The unconscious mind is probably one of the biggest mysteries of the human mind. Even though Freud wasn’t the first person who talked about the unconscious, he sure was the one who popularized the term.

Freud believed that the unconscious mind holds lots of content that shapes our thoughts, emotions, and feelings. Therefore, the unconscious mind affects our life and decisions on a regular basis.  

Even though the terms unconscious and subconscious can be used interchangeably, they are actually quite different.

What is the unconscious mind? 

The unconscious mind is the part of the mind that holds operations that are not available on conscious awareness. These are usually repressed memories, emotions, and other deeper mental processes.

Freud believed that we tend to bury especially the negative and traumatic stuff into the unconscious to protect ourselves. He used the famous Iceberg metaphor to illustrate how the conscious and the unconscious mind works.  

The tip of the iceberg is the conscious mind in which we store linear thinking, certain memories, and emotions. But the bottom part (the biggest portion) of the iceberg represents the unconscious mind.  

What is in your unconscious mind? 

It is believed that the unconscious mind affects every single part of your life. Even if you may think that you are making a rational decision, your decision is usually made unconsciously before it resonates with you consciously.

We start building the unconscious mind starting from when we are in the mother’s womb until now. But the most important emotions, life patterns, and core beliefs are learned between the ages of 0 to 8 years old.

Here are the most important things that are stored and repressed in your unconscious mind:

Beliefs

From the time we are born, we create associations about everything around us. We use those associations to save time, be more practical and expand. These associations create our beliefs.

For example, a kid that grew up in a house with dogs may believe that dogs are loving and nice. In comparison to another kid who was chased by a dog growing up; for that kid, dogs may seem vicious and scary.  

Patterns

Based on our beliefs, we start developing patterns unconsciously for efficiency. These patterns can be about anything from the morning routines to relationship patterns.

Memories

All of our memories are stored in the unconscious mind. We may remember some of them, especially the ones that are important to us. But there will be some memories that are difficult to remember such as moments from your childhood or what were you doing on a random day 5 years ago.

Regardless, the unconscious mind has all of those memories stored. This is actually why hypnosis is known to help with remembering repressed moments.

Emotions

Different situations evoke different emotions within. You may be thinking that you are not feeling these emotions. Consciously, it may be hard to connect with difficult emotions. Or sometimes during busy daily life, we may simply not have time to focus on important feelings. What happens to those emotions then?

They get repressed into the unconscious mind. Just because you are not thinking or focusing on emotions at the moment, it doesn’t mean that your mind is not holding onto them. Repressed emotions can actually cause issues like anger, anxiety, or depression.

Learned behaviors

In the early years of life, we do a lot of observing and we learn important information about life, our being, and how to do things from our family, culture, siblings, friends, and environment. These learned behaviors are also stored unconsciously.

For example, if you grew up observing your sister biting her nails, most likely you learn about that habit and store it unconsciously until you feel anxious or nervous yourself. When you feel that you are overwhelmed in life, this dormant habit can potentially come alive.

Survival mechanisms 

The unconscious is designed to help us survive. Frankly, this is the unconscious mind’s main purpose. Freud thought that this is another reason why emotions and memories were repressed unconsconsciously, to protect us!

The most important survival mechanism, the fight-flight-freeze response is also activated unconsciously. We may not consciously think about tensing up when getting ready for a public speech but unconsciously this may trigger the fight response and you may feel like you will faint instead.

How can your unconscious mind affect your life?

Think about it, if our patterns, beliefs, and emotions arise unconsciously, it means that our life is dictated by the things we store unconsciously, right?

We may be lenient towards certain people, jobs, or relationships because of the beliefs we have unconsciously. Or we may be attracting the same kind of jobs or relationships because of the patterns we have unconsciously.

You may be finding yourself drenched in uncontrollable anger or anxiety because of the emotions you’ve been suppressing unconsciously.

That is to say, it is extremely important to be familiar with our unconscious mind in order to live a satisfying life in which we choose how to be present rather than unconsciously our past dictating our daily lives.