How does our mind work?

Do you even know your own mind?

“We should never be ignorant of how our mind works! It’s our greatest gift. We can do anything we want with it but we have to develop it.” Bob Proctor.

No one has ever seen the mind. However, we can use our imagination to try to picture it. This image gives us an idea of how our mind is structured.

We have a power within us that is greater than any condition or circumstance around us: our mind. The thoughts that we create in our mind can direct this power to whatever result we choose.

The mind is not a single entity. It consists of 2 minds: the conscious mind and the subconscious mind.

The conscious mind

The conscious mind is the thinking mind. It is the part of our mind that we use to think and reason. It’s also where our free will resides – where we decide what we want to do and what we want to focus on. The conscious mind is the creative mind, where we can create any thought we want. 

The conscious mind uses our sensory factors and intellectual faculties to think thoughts. Our sensory factors help us to experience the world through our 5 senses (sight, sound, touch, smell and taste). When we allow outside stimuli to direct our thoughts, we focus on the present moment. Our intellectual faculties, such as our will and imagination, allow us to direct the energy of our thoughts that is always flowing to and through us. By focusing that power, we can build any idea or thought we want.

The conscious mind has the ability to accept or reject any idea. No one and no circumstance can force us to think any thought we do not want to think. The thoughts we choose to think – whether they come from outside or inside – will eventually determine our results in life. When we accept a thought, it is impressed upon our subconscious mind.

The subconscious mind

The subconscious mind is the conditioned mind. It has no ability to reject thoughts. So every thought we think is impressed upon the subconscious mind. This part of our mind knows no limit except the ones we choose. Any thought we consciously impress upon the subconscious mind through repetition becomes fixed in there. Fixed ideas automatically express themselves in feelings and actions, until they are replaced. Fixed ideas are commonly called habits.

The subconscious mind is the habit mind. It’s where behaviours are imprinted. 

When we look at the world, we’re operating through the subconscious mind, the programs of how to interpret life and how to respond to life. The programs from the subconscious mind come from downloading other people’s behaviours that we have observed (our family, our friends, our community,…). This happens during the first 7 years of our lives. 

If we’re operating from the conscious mind, we’re in control of our life. If we’re operating from the subconscious mind, we’re in automatic behaviour, playing programs that were acquired from other people. 

How can you use your mind to transform your life?

“As a man thinketh in his heart, so shall he be.”

“A man is literally what he thinks, his character being the complete sum of all his thoughts.”

James Allen, As a Man Thinketh.

The body is the instrument of the mind

Our body is the instrument of our mind. It is the physical representation of us.

The thoughts we consciously choose and impress upon the subconscious (which is in every cell of our body) move our body into action. And the actions we take determine the results we get in life.

To change our results, we must choose different thoughts because our thoughts can change our feelings and actions. Our actions then become our behaviours, our behaviours become habitual and our habitual behaviours become who we are. Who we are is our personality or personal reality. So our thoughts literally create our personal reality.

We are creatures of habits. Habits are formed by our subconscious mind. And we operate from our subconscious mind 95% of the time. The conscious mind has little power to overcome the influence of the subconscious mind since it’s only functioning 5% of the time. So even if you fill your conscious mind with positive thinking, your subconscious mind is still running the show.

To create lasting changes in belief, you must change your beliefs not just at the level of the conscious mind, but in the subconscious mind.

The subconscious mind can be reprogrammed through the repetition of a thought or an idea attached to a strong feeling and emotion. The constant repetition will eventually reprogram the beliefs in the subconscious mind. These new beliefs will create new actions. These new actions will become new habits. And these new habits will then create the new you.

See? Change is simple! But it is not easy!

When we are thinking, the conscious mind gets engaged, and the subconscious mind is the default program running in the background, the auto-pilot. When we are thinking, we are not using the conscious mind in controlling our lives. We default to subconscious programs. So we think we are controlling our lives, when in reality we are living from the programs running habitually in our subconscious mind. This is why thinking alone will not change anything in our lives!

Both Dr. Joe Dispenza and Bob Proctor have insisted on the fact that for a new idea or belief to be impressed upon the subconscious mind, we need to think a new thought attached with an emotion or feeling and use repetition to become more familiar with this “felt idea or belief”. This combination will then move us into action and change our behaviour. This change in behaviour will change our results: what we are doing and who we are.

It looks like this: Thoughts → Feelings → Actions → Results

This is a powerful formula for change!

“The energy of infinite possibilities is shaped by consciousness: your mind.” Dr. Joe Dispenza.

How is this relevant to healing?

If health is one of your goals, if you want to change the results you are getting in this area of your life, then you need to understand this. 

Your mind can also control the expression of your genes. 

Consciousness is an interpretation of our experiences, of what we perceive is happening in our environment. Our cells depend on the nervous system’s interpretation of our environment to adjust their biology. So if we change our perception, our mind and our belief about life, we change the signal that is going in and adjusting the function of the cells.

“The moment you change your perception is the moment you rewrite the chemistry of your body.” Dr Bruce Lipton.

We are not victims of our genes. By our ability to change our environment and our perception of our environment, we have the ability to control our genetic activity. We are not victims of our heredity, we are masters of our genetic activity.

The supreme power over our biology is thought, the invisible energy from our mind that shapes our body and our relationship to the world. But our mind comes between the environment and our cells.

“Thoughts, whether positive or negative, determine our biology.” Dr Bruce Lipton.

What’s the problem with the subconscious mind?

1. The programs in the subconscious mind come from other people.
2. Most of these programs are negative, limiting, disempowering and self sabotaging.
3. When we’re playing these programs, it is because our conscious mind is engaged in thinking. Which means we are not observing our own behaviours that come from the subconscious mind because we’re too busy thinking with the conscious mind. That means 95% of the day we are not operating from the conscious mind of what we want, wish and desire. 95% of the day, because we’re engaged in thought, we operate from the subconscious default mind.

What’s the problem with good resolutions and intentions?

When we start the day (or the year) full of intentions and good resolutions, with a strong purpose and desire, produced by the conscious mind, we end the day (or the year) concluding that it didn’t happen. So we think: it wasn’t me, because I went out with a vision for success. And then we become victims: my life is not under my control and I’m not successful because the Universe is not helping me (or whatever excuse we find in our environment to justify our failure). That’s the perception. But it turns out: it’s completely wrong! 95% of the day we shoot ourselves in the foot with bad mental programs and at the end of the day we look at our foot and say: “Who did that?”. Well, you did it to yourself!

What’s the solution?

Staying mindful and conscious is the answer! Being fully present in the moment. When we are mindful, we operate from wishes and desires and we start manifesting. When we are thinking, we default to the bad programs. The consequence of thinking is that we let go of control and go back to the default negative programs of the subconscious. The result of that is that we stop creating life from wishes and desires and fall back in the programs.

What’s the connection between being fully present (according to Dr. Bruce Lipton) and linking feelings and emotions with thoughts (according to Bob Proctor and Dr. Joe Dispenza)?

Mindfulness is being conscious of the present moment. It is having an awareness of our thoughts, feelings and emotions as they arise. When we are mindful, our thoughts are in tune with what we are sensing in the present moment. Being mindful is perceiving our environment through all of our senses.

So by practicing mindfulness and staying conscious, while applying the “thinking – feeling – acting – creating results” formula, you are using the full potential of your mind to transform your life.

When we are absorbed in thoughts, our thinking mind is distracting us from what is really happening in the background: the subconscious programming is in control of our behaviours, of who we are being in the moment and how we are responding to our environment. This prevents us from truly creating changes in the now.

What is your health goal?
What type of health do you want to create for your life?
What do you intend to do with your health? 

These are all important questions. It is your intention for healing. And it is all tied up to what you believe is possible.

Beliefs are so important! What you believe is what is true for you. Your beliefs become your reality.  

Our beliefs are held in our subconscious mind. Our belief system or paradigm is run by our subconscious mind. Since we operate 95% of the time from our subconscious mind, it means we are most of the time running from the same program: our belief system.

The good news is that there is a way to change this programming. We can transform our life by changing our belief system. We have the power to decide which beliefs serve us and which beliefs need to be replaced. We also have the will (our higher faculty) to make these changes. So what is stopping you?

Are you ready to make a change in your life?
Do you want to change the results you are getting in your life but don’t know how to do it?
Is there something you want and truly desire in life but you are not sure how to get it? 

I can help you! Get in touch with me and I will guide you to a life-changing program that you can follow to transform the results you are getting in your life.

This article has been written based on the work of 3 experts in their fields:

Dr Joe Dispenza – Chiropractor expert on mind-body medicine, epigenetics, neuroscience and neuroplasticity.
Dr Bruce Lipton, PhD – Cell biologist, expert on mind-body medicine and epigenetics.
Bob Proctor – World expert on the human mind, and world leader on human potential and personal development.