Functional Design of the Mind
The Three Minds: Positive, Negative, Neutral
To understand the technology of meditation, we have to understand how the mind works. Our mind has three basic channels: (1) the unconscious and subconscious channels, (2) the dualistic/analytical channel, and (3) the neutral channel.
Subconscious and Unconscious
Subconscious refers to hidden programming that directs our actions, controls our emotional responses, and influences how we think and what we believe. Our subconscious operates below our conscious knowing in our physical and emotional bodies.
Unconscious refers to that which is not conscious, that which we are not aware of. For example, we are unconscious of the neutral channel until we awaken it by paying attention and by using yogic techniques. When we are in an asleep state of being, we are also unconscious of how the subconscious runs our reality show. An important goal of meditation is to train ourselves to become conscious of our subconscious programming and to become aware of the subtle energies of our being.
Dualistic/Analytical Channel
In an awakened, asleep state, we humans operate out of our dualistic mind, which his often referred to as our rational mind. Our dualistic mind, by its very nature of being dual, has two aspects and alternates between negative and positive. The dual function makes it possible to analyze, discriminate, and evaluate information and alternatives. The negative and positive minds have a practical function to compute in finite reality, in time and space.
Negative/Protective Mind The negative/protective mind is the fastest part of the mind and the first to activate or respond to any stimulus. It operates as an automatic survival reflex and protective mechanism. Its functions are (1) to warn us of negative outcomes and potential danger, (2) to critique what is wrong, harmful, or dangerous, and (3) to identify problems to be solved. If it operates reflexively from fear, it can be overprotective, confused, cynical, and cause us to overreact. When it is grounded in reality, it offers us valuable information and is a good strategist.
Positive/Expansive Mind Once we have been placed on guard by the protective mind, the positive/expansive mind identifies opportunities and rewarding possibilities. It is results-oriented and looks for pleasure, benefits, and satisfaction. It wants to create and use resources and is willing to take risks. Off in its own orbit, it generates fantasies and indulges in lottery-winning thinking. Under the supervision of the neutral mind, it can help us enjoy the moment and guide us to the future.
No Peace in Duality It is important to realize that the dual mind does not have a built-in arbitrator or the capacity to make choices. Limited to the negative and positive functions, the dualistic mind always fluctuates and can become confused and conflicted. This inner war can cause us much stress and grief. We cannot escape inner conflict by trying to be positive, because every positive thought is balanced by a negative thought, which means that there is not resolution, just an endless discussion. It is not possible to experience peace, stillness, or stability in our dualistic mind.
An Exit Strategy - The Neutral Mind
The good news is that there is a way out of this mental and emotional turmoil. We can tune in to another channel, the neutral channel, where we exit our internal battleground. We can find peace in our neutral channel because it is non-dual - it only has one voice. Instead of discussion, analysis, and judgement, there is a wise knowing and vast space that is peaceful, stable, still, and harmonious.
The neutral mind is non-reactive and unattached. It observes and gathers information from both positive and negative minds. It sees the implications of the different alternatives and selects the best choice. It looks below the surface and gives an intuitive assessment that aligns us with our soul, mission, purpose, and the highest good. In the neutral mind, we get a reality check that is processed beyond time and space.
Meditation: Clear Your Mind
"Clear your mind of all thoughts" is a common meditation directive. If you have tried this without success, it is important to know the in the dual channel, "clearing your mind" is not possible. It is normal that the dual mind will keep producing thoughts. This is why we have to access the non-dual channel, where there is only one thought -- one sound -- the sound of silence and one voice -- the voice of the soul.
Status of the Three Minds
When the neutral mind is not yet activated and only the positive and negative minds are available, one or the other is usually stronger and supersedes the other. Both operate at less-than-optimal levels.
In duality, the negative mind is judgmental, angry, fearful, skeptical, argumentative, and controlling by default. Our positive mind is opportunistic, delusional, naive, and spaced out in fantasyland. When the neutral mind is inactive, there is a gap in consciousness that our negative and positive minds fill with stories, dramas, and conflicts.
Dualistic/Analytical Mind
Computes negative and positive options in the finite reality.
In duality we are conflicted, confused, anxious, preoccupied
Non-Dual/Neutral Mind
Computes unity with intuition in infinite and soul reality
In neutral we are able to be consistent, coherent, humble, flexible, open, and heart-centered
The Mind's Swings and Balance
Swings between negative and positive are a natural function of the dualistic mind. Opposites make it possible to be aware of, contrast, and compare alternatives.
Opposites also give us experiences that help us discover who we are and what works for us. They confront us with tests and challenge us to find our depth, our authenticity, and truth. We train the mind to find and live in neutral so we have a stable base to support us during the ever-present fluctuations and challenges of life.
Neutral Center or Dual Collaboration with Our Subconscious
Our non-dual neutral mind has the capacity to regulate and balance both our negative and positive minds and to evaluate and make choices from a soul perspective. Optimally, our negative and positive minds feed their respective information to our neutral mind. However, if we are no consciously operating from an awake neutral center and the dual mind is in charge, our negative and positive minds link up and create a negative feedback loop between themselves and our subconscious. The negative mind tries to protect us from pain and the positive mind expands and supports our pain. It is in the unwitting collaboration of our negative and positive minds that magnifies and projects our fears, stories, judgments, and vulnerabilities, and undermines our identity and effectiveness.
When neutral is not a moderating force, we only hear the pros and cons and selectively choose to see what our limited ego wants to see. When the dualistic mind thus dominates our inner conversation and distorts the truth, we do not accurately see things the way they are. Without access to the clarity of an unbiased perspective, we suffer from self-doubt and lack self-trust.
A Conscious Mind
When the neutral mind is awakened, all three minds can be strong and balanced and collaborate for our highest good. From neutral consciousness, we can compute intuitively (not robotically) and receive immediate intuitive feedback about what to do (or not do) with accurate information.
With neutral consciousness, we can pay attention to how we use our three minds and be alert receive information from our negative and positive minds. When the neutral mind is in charge, we do not react or take action from either positive or negative. We act from neutral after we have processed relevant information and determined what response is the most appropriate for us in current time.
In neutral, we intuitively know that our responses cause certain effects. We see the possible effects and choose actions that will have an elevating effect, serve our soul and not the ego, and lead to fulfillment and inner peace.
Optimally, all three minds are strong and available and work together to process information. When they are alert and synchronized, they (1) choose the most appropriate responses and solutions to our problems, (2) create with originality and integrity, (3) project a supportive vibration into the world and universe, (4) optimize our life choices, and (5) deliver our gifts.
We Have Been Given Everything We Need
The wonders of the mind make it possible to become unshakable, wise, creative, and happy. We have been given everything we need for our special human journey, namely
A body that is the vessel for our soul on planet Earth
A sensory system that gives us subtle and sophisticated sensitivities for clarity and discernment
A mind that is designed to serve our soul through consciousness and instant intuitive understanding. Our mind can always tune in to and experience God, while maintaining connection with Earth in time and space.
Our three minds are given to us to serve us, but we must train them to be supportive and strong. In sum, we are well equipped, but we have to activate, use, test, and refine our equipment.
Perceptions and Projections
Our being is one big receptor mechanism, which creates endless waves of impressions, sensations, thoughts, feelings, and emotions. Our three minds are the process mechanisms, which create perceptions (how we think, feel, believe) and projections (the vibrations or messages that we send out into the world and universe).
When our focus is scattered and not consolidated at the center of our being, there is a gap in consciousness, which distances us from our soul. Without centered self-focus, our energies and mind interlock with internal and external distractions.
In asleep consciousness, we get caught in the web of perceptions and projections formed by fear, anger, subconscious programming, unresolved emotions, and hidden motivations. We use meditation to train and direct our mind to operate from elevated soul consciousness, where we are able to perceive and project from purity and love.
The Need to Train and Direct the Mind
Our three minds are not supposed to do things to us. They are supposed to do things for us and to support our human journey. We each have the innate capacity to direct our minds to elevate ourselves and to liberate ourselves from self0inflicted pain and suffering. The faculty of choice (free will) gives us the opportunity to determine the projection, direction, and involvement of the mind.
Humans were designed to operate in finite reality with connection to infinite reality. In the neutral mind, we can connect with Infinity and our should to find clarity, peace, and divine guidance.
The Window of the Mind
Our neutral mind serves as a mirror in which we see Infinity and our soul.
The mind is our window to life, love, and many dimensions of reality. How we perceive everything depends upon the clarity, purity, and openness of the window of our mind.
Ego Window
When we see through the dualistic mind, there is a blind spot, which limits and distorts our perceptions. The schemes/scenarios of our negative emotions blind us.
In duality, we fall prey to mental distortions and emotional dependencies that interlock us into external attachments and fantasies. Flattery pumps us up. Criticism deflates us. Good things makes us happy. Bad things make us sad. Yogi Bhajan called us yo-yos. Up and down, inflated and deflated by our reactions because we are dependent on external input, recognition, and stimulation.
In addition, we lose energy and get burned out when our mind and emotions intermingle and interlock with our subconscious and with someone else's mind and emotions. If we do not know how to contain and manage our energy, this tendency can increase as our sensitivity increases.
Soul and Infinite Window
In meditation, we open the window of our neutral mind so we can perceive with a minimum of distortion. The strength of our mind is gauged by its clarity, purity, and ability to be in oneness with divine and soul qualities. In neutral, we can stop giving away our energy by staying centered in a neutral space inside our body and by focusing on and engaging our sensitivities with universal qualities (neutrality, stillness, silence, peace, stability, clarity, purity, etc.), which are discussed in more detail later.
In neutral, we can observe and allow feelings and thoughts without reacting or creating anxiety and conflict. We can feel, sense, and view everything as part of an unfolding creative process. In neutral, what we need to learn becomes clear, and we can define our direction. In that way, the light of our soul carries us through life's challenges and pain.
Neutral transforms through (1) perspective, (2) non-attachment, (3) allowing, (4) acceptance, and (5) love.
First and always, establish your base neutral, where a higher perspective, resolution, and love are always available.
Let Neutral Direct Your Life
The mind is a practical tool. When we understand and experience its basic structure and functions, we can use it to stop playing games, doubting, and sabotaging ourselves. We can then appreciate, believe in, and support ourselves, which enables us to free ourselves from unconscious existence and take responsibility for living conscious lives. In short, the mind supports us when we direct it to our soul and Infinity.
Duality and Limited Ego
In every life situation (1) our negative and positive minds emit a stream of thoughts, (2) our sublet sensitivities register a stream of impressions, and (3) our emotional body constantly reacts. If we are not conscious of what is going on and know how to respond (or not to respond) appropriately, we are subject to our subconscious programming and the whims of fate. When we do not have access to our neutral mind, a web of conditioning and habits rules our psyche and controls our reality.
Isolated in our dualistic mind, the limited ego interferes instead of allowing us to listen to inner guidance. A mind that cannot listen creates fear, emptiness, depression, illusions, and false identities. Duality seeds complications by linking into our subconscious programming, which reacts with habitual emotional responses. Both the dualistic mind and our subconscious emotions operate from fear and try to be in control to avoid pain. We feel like a victim, powerless, abused, and try to get attention and sympathy to attenuate our pain.
Soul Solutions Require Neutral
When we are in an unawakened stare, we are the source of our own pain and insensitive to our own intuitive powers. The good news is that we can liberate ourselves by cultivating a relationship with our neutral mind, where we have the innate intuitive capacity of (1) subtle sensitivity, (2) deep understanding, and (3) instantaneous knowing. The neutral mind can collaborate with the dualistic mind with our getting trapped in its endless activity.
In the neutral mind, we can
Use our sensory awareness to wake up to our soul identity.
Understand, use, and direct our mind to serve our soul, not our ego.
Recognize thoughts that are useful, regulate our reactions, and choose beneficial actions.
Transform and liberate energy consumed by reactive conditioning into aliveness and creativity.
Make choices bases on reality and our unique identity and basic nature.
Trust and rely on clarity and wisdom of our Soul Self.
Step back, not interfere, and allow things to progress at their own pace.
The neutral mind is our power, our servant, our projection, our compass, our guide, and our connection with the Divine.
Neutral is not optional. Neutral is the foundation of meditation, happiness, and life. In neutral we become vast and dwell in God.
Our mind was given to us to be our servant, but we must awaken and use its faculties and train it to serve us. We must train our mind to pay attention, to focus, to operate in neutral and to be aware and sensitive beyond time and space.
Source: The Power of Neutral: A Guide to the Mind and Meditation by Guru Rattana, Ph.D. Part 1: Our Spiritual Journey, Understanding the Mind
