What are the Three Layers of the Universal Mind? The Universe is not many things, but one thing. It is a sea of pure consciousness. This one being of which we are all apart can be thought of as power that is conscious of itself. It is intelligent energy. The Universe is a Mind. Within this Mind there is a living imprint of every thought, feeling, memory and experience of each and every particle of each and every being that has ever or will ever exist in creation throughout eternity.
This is sometimes the Akashic Field or Akashic Records, and we can compare it to a memory-bank— except that at the highest level of this Universe, there is no such thing as time. In this way, everything that has ever happened, will ever happen or could ever have happened is happening, now, in the perennial present.
Because you are but a piece of this vast Mind, you have access to all the contents within it. All the “memories” of “others” are within you, as you are within the Mind of All. You can learn to access these different layers of information through an understanding of the three layers of your own universal mind.
Next after this publicity
The Superconscious
Little can be definitively stated about the Superconscious layer of the mind. It is one of the three layers of the universal mind. Psychoanalyst Carl Jung called this the Unconscious, and described it as a collective the repository of the experiences of all beings. Jung reached these conclusions about the Unconscious layer of the mind due to his extensive work with dream analysis. In the dreams of his patients he found motifs and recapitulations of myths, stories, fairy tales and rituals from ancient times of which the dreamer could not possible have had any conscious awareness.
A spiritual wellspring from which all humanity draws
The notion of a collective Unconscious accounts for the emergence of identical concepts, symbols, images and religious customs all around the world at times when travel and commerce were impossible. Throughout history, on opposite sides of the worlds, peoples of entirely discrete cultures have produced the same images, creation myths and ceremonial forms. To this day, people from all manner of backgrounds nevertheless have the same dreams.
These images come from the Superconsciousness. This Superconscious layer not so much a part of you as you are part of it. As such, the Superconscious can not be directly commanded into action, which is why Jung called it the Unconscious. By definition, we cannot directly access what we are not conscious of. Between lifetimes, when we are pure consciousness, we are this energy. We also commune deeply with this energy during sleep. However during waking consciousness of this incarnation, a veil is across the Superconscious layer of mind. It is still there, yet will only reveal itself when certain conditions prevail in the psyche, and even then still only of its own volition.
In order to receive the surges of awareness from the Superconscious mind, the Self-conscious mind must be subdued into abeyance.
The Conscious Mind
The Self-Conscious mind is the psyche with which you are most familiar— the reasoning, desiring, selecting, categorizing mind that is commonly the ‘ego’. And the Self-Conscious mind operates by logic, analysis, discernment and focus.
The Self-Conscious mind is like an archer. It feels a desire, chooses a target, fixes its aim and releases a shot. We create our physical, emotional and mental experience in life through the Self-Conscious mind, by fixing our attention upon a certain stimulus and responding to it. The Self-Conscious mind filters out everything extraneous to the object of our attention, and our entire world becomes whatever thought or activity is preoccupying us in the present moment.
Our identity is the by-product of this focus. Our lives are the results of the Self-Conscious mind’s selecting process. And our careers, relationships, homes, hobbies, expertises and bodies reflect what we have prioritized, focused upon and included in our awareness, as well as what we have neglected or purposely excluded from awareness.
The Subconscious Mind
Let’s see the third layer of the three layers of the universal mind. In order for us to be in the present moment in a state of focused attention, we must be able to set many things aside. A receptacle is offered for this purpose in the Subconscious mind. This level of consciousness is responsible for the maintenance of the vital functions of the body like heartbeat, circulation, respiration, digestion and cellular generation. We do not have to focus upon these processes because the subconscious mind is tending to them, leaving us free to focus on the task at hand.
Beyond regulating vital organs, the function of the Subconscious mind is largely memory and the storage of personal experience. In this layer of mind we store the emotional imprints which many would call “conditioning”. The subconscious mind holds a set beliefs about ourselves and the world which, whether we are aware of them or not, are quietly “running the show” of our lives from behind the curtain. It can be the emotional residue of all lived experience— the feeling tone or sense of life that we have taken away from the aggregate of our time on earth.
An “in between”
The subconscious mind lies “in between” the Unconscious and the Self-Conscious, in that its contents are partially available to the conscious mind and partially veiled. We may be dimly aware of the general attitude we face life with, and what experiences have formed this perspective. At the same time, we have lived through many experiences that left impressions upon us which we are altogether unaware of, in spite of the fact that they are informing our decisions like a master dancing a puppet on strings.
The subconscious mind also registers information about our surrounding which is, for one reason or another, occluded from the conscious mind. The subconscious mind is participating, to some degree, in the Mind of All, even while the Self-Conscious mind is reading a book or talking to a friend. If necessary, the subconscious mind will intrude upon Self-consciousness to make this information known.
Next after this publicity
For instance, many people have reported waking up in the middle of the night at precisely the moment their house was being burglarized; some report waking without any noise, while others report waking at the slight noise of a door opening, even though on any ordinary night they sleep through loud noise coming in from the street. Even as the Conscious mind is asleep, the Subconscious mind is aware of all that is going on around the body, making note of anything anomalous which poses a threat to you.
The Threefold Mind
We may picture the three-fold mind as a series of concentric circles. At the center is the Conscious mind, the self-oriented awareness of the individual. Beyond this lies the Subconscious mind, the phase of consciousness which holds much personal information about the individual, as well as a wider awareness of the surroundings and collective. Beyond this is the Superconscious— the pure, undifferentiated awareness of all.
In order to access the information and power which reside in Superconsciousness, you must be able to allow your awareness to shift there. This is largely a matter of quieting and loosening the grip of the Conscious mind.
There are many means of this, including trance, hypnosis, meditation, psychedelics, fasting, chanting and prayer. Entering the flow state through creativity or even through taking a gentle walk in nature helps to lift the limiting and censoring function of the Conscious mind so that all of the information which is normally occluded from the waking mind can surge forth into our conscious awareness.
In this way, we close our physical eyes and instead look through the eyes of the great cosmic spirit which is also us.
Now what do you think of the three layers of the universal mind?
