Tip Of The Iceberg

When the unsinkable ship Titanic made its voyage from Europe to the United States, it experienced the tip of an iceberg at a distance and by the time, the captain and the crew realized how dangerously close they were to the iceberg, the iceberg wrecked the unsinkable resulting in the world’s first unsinkable ship built began its journey to the bottom of the ocean. It is the judgment error of the captain not knowing what was beneath the visible iceberg that resulted in the disaster and loss of lives. Our outer vision is restricted to what our sense of vision could perceive but our inner vision can see the full potential of the hidden power.

In real life, when we are in the simmering state of mind, the mind generates creative solutions and great insight of omniscient quality. The great psychologists and philosophers have always known that there is multi-level hierarchy to the human mind. They always knew below the surface of the conscious mind is a dormant volcano of powerful though energy waiting to erupt. Some even think tapping into this force can produce timeless, highly influential bodies of work. Like the iceberg, there is a great deal under the surface of our conscious mind, everyday level of thinking that is hidden from view. Best known as the "subconscious" and "unconscious," these powerful mind layers do much of our thinking's "heaving lifting”. This is like our computer running several processes beneath what we perceive as a simple surfing of the internet.

Meditation helps us to uncover the power of subconscious and unconscious mind. Let us understand the functions of the conscious, subconscious and unconscious mind and how to tap the power of each one of them. In our normal day to day to life, our conscious mind observes and perceives everything we come across through our senses. This is real time data with no deep analytics behind it. The conscious mind operates with Beta Brainwaves and has the characteristics of logic, belief, planning, instantly analytical, very limited peripheral stimulation, superficial, likes/dislikes, comparisons, expectations, stress source, superficial ideas, educated mind, intellectualization, willpower, more energy for less effort, short-term memory, self-esteem, judgment, etc. Often it delves into past and future and brings worthlessness.

Subconscious mind operates with Alpha & Theta Brainwaves. The characteristics of subconscious mind includes, insight, incredible smart, imaginative, stress free, untapped talents, limitless creativity, programmed 24/7 by thoughts, intuitive, life solutions, deep thoughts, emotionless, permanent memory storage, always in the present moment, unlimited space, inventive, understands the path to success, capable of finding the meaning of life, closer to higher self, etc.

Unconscious mind operates with Delta Brainwaves and this is the very core of who we really are. This establishes spiritual connection. The characteristics of unconscious mind includes, immune system, cellular memory, primal instinct, body system regeneration, drive the dreaming state, incredibly beneficial and access the collective consciousness. These functions are automatic without conscious or subconscious minds’ intervention. Deep meditation drives us towards this unconscious mind allowing us to discover the truth about our Self.

Serving as a massive data warehouse, our subconscious/ unconscious mind layers permanently store all our memories, habits, behaviors, programming, deep-seated emotions, and really everything that we have learned and experienced up to this point in our life. An incredibly powerful tool, meditation is the secret to intelligently diving in, navigating, and effectively using this vast reserve of information to our maximum advantage. Data filtering and archiving adds the greatest value to our life. When we execute something passionately whether it is playing a game or drawing a painting or making a jewel or carrying out research, some of us will get into a zone and our concentration increases manifold bringing very high quality to our work that could be considered as best practice. This is the effect of the influence of subconscious and unconscious mind. Our limitation is our own perception of what is possible for us to perceive. Meditation controls the perception and reveals the limitless potential of subconscious and unconscious mind. Let us not look at the tip of the iceberg and limit our potential and let us dig deep into our limitless potential to make our waking state of life meaningful. Our core unconscious mind provides everything that we need for us to exist automatically including breathing, regeneration of cells, immunity to fight against foreign substance, etc. That is high level competency that a conscious mind can’t replicate. Let us tap the potential of subconscious mind to become insightful, inventive and intuitive to discover ourselves and enter the territory of unconscious mind to experience our true Self.

When we get to that level of meditative state, the conscious mind would be redundant.

 

Dear Smt. Jayasala:

I am very humbled and feel deeply honored by your words of appreciation especially coming from you who I consider as extremely knowledgeable be it scriptures or psychology. Kamba Ramayanam is like a sugarcane and more we taste, the larger our desire becomes to taste more. A common word of praise attributed to Kambar is that even the mill in his house would sing. Anything that is extraordinary is described as "Kamba Chithiram" (Art of Pulavar Kambar) which later in the usage of "Kamba Sutram".

It is true "tip of the iceberg" is generally used in a negative connotation to describe a major problem hidden behind a visible small problem. But our perception of our potential is like "a tip of the iceberg" limited by the conscious mind's understanding perceived by the senses.

Thank you for sharing the significance of how things are organized in a vessel and sent along with the newly-wedded daughter to make her understand how life would become easier as she progresses in the married life.

More you described about your family friend "Iyer's" description of Patanjali Yoga, I am very tempted to read his scholarly interpretations.

It is the member's response here that makes me feel very excited especially the one you write with loaded information. It is always a privilege to get a response from you whose articles are published by Newspapers and Journals regularly for the rich content and language. Your responses only teach me a lesson how humble a person should be despite the depth of knowledge one possesses.

Viswa

 

Rihana,

Imagine an infant lying in a dark room waking up and feeling very hungry. Crying aloud when she is unable to find what danger surrounds her, suddenly, a pair of hands reaches out to this infant and embraces her with great love. The touch gives her an instant message it is her mom. No matter, how much danger surrounds her, that touch makes her feel relieved from all her tension and begins smiling.

Similarly, we are all hanging on to the conscious mind as a security blanket thinking that we are surrounded by danger and we need to protect ourselves from inevitable risks. But if we understand the power of subconscious and unconscious mind, we would understand that the security blanket of the conscious mind is not needed. If we recognize the power of the mind that could regenerate our cells, provide immunity from most health issues, intuitively make decision without the need to observe, analyze and conclude, etc., why would we need conscious mind? Let us unlock the power of the subconscious and unconscious mind to our best advantage to guide us in the right direction.

It feels like letting the adult child (who wanted to be independent) we brought under our wings to fly free without our guidance. Sounds familiar?

Viswa

 

My dear Rajeni,

Thank you for your response. I enjoyed reading Episode 27 of "You are missing in my heart". Please take your time to read about various brainwaves and their capabilities.

Think about what are the important aspects of meditation. 1) Breath control, 2) Straightened body to align all 7 Chakras, 3) Control of senses, and 4) Allow free flow of thoughts from deep down, 5) Cleansing thoughts that are unnecessary, 6) Improve concentration on one thought and 7) Remain in the present moment for as long as possible. This is Raja Yoga Meditation. One can achieve this same state by a) saturating one's mind with one thought (repetition of name or visualization of a form (Bhakthi Yoga)), b) doing one's action with the best of one's ability, lovingly and selflessly without any expectation (Karma Yoga) and c) Research and Study of Scriptures and practice those teachings that explain the inherent nature of a human being (Gnana Yoga).

It is like cleaning up the hard disk and reinstalling the operating system with recent security upgrades to make the system work more efficiently on the applications we would like the computer to work. It is a maintenance activity that everyone should do regularly.

Understanding the Conscious Mind, Subconscious Mind and Unconscious Mind is like reaching out to the right friend or relative seeking help in a crisis (swimming in the ocean of life). Power of positive attitude works very well in Subconscious Mind.

Visualize if you like to speak in a conference, it is your conscious mind that tells you what to communicate. It is mixed with acquired knowledge (ability to prepare the PPT), stage fright (emotion), and expectation of appreciation (ego). It may vary from person to person. If you use visualization techniques to create a deep impression about your speech being accepted well in your subconscious mind, the emotion and expectation will be eliminated and you may be able to get into a zone where you deliver your speech precisely how you visualized with the power of Subconscious Mind.

We are mostly driven by our mind in life. Imagine when your mind is sleeping, if a mosquito bites, who is realizing the pain and automatically remove the mosquito from your body. When you go to bed with a mental or physical pain, who is healing you during the sleep. Think about how our cells regenerate on its own day and night. Think about what makes us breath non-stop when we are in deep sleep state. That is unconscious mind and the power of this mind is endless. If we begin taking guidance from this Unconscious Mind with the help of Subconscious Mind, our life changes dramatically.

That is why learned people advise us to raise above our Conscious Mind and reach the realm of the Conscious Mind. There is something in us that is all knowing, intuitive, inventive, automatic and beyond comprehension. What we call it is irrelevant but experiencing it is important.

I have written many threads already about meditation.

Viswa

 

Dear Smt. Srinivasan:

Thank you for your response and appreciation. I know you and Smt. Jayasala are accomplished souls but you both speak always with humility.

Getting back to the subject, I have a feeling that our Conscious Mind is just like living with a peripheral vision. It has the potential to look outwards with the help of senses and learn everything other than ourselves. The learned people talk about inner vision i.e. understanding what is stored in our subconscious mind and the capabilities of subconscious and unconscious mind. More than understand the world outside, it is more important to understand how our mind relates to the outside world by studying our mind. First of all it is hard to understand what is in store inside. Even if we get to it, learning how to make best use of it is difficult. Moreover, our conscious mind justifies its own will more than what we find in store inside our subconscious mind. Emotions and fears get the most of us and only a positive subconscious mind helps us overcome those fears and emotions.

Swami Vivekananda was a disciple of Swami Ramakrishna Paramahamsa but the Guru has mentioned to all his disciples that Swami Vivekananda has total control over his mind to be in thoughtless state in less than a minute (much faster than Guru himself) despite Swami Ramakrishna was able to visualize the Goddess at will. This was possible because of his ability to invoke his Unconscious Mind at will.

Viswa