Who runs your life ?

Synopsis: Our actions and words are caused by our thoughts. Neurological
researchers have noticed that our thoughts are not necessarily the product of our
conscious mind. Most of the times, our conscious mind is not even aware that the
thoughts we think are “supplied” to our conscious mind from our subconscious mind.
Our conscious mind does not know what thoughts we are going to think at the next
moment, for instance. Often, our conscious mind receives the supplied thoughts and
remains under the belief that it is thinking it’s own thoughts. Both scientific studies and
examples from our daily experiences are quoted to illustrate that our conscious mind is
largely unaware of what is happening in and around us.

We can argue that if our thoughts are not really our thoughts, there is no question of
freewill and consequently; there is no question of responsibility for our actions. This
argument is, however, not true. On the contrary, the fact is that, our life is all about
keeping one hundred percent responsibility for our conscious living. Although our
default unconscious thought patterns and compulsive thinking is not our fault, it is our
responsibility to correct that state.
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Who is calling the shots in your life ?

Who is really in charge of your decisions in life ? Who controls your experiences in life ?
Where are your thoughts originating from? Since our thoughts are the precursors to our
words and deeds, do you know where from is the ultimate originating of our thoughts?
In short, who is truly in charge of your life now?

We believe we are fully awake during the time we are not sleeping and our conscious
mind is totally engaged in conscious activities like thinking, analyzing, planning, etc.
However, do you know that the thoughts that we think are NOT “our” conscious
thoughts, per se? We identify our thoughts as the activities of our conscious mind and
that is why we refer to the thoughts that occur in our mind as “ my” thoughts or we say
“I” think, so on and so forth.

Researchers have realized that thoughts are given to us.They are, in one sense,
bubbling up from the depths of our subconscious mind and our conscious mind is only
merely capturing these thoughts and boastfully owning it up by saying “ my thoughts”
or “ I think” .

Benjamin Libet1 (1916-2007) was a neurophysiologist, who made far reaching

contributions to our understanding on how human mind is thinking it’s thoughts. His
findings were widely accepted and equally debated too. In 2004, he published his book
“ Mind Time ”, summarizing his research findings.
Through experimental evidence Benjamin Libet established that our brain activities
start some 550 milliseconds before we initiate a physical action triggered by a conscious
decision. (1 second = 1000 milliseconds). Meaning, if I stop this typing and get up from
the chair to go to the kitchen to take a bar of chocolate, a “ readiness potential” is first
formed in my brain some 550 milliseconds before the actual time I got up from the
chair. Some 200 milliseconds before I get up from my chair, my conscious mind
“decides” to eat chocolate. Actually, 350 milliseconds before this desire is captured by
my ‘poor’ conscious mind, my brain has already decided and initiated the process to
execute the desire. “I” (meaning, my conscious mind) am not even aware that the
decision is already taken. We feel everything is happening instantaneously and remain
under the illusion that we have decided and acted on our decision.

Continuum of Our Action Process ( Benjamin Libet’s Studies )

So where has the desire to have the chocolate originated from? From my free willed
conscious mind ? No, according to the research evidence! It could have bubbled up
from somewhere else unknown and got registered in my brain, by evoking a “ readiness
potential “ detectable in ECG or fMRI, much before my conscious mind became aware
of my desire for chocolate bar. It is only after 350 milliseconds later, that my conscious
mind captured the thought ‘ bubble ’ ; yet another 200 milliseconds later, my neurons
fired commands , my muscles moved and consequently I got up from the chair!!!. My
conscious mind is under the mistaken notion that it took the decision to eat the
chocolate, totally unaware of the drama staged in the background.

Several others, repeated Libet’s experiments using even more advanced instruments
such as MRI and fine-tuned Libet’s results. Marcel Brass 2 not only confirmed Libet’s
findings but also proved that he can even predict the Yes or No of the decisions we are
going to make, upto ten seconds before these decisions are actually made! He used

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functional magnetic resonance imagery technique for doing this. Hot debate on Free
Will is raging amongst subject experts in the field of Science, Philosophy and
Theosophy, since absence of Free Will have implicit implications for our morality and
behavioural responsibility3.

Stirring a hornet’s nest.

“If my thoughts are not mine, I am not responsible for my actions”. “Well, where is the
concept of freewill then?” – one might think. This indeed, stirred a hornet’s nest.

Inspite of his findings indicating the presence of a persuasive power triggering our
mental activities, Libet himself did not interpret his experiment as evidence of the
inefficacy of conscious free will. Even though a readiness potential is created in the
brain to do a particular action for 550 milliseconds, Libet pointed out that the conscious
WILL retains a right to veto any action at the last 200 milliseconds. Libet said, “My
conclusion about free will, one genuinely free in the non-determined sense, is then that
its existence is at least as good, if not a better, scientific option than is its denial by
determinist theory. Given the speculative nature of both determinist and non-determinist
theories, why not adopt the view that we do have free will (until some real contradictory
evidence may appear, if it ever does). Such a view would at least allow us to proceed in
a way that accepts and accommodates our own deep feeling that we do have free will.
We would not need to view ourselves as machines that act in a manner completely
controlled by the known physical laws” (see Doty, 1998 4)

In summary, there is enough empirical evidence to suspect strongly that our conscious
mind is not aware of the “nudgings” it receives from the subconscious mind to think in
one particular manner. Unless our conscious mind is alert and guardful, there is an
extremely high probability that our unsuspecting conscious mind would automatically
obey those nudgings, regardless of whether such nudgings are of an ethical nature or
not. The window of opportunity to available to our conscious mind to veto those
nudging is merely 200 milliseconds only!! We will not grab this opportunity unless we
are alert and remain watchful. Whether we have a “free will” or or not, therefore,
depends on the extent of “alertness” we practice in our day-to-day life. This is a
significant aspect for us to appreciate.

More about our Conscious mind!

Tor Nørretranders is a popular Danish Journalist who writes extensively on scientific

studies. He has compiled wonderful facts about human mind and consciousness in his
book titled “The User Illusion: Cutting Consciousness Down to Size” 5. Quoting scientific
studies, he has reported that our conscious mind can only handle some 15 – 20 bits of
information per second, whereas there are at least 10 – 12 billion bits of information
available to us every second. Some 10 billion bits of pixels are brought in by our eyes
every second. Another 1 billion bits of information is brought in by our touch every
second! All the rest of our sense organs bring about another one billion bits! Out of this,
our conscious mind takes only 15 – 20 bits per second, at best. Is our conscious mind

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a terrible under performer? Yet, we believe we are “consciously” taking decisions and
run our show of life.

So, who in reality, runs the show of our life? Not our conscious mind! For a majority of
humanity, the conscious mind is underperforming and is largely asleep for most part.

Our daily experiences.

While the brain-scientists generally agree in unison that our conscious mind is a terrible
underperformer, let us examine, whether our day-to-day experiences too agree with
their findings.

While setting out on a journey, how many times have have you wondered whether or
not you have locked up the house ? Invariably, if you go back and check you find that
you have indeed locked up the house. Your conscious mind has not even taken note of
the physical action you did. That is the reason why you had to return back home to
check out. In reality, your body acted. Your conscious mind did not take note of it! It is
true that only 15 – 20 bits of information is filtered by our conscious mind! It is true that
many actions are still done automatically by “instincts” much like how it happens in the
animal kingdom. Instincts are pre-programmed files kept waiting to be executed. It is
these files from our subconscious mind that trigger the Libet’s readiness potential in the
brain.

How many times, you have driven your car from your home to office and from office to
home, like an automaton ? Your mind will be thinking hundred thoughts, while your body
is driving your car, automatically stopping at every red signal, taking the right turns at
the exact places.

If we examine our responses and our retorts while we are engaged in heated
arguments, it is all too clear that words just came out of our mouths, without any
conscious thinking .They just come out of us, much like a tape recorder blurting out,
without any conscious considerations accompanied by intellect.

What does it tell you? More often than not, we are automatons, going through the
motions of life, without the application of our conscious mind to the words we speak or
to the actions we do.

When we drive on the roads, we only see things that fall within a certain angle of our
vision. We do not bring the capabilities of our eyes for lateral vision. We only see
what we want to see! Our conscious mind filters and operates with the minimum
required input.

While reading what we wrote ourselves, most of us do not often spot the spelling
mistakes and disjointed sentences. This is not because we are inherently incapable of
spotting them; it is only because our conscious mind is not “applied” consciously and
does the job unconsciously.

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Human Mind - Limited Modern and Vast Ancient Views.

We have seen that our conscious mind, which is the anchoring point for our waking life,
is at a disadvantage both in terms of registering what is available to our sense organs
and in terms of choosing what we should think and how we should response to
situations. Our choices of responses to life situations are influenced by the suggestions
given to our conscious mind. But, where are these suggestions coming from? It cannot
come from anywhere else other than our mind itself. In order to understand the details
of this process, we need to understand the way our mind is structured and the way mind
functions. Let us now review as to how much do we know about our mind.

Modern psychology has broadly classified human mind mainly into two segments,
namely, (1) Conscious Mind and (2) Sub Conscious (or Unconscious) mind. In addition
to these two main aspects of mind, modern psychology has vaguely identified the
existence of the principle of mental energy. Although modern psychology has used
terminologies like ‘ego’/’conscience’, such terms are loosely used and lacked detailed
clarity.

In stark contrast, the ancient understanding of human mind is significantly deep and
vast. Ancient Hawaiian Psychology and ancient Indian yogic science had known
much more than what modern psychology knows today; they had also effectively used
that knowledge for psychological and physiological healing. They had very well
understood the conscious and sub conscious aspects of minds and had also known
the existence of mental energies and consciousness. Given below is a brief overview of
both modern and ancient views of human mind.

Modern Understanding of Mind

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According to Austrian neurologist Sigmund Freud (1856-1939), human mind has three
aspects (1) “Id”is Freud’s concept of Sub conscious mind, which is animalistic, primitive,
passion driven, and is the hidden seat of unresolved conflicts. He considered it
inherently bad and and needing it to be controlled (2) “Ego” is Freud’s concept of
Conscious Mind (3) “Super Ego” is his idea of Conscience, which is an intuitive sense of
right and wrong. He theorized a psychic energy called “Libido” which is genital in nature,
and can be positive or negative. For Freud, “libido” was more like a working concept
only and is not a real, tangible energy.

According to Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Carl Jung (1875-1961), Human mind
has three aspects (1)” Persona” is his concept of Conscious mind (2) “Anima” is his
concept of Sub conscious mind (3) “Ego” is a combined concept of Conscious & Sub
conscious minds which is more like collective unconsciousness. There is “libido” too in
his concepts; but it is something like a lifeforce energy. It is neutral in nature and not
specifically genital. But it is not real or tangible, and we will have no control over it.

Wilhelm Reich (1897-1957) was an Austrian doctor of medicine and psychoanalyst,

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whose significant contribution was the demonstration of “libido”, the lifeforce energy,
which Freud only theorized as a working concept connected to genital. But Jung
explained “libido” as a neutral, lifeforce energy which is still not tangible and not
controllable. Reich could demonstrate that “libido” was real, tangible and controllable 1.
He had also discovered that the flow of this life force energy ‘libido’ is restricted when
the muscles are tensed up. When the muscles are eased up, the flow of energy is more
and resultantly his patients experienced cathartic emotional release.

Ancient Understanding of Mind

According to Ancient Hawaiian Huna Psychology 6 of Huna Culture (believed to be

35,000 years old), Human mind has three aspects (1) “Ku”, the hidden, Subconscious
Mind, inherently good and can be taught and trained and is the seat of learnt habits
(2)”Lono”, the Conscious Mind (3) “Amakua”, the Superconscious Mind. According to
ancient Hawaiian understanding, emotional disturbances are due to the conflict
between “lono” and “ku”- i.e. due to the conflict between sub conscious and conscious
mind. Hawaiian psychology also recognized a life force energy which they called
“Mana”, and is tangible and manageable (Ancient Hawaiians knew how to manage it)
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According to the ancient Indian Yogic Psychology (At least 6000 years old), mind is
called “Anthakarana”, meaning, an inner instrument. We are not our body; we are not
our mind; we are a unit of Consciousness - a unit of awareness and self-aware. That
means, we are this feeling of awareness (SELF). Body and Mind are two instruments
the SELF uses. Mind is the link-instrument that the non-physical SELF and physical
body connects in between.

In Yogic psychology, human mind has four aspects (1) “Manas”, the Lower Mind, which
is the importer and exporter of feelings and sensations from the external world through
the intellect to the SELF (2) “Ahamkara”, is the ego which is the feeling of a separate “I”,
identifying with the objects of the world and developing attachment or aversion to it. Ego
interacts with the world dualistically. (3)”Chittha”, is the mind-stuff which is a faculty for
storing all memories. Everything that passes through the lower mind, ego and intellect
will be stored in chitha. These stored memories are recalled to the surface of the lower
mind from time to time. (4) “Buddhi” is the Intellect which is the discriminative faculty of
the mind. This faculty is staying closest to the SELF and therefore it imbibes its
brightness and light.

Lower mind, Ego and intellect are the aspects of Conscious mind. Chittha or Mind-stuff
is the sub conscious mind. There is a life force energy called “Prana”, which is very real,
tangible and manageable. Yogis knew how to manage Prana.

The ways of the mind

From the above discussions, it can be seen that the ancient Indian Yogic Science gives

1 Note: It is interesting to note that both ancient Hawaiian Huna psychology and ancient Indian Yogic Psychology
hold the same view that Mana/Prana is real, tangible energy and it is controllable and manageable at will.

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the most comprehensive understanding of our mind. It can also be seen that western
understanding of mind also agrees with the ancient Indian understanding to the extend
they have so far reached.

Our Dysfunction and Dilemma

Most of the driving of our life is done with our subconscious mind in the driver’s seat,
even though we - conscious mind - think that we are driving our life. How do we walk ?
It is the work of our subconscious mind. Our conscious mind does not take conscious
decisions as to which muscle to flex first or which leg to put forward first, etc. It is an
automated process, driven by the ‘data’ present within us, in the depths of our
subconscious mind.

How do we breathe ? It is in the same manner! Imagine, if we have to breathe with

conscious involvement! Life would have been miserable then. So, at subconscious
level, there is a large repository of data, which drives our life – much like the data
forming the operating system of a personal computer. Many of these are extremely
useful in animating our body. But in our conscious state too, we continue that habit of
passivity and allow the past data stored there to drive our all decision making
processes.

In a way we are sleepwalking! We think we are awake when we get up in the morning
from a good night’s sleep. We are not! We continue to be driven by data. And what is a
data? Our old hardened thoughts are our data. Our memories are our data. They are
hidden in our subconscious mind and drive our lives.

Have you noticed how the animals in a circus are trained to do many acts for the
spectators? They are merely data driven. They are not doing any conscious acts in the
circus. Training is nothing but planting the data in them. The only difference there is
that humans are planting the data in animals.
In our case, most of our day-to-day functions are the effect of self-training. What is self-
training? It is depositing new data within us and allowing that data to run us.

Many of our supposedly conscious acts ( like driving a car, locking the house before
going out, reading a passage , our conversations in daily life etc ) are done by data in
the subconscious mind as proxy. We are as much asleep as an animal in the circus

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ring. We need to wake up! If we are not alertful, we become more or less like data-
driven biological machines!

Solutions from the old world

It is amazing that this great knowledge was available to humanity , across many
cultures, for millennia.

In ancient India, thousands of years ago, there existed a system of healing and mental
purification which is used even today in meditational practices such as Sahaj Marg. (
http://www.sahajmarg.org ) . The basics of this practice is the fundamental understanding
that the reason for disease and suffering are due to the samskaras or impressions (
data ) present in us. When these samskaras or impressions are erased and removed ,
our life and experiences change. They advocate a correction procedure of meditation
and cleaning . The procedures have been simplified by Sage Ramchandra Maharaj of
Fategarh, U.P, India ( 1873 - 1931) and made them befitting the modern times.
The great teachers of advaita( non-duality )in India, had said this long before -- “ we
are not the doers” - they said. “ We think we are the doers. But , know that we are not
the doers” , they explained. These words are pregnant with deeper meanings at
different levels of understanding.

In ancient Hawaii, millenniums ago, they were aware that humans are driven by ‘
memories ‘ ( data ) and that it was a fault in our system, causing pain and suffering.
They devised a very efficient practice called in Hawaiian language ‘ ho oponopono ‘
( meaning “ making perfect” or “correcting” ) ( http://www.self-i-dentity-through-
hooponopono.com/whos-in-charge.htm) . The procedures have been greatly simplified
subsequently by Sage MorrnahNalamakuSimeona ( 1913 – 1992 ) and made them
suitable for the modern times.

Solutions from the New World

Eckhart Tolle ( Born in 1948) is a German-born Canadian spiritual teacher and a

bestselling author. He is the author of “The Power of Now” and “A New Earth:
Awakening to Your Life's Purpose” – two wonderful books proposing solutions for
awakening in our conscious life, by living in the power of this moment. “ A new Earth “
easy to read and assimilate.

Conclusion

There is ample evidence from neuroscience as well as from our daily experiences and
from the old world teachings that humans are still driven by data or memory which is
responsible for our experiences in life. This data is responsible for all human sufferings.
We need to delete these data and prevent new data from forming.

Our present condition is our responsibility. It is not our fault, because our operating
system is designed as such by the grand designer . Nevertheless, it is our responsibility

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to find a solution and move forward.

We do have the freewill to override these data and create a brand new future. It is a
possibility gifted to us by the grand designer of life. The way forward is to delete the
data and prevent new data from forming and to live in the power of now.

We can choose to meditate and carry out cleaning as in Sahaj Marg or we can practice
the cleansing methods as in ho oponopono practice or simply begin to live in the power
of now as advocated by Eckhart Tolle. Choose what is best suited for you and make
the difference to yourself and to the world.

N.Kumar

References:

1. Libet, B. (2004). Mind Time: The Temporal Factor in Consciousness

(Perspectives in Cognitive Neuroscience).Harvard University Press.
2. Muehlhauser, M interviewing with Brass, M. (2011). Conversations from the Pale
Blue Dot. Retrieved from http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=12153
3. Kuhn R.L, Getzels P. Closer to Truth- - Big Questions in Free Will Documentary
(2016).Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9uRTjfhIf4M
4. Doty, R.W. (1998) Five Mysteries of the mind, and their consequences.
Neuropsychologia 36, (10), 1069-1076
5. Nørretranders, T. (1999). The User Illusion: Cutting Consciousness Down to
Size. Penguin Books.
6. King, S.K. (1985) Mastering Your Hidden Self, Quest Books, Theosophical
Publishing House, Wheaton, USA
7. Tigunait, R. (1983) Seven Systems of Indian Philosophy, Himalayan
International Institute of Yoga Science and Philosophy, Honesdale, PA, USA.

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