A Conscious Solution to the Unconscious Mind

The work of Dr. Bruce Lipton; a cell biologist of high renown, has recently inspired me to change my thoughts, in order that I may change my life. His work has lead me to the conclusion that the most powerful thing we have is our conscious mind. Our ability to think, question, reason, and ultimately make decisions is really what gives us humans the ability to create our selves and our lives- as opposed to existing haphazardly. Our ability to choose can be used to ‘program’ that part of us which cannot think, but essentially runs our lives; the subconscious.

Dr. Lipton’s statement- that we humans typically use around 5% of our minds consciously, and the other 95% unconsciously- astounded me, as I believe it has done to you as well! That means our unconscious mind essentially runs our lives! Let me illustrate that with an example, similar to one used by Dr. Lipton in his book The Biology of Belief:

Have you ever got in your car- become so involved in listening to a radio program or song, only to have realized- once you reached your destination- that you don't remember part, most, or all of the journey? How is that possible?

Well, while you listened to the radio consciously, you simultaneously used your subconscious mind to drive the car. Now for the important part: you probably don’t even remember that drive, as you were consciously involved in listening to the radio. However, you probably couldn’t drive with your conscious mind elsewhere the first few weeks or months that you started driving. You had to ‘program’ driving into your subconscious for a time, in order to be able to access that program on a subconscious level. So if you were able to program driving into your subconscious mind, you’ve probably managed to fit other programs in there as well (such as the ability to do ‘mindless’ tasks, in order that you may daydream while you do them).

And what’s more, you aren’t the only one who has ‘downloaded’ these programs into your mind. Our parents, teachers, friends, media, and society have downloaded programs in there as well! That’s why what is ‘truth’ to one person is considered ‘absurd’ to another, and vice versa.

Basically, I see Lipton’s findings like this: we all view the world through different lenses, which are our versions of reality, and our reality comes not from the conscious mind, but rather, from the subconscious mind. At any given point in time, we are being bombarded with an overload of information. Therefore, we are conscious of only a tiny fraction of our surroundings. What we will be conscious of is decided by our unconscious mind, which separates the ‘relevant’ from the ‘irrelevant,‘ and how we distinguish is based upon the already existing programming of our subconscious mind.

So if you subconsciously believe the world is a frightening/bad place, where evil reigns- then that’s what you’ll further perceive. Likewise, if you consider the world to be essentially exhilarating/good and kind, then you will typically perceive information which supports that view. Really, the world is both terrifying/bad and exhilarating/good- it’s just that you find what you look for- usually disregarding what you don’t expect to find; what you’re not ‘programmed’ to find.

So up to this point, you’ve probably experienced having decided to make improvements to yourself and in your life, only to have failed or fallen short of your expectations (who hasn’t?). Could the problem be that 5% of you invests in making these changes, while the other 95% is fights such decisions, because they don’t support its programming? And what can you do about that?

My advice is to first decide what improvements you want to make. Then find out exactly why you want to make them- get yourself some reasons! At that point, you can begin changing your life in ways which support the decisions you’ve made. As you continue making changes to support your desired improvements, you will find new (and maybe even more useful) ways of making other like supportive changes. What you’re doing then is creating new programs in your subconscious mind by using your conscious mind. You are rerecording the tape in order that you may hear a different tune or re-coloring the lenses in order that you may see through a different hue, so to speak. In other words, you are changing your reality to change yourself and your life.