Self-Discovery

Who Are You Anyway?

In the strange world of Multiple Personality Disorder (MPD) we learn a lot about the power of the subconscious mind over the body as a whole and how it creates our physical experience.  A single person might have multiple personalities and each personality has multiple subconscious self-images.  Remember that the subconscious controls the involuntary actions of a person.  Because the physical body does not change, (only the personality and subconscious self-image in control of the body changes), all the involuntary changes that occur between personalities are a product of the subconscious mind and not the physiology or genetic code of the body.  

Also remember that the subconscious mind is only running pre-programed scripts based on either the Subconscious Self-Image or Learned Behaviors.  

The subconscious self-image is a detailed mental image of who we are.  It tells us everything we need to know to react to any situation.  It tells us what we like and don’t like.  It tells us what diseases we have, our food preferences, how we talk, what we like to wear and every other aspect that makes us who we are as unique individuals.

Because MPD patients have multiple personalities each with its own subconscious self-image, we are able to see how much our self-image affects our life.  

For example, when one personality has an histamine (allergic) reaction to smoke, pollen or cats and another personality in the same body does not, we know that these involuntary allergic responses are not a result of the body’s physiology, genetic code or the stimuli itself.  We are witnessing the power of the subconscious mind to respond to the current subconscious beliefs and fulfill the subconscious self-image of the personality that is presently in control of the body.  

Not only does each personality potentially experience different allergic reactions, but different personalities might also have different medical conditions like diabetes, heart conditions or scares.  Some require multiple sets of glasses because different personalities have different prescriptions or no prescription at all!!

Other MPD patients might have personalities that are blind and deaf while yet another personality can see and hear just fine.   Personalities have been shown to have differences in a wide range of attributes.  Here are a number of quotes from other resources on the subject.

“Frequently a medical condition possessed by one personality will mysteriously vanish when another personality takes over. 

Dr. Bennet Braun of the International Society for the Study of Multiple Personality, in Chicago, has documented a case in which all of a patient’s subpersonalities were allergic to orange juice, except one.  If the man drank orange juice when one of his allergic personalities was in control, he would break out in a terrible rash.  

But if he switched to his nonallergic personality, the rash would instantly start to fade and he could drink orange juice freely.  

Allergies are not the only thing multiples can switch on and off.  If there was any doubt as to the control the unconscious mind has over drug effects, it is banished by the pharmacological wizardry of the multiple.  By changing personalities, a multiple who is drunk can instantly become sober.  Different personalities also respond differently to different drugs.

Braun records a case in which 5 milligrams of diazepam, a tranquilizer, sedated one personality, while 100 milligrams had little or no effect on another…

There are cases of women who have two or three menstrual periods each month because each of their subpersonalities has its own cycle.

Speech pathologist Christy Ludlow has found that the voice pattern for each of a multiple’s personalities is different, a feat that requires such a deep physiological change that even the most accomplished actor cannot alter his voice enough to disguise his voice pattern.

One multiple, admitted to a hospital for diabetes, baffled her doctors by showing no symptoms when one of her nondiabetic personalities was in control.

There are accounts of epilepsy coming and going with changes in personality.” – Holographic Universe, by Michael Talbot page 99

”Some multiples carry several different eyeglasses, because their vision changes with each personality,” said Bennett Braun, who directs a unit devoted to treating multiple personalities at the Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center in Chicago. Dr. Braun reports the case of a young woman who in one personality was colorblind for blue and green, a problem that ended with the successful treatment of her multiple-personality condition.” – http://www.nytimes.com/1985/05/21/science/new-focus-on-multiple-personality.html

“Research reported over the last decade on some of those suffering from multiple personality disorder (Hall, 1994; Barasch & Hirshberg, 1995). What the studies report is the bona fide appearance of clinical symptoms of a particular medical ailment with the manifestation of a ‘personality’ in consciousness, requiring the specific appropriate medicines and treatment to sustain function and life. All the while the association of another state of consciousness in the same subject’s mind creates an entirely different set of clinical symptoms of pathology to precipitate, and no pathology appearing whatsoever when a third state of consciousness presents in the conscious mind. 

Thus, a diabetic in one ‘personality’ becomes a cardiac patient in another state of consciousness and shows no medical pathology at all when another schizoid fragment of consciousness presents itself through yet another state of mind. The confirmation of genuine clinical medical symptoms of disease, concurrent with specific psychological states of consciousness in the subject, demands an understanding that supersedes the casual and common misunderstanding and misuse of the labels ‘hypochondria’ in medicine and psychiatry, and further demonstrates the influence of consciousness beyond the limits of conventional mechanistic mind/body notions of causality and disease etiology…” – Barasch, M. & Hirshberg, C. (1995). Remarkable recovery. London: Headline Books. Hall, N.R.S. (1994). Advances, 10, 7-15.

“Candace Pert, Ph.D: There are aspects of mind that have qualities that seem to be outside of matter. Let me give you an example. People with multiple personalities sometimes have extremely clear physical symptoms that vary with each personality. One personality can be allergic to cats while another is not. One personality can be diabetic and another not.

Bill Moyers: But the multiple personality exists in the same body.  The physical matter has not changed from personality to personality.

Candace Pert, Ph.D: But it does. You can measure it. You can show that one personality is making as much insulin as it needs, and the next one, who shows up half an hour later, can’t make insulin.” – The Chemical Communicators,” Interview with Candace Pert by Bill Moyers, The Truth Seeker Journal,Volume 123 (1997).Accessed May 30, 2012

“In the same way that a distinct state can portray behavior demonstrated by someone they were persistently exposed to in childhood, they can do the same with biological and physiological ailments, including visual acuity, medication response, allergies, food intolerance, plasma glucose levels in diabetic subjects, heart rate, blood pressure, galvanic skin response, muscle tension, immune function, electroencephalography patterns (EKG, ECC), functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) activation, brain activation, regional blood flow, and taste preferences. This is most dramatically seen in states that are out and are completely blind or deaf, yet when other states are out they can see and hear perfectly well. (ISSTD, 2011) (Howell, 2011, p. 57) (van der Kolk, 2014)

A good summary of some of the physical changes observed, measured and documented is given by Dr. Philip M. Coons MD in his article, “Psychophysiologic Aspects of Multiple Personality Disorder, A Review”.  In it, he references 65 specific case studies, journal and research articles which discuss different documented changes that can occur between personalities.  From that article I have created the following list of attributes that have been documented to potentially change from one personality to another:

• Voice – Each personality has different voice quality and speech patterns
• Vision – Each personality has different visual abilities.
• Handedness and Handwriting – Some personalities are right handed and some are left handed.  Each personality could have a different handwriting script.
• Skin – One personality might exhibit a rash or welts that another does not.  “The first patient would develop symbolic needle track marks when she would switch to a drug-addicted personality. The second would develop welts and marks on his back and legs when undergoing flashbacks of physical beatings.”
• Allergies – One personality might be allergic to cats or other things and experience histamine responses while another personality in the same person would not.
• Medication – Personalities may experience different responses to the same medication

There are so many ways that our subconscious self-image and beliefs are fulfilled by our involuntary subconscious mind that we could not possibly list them all.  We can see only a glimpse of this in the study of Multiple Personality Disorder.  But this is hardly the beginning of our subconscious mind’s power and influence in our life…

Our Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

So far we have looked at the way the subconscious mind portrays the self-image into our daily lives.  We’ve looked at how our subconscious mind influences our actions based on the self-image and subconscious beliefs and how it even affects our physical body.  The subconscious mind is able to do so much more!  

Our subconscious mind not only influences every aspect of our lives and portrays our subconscious self-image into everything we do, but it validates that self-image as well through means of subconscious self-fulfilling prophecy.  

The subconscious mind takes in about 400 billion bits of information every second from the 5 external senses as well as a variety of internal senses.  From all this information it selects about 2000 bits of information per second which it thinks is most valuable and presents this information to the conscious mind.  So we are consciously only aware of a fraction of the information available, but subconsciously we see and process all of it.  

What is most remarkable is that not only does the subconscious mind determine what is presented to the conscious mind, but it also interprets and changes the information before sending it to our conscious mind.  This means that not only does our subconscious mind decide what is presented to our conscious mind, but how it is presented.  And here is the problem:  Our subconscious mind is BIASED like you wouldn’t believe!!!

It is so biased that it presents only information that supports its current belief schema.  And it presents information to our conscious mind in a way that favors its current beliefs and views as well as information that validates the current subconscious self-image.  So the person who believes that they can’t have or do a thing is presented with information that supports that belief while a person with a belief that they can have or do a thing is presented information that supports that belief.  And both are right and both have ample evidence which supports their belief as far as they can see.  

Your subconscious mind decides which information is important based on a number of criteria, one of which is your subconscious self-image.  If your subconscious self-image portrays a poor person, then the subconscious mind will only present information to the conscious mind which validates that self-image.  A poor person will see and focus on the endless bills they have to pay, how little they make and other things that are relevant to a poor person.  

The subconscious mind doesn’t stop there.  It has an incredible ability to calculate, strategize, predict and plan.  

Because your subconscious mind is able to calculate complex things with ease, you don’t have to continuously think about how to fit your name into a given space when signing a form.  You don’t have to calculate how much blood needs to be pumped through your heart while running or at rest.  It takes no conscious effort to calculate how fast you need to slow down to avoid hitting a stopped car in front of you.  All these calculations are done instantly by your subconscious mind.  And without effort, you subconsciously calculate everything in your life.

If you are planning to invest, it calculates the potential results of the available investments and determines which investments are most in line with your subconscious self-image then it presents those investments to your conscious mind and presents them in a way that appears favorable to you.  It looks at your relationship self-image and calculates ways to create the relationships you are programmed to have.  And so it does with your health, wealth and happiness.  Every aspect of your life is involuntarily influenced or controlled by your subconscious mind creating the life which is maintained in your subconscious self-image.

A person with a financially poor self-image will find that they live paycheck to paycheck and that no matter how much they don’t like it, they are unable to change their financial status.  Such a person will not even see opportunities within their grasp that could instantly change their financial status because their subconscious mind won’t present it to their conscious mind.  That life changing information is determined by the subconscious mind to be irrelevant and unnecessary.    

This is important to see and understand clearly, so let’s look at an example.  Let’s say that a person saves up some money and is looking for investment opportunities.  If the person’s self-image defines the person as financially poor, then what opportunities will the subconscious mind present to the conscious mind as possible investments?

The subconscious mind will review all the infinite bits of available information it has received as input and determine which information will lead the conscious mind towards making decisions that will result in maintaining the existing subconscious self-image.  The subconscious mind will only present to the conscious mind choices and options that are calculated to create the external reality that matches the internal reality. 

Although such a person might use the conscious 4% of their brain to intentionally invest their money hoping to become wealthy, the subconscious 96% of the brain would effortlessly calculate and convince the person to invest in dud opportunities, sell at the wrong times or do whatever was required to result in realization of the preprogrammed financial self-image.

What this means is that the person with a financially poor subconscious self-image will only see and take investment opportunities that match up with their poor subconscious self-image.  Although there may very well be a whole range of opportunities that would quickly make the person financially free, the subconscious mind will not choose to present this information to the conscious mind or if it is presented, it will present the information in a way that looks and feels less desirable.  It will also create a lack of energy and motivation when moving toward those things which are not in alignment with your self-image and subconscious programming.

In this way, the subconscious mind will fulfill every aspect of our internal self-image and programming by influencing our spending habits, our occupational choices, our work ethic, how we spend our personal time, and anything else that could impact our reality and create the physical world patterned after our mental world.

In other words, the subconscious is the river that flows toward a certain predetermined life experience.  You can fight the river all you want, but ultimately your conscious mind is no match for the subconscious mind and you will not be able to swim upstream against the flow created by your subconscious programming.

All people are subtly drawn toward and only perceive those things that tend toward validating their subconscious self-image.   In the psychological circle, it is known as “Confirmation Bias” which is generally defined as, “The tendency to search for, interpret, focus on and remember information in a way that confirms one’s preconceptions.” (Pohl, 2004)  But this form of Confirmation Bias not only sees and finds evidences that support the subconscious self-image, it actually plans, organizes and works tirelessly to create the external reality that is already created internally.

If a person tries to make a better life for themselves by going after a better job or position without changing their subconscious self-image, they will find that they are swimming upstream against an incredible current which will eventually sweep them back to where the subconscious self-image has placed them.  And this is where I was prior to having my spiritual experience…

The Big Difference

While helping others to succeed, I realized that the same change that took me from failure to success was the change that others as well.  This has caused me to reflect on my own experience with the intent of understanding the big difference for me.  

When I was a failure, I had the same education, the same opportunities and the same skill sets and everything needed to accomplish my goals.  None of this changed .  As a failure, I found hundreds of excuses for not doing what I was physically capable of doing.  The excuses were coming from my subconscious mind which was holding me in alignment with my subconscious self-image.  I was a perfect example of a failure created by my subconscious mind matching my internal self-image to my external reality in nothing more than a self-fulfilling prophecy.

During my spiritual experience, my subconscious self-image of failure was instantly changed, rewritten or replaced with an image equal to that of unlimited potential.  I was given a clean slate with which I could rewrite my self-programming according to my desires.  Whereas, before I could not ultimately succeed, now I could not ultimately fail.

Once the new self-image was in place, my subconscious mind immediately changed the course of the river of fortune and I was swept from one level of success to another, to another, to another as fast as I could create my new reality.

The BIG Difference and the only difference in me was my subconscious self-image.  Through my spiritual experience, my negative self-image was replaced with a “Blank Slate” and “unlimited potential”.  I want to point out that with a blank slate and unlimited potential, I was able to move forward uninhibited by my past programming.  I could literally do whatever I wanted to do with the confidence and knowledge that I would do it.

There is a revealing question that asks, “What would you do if you knew you couldn’t fail?”  

Well, I was doing it!  

Just as I was previously unable to fight the current pulling me away from success, I was now in complete control of that current and able to direct it toward whatever success I could imagine.  I had been given a new program, new instructions for my subconscious mind to follow and like clockwork, it continues to do so.