MIND

Mind can be defined as an ability of a person to be aware or conscious of things and to think and reason; a person’s attention, remembrance, intention, or opinion and sanity.

In modern times Sigmund Freud, 1856-1939, the Austrian founder of psychoanalysis, advanced our knowledge tremendously with his research into mind processes and with his psychoanalytic concepts. He believed that the mind as a whole consists of three main divisions-the Ego, the Superego and the Id. Our awareness, the part with which we think and reason, he called Ego. The ego is the more conscious of the world and of itself (that is, it is mostly self-conscious) and is the part of the psyche which tests reality. The ego develops when the child becomes aware of the difference between “self” and things, which are not self”. Another part, best thought of as partly conscious, he termed the Superego. The superego is the “conscience” made up of the internalized taboos, prohibitions and moral restraints imposed by parents and society. These parental and societal inhibitions are instilled in childhood and remain largely unconscious. Below consciousness is a part, which he called the Id, this being the seat of our memory and basic instincts. The id is the sum total of our primitive drives and urges of one’s nature. The id is completely unconscious its energy is called “libido” and is governed by the “pleasure principle”. These three concepts, ego, superego and id, form the structure of the psyche according to Freud. To simplify and summarize: the id says. “Do it now!” the Ego says, “Not now. This is not the appropriate time and place to do it”, and the Superego says, “Don’t do it at all – ever! It’s evil and wrong to do it under any circumstances”.

Later Freud theorized as to a fourth part lying between the id and the ego, just below the level of consciousness, calling it the Preconscious. Experiences, which once were conscious but now are imperfectly consciousness and unconsciousness known as the preconscious. A memory is preconscious when we say, “I know it but I can’t recall it to my memory”.

The superego is not just partly conscious and conscience but is the most spiritual part of the mind. He termed it the super conscious mind.