THE POWER OF THE MIND
BY
ENGR. PETER .E.ARUOTURE MNSE
{DIRECTOR OF WORKS, LOCAL GOVT (RTD)}
MOTIVATIONAL SPEAKER
THE PARABLE OF THE GENIE
An old man narrated a story of what he encountered when he was a boy. A woman told him a story of how she found a corked bottle on a beach.
When she pulled the cork from the bottle, she imagined a genie came out and granted the woman all her wishes and she became very rich and successful in life. A genie is a spirit servant who was granting all the wishes of his master contained in Arabian fairy tale titled “Aladdin and the magic lamp”. Because of this story, the old man spent all his life searching for his own bottle with genie in it in several beaches around the world.
After several years and now old, he found a bottle he has been looking for near his home. For a reason unknown to him, he felt that there was a genie inside. He removed the cork with ease and out of nowhere a genie appeared. The genie said, I am here to grant you whatever you want, whatever I want? the old man replied. The genie accepted that he can ask of almost everything as his old age has put a limit on what he may want now. The old man was however sad that if he had found him earlier when he was still young, he would have accomplished so much in life.
The genie replied that I have been with you all along. I was not in that bottle. I have been with you and granting your wishes all of your life. Remember when you were six years old and wanted your father’s attention? I made you to cut your finger. It was not an accident. Your father washed the cut and held you. Remember when you said you were too young to write school certificate exam? I made you to freeze in the exam hall and you started shaking with fever and could not write the exam. I only granted your wish. Because you were not aware that I am a part of you and always granting your wishes, you in most cases make wishes that hurts you and others. Sometime the wishes come from others like parents, teachers, friends and even from television adverts. I am glad that you have now found me. Now you will make only thoughtful and good wishes. Together we can stay healthy, find peace and enjoy the richness of life. You must however learn how to contact me to make such wishes with ease. If you acquire the knowledge of who I am and how to contact me, I will grant you peace, prosperity and happiness.
The genie is our subconscious mind linked to God which is actually the molder of our destinies as we wish him to do for us. The search for the bottle from beach to beach is human’s religious search for the divine resulting in the multiplicity of religions.
Invited guest, ladies and gentlemen, the essence of this lecture in consonance with the aims and objectives of Felix Anirah Foundation is on how our young children can discover their genie early enough for their growth and achievement in life. This lecture will also try to examine how Widows and humans generally can know themselves better for their wellbeing.
The topic – “The Power of the mind” is very broad but I will make attempt to simplify it for the understanding of our children who are the main target of this lecture.
Mind
Mind is defined in oxford advanced learner’s dictionary as “The part of a person that makes them able to be aware of things, to think and to feel: the conscious/subconscious mind”.
Collins English dictionary defines mind as “The entity in an individual responsible for thought, feelings and speech.
Wikipedia also defines mind as “a set of cognitive faculties including consciousness, perception, thinking, judgment and memory. The mind is the faculty of human being’s reasoning and thoughts. It holds the power of imagination, recognition and appreciation and it is responsible for processing feelings and emotions resulting in attitudes and actions”.
There are however various slight definitions in the field of philosophy, religion, psychology and cognitive science on what the mind is.
There is however a general agreement that apart from the physical body being governed by the conscious mind with all the five objective senses of sight, smell, taste, touch and hearing, another inner body still exist. This is what controls the involuntary aspect of man thereby making man a dual being having physical and spiritual bodies.
This corresponds to the biblical verse in: 2 Corinthians 4:16. Here Paul referred to the inward man as the imperishable one that is renewed day by day and the outward man which perishes. This agrees with the concept of the conscious and subconscious minds recognized in the field of psychology and psychiatry. In a more elaborate discussion, the concept of body, mind and soul could also be considered. This is however beyond the scope of this forum. The body is however the only physical entity among the three. The remaining two which are mind and soul are abstract and subliminal. The mind or consciousness cannot be pinned down in the human body.
The brain is however the controlling and coordinating centre of the nervous system.
No one else can know our mind. They can only interpret what we consciously or unconsciously communicate. This is why shakespear said in Julius ceaser that there is no act to find the mind’s construction on the face.
CONSCIOUS AND SUBCONSCIOUS MIND
The mind is divided into two which are the conscious and subconscious mind. The conscious mind is about 8% of the human brain while the subconscious is above 92%.
The conscious mind controls the voluntary function. For example, we can consciously move our arms up and down. We can walk and talk. These are conscious actions. Most thoughts in the conscious minds are communicated by inner or outer voices. The conscious mind communicates predominantly with words. This is why a large vocabulary is required for its operation. Words are the tools of the operation of the conscious mind.
In contrast, the subconscious mind has limited vocabulary and not articulate with words. It has no contact with the outside world which is three dimensional. It operates on four dimensional level. According to Psychologist, it is blind. It does not know the difference between real and imagined. It relies on sensory inputs as it responds to reality and imagination in the same way. For example, when we dream of a monster pursuing us, our body responds the same as if the monster was real. The “Fight or Flight” mechanism jumps into action and adrenaline is pumped into the blood stream. The body responds by sweating with increased heart rate etc. In reality, there was no monster and therefore no threat.
A critical factor is that the conscious mind can only do one thing at a time. It cannot do two things simultaneously. Example is reading while watching TV. If one concentrates on either of the two consciously, one must suffer.
The conscious mind has a sense of awareness. It knows persons, places, conditions and things. It is self conscious and knows his environment. The conscious mind has will; Will is the ability to initiate and direct the direction of our thinking. Human beings have free will but the power belongs to the subconscious mind because of its infinite unlimited nature. The subconscious mind can do several things at the same time e.g the workings of our internal organs even when we are asleep. All our involuntary functions like our heart beat, digestion, liver and kidney functions etc are controlled by the autonomous system through the subconscious mind.
It is a combination of the will from the conscious mind and the power from the subconscious mind to form “will power” that generates the “power of the mind”. In any battle between will and imagination, imagination wins. That is why no amount of will as new year resolution to stop bad habits like smoking can be successful except imagination which is the link to the subconscious mind is used. The question now is how do we discover and exploit this innate quality or potential in all us? Majority of us are ignorant of this inherent power.
We patronize few who have recognized and harnessed their own power. Some are traditional medicine men or native doctors while others have religious homes masquerading as men and women of God. The power of the mind enables us to perform feats that look like miracles. It is our thoughts, words, deeds, habits and character that becomes our destinies. It all started from thoughts which emanated from our minds. We are all endowed by the same power.
Because of lack of knowledge of how to use the subconscious mind, most of our prayers are not answered.
It is not the thing believed in that brings an answer to our prayers. The answers to prayers become realizable when the individual’s subconscious mind responds to the mental picture or thought in our minds. The bible says that what a man thinks in his heart, so is he (Proverbs 23:7). Whether one is a Buddhist, Christian, Muslim, Hebrew , traditionalist is irrelevant to the answer to our prayers. It is not because of a particular creed, religious affiliation, ritual, ceremony, formula, liturgy, incantation, sacrifices or offerings but because of belief or mental acceptance and receptivity about that for which we have prayed and visualized. Proper technique and methodology of how to contact the subconscious mind within are all what is required to get answers to our prayers. Essentially, answered prayer is the realization of our heart’s desire. Salvation is personal and all external advice are to enable us communicate with the master within who is always ready to oblige us with any of our wishes whether good or bad. Natural law however provides that whatever we sow, we shall reap. Good things will happen in our lives if we busy our minds with the concepts of harmony, health, peace and good-will at all time instead of sending holy ghost fire to consume our enemies. Our mind will always attract back to us any picture held in our minds whether good or bad in accordance with the law of karma and attraction.
APPLICATION
The human brain produces about 25watts of electrical power. The subconscious mind transmits this energy as urges, emotions, impulses etc. This energy in the subconscious mind is inexhaustible. The brain functions 24 hours a day. The subconscious mind is awake 24hrs a day. It never sleeps. It takes things literally without judgment or refinement. Many children and adults are products of wrong parental upbringing. The child’s brain is like a new computer with only basic software like crying, heartbeat, body temperature and breast sucking pre-installed before birth to keep the baby alive after delivery. Other softwares are usually installed after birth. The programming of the child’s brain while growing up has time windows. When the window closes, a limit is set that is difficult to overcome. Experts claim that half of baby’s brain cells die by age 5 because of non usage. The different windows are:
- Maths and Logic- Birth- 4yrs
- Vision- Birth- 2yrs
- Vocabulary- Birth- 2yrs
- Language- Birth- 10yrs
- Emotion-Birth-2yrs
- Motor development- Birth- 5yrs
Above is a guide to parents for the proper upbringing of their children. For example, mathematical toys will assist in maths and logic windows. Exposing the child to beautiful colours and outdoors will help with vision, Language has to be learnt before 10yrs to avoid the child having accent. Good manners and behavior will open the emotion window. Good use of legs and hands will enhance the motor window. Example is Andre Agasse who is former Lawn tennis world champion. He was exposed to swinging ladle and bats by his father when only 2yrs old. This opened the motor window that made him a good tennis player as he grew up. Those of us who are not proficient because of our parent’s ignorance should not however lament as the subconscious mind can reverse them.
Another example is an experiment carried out by a Russian scientist on 4 groups as revealed in a book titled ultimate athlete by George Leonard. The table is self-explanatory. A combination of visualization or imagination of 75% recognized by the subconscious mind and 25% of physical exercise by the conscious mind took first position.
| Group | Physical Training % | Visualization | Results
|
| 1 | 100 | 0 | 4th |
| 2 | 75 | 25 | 3rd |
| 3 | 50 | 50 | 2nd |
| 4 | 25 | 75 | 1st |
The human mind has four states as shown in the table below.
| STATE | BRAIN WAVE
Frequency (cycles/sec) |
DESCRIPTION | COMMENTS |
| Beta | 14 – 100 | Awake | Very busy. Aware of many things |
| Alpha | 8 – 13 | Meditative | Focused attention. Different concept of time |
| Theta | 4 – 7 | Inspirational | “Aha” insights. Global thoughts |
| Delta | 3 and lower | Sleep | No conscious awareness |
Out of all the 4 (four) states shown in the table, it is only in alpha and theta states that we can communicate effectively with the subconscious mind on what we want. This can only be done when we are alone in a quiet moment in prayer and meditation. Two exception periods are however provided for naturally. These are called bother-line states. These are when we are about sleeping and waking up. These are the best periods to send a wish to the subconscious mind or God. We should always be positive. Children should be respectful and hardworking. They should respect and obey their parents and elders. They should have faith or confidence in any religion they are introduced to. With love for humanity with clear conscience, nothing bad will happen to them. This will make them to be close to the subconscious mind which has a link with the soul and God. This is why Jesus Christ said that the kingdom of God is within us. Do not think and speak evil as what you think will be attracted to you. Mark 11:23 confirms the enormous power God conferred on humans in creating our destinies. Every thought is a cause and every condition is an effect. The Bible advised in Prov.25:21-22 that if our enemy is thirsty or hungry, we should give him water and food. Christ advised in Mat. 5.23-24, that we should pray and reconcile with our enemies before God can accept our offerings. He also advised us to guide our thoughts in Mat. 5:28 that the thought of looking another man,s wife with lust amounts to committing adultery. As an illustration of the power of the mind, a woman once saw a bag in a super market on a Christmas eve and wished herself having that bag for the xmas. She pictured herself holding the bag by 10:00am in the morning. By 8:00pm in the evening, her fiancée presented exactly that bag to her as a gift. She filled her mind with the thoughts of expectancy and released the whole thing to her inner mind which has the solution to all problems hence the positive result. Our in-depth prayers or thoughts can be answered by God through our subconscious mind whether we are atheist or religious. Good health, employment, success in education by seeing yourself as being successful can also be achieved like the womanmentioned in the story. Try to eliminate fear from your mind as what you fear may likely be attracted to you. Our subconscious minds are linked with all subconscious mind and the entire universe. It can be easily accessed through auto- suggestion and meditation.
REFERENCES
- The Power of your subconscious mind – Joseph Murphy
- The Power of your subconscious mind – Harry .W. Carpenter
- Wikipedia