The Human Mind. What is it and where does it come from? For the purpose of such exploration let me begin by conjuring up an image of our origins, since I believe that everything we are at the moment must have existed, in its potential, at the beginning.
Imagine the earth. A living globe, endlessly spinning around itself and the sun, covered with a layer of water upon which vast chunks of hardened volcanic sludge have been floating, after emerging from our planet's depth millions of years ago and forming the semi-stable land masses we call continents.
Thanks to modern technology, whereby we are able to explore our planet back in time, we now know of a distant past, when continents had not yet been formed, the earth's surface was entirely covered with water and where primordial life had not yet outgrown its liquid cradle. What kind of life are we talking about? Unicellular, mostly, with some relatively simple multicellular aggregations perhaps, but nothing fancy, at least not in comparison to what came next.
Simplistic as it may be, the image evoked by the previous paragraph facilitates an apprehension of the initial conditions that eventually brought terrestrial evolution forth, all the way to human.
I want to clarify that, for my purposes, it isn't necessary to qualify or take sides in the creationist debate at this time. Whether humans have evolved from green algae or were "gifted" to the planetary ecosystem by way of a somewhat conflicted divine intent is irrelevant to my aim for this dissertation. I don't see how anyone could deny, however, that humans are made of the same "stuff" as the rest of the planet and its other, non-human components, or elements, as they are called in chemistry, at least on the physical level.
Like Legos, assembled and disassembled by a toddler's creativity, these elementary atomic blocks in different combinations, are what we, and everything else, are made of. This is true, in spite of the fact that, beguiled as we are by commercially concocted "newageries", and I am certainly not exempt, we may be reluctant to assign animistic qualities to molecular structures.
But even as I steadfastedly hold on to plain and simple logic, I would have to admit one thing: if we are made of elements and we are aware that we have an unconscious mind, it follows that the two factors in this equation are not mutually exclusive or even antithetical.
Let me see if I can express myself more clearly: what I mean to say is that these elements, the flesh and blood we are made of, must be somehow involved with, and connected to, the non-physical realm of the unconscious mind. If it weren't so, us humans wouldn't have a concept of it, much less write books about it, given that we are made of these elements and these elements are at the foundation of our ability to write, think, feel, create, etc.
As I write these words, typing on a keyboard, a small percentage of me, one that often believes to be in control of things and usually calls herself Roberta Maria, identifies with a body and its functions, making choices based on the content of a memory data bank it has accumulated while living out its own unique life time.
At the same time as this self-identification occurs, however, I can't help but to notice that there is a lot more to this scenario than what I just described above.
From that perspective I can say that it is the elements I am made of, coalesced into one temporarily stable structure, who are writing, thinking, breathing, reflecting and creating. Furthermore, it is obvious to me that these elements could perform the same activity without the need to be labeled as a unified identity. In other words, the level of awareness that is required in order to write this piece is emerging on its own out of the elements I am made of, since it is from these elements that the activity is emerging as a spontaneous expression of an innate potential contained therein.
I know how blasphemous my previous paragraph might read to some folks, and I wish to make clear that I don't mean to offend anyone. I am not in favor of any particular point of view and I don't take sides on any such debate. I have my own set of opinions and beliefs, but I am not trying to present any of them as the truth. I am simply saying that, in order for a human being to do anything, a body is needed. And since a body is made of elements, the same as those that make up everything else, then whatever awareness the human is endowed with must be the province of those elements to begin with.
And if this notion is so disturbing to some of my readers that they feel they have to dismiss me right here and now, so be it. I am still going to go forward, but not without pausing for a moment to honor and acknowledge everyone's right to defend whatever one has come to believe.
Unconsciousness presumes consciousness. I couldn't be aware of having an unconscious mind, if I wasn't conscious of it. Therefore the unconscious mind is simply another form of consciousness, one that doesn't require ego dynamics in order to function, nor does it depend on individual memories for its continuity and this is where my planetary metaphor comes in handy.
Like the continents, floating on the earth's water, my conscious mind emerges and shapes itself into the visible dry land that can be rendered hospitable to human life. Roads can be built, buildings, tunnels, churches, etc. etc. However, land life would not be possible without the constant inflow of nourishment, support and renewal that comes from its liquid originator and container, water, and for the purpose of making my point clear, the above metaphor couldn't be more perfect.
TO BE CONTINUED