What is the brain, mind, self and self image and the differences and relationships between them.

The brain in order to make sense of its own self, and its situational reality in order to survive creates self consciousness. This self consciousness we term as the mind.

It is extremely essential that we know the distinction between brain, mind, self image and our real self. As we do not know clearly what is the defining distinction between them then how are we expected to know, understand and become our true self. Because we do not have a crystal clear definition of the brain and mind how can we know, understand and fix them? No wonder because our understanding of the brain and mind is fuzzy we are still not sure how to tackle the emotional and even physical problems of the brain and mind. Even more important as a result of our ignorance, we are unable to create even a single subject that can enable one to develop our brain and mind to its highest +2 super mature level. Also due to this ignorance even our therapies are based on partial ignorance. In this knol I hope to explain clearly by defining the brain, mind, self image and self and even scientifically measure them.


BRAIN
The brain is a physical organ of the body, just like our heart and hands. However the brain has two different functions: a) It is partly like the heart where it functions unconsciously, creating the growth and maintainance of the physical human body. b) It functions at the subconscious level which is kind of an in between consciousness, which has the main impact on the person's over all personality. This subconscious part is the part that chiefly determines emotional intelligence quality that powers and sustains the mind quality.

It is an inherent nature of the brain that from the very early stage of life it tries to figure out its own self and tries to answer the question, 'Who am I'? In the fetus stage based on the feedback from the experiences of womb life the brain forms an omnipotent and omnipresent self image.
As life moves on, the brain accumulates experiences and these experiences are stored in the subconscious brain which we know as memories but in actual reality these memories are not just consciously forgotten experiences. At the subconscious level these experiences in the form of memories keep impacting the impressionable brain by influencing and flavoring the self image. Thus these subconscious memories keep the mind in its grip. Once these unhealthy memories are removed from the subconscious brain the mind becomes free and super mature.

Keep in mind that the brain is a process creating machine and it creates the process that we call the mind. The mind being a process it is subject to change depending on life's situational reality. By exposing the mind to knowledge and learning and correct upbringing we can ensure a super mature mind. And even adult minds that need fixing can also be made super mature through proper relearning which in the case of the mind means unlearning the entrenched unhealthy memories powering the unhealthy subconscious.

The brain works on projecting the mind based on memories of experiences. Unhealthy memories based on unhealthy experiences keep projecting an unhealthy mind. Once these unhealthy memories are removed from the subconscious brain the healthy mind is projected.

The quality of the actual physical brain determines the quality of the unconscious functioning of the brain. The genes and the physical nourishment determine the physical quality of the brain. And the emotionally nurturing environment from fetus stage to 6 years of life, creates the subconscious brain that is responsible for and determines the the level of development of emotional intelligence. And it is this emotional intelligence that powers and determines the quality of the emotional mind.

MIND
The unconscious brain and the subconscious brain together project consciousness whose chief quality is self consciousness. This self consciousness the brain creates to chiefly make sense of, to know, understand, secure, live, protect, thrive, reflect on and identify its compound self - its physical body and the accompanying emotional personality/being. This self consciousness we have termed the mind. We perceive this mind in the form of self images. Each self image is practically the face of the self consciousness where each one of these self images has a mind of its own, a personality and mentality of its own. The mind functions like our hands; however under the control of its own self consciousness, which is represented by the minds own self image.

Through a perfect upbringing the self image develops to its full potential that is to the +2, super mature level. At this level the self image controls the mind and uses it to determine behavior, the behavior of the body, the behavior of the brain and even its own mental behavior. However the majority of people do not develop to the super mature level. Some get stuck at the -2, premature level, others at the -1, immature level while most get stuck at the +1, mature level. Which means the mind gets developed to the -2, -1, +1 and +2 levels. Many times the self image is a mixture of some or all of these levels.

At the -2, premature level the brain produces -2 premature emotional intelligence resulting in a -2, premature emotional intelligence powered mind. At this level the self images behavior is more instinctive than intutive. At this stage the brain more or less controls the mind and the self image. At the -1, immature stage it a toss up between the brain and mind. At the +1 stage the mind is still not mostly in charge but is controlled by a partly phony trophy self image. At the +2 stage the self image and the mind are one. The two work together and produce free will that is complete freedom from the dictates of the subconscious brain. The mind and self image union creates complete freedom of the self. When the self image and the mind are one then together they merge into the true self. The true self is the final product of the +2 super mature brain mind complex.

At the -2 premature level the adult brain, the mind, the self image and the self all have separate agendas. The brain is stuck at a long past reality. It lives in a make belief world as if its situational reality is still the same as when its life was dependent on its elders and it was helpless. So the brain builds up either a violently reactive
self image and takes to a life of crime. Or becomes passive and totally dependent on society. In most cases the self image becomes a mixture of the two. The grip of the -2 brain is so strong that the mind has access to and knows the current situational reality but the mind is at a loss and does not understand the current context of its life. At the -1 level the understanding is mixed. At the +1 level the trophy self image dominates the brain, the mind and even controls the true self. At the +2 level the true self is free from the brains past patterns. The brain at the super mature level acts as an organ of the body and is at the beck and command of the self.


The brain runs on two wheels. One is fully physical and the other is fully emotional where both have an impact on each other. For sustenance the brain needs physical nourishment, physical exercise and emotional nourishment where the emotional nourishment patterns are set early in life and the brain's entrenched emotionally set patterns produces their own emotional nourishment hungers that shape the mind and thus the self image. These hungers create their own emotional problems chiefly the distortion of current situational reality. The brain supplies the emotional tone to the situational reality feedback from the mind.

SELF IMAGE
The quality of the subconscious brain determines the quality of the emotional mind which means that it is the subconscious brain that determines the emotional maturity level of the self image. The subconscious brains own quality is determined by the amount of emotional brain garbage that still keeps churning in the brain. Thus it is the quality of the emotional brain garbage that determines the quality of the subconscious brain that determines the quality of the self image that determines the quality of the emotional mind - the mentality/personality of the individual.

SELF
At the premature brain level the brain projected self image completely dominates the real self. The real self is more or less hidden under the emotional baggage generated self image. At the immature brain level the real self is barely known and some times the real self flares up in the form of ones conscience. At the mature brain level the self is well known but is still dominated by the trophy self image. Deep down at the real self level the person knows that the trophy self image driven life is partly hollow and that the trophy self dominated life is still not good enough and does not give pure happiness. When one feels restless and deep down anxiety while not knowing where it is coming from; it is the real self that feels this restlessness and anxiety. So the trophy self drowns ones longing for true fulfillment through alcohol and/or drugs. At the mature brain level the mind knows the true self and feels helpless in freeing ones self from the yoke of the trophy self image. One does not know where to begin. The cause of this trophy self image is the ingrained belief of being the best. This belief planted by the parents can be taken out. There are lots of ways to do this from psychoanalysis, to yoga and many ways in between. I have trade marked a very specific program that I call, 'Self Image Therapy'. It involves a few steps to actualizing ones true self and becoming free of ones self image. The first step is to make one self aware of what is involved and what and why and how one is for all practical purposes ones self image. What is causing the projection of this trophy self image and how this cause can be be removed.

The real self is always there yearning to be free. The true self is composed of pure humanness and so it is always known to us and we again and again experience it in the form of our conscience. If you want to know your authentic self then close your eyes, learn to identify with your mind and focus your mind on your conscience; which is your true self.

THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BRAIN, MIND, SELF IMAGE AND SELF.
Lets examine how the brain, mind, self image and self operate at and or with each stage. How the brain behaves when undeveloped and stuck at different stages and how the undeveloped brain impacts the mind, the self image and the self.


What are the advantages of knowing the true nature of the brain and mind, self image and self?
The subconscious part of the brain is the part that chiefly determines emotional intelligence quality that powers and sustains the mind quality. It is this subconscious brain that projects the mind. So to insure mind quality we have to insure the quality of the subconscious brain. Any emotional problems of the mind stem from the subconscious problems of the brain. Consider the flash light. The light coming from the flash light is the mind. The physical flash light is the brain and the battery in the flash light is the subconscious. If there is a problem of a weak light coming from the flash light or no light coming from the flash light it is the battery that has to be recharged or replaced. Similarly its the subconscious part of the brain that needs recharging or replacing whenever the mind needs fixing.

As a person ages the experiences of womb life and early childhood up to the age of 6 years mold the subconscious brain quality; which determines the mind quality. The emotional part of the mind is practically the projection of the subconscious brain. Thus the focus of fixing the mind or improving the mind to the highest super mature level has to be the fixing of the subconscious brain.
As the brain works in images it project even the mind in the form of a self image.So if we want to see, know and understand the mind we have to see, know and understand the self image. Thus to fix the mind all we have to do is fix the self image. As the self image is a well known entity that can be seen and felt it can be fixed. And fixing the self image is fixing the mind; which means fixing the subconscious brain.
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Notes
There are many properties of the brain that are very confusing.
1) It is not very clear whether the mind or the brain controls the five senses.
The five senses are the domain of the mind. The brain works devoid of all the senses. It is completely blind, deaf, cannot taste, touch or smell.
The brain runs not on interpreting the current reality as it is now but on past lessons from the similar reality that
MIND
The brain in order to make sense of its own self, and its situational reality in order to survive creates self consciousness. This self consciousness we term as the mind.

For most of us, in our own minds about our own self we fundamentally know that we are not that good and so we put up a mask to show that we are good. The irony of all this is that our core fundamental self is made of pure humanity! Our true self is much better than our wildest fantasies. So we feel bad about being bad and we try to hide our badness from others by putting up a mask; while all the time our core self is as good as it can be.

Also in our brain's opinion we believe in our own eyes that we are much better than we really are and so we expect much better results from our behavior as we over rate our own performances.

It is the brain quality that determines the self image quality and the mind quality. The human brain works in images. We do not perceive reality we perceive its image and so no matter how well our brain is anchored to the super mature level we still cannot shake off the self image perfectly. As man is made in the image of Gd we must strive to make our self image as close to the true self as humanly possible. In my view one of the chief attributes of Gd is that Gd has no self image. He is his true Self. He just is. And that is what we have to strive for. Even becoming aware of all this gives us an edge over being ignorant of what is involved in becoming our true self.

This subconscious part is the part that chiefly determines emotional intelligence quality that powers and sustains the mind quality. Thus to fix the mind one has to fix the subconscious brain. The subconscious brain is usually polluted with emotional baggage which means painful memories that keep churning the brain. It is like suffering a slap at the hands of the parents while very young the self image suffers an emotional blow. The memory of the incident is forgotten but at the subconscious level the emotional hurt keeps impacting the self image.


Knowing and Understanding and Awareness

The mind knows. The brain understands. When the knowledge and the understanding are both the same then they together project perfect awareness. The bottom line awareness is the awareness of your own self. True awareness is the true you. It is absolutely essential that you know the difference between knowing and understanding if you are to answer the question, 'Who Am I?' Because you don't, 'Get It' by merely knowing. You have to know and understand your true self. Only then can you become awareness itself. Your awareness of your self can even be and is mostly a mixture of your mind generated self(knowing) and your subconscious brain generated self image(understanding). Understanding is generated at the subconscious brain level.



So which is superior knowing or understanding? It is both. Both are essential sides of the same coin, just as half a coin is more or less useless currency. When both are +2( super mature) they become one and then they both work in complete harmony.
All new information is first processed by the mind. Knowing is the first step to becoming familiar with any information. Knowing is the domain of the mind. It is the mind cells that come into play when the information is being processed. Understanding is the domain of the brain. The brain cannot perceive. The brain is handed over information by the mind. The brain cross references any new knowledge with its stored knowledge and believes not the new information but in the new information in the light of old information. Its like if some one who in the past has been a source of bad experiences does something good. The mind passes the good experience to the brain. The brain cells break down this new unexpected behavior and reassemble this behavior in the light of the past memory of the person. So the brain at best doubts this new experience. Unless this new good experience is repeated again and again the brain does not change its opinion over night. What the brain does is understand. In order to understand the brain has to be exposed to the same knowledge again and again. This is why the more homework the student does the more he understands the subject because the brain develops a better and better understanding of the subject.

When the brain and mind are on the same page then it becomes awareness. When what the mind perceives and the brain has the same experience stored in the brain then both the brain cells and the mind cells know and understand on the same level. When the knowing and the understanding are the same then it becomes awareness. Awareness is the key to a +2 life. The differences in the knowing and the understanding are the key ingredient of a confused and unhappy life. Even in relationships if the mind and the brain don't have the same feelings then this relationship is in trouble and a source of agony. When knowing divided by understanding = 1 then the brain/mind collective is run by awareness. Awareness is you. Awareness is your consciousness. It is not just the third eye. It is the pure real you. It is generated by a fully developed mind/brain collective.

However one can also consciously create better awareness by focusing on the differences of ones knowing and understanding by bringing both onto the same page through your own lesser consciousness, through your lesser awareness. Its like with your first million you create the next hundred million.

So which is superior knowing or understanding? It is both. Both are essential. However understanding is the ultimate goal of knowledge. If you are in a job that needs a certain level of expertise and you understand this expertise then understanding this expertise is more important than knowing this expertise. Knowledge is the tool but understanding is the process that improves the brain to develop to a higher level(which is the goal of education, especially my way to create wisdom - develop the brain to +2)). Therefore understanding is the king. But the king cannot function without his staff. The king cannot remain healthy without his physical therapy coach. Without new knowledge the brain becomes stale.

When the brain is educated it understands. But knowledge is always needed because the brain has to be a perpetual learner. So new knowledge is always needed especially for those who want to advance the frontiers of science. When both are +2 they become one. They both work in complete harmony. When we have them both on the same page at +2 then they create pure awareness/consciousness - the real you.

The most important question, 'Who am I?' for most people is answered by a mixture of knowledge and understanding. By the mind and the brain. If correct knowledge keeps coming into the brain via the mind the brain continues to develop its understanding of the self to the extent that one day knowledge and understanding both come together to create the true self.

Knowledge is organized information. While knowing is waking up to knowledge. Understanding is the end product of a process that integrates knowledge/knowing into the brain infrastructure.
To be continued.