The Threefold Nature of Our Mind, the Art of Self-Perfection, and the True Nature of Choice, Imagination, and Higher Will

Posted On April 9, 2018 / Written by Dr. Linda Gadbois

 One of the problems we have in realizing the true nature of not only ourselves, but of reality in general, is that we have a hard time not thinking in separative, dualistic terms, while trying to comprehend a reality that’s the unification of multiple dimensions into a cohesive whole. We fail to recognize the relationship that exists between higher and lower planes, between spirit and matter, and between ourselves as we exist simultaneously on various levels of consciousness. We imagine that spirit exists separate and apart from matter, that our Higher Self is a being separate and different from us, that our own subconscious and conscious mind exists and operate independently of each other, and that our outer reality is objective in nature and has nothing to do with our inner reality and how we form an experience of the outer world. We’ve been trained to a mindset that sees all of life which exists as a unified whole as being comprised instead of a bunch of separate parts that have no direct relationship to each other and as being able to function independent of everything else, when in fact it’s actually an intimate and cohesive part of everything else.

The confusion arises from the fact that we exist in a primarily dual state as a form of paradox while in the material realm. This dual state as the perception of separation that creates the appearance of our self and others, as if we’re in here and they’re out there, apart from us, is necessary in order to have an experience of ourselves as someone or something specific. We can only experience ourselves as we exist in relationship with everything else. Our very perception is formed by seeing ourselves in everything else. This is because we actually exist as being universal in nature, comprised of a unique combination of archetypal attributes and qualities that make up our self as memories formed out of self-created experiences of ourselves, which are the very foundation for the psychological make-up of humanity as a whole, and that of the Natural world which is also governed by a form of archetypal memory as the instinctual field of the collective Unconscious.

What we refer to as the invisible realm of spirit that underlies, permeates, and animates the material world giving it Life, is the realm of archetypal ideas and principles that serve to give rise to all material form. Archetypes exist as a form of generalized, universal idea as attributes, qualities, and personality traits that are used at the personal level to self-create by embodying them and becoming one with the idea they represent and acquiring those same traits as a result. Universal memory as archetypes are very similar to personal memory as whole realities or experiences that are complete with qualities, characteristics, personality traits, emotions, thoughts, meaning, roles and identity, and behavioral dynamics that naturally lend themselves to telling certain types of stories. They are the complete ingredients necessary not only for creating a personal inner reality, but also an analogous experience of the same type of outer reality. How we experience something is what forms the basis for creating a memory out of it as a union between the inner imagined reality, and the outer equivalent, that together allow us to experience the inward born idea outside of ourselves as an inherent part of our environment and we get a sense of ourselves within and as an intimate part of that idea, and it forms into a personal memory that serves to shape us. We’re always using universal memory to create our experience of reality, and create ourselves by way of those experiences.

Because all of life is a coherent part of the same universal memory as the collective unconscious, whatever archetypal memory we resonate with we act to draw into our mind and imagination, and become one with it in mind and spirit, tuning ourselves to it by taking on the same qualities and personality traits, and we simultaneously connect with those same qualities and ideas in everything around us. As we change our inner constitution, our outer experience of ourselves changes accordingly. As we incorporate and integrate ideas into our mental paradigm, we form a natural relationship with that same idea in everything outside of us. Once an idea and way of being becomes a natural part of our inner being it also becomes a natural part of our outer world as our unified experience of our self. The inner and outer worlds exist as complementary opposites of each other, which means that if you change one, the other one changes automatically to match it. We’re always connecting to and forming a relationship with ourselves as our inner nature in everything around us and creating an experience through the unification of the inner and outer that becomes an inherent part of us as our soul’s memory. We’re always borrowing from the universal as a means of creating our self as an individual.

All creation comes by way of what’s called the primary “3 in 1 Law of the Trinity”. Every single entity is comprised of two complementary opposites that work together to produce a third entity as a functional, unified whole. The material mind also exists as complementary aspects of the subconscious (inner self) and self-conscious (outer awareness of self), which work together to produce an offspring as a unified reality that’s a fundamental part of both. Each aspect of a whole acts to emanate and give rise to the other. While we tend to think of the self-conscious mind as being of a different nature and function as the subconscious mind, it’s actually a complementary aspect of the subconscious which is what gave birth to it. The true conscious mind, which is that aspect of us that we commonly call our Higher Self, is the unification of both the subconscious and self-conscious in an exalted state as a single entity on a higher plane, and is actually the aspect of the mind that operates as Will within the lower mind.

The self, like the mind and soul, is threefold in nature and exists simultaneously as three aspects on three parallel planes that function together to produce a unified whole as a cohesive reality. Within each plane, the single aspect of the self within that plane exists in a dual state of polarity as complementary opposites of itself, forming a triad. The Higher Self is what we call the human soul of the middle plane that acts as a medium between the Oversoul and the lower soul, and when manifesting in the lower plane of material existence, also separates into dual and complementary aspects of itself, and emanates the subconscious mind which acts to form and give life to the material body as it’s vehicle, contains the self-conscious aspect of the mind in its potential and latent state. After a period of gestation, this aspect of the mind is then birthed by the subconscious through a natural growth process as it’s complementary opposite. This idea is represented metaphorically as the “Madonna (Mother) and male child” as her divinely conceived offspring. The subconscious mind is the direct emanation of the Higher Soul and is formed out of the memory of all incarnations as an accumulation of integrated experiences to form a summation as our personality.

The self-conscious mind, which is what most people think of as the mind, is birthed and exists solely within the material body as our outer awareness and what we think of as brain consciousness. The self-conscious is the masculine offspring as self-awareness that’s based exclusively on the body and current life conditions of the body, forms what we refer to as the ego as our souls identification with the body and the material world. Naturally, because this identity or sense of self is formed entirely within the current incarnation and based on outer awareness of the self, it’s also the mortal part of us that dies with the body. As humans, we are both immortal and eternal and mortal and temporary.

While we tend to think that the self-conscious mind has the ability to generate its own consciousness and therefore has a will of its own as a personal will, it actually doesn’t. All material bodies only have the consciousness it acts as a vehicle and vessel for and is able to draw in from the aether and assimilate through resonance. What it does have is the ability to discriminate and evaluate ideas, and is the aspect of the mind that chooses and selects what it focuses on and thinks about, and thereby becomes one with producing a form of seed for the subconscious mind to produce inwardly by imagining it as a possible reality that it then uses to give birth to an outer reality of the same nature. This is the aspect of the mind that acts as the gatekeeper to the subconscious through its ability to discriminate and select what it let’s in to the womb of the subconscious, and what it rejects and keeps out by withdrawing attention from it.

The self-conscious is the aspect of the mind that forms conscious thoughts and internal dialogue that works together with the subconscious mind to manifest both an internal reality and external reality of the same nature and likeness. There’s always a fundamental paradox at work in everything as the feminine and masculine qualities that operate as complementary opposites, because while we consider the subconscious to be our inner self and internal nature, it’s also what produces and gives birth to the outer world as an extension, projection, and equivalent of itself as a kind of metaphorical theme. And while we say that the self-conscious mind is our awareness of the outer world, it produces the thoughts and internal dialogue we experience as our inner nature, and is what acts to witness the outer world of which it provided the seed of the subconscious mind for creating.

Whenever someone is unaware of the multiple aspects of their mind and self (which are most people), and how these various aspects operate together to produce a unified whole as a cohesive inner and outer experience of reality, their self-conscious mind of thought tends to be run almost entirely by their subconscious mind, which operates exclusively out of memory of some form, and is habitual and repetitive in nature. When we remain in a primary state of unconsciousness, unaware of our true capacity for creating in an original manner, most of our thinking is repetitive and based on memory. When this happens our thoughts appear random, sporadic, compulsive in nature, lack meaning and a sense of coherence, and are constant. We simply replay the same type of thoughts as memory over and over like a broken record. All of our thoughts are something we’ve been taught, heard, told by others, or of past experiences that are played out by applying them to current situations producing more of the same type of experiences as variations. The capacities of the self-conscious mind as the ability to select, focus attention, and form thoughts, which together produce a seed for impregnating the subconscious imagination with brand new ideas for creating in an original and unique manner, exists for the most part in an unconscious state and uses its creative ability instead to merely focus on memories of the past and create more of the same type of experiences over and over.

The Higher mind of the human soul has the ability to truly create by choosing and drawing in universal memory of archetypes as qualities and characteristics that naturally forms an idea as a material form. It then willfully projects the archetype into the subconscious mind in the form of a memory that seeds it with a new pattern for creating on different scales within the material plane as both an inner and outer reality. The idea, once drawn in and conceived by the subconscious is reflected in the imagination as  a mental impression that the self-conscious mind witnesses in a passive manner as an inspired thought that comes to it out of nowhere. The self-conscious mind evaluates it and has the option to either choose it by continuing to think about it, or to reject it by saying no and withdrawing attention from it. When the self-conscious selects and continues thinking about the idea, fashioning it as a possible outer reality, it adapts and modifies it by defining it with details and sensory attributes into a new variation as a unique and personalized version.

This unique adapted version of a universal archetype is then concentrated on by continuing to think about, and it acts to re-seed the subconscious mind with a new version of the same idea, as a form of virtual memory that it can easily use to create both an inner and outer reality as the experience of the idea that becomes the basis of an actual memory, that serves to shape all three aspects of the self and soul at once. All actual creation (of brand new ideas) within the material world comes as a form of feedback loop that undergoes a transformative process of adaptation and modification between the Higher Self and the lower self, and between the higher and lower planes. This is symbolically represented by the Hexagram as interlaced triangles (a triangle represents the 3-fold nature of the mind) oriented in different directions (star of David) of higher to lower and lower to higher, as in the axiom “as above, so below, and as below, so above, in the manifestation of the One thing”.

This creative process is also illustrated in the Tetragrammaton or Tetrad, as the four letter name of God, as will, intellect, feeling, and the manifestation of will. This process forms the symbolic basis for the four Elements of the material plane as fire (will), air (thought), water (sensation), and earth (manifestation). Naturally, there are only really two true Elements, that of fire (Higher Will that injects the archetypal idea) and water (subconscious conceives and reflects it), which together in a unified state produce air (thought as form) and its denser version of earth as it’s material manifestation or outer reflection.

Spirit as the Life-Power is always represented as air and breath, which is the unification of the feminine and masculine principles that form a functional whole. Together they work as a single entity. We inhale the outer, integrating and assimilating it into our molecular structure, then exhale infusing the outer reality with the molecules of our inner structure. There’s always a mutual exchange going on between the inner and outer, between the individual self and it’s greater self as the outer reality, which are comprised of the same substance. Will exists as the Higher, creative Soul that operates in dual aspects on the lower, more dense plane as intellect and feeling sensation that together form a unified whole as the etheric body or holographic blueprint as an inner imagined reality that produces the outer world as a material manifestation. Whatever we focus on and think about with emotional intensity forms a kind of request as a command to the Will of the Higher Self, which acts in a neutral and unbiased fashion to create it as an outer experience.

When we reside in a primarily unconscious state, we have no real awareness of our subconscious mind or our higher consciousness, and imagine the thoughts they produce and reflect in the mind as novel thought-forms to be our own willful creation. Yet because the self-conscious aspect has to choose the thoughts given to it by the Higher Mind (usually as a form of guidance or answer to an inquiry) and use its ability to develop them by continuing to think about and concentrate on them, it often doesn’t, and as a result they’re never allowed to take hold, and it reverts back instead to its redundant habitual way of thinking. Whenever the self-conscious rejects an idea and doesn’t allow it to be developed and grown in the imagination to fruition, it doesn’t act to use the idea to seed the subconscious, and it never manifests as part of its outer reality. This is often what happens when we ask for guidance from our Higher Self and when an idea comes to us intuitively in response to our request, we evaluate it momentarily to decide whether we like it or not, and if we don’t, we say nope, this isn’t it, usually because it didn’t show up the way we wanted it to. Then we go right back to asking for more guidance.

Part of the problem many have is they have trouble telling the difference between ideas conceived from the Higher Mind and ideas received through the willful actions of others. The subconscious mind acts as the womb for any suggestion that’s allowed in and to take hold by the self-conscious mind. Whatever we give our attention to while in a passive state without discriminating or evaluating, and readily engage in by becoming a part of it and continuing to think about it, becomes a natural part of our thoughts and our perception of reality. This is most prevalent through various forms of entertainment and passive engagement where we surrender all resistance to the ideas we’re being fed and relinquish the need to discern them intuitively for meaning and accuracy, and as a result, they become a part of our natural thoughts and we think about them in a random and habitual manner. Usually without having any idea of what’s actually going on. Our mind is constantly accessing memory through association of various sorts. This is why songs frequently pop into our head out of nowhere and plays over and over, we imagine a scene in a movie we watched years ago, we think about the news we heard two days ago, we process the ideas of an article that we read over and over, and so on.

We all have the ability to self-create through our ability to choose or select ideas, then develop them by concentrating on them until we form them in our mind as a full, intense sensory reality that gives us an experience that develops them into an imaginary memory that impregnates the subconscious mind where it then becomes a natural part of our behaviors and outer reality, producing an experience of it as an analogy. We can likewise choose to actively develop qualities and characteristics that are latent within us as a means of self-development that evolves us to higher states of being. The ultimate goal of our higher soul is to achieve a state of self-perfection as a form of completion that actively utilizes all of our potential as the basis of being and creating. Who we become in our life is always a matter of choice and what it is we choose to give our attention to and concentrate on by thinking about repetitively. Whatever we choose to think about and create as an imaginary reality and life-like scenario, we impregnate our subconscious with as a pattern for producing as an experience through our activities.

The subconscious, once given an idea as an actual possibility for reality, begins taking action on it while connecting to that same idea in the greater subconscious mind of the material world as a primary form of telepathy or mental transmission. This is the same way instinct and intuition works.  A well-developed idea formed out of energetic essence in the imagination becomes magnetic and acts as a passive vehicle and receptor for electric energy of a complementary nature. It forms an organized pattern of primal matter (light essence) that becomes a holographic blueprint for creating that attracts and draws in consciousness as vibration that brings it to life through activity. All material form, whether imagined or actual, provides a kind of empty shell for consciousness to ensoul and bring to life as a vibratory frequency. Just as all frequencies have a pattern in it and a self-organizing force, all patterns as organized matter forms a frequency.  As an idea comes to life inside of us as a living form infused with strong emotions, and attracts and emanates an electromagnetic field, which are the natural forces of the mind that shapes matter as light-essence into material forms that serves as a vehicle for consciousness to express through, it acts to vibrate at a certain frequency that vibrates that same idea in everything else through sympathetic resonance, and reorganizes how the outer world appears as a composition to be analogous to the inner one. Matter only becomes organized into a fixed form when it’s being observed by a mind. When not being observed, it returns to a state of pure potential as a fluctuating field of information.

All vibration has both a pattern as a living form inherent in it and a self-organizing force that shapes matter into the form of the pattern. How something functions is based on its energetic structure. Form always indicates the behavior, function and natural operations and activity the form takes on. As we think about and form an idea in our mind as a well-defined sensory reality coupled with a strong emotion that produces an inner experience of it as the meaning it has, we literally become “one with that idea in spirit” and we tune ourselves to its vibration. Our vibratory frequency is based on our emotional thoughts and what memories we live out of. All vibration as a pattern for producing life act to structure the same type of pattern on all scales and levels simultaneously as both an inner and outer, and an upper and lower, that function together as a unified whole or cohesive and coherent reality of the same nature. Whatever we think about and imagine with intensity we are literally creating as our life experiences and creating ourselves by way of those experiences.

When we begin waking up from our unconscious state and begin realizing how our own mind is operating on many different levels to create our entire material existence, we consciously move out of creating through repetitive patterns of past memories, and we can begin to intentionally determine what we focus on, give out attention to, and concentrate on instead. We can begin choosing who and how we’re going to be by intentionally embodying new qualities and characteristics as new ways of being that serve to transform us and our experiences of our self within a corresponding outer reality. We can begin realizing our full potential as a creator and begin acting on ourselves to intentionally create ourselves. We can learn how to consciously direct our attention into ideas that we want to become one as the means of self-creating. We can mentally blend only with ideas we want to become a part of our self and our experience of our self as our outer reality. We can begin using our mind the way it’s designed to be used to create ourselves as a higher, perfected, and glorified being.

Once we begin using universal ideas and archetypal memories born out of our true nature as the means of creating ourselves, we can begin vibrating at a higher level of consciousness that resonates with our Higher Self instead of our lower, unconscious, desire and impulsively driven self. When we strive towards self-perfection as the means of self-creation of our highest potential, we become aware of who and what we’re blending with energetically, and we tend to become steadily isolated from others because very few people are engaged in the same creative process in the same way or at the same level as we are. This is why the spiritual Adept and Initiate are symbolically portrayed as a Hermit. Higher consciousness is the awareness of the true self and the true nature of reality. Consciousness is the root and foundation of all physical manifestation. We are always the one creating our self and our experience of the outer world as a projection and correspondence to our inner world. All reality as we know it is formed out of our relationship with ourselves in everything else.

From a purely psychological perspective, this is the state of being as the awareness that all volition is universal in nature, not personal. Whatever we choose to think about and become one with is brought into fruition through our Higher Will, which acts as a form of neutral force for creating whatever we ask for and have a predisposition for as an unconscious state that creates out of memory of the past. It’s the realization that the idea of personal will originating in the animal body as a function of the personality is an illusion. The material body, like all creatures of the animal kingdom is driven by instinct that comes as intuition and has no consciousness or creative will of its own, but merely acts as the vehicle of expression for the Will of the Higher Soul.

Because the intelligence of the Higher Will works through the intelligence of the lower mind and body, it creates the illusion of being the outcome of a personal effort and aspiration, while in reality it’s simply the final stage as the outcome of work initiated and carried out by the Life-Power Itself. The Great Truth is that the heavenly man (Archetypal Man) reproduces himself in the earthly man, symbolized by the archetypal ideal man of Adam Kadmon (Adam of the Bible), also called the microcosm. The Microcosm is a direct reflection of the Macrocosm on a smaller scale and plane because it’s comprised of and operates according to the same laws and principles. In this idea we find the truth hidden as a clue of the spiritual doctrine of the Christ as being begotten, and not made. Who was also described as being in this world but not of it. We find the meaning of Christ’s words when he said of myself I am nothing, all power comes from my Father. We are a reproduction of an original source and not created by our own hand. What we perceive as our physical make-up and concrete mind is but a vehicle and aspect of our higher source as our true nature.

All original ideas that are used to perfect the formation of our essential nature comes as a relationship with our immediate environment, what’s stimulated and brought out in us in response to it, and how we spontaneously develop as a result. The only thing that can be actively brought out in us is what’s there in latent form to begin with. We are never given something from another or from a source outside of us, nor do we ever acquire something we didn’t originally possess. The outer world only acts to stimulate, awaken and bring into an active state what exists in latent form within us that’s of the same universal nature. We perfect ourselves to a higher level of consciousness by overcoming emotionally driven instinctual tendencies and becoming aware and identified instead with our true Higher Self. Whatever we choose and give our attention to, we unite with in mind and become like in nature. By becoming aware of this natural process and choosing to focus exclusively on our Higher Nature, we perfect ourselves and transform into our Divine Nature, free of all internal conflict and indecision born out of an unconscious state.

Dr. Linda Gadbois   

Spiritual Mentor and Personal Transformation Consultant