche that said “no, I would never do that” and another aspect that said “screw that, I’m doing this!”

Each aspect of our psychology essentially operates with a “mind of their own.” Each one of our thoughts is directed from one particular aspect of our psyche in an attempt to get us to identify with it. Whenever we react to a circumstance, that’s just one aspect of our psyche manifesting itself.

Each aspect of our psychology fights for supremacy and wants to be in control. That’s why we see our personality as such a dynamic and shifting thing. If there were a hundred people in a car all fighting for the steering wheel, what kind of course do you think that car would take? It would just drive all over the place, kind of like our thought process.

We get angry and we identify with anger. Now anger gets control of the car and is steering it where it wants to go. When anger gets bored and says “I’m outta here” and leaves the car stranded somewhere else and we realize “where am I? How did I get here?” Then another aspect of our subconscious comes forward and takes the car and steers it somewhere else. The consciousness should have control of the wheel, but it’s stuck at the back sleeping. It’s the various aspects of our subconscious that direct the course of our life.

That’s the whole concept of the Plurality of the Subconscious. The entire time that process is going on the consciousness remains asleep. We instead identify with the various aspects of our subconscious and let them direct the course of our life.

Our mind has a conscious part and a subconscious part. Anytime you’ve ever made a voluntary effort to focus or concentrate or pay attention, that was your conscious mind. Anytime you’ve made an effort to be mindful of your surroundings, that was your conscious mind.  Anytime you’ve ever made an effort to be aware of where you were and what you were doing, that was your conscious mind.

The subconscious mind is different. The subconscious is very mechanical and automatic.  While the conscious mind requires a voluntary effort from you, the subconscious mind just acts on its own. The subconscious is reactive and has us reacting to circumstances. The consciousness is passive.

Our subconscious mind is made up of a ton of components or psychological aspects or “psychic aggregates”. We do not possess a definitive individuality, but we are a psychological multiplicity. Because of the subconscious no person is continuously the same. We’re never the same person. We’re constantly shifting. Our personality is very fluid. We’re constantly changing and adapting as various aspects of our psychology come in and out.

We change our mind because one aspect of our psychology is replaced by another. We react in situations and then regret what we have done when certain aspects of our psyche replace each other. We can’t make up our mind. When we make up our mind we change our mind. We are full of contradiction and hypocrisy.

Our subconscious can essentially be broken down into anger, envy, lust, gluttony, laziness, pride, greed, and fear. Each of these is seen as the head of a legion of many more aspects of our psychology. It’s like each one of those categories is the captain of a giant army. Anger might be the general, but underneath anger might be hate, bigotry, discrimination, impatience, annoyances etc. Gluttony would include overeating, as well as addictions, such as drugs and alcohol. Greed might include attachment to money and material things. Fear includes all major anxieties and phobias, as well as little worries and concerns. Essentially, all aspects of our psychology can be grouped under one of those categories.

Our consciousness is essentially “trapped” within the various aspects of our subconscious that we have. Every aspect of our psychology that we have whether it be envy, anger, fear, lust, they all have our consciousness “trapped”.

Consequently, the subconscious controls our lives and causes us to sleep profoundly. The irony of being human is right now you’re saying “well I’m not in bed, I’m not asleep.” The irony is right now you are asleep, but firmly believe to be awake. Life is a continual dream. It’s full of distraction.

We find ourselves constantly bombarded with thousands of thoughts everyday. We can’t keep track of all these different thoughts. We’re constantly thinking about errands we have to run, chores we have to do, our plans for the weekend etc. While we’re doing that we’re never in the present moment.

Our consciousness lives in the present moment.  Anytime we put ourselves into the present moment, we’re activating our consciousness. The subconscious is constantly trying to take us out of the present moment. It’s dragging us back into the past, reliving memories and experiences. Or it’s pulling us into the future so we can worry and plan and plot. It generates those thoughts and images so we can identify with them and stay out of the present moment. It continuously distracts us in an attempt to keep us out of the present moment and prevent us from working with our consciousness.

When we work with our consciousness, we’re essentially “feeding” it, and “starving” the subconscious.  The subconscious wants to be fed. It wants to be in control of our personality. When the subconscious is in control then we’re “feeding” it, and allowing it to sustain itself.

The consciousness is almost like a seed within us. It starts to germinate when we are born, but without light, food, and water the seed cannot grow beyond germination. If we planted that seed in the some dirt and watered that seed and placed it near a sunny window, that seed would continue to grow.

Let’s say there’s another seed in that soil, the seed of a weed. As our plant starts to grow and develop, so does the weed. The problem is the weed grows faster than our seed. So the weed takes all the water and nutrients from the soil and because the weed grows faster, its leaves shade our little plant.

So every day we water the weed, make sure it’s free of bugs and fertilize it. And that weed keeps growing into a giant weed. We totally forgot about that consciousness. That’s what happens with humanity. That weed that we grow and develop is the subconscious.

If we give our seed the right conditions it will grow and transform us. We have to realize at some point that the weed is not our plant. If we pull that weed out of the soil and go back to tending to our seed, it would continue to grow and develop, leading to an awakening of the consciousness.

We have to work on our psychology to remove or control that which prevents the consciousness from growing, the subconscious. The keyword is “work” on our psychology. This isn’t going to happen automatically. We’ve been identifying with that weed for so long that we don’t know what the consciousness is. We’re so disconnected from it that we forget that it’s even there.

Imagine yourself in a crowded room and in the corner is a small child. That small child represents the consciousness. The problem is other than that child in the room there are a hundred other people. And those people are shouting and getting in the way. We can’t even notice that child in the corner. We’ve even forgotten that it’s there. We’re too busy noticing all those other voices clammering for our attention.

The average person has between 30-50 thousand thoughts in a given day. All those different thoughts are like different people screaming for our attention. We end up identifying with the loudest person and then stop and listen to what they have to say and have a conversation with them. We’ve forgotten about that small child in the corner. Now if we could shut up every one else in that room (i.e. meditation), turn off every other voice, we could focus on that small child and hear what it has to say.

Because we spend the whole time identifying with our subconscious, our consciousness never gets fed and doesn’t grow. There’s a Native American fable about an Indian chief talking to a child about a white wolf and a black wolf constantly at war for dominance. This is analogous to our consciousness and subconscious being constantly at war for domination of who we are as a person. The child asks the chief “which one wins?” The elder responds “It depends which one you feed.” We all have that choice.

Every time we identify with anger and we surrender to it, then we’re feeding and sustaining it. Anytime we identify with fear, then we’re feeding that fear, and we’re causing this viscous cycle where these things just keep growing and growing. The more times we feed it, the stronger it gets, and the more it wants to recur. So the more it generates thoughts and images in our mind that cause us to identify with anger and fear.

All the aspects of our subconscious are triggered by various circumstances. Most of our behaviors, the thoughts, the emotions, and the actions are simply reactions. If someone insults you, you get angry. If someone compliments you, you feel happy. You get caught up in traffic, you get angry. You find some money on the ground, you get happy. That’s what our emotions are for many cases, just simply a reaction to circumstances.

The circumstance could be a person saying or doing something, or an inanimate object, like a traffic jam for example. “I am late, therefore I am angry. That’s the equation. Why? Well, because I’ve reacted that way my entire life. That’s the way I’m programmed through previous experiences and behavior, and education and upbringing, society. That’s the way I’m supposed to react.”

A lot of our emotions and our thoughts follow a pattern like that. That pattern has been developed over the course of our lives by the type of parents we had, the area that we grew up in, the people we went to school with, the experiences we had. All of our life experiences have molded these sets of equations of A + B = C. And we carry hundreds of different equations within us, where the “equals” part is just a different aspect of our psychology.

So, all kinds of different aspects of our life are affected by various aspects of our psychology. The course of our life is like a car just flying all over the place with different people fighting for the steering wheel. The whole time there’s that consciousness, the one who should be driving the car, but can’t even get near the steering wheel.

We put ourselves on a pedestal and think that we’re “perfect” or we’re fine. We excuse behaviors in ourselves that we wouldn’t tolerate for a second in other people. We spend so much time criticizing and judging other people, and never direct that at ourselves. We never get to know who we really are. That’s one of the difficult things about being human and examining our own psychology. If we want to transform ourselves we really have to hold up that mirror and look at the reflection staring back. And not a lot of people want to do that.

That’s where the technique of self-observation comes in. Self-observation is holding up that mirror and really studying what’s there.

We must observe ourselves and try to get to know the different aspects of our subconscious mind. Just like the moon has a dark side that you never see, your psychology has a hidden side that you can’t see. Imagine a dark cave with a small candle. That small candle represents the consciousness and it illuminates a very tiny area. And because of that there are all kinds of stuff that can hide in the darkness. We want to develop that consciousness and turn that candle into a huge spotlight that shines everywhere leaving nowhere for the subconscious to hide.

We have to discover what aspects of our psychology control us the most? What aspects of our psyche appear regularly? What triggers them? What problems do they cause us? When you look back over a particular day what emotions were there? What thoughts were there? What triggered them? Where did they come from? What were the results of those thoughts or emotions?

Observation is the first step in working on our psychology, and the next step is comprehension, really understanding everything about that particular aspect of your psychology. This includes how it works, what causes it, where it comes from, and the different formulas that allow it to happen. Once you fully understand a certain aspect of your psychology, then the third stage is changing it, essentially controlling it or “removing” it from your behavior.

1. Observe it.
2. Understand it.
3. Change it.

Our daily life is like a psychological gymnasium where we can essentially “work-out” or “exercise” our consciousness. Every situation we find ourselves in is an opportunity to learn something and perfect ourselves. Every situation in our life is an opportunity to observe, comprehend and change an aspect of our psychology.

The social interaction of life is the perfect mirror in which we are able to discover ourselves. In social interactions hidden aspects of our psyche come out spontaneously and if we are in a state of alertness we can see them. So our friend comes over in a car. If we’re paying attention we can see “that’s jealousy I’m feeling right now. Why should I feel like this? This is my friend. I’m supposed to be happy for them.”

We must be alert like a sentry in a time of war. We have to be waiting for the manifestation of a particular emotion or a particular thought. So if we really want to get to know anger or envy, then we must swear to be “conscious of the different manifestations of anger that occur during the day. I am going to be prepared and waiting for them to happen.”

Eventually we want to observe ourselves in action from instant-to-instant, moment-to-moment. That’s the goal. That’s a state of continuous consciousness. That’s going to take some practice to be constantly aware of our thoughts, feelings, and actions. That’s something we’ll develop over time. Right now we just have to look at what aspects of our subconscious cause us the most problems in our lives and those will be ones that we will start to observe.

The goal of awakening the consciousness is controlling and changing the various aspects of our subconscious mind, and “freeing” the consciousness. Recall the story of Aladdin and the lamp. Aladdin was an average person who found a brass lamp where a magical genie was trapped within. Aladdin rubbed the lamp and allowed the genie to escape. The genie was able to transform his life, and make him happy, and grant him wishes. This story is like an analogy for the concept of the consciousness and subconscious.

Awakening of the consciousness is eliminating the subconscious and freeing the consciousness, allowing the consciousness to grow. It’s ripping that weed out of the soil, cleansing the psychology. It’s choosing not to identify with anger, envy, greed, fear, lust, but identifying with our consciousness. It’s kicking all the noisy people out of the room and focusing on the small child in the corner, listening to what it has to say, allowing it to guide the course of our life. It’s taking hold of that ship’s wheel and steering it in the right direction. It’s no longer allowing the wind and the waves to determine the course of our life, no longer being a victim of circumstance.

This can only happen through conscious work. It’s not going to come unless we work on ourselves. The awakening of the consciousness isn’t going to happen spontaneously someday. It comes through a slow process of working directly on our psychology. It doesn’t come overnight.

We have to struggle against the subconscious. It is unnecessary for us to continue to live in misery. It’s really a choice that we can make. We can choose to fight against the subconscious. We can choose to develop the consciousness.

We think we are in control of our lives, but a lot of the things we do are merely reactions. We simply react to situations. We react to other people. We react to the circumstances of life. If somebody insults us, then we get angry and upset. If someone compliments us, then we feel good. If we’re stuck in a traffic jam while driving, we react in anger and impatience. If someone cuts us off on the road, we get angry.

We like to think we’re in control but in many cases we’re under the illusion of control. We’re not even in control of our own mind. We like to think we are, but if we ever try to meditate or quiet our mind, we quickly discover how difficult that is to do. We get continuously assaulted by an endless stream of thoughts, images, and memories that keep us continuously distracted. Consequently, we find ourselves in a perpetual dream-like state. Our consciousness is asleep.

As we begin to observe ourselves we will uncover a hidden side of ourselves. By definition the average human being has a large portion of their psychology that’s hidden from them. Just like the moon has a dark side, our mind has a side that we’re not aware of. That’s the definition of the unconscious or subconscious.  The subconscious is this massive section that we are completely unaware of what’s happening.

Unfortunately for us, the subconscious is the source of a lot of the impulses, drives, emotions, thoughts, feelings, and reactions that we have. When we start observing ourselves and start becoming “conscious” of our own thoughts, feelings, and actions, we uncover the whole hidden side of ourselves that we were completely unaware of. This is something that happens through the process of self-observation.

We will discover that we are unable to control certain aspects of our mind.  Anger and depression and anxiety are all very hard to control. Nobody wants to experience these, but they’re not so simple. You can’t just “snap” out of it or tell yourself to “get over it”. These are very difficult states or emotions that take a lot of effort to overcome.

Emotions such as anger, lust, envy, fear, and depression all seem to operate with “a mind of their own”. It’s like each one of them represents a different person inside of us. How many times have we lost our temper with someone and found ourselves having to apologize later. We end up saying “I’m sorry. I don’t know what came over me. I don’t know what I was thinking. I didn’t really mean it.”

The next question is if you “didn’t really mean it”, who meant it then? How did it happen? What came over you? Where did that reaction come from? What part of your psychology produced that behavior? If it was directed at a loved one, someone you care about, then why would you want to say hurtful things to them or do hurtful actions to them? Where exactly did that behavior come from?

We have all kinds of things like that happening throughout our lives, but we never really stop to question where and why? What is anger exactly? Why did I exhibit that emotion? Where did it come from? What triggered it and what kind of effects did it have on my surroundings, the people around me. These are the types of questions that we don’t ask, but we will start to ask when we begin studying ourselves.

We have so many behaviors that we just accept and take for granted. We judge and criticize everyone around us, but very rarely do we judge and criticize ourselves. One of the most important aspects of working on psychology is to take all that effort used in judging and criticizing other people and direct that internally. Rather than questioning “what’s their problem? What are they acting like that for?” Instead direct that inwards when we find ourselves in a similar situation.

We’re like a small ship tossed about in the stormy waters of the ocean. These uncontrollable aspects of our psychology become the wind and the waves of our ship. They control and manipulate most of our lives and actions.

We all know people who have problems with anger or addiction or lust or envy, and end up complicating all kinds of aspects of their lives. We’re usually able to see their problem and always question “why can’t they see what they’re doing? Don’t they understand the consequences of their actions? Can’t they see that they’re always single because… Can’t they see that they’re broke and have no money because… Can’t they see they’re unemployed because…” That’s always clearly visible in other people but something we rarely see in ourselves.

These “uncontrollable” aspects of our psyche are the cause of the suffering and misery that we experience; the unpleasant things in life, the difficult circumstances and experiences that we wish we didn’t have.  When we look at a difficult circumstance of our life and figure out what happened, we usually see it’s the result of these uncontrollable aspects of our psyche.

There is a continuous search for pleasure to escape from misery. Because we’re under the influence of all this negative stuff like anger, fear, and depression we have a continual search for pleasure as an escape from the misery. That’s why as a society we become so materialistic; we look for this “happiness” from somewhere else. The happiness can’t come from within because we have all this negative stuff there, so we look for it in cars and houses and jobs and money, forms of entertainment etc. Some people go as far as drugs and alcohol as an attempt to find that pleasure or “happiness”.

We constantly find ourselves shifting between pleasure and pain, highs and lows. We’re constantly going from being really happy and enjoying something to being depressed or upset. We’re like a pendulum, constantly swinging from one extreme to the other as we find ourselves transitioning from the high points to the low points. This is an unbalanced way of living that can cause all kinds of problems psychologically.

It is unnecessary for us to continue living like this. We can choose to start working on our psychology. This blog will act as a practical guide for anyone suffering with any kind of psychological problem or just looking to improve their mental health. It will feature various tips and tools and techniques that will help you understand and control various aspects of your mind.

The contents of this blog should help you to transform yourself in a practical, positive manner. It’ll help you to transform from a stressed out, nervous-wreck into a calm, relaxed, tranquil person. It’ll help you change from a timid, insecure person into a bold, confident person. It’ll help you change from an angry, wrathful, tempered person into a kind, easy-going, patient person.

Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for more content to come.