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Conscious mind vs subconscious mind

A very popular analogy used to illustrate the differences between the conscious and subconscious mind is that of the iceberg.  One can picture the tip of the iceberg poking out above the surface of the sea, and the rest of the iceberg which is massive, is underneath the sea.
It is the piece above the surface which represents our conscious mind, and the huge section below the surface which represents our subconscious mind.
And so what this means is that it is a very small percentage of our mind which we are actively aware of at any given time.  In fact, it is approximated that 5% of our awareness is conscious and 95% is subconscious.

One could not find a physical mind, anatomically.  A mind, conscious or otherwise, is not an bodily organ or area of an organ.  They simply describe how the mind works.

The conscious mind is responsible for our ‘free will’, our values and belief systems, and for our reasoning and logic. For any action we make with intention, for instance choosing words carefully, or choosing to raise a hand or nod a head, we can attribute these to the conscious mind as well.

The subconscious mind is responsible for every single other thing we think, do or say.  So any involuntary actions that our bodies take, such as heart beating, or breathing, are controlled by the subconscious mind.  And any involuntary thoughts or habits that our mind and body takes are controlled by the subconscious.  It does develop and grow as we do with our life experiences, our learnings and automatic functions. And thus, it is here that hypnotic suggestions are directed because it is here where we typically desire change to take place.

Our subconscious mind is effectively what drives us and so what we expose it to will determine how it drives us.  So many exposures are out of our control and are down to our environment, even genes sometimes, and these exposures can all add up and equate to unfavourable thoughts, habits and actions.  Talking directly to our subconscious will enable changes to take place, hence hypnotherapy whose job it is to do this.

Iceberg representing conscious and subconscious minds
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