LAYERS OF HUMAN MIND
Human Mind is complex and layered in nature, First
Layer is the Conscious Mind and the Second Layer is
Subconscious or Unconscious Mind.
First Layer: Conscious Mind
Every thought, choice, planning etc that arises in our
brain is only because of the support of our Conscious
Mind. In fact, every action, thought or desire that is
arising in us in this very present moment is also getting
possible due to our Conscious Mind.
Our Conscious Mind is responsible for our logical
decisions what we make in our daily routine, and it is
considered to be the boss of our physical body, brain,
and mind. It is the face of our personality, the conscious
mind consists of everything inside of our awareness.
This is the aspect of our mental processing that we can
think and talk about in a rational way.
The conscious mind includes such things as the
sensations, perceptions, memories, feelings, and
fantasies inside of our current awareness. Closely allied
with the conscious mind is the subconscious, which
includes the things that we are not thinking of at the
moment but which we can easily draw into conscious
awareness.
Things that the conscious mind wants to keep hidden
from awareness are repressed into the unconscious
mind. While we are unaware of these feelings, thoughts,
urges, and emotions, it is believed that the unconscious
mind could still have an influence on our behaviour.
The Conscious Mind is just the Tip of the Iceberg:
It is often used the metaphor of an iceberg to
describe the two major aspects of human personality.
The tip of the iceberg that extends above the water
represents the conscious mind. As you can see in the
image at the right, the conscious mind is just the "tip of
the iceberg." Beneath the water is the much larger bulk
of the iceberg, which represents the unconcious mind.
Second Layer: Subconscious Mind or
Unconscious Mind
The Subconscious Mind is also known as the
Preconscious Mind, includes things that we might not
be presently aware of but that we can pull into
conscious awareness when needed. You might not
presently be thinking about how to do long divisions,
but you can access the information and bring it into
conscious awareness when you are faced with a math
problem.
The Subconscious Mind is a part of the mind that
corresponds to ordinary memory. These memories are
not conscious, but we can retrieve them to conscious
awareness at any time.
While these memories are not part of your immediate
awareness, they can be quickly brought into awareness
through conscious effort. For example, if you were asked
what television show you watched last night or what
you had for breakfast this morning, you would be
pulling that information our of your subconscious.
The Subconscious is the part of your mind that operates
below your normal level of waking consciousness.
Right now you're primarily using your conscious mind to
read this article and absorb its meaning, but beneath
that mental focus,