The Stick Person

I have been taught that we think in images; and I accept this as fact. If I say the word, “dog”,  you most likely think of an image of a dog in your mind. The same thing holds true for just about any word I say. You don’t see the word itself, you see the image that the word inspires in your mind. If I were to tell you to think of “mind”, what image does that inspire? If you’re like most people, the image that comes to mind is the brain. That’s fine, but the brain isn’t your mind. The mind is much more than the brain, it is all of you.

In the SGR Club, we refer to this simple stick person to help us form an image of what the mind is and how it works. This stick person concept was first developed by the late, Dr. Thurman Fleet of San Antonio, Texas in 1934 (circa).

This image is divided into sections: The five senses, the conscious mind, the sub-conscious mind and the body.

The five senses (represented in the diagram as little antennae) are how information gets into our mind.

The conscious mind is the intellectual part of our mind and is the part that houses the will, which means this is where we have the ability to decide to accept or reject any ideas or information that we receive via the senses. This is also the part of the mind that can originate ideas.

The sub-conscious mind is the emotional part of our personality. The sub-conscious mind does not have the ability to reject any ideas; it believes everything it is told by the conscious mind. The more a message (idea) is repeated, the deeper it is placed into the sub-conscious mind; these repeated messages become our beliefs about ourselves and the world we live in. The sub-conscious mind expresses those beliefs as vibrations through the body. These vibrations are our feelings and emotions. Bob Proctor says, “the sub-conscious mind is the God-like part of you, referred to as Spirit. It knows no limits, save those you consciously choose.”

The body is the physical aspect of our personality and is the instrument of the mind. It includes all of our physical parts, including the brain. As with all things, our body is in a constant state of vibration. The vibrational state we are in is dictated by the beliefs that reside in our sub-conscious mind. Different events that we encounter can trigger different beliefs in the sub-conscious mind that are then represented by different emotional states and physical responses.

In our discussions in the SGR Club, we refer to this Stick Person idea over and over. It is a very important concept for understanding ourselves and the current state we are in.

For further information on this topic, we suggest the book, “The Power of Your Subconscious Mind” by Joseph Murphy.