Subconscious processes undoubtedly influence a person’s degree of success in striving for active longevity, and therefore can become his resource and engine if he learns how to handle them correctly. Otherwise, there is a high risk of turning the subconscious mind into an insurmountable obstacle to a healthy and happy life.

Often, when browsing popular science literature, you can come across a number of terms that are intuitively close to each other: “unconscious”, “subconscious”, “preconscious”, “unconscious”. And although it is customary among scientists and psychologists to separate these concepts to denote slightly different aspects, we are talking about the same phenomenon — any mental phenomenon or process that does not attract our attention and does not require conscious control, occurring independently of a person’s will. Jean Piaget, a famous Swiss psychologist and philosopher, suggested using the following example in 1970 to illustrate the work of the unconscious: imagine a child playing with a ping-pong ball. And so he throws the ball in such a way that it hits the table and bounces back into his hands! A child cannot explain such a successful throw to himself with the help of knowledge of physical laws, so he understands it not with thoughts, but with action. In other words, a child playing with a ball begins to acquire knowledge about the technique of throwing and the trajectory of the ball, unconsciously capturing the relationship between the tension of certain muscles of his arm, body position, perception of the speed and angle of the ball and the result of such flight.

After each ball is thrown, the child’s brain compares the result he wanted to get by launching the ball with the result he actually got. Although some degree of conscious evaluation is possible when comparing, but by and large it occurs unconsciously. Successful actions from the point of view of expectation have more weight in the formation of a system of unconscious knowledge. Thus, thousands of combinations of information units from the environment, the internal environment, as well as at the interface with both environments, are unconsciously imprinted in the brains of children and adults every second. For comparison, according to the classical formula, a person is consciously able to perceive only 5± 2 objects at a time! In studies of hypnotic “switching off” of conscious perception in 1990, psychologist D. Kilstrom demonstrated the process of unconscious acquisition and use of knowledge. Initially, well-hearing subjects were taught that they were deaf and now could not hear a sound. After that, an audio recording containing an excerpt of the text was played for the participants who were consciously sure that they could not hear anything. Then, with the help of hypnosis, their hearing was restored and they were given a questionnaire containing questions about the played text. The subjects answered most of the questions correctly, although it was possible to give correct answers only by knowing a set of facts from the played audio recording. Back in the early twentieth century, E. Clapared, a psychologist from Switzerland, wrote about the effect of amnesic syndrome (Korsakov syndrome), in which patients stop consciously recognizing things, events, and people they know. To identify how the effect manifests itself, the psychologist placed a small needle in the palm of his hand and shook hands with a patient suffering from a similar disorder. When Klapared came up to greet him again the next day, he saw that the patient did not recognize him, but in response to the psychologist’s outstretched hand, he did not give his hand. This is how the “implicit”, that is, the unconscious adaptation of a person’s own behavior to living conditions, the acquisition of new skills and unconscious knowledge about the world and oneself occurs — the formation and addition of the space of the unconscious.

The skills, knowledge, and abilities implicitly acquired throughout life are used by a person in assessing the success of social communication, in professional activities (for example, when developing a business strategy or diagnosing a patient), when making judgments in the field of aesthetic perception – and this is just the beginning of the list of aspects that affect intuitive knowledge in our lives. The information learned implicitly allows you to create unconscious “predictions” of the most likely future events. This is the mechanism of intuition. For example, a child can assemble a Rubik’s Cube faster than adults, guided by intuition, whereas an adult who is used to relying on conscious (explicit) knowledge, trying to find logically correct patterns when working with a cube, “takes” much longer. However, intuition can also let a person down. It is enough to imagine that when making vital decisions aimed at planning one’s own longevity, a person “relies” on unconsciously accumulated knowledge about himself and the world around him. However, if, due to his social circle, upbringing, limited information, and cultural influence, he has insufficient or distorted subconscious experience, the likelihood of not only forming an ineffective plan, but also harming himself increases. So, in the experiment of psychologists K. According to J. Anderson, M. Lepper and L. Ross, the subjects were asked to express their opinion on which firefighter is the most successful — risk-taker or cautious behavior. The participants were divided into two halves. The first group was told the story of a very good firefighter who was not afraid to take risks, and a cautious firefighter whose work was not successful. The second group of subjects was presented with the opposite information. At the opinion gathering stage, the researchers noticed that participants from the first group were more likely to assess the willingness to take risks as a factor in the success of firefighters, reinforcing their opinions with arguments about the bravery of risking firefighters. Participants from the second group, on the contrary, considered risk-taking to be a dangerous trait, referring to the relationship between the success of firefighters and caution and foresight in behavior. The formed judgments remained with the participants of both groups in the form of internal evaluative attitudes even after the researchers revealed the idea of the experiment to them.

As follows from recent scientific discoveries, the human brain is designed to “strive” to spend as little energy as possible on its work. And for the conscious analysis of information coming from the external and internal environment of the body, creating new decisions about how to act in different situations, constructing opinions about something, even new knowledge about oneself, you have to pay a lot of energy. The fact is that the formation of a new view, opinion, and behavioral skill is possible due to the active restructuring of connections between neurons in the human brain, which requires a lot of energy fuel. For example, in order to change the way to get to work to a more healthy one — to switch from a car to a bicycle, you need to analyze all the available and all the information received about the pros and cons of riding each of the two modes of transport, compare priorities and evaluate them in terms of relevance, take into account possible ways of developing events after failure. from the car — and this is not a complete list of those tasks that the brain consciously and unconsciously performs, learning, building new interneuronal interactions! Therefore, if the already formed skills, opinions and views do not harm optimal comfort and the fulfillment of vital tasks, the brain will have little reason to engage in the formation of new ones, even if they undoubtedly benefit the aspirations, desires and health of its owner. Let’s recall the parable of the dog lying day after day on a sharp nail and howling in pain. Why won’t the dog get up from the nail? Because the pain is enough to howl, but not strong enough to leave the heated place. Once formed, judgments and behavioral skills that do not require special conscious involvement become unconscious attitudes and strategies of a person and live in him as autonomous entities that influence all consciously made decisions and actions, as well as how a person generally sees the world around him. “Two thirds of what we see is behind our eyes,” says a Chinese proverb. According to the observations of psychologists, centenarians, as a rule, are carriers of positive attitudes about the world, emerging obstacles, their abilities and their own value to others, the benefits and joy of interacting with others and learning new things. These people have laid a solid foundation of healthy and healthy judgments in their subconscious. Thus, unconscious attitudes relieve a person of the need to constantly reflect on their every action and opinion in familiar, repetitive situations, which saves time for life and, in the case of good attitudes, helps a person to be effective and move towards their goals. On the other hand, the presence of unconscious attitudes makes it difficult to adapt to changed circumstances and relationships, causing inertia and inflexibility of thinking. Unfortunately, it is not so easy to discover unconscious attitudes on your own, especially if they are associated with subjectively traumatic or unsafe experiences for a person.

When a person is confronted with events and facts that sharply contradict his usual worldview, that is, they come into conflict with his knowledge and values, the brain strives to make consciousness quickly “forget” or not notice dangerous information that can destroy the already erected castle of ideas about the world. Remaining devoid of conscious attention, but nevertheless perceived, such “unnecessary” information lives in the subconscious, entering into a relationship with the knowledge that is already stored there, trying to somehow fit into the existing picture of the world. If an internal conflict is insoluble, tension arises that is not realized by a person, but nevertheless tends to be expressed, just as boiling water boils and evaporates, lifting the lid of a saucepan. While the “lid” is closed, it is difficult for consciousness to look inside, however, depending on the strength, an unconscious conflict can manifest itself outside in the form of certain artifacts. These are well—known unexpected reservations, unexplained delays, headaches for no apparent reason, as well as more serious psychosomatic illnesses, neuroses, and depression – the list of possible manifestations is extensive.

All of the above facts allow us to make sure that a person acquires an inestimably greater number of skills and knowledge implicitly, without the participation of consciousness. In the second half of the 20th century, the famous Soviet psychologist O. K. Tikhomirov conducted a series of experiments with the registration of eye movements of chess players. He saw that when the players were thinking about their next move, they were doing a whole series of exploratory actions aimed at finding the right solution without realizing it. So, the more brilliant a chess player is, the greater the role of unconscious cognitive skills in his success. Experiments with hypnotic suggestion by V. L. Raikov are widely known, during which the famous hypnologist noticeably improved the creative and cognitive abilities of participants, helping them access the skills and knowledge accumulated in their subconscious. Under hypnosis, the subjects were told that each of them was a famous artist (for example, S. V. Rachmaninov or I. E. Repin). It turned out that by identifying with any kind of master, a person is able to afford to discard conscious limiting knowledge about their abilities and start performing music, drawing or doing any other activity much better! In 1993, G. Spitz described a six-year-old boy with the skill of unconscious counting. It only took a few seconds for the boy to correctly multiply five-digit numbers. More often, such abilities are registered in people with mental disabilities (savants), who are able, for example, to instantly translate calendar dates into days of the week, and without the skills to solve simple arithmetic problems. The fact is that the role of consciousness in the thinking of such people is reduced, and therefore they gain access to the “riches” of their subconscious, like V. L. Raikov’s subjects in the experiment described above.

To build an effective relationship with your unconscious, you first need to “invite” it into your daily life. And for this you will have to come to an agreement with consciousness. After all, in some matters, the subconscious mind will need help to be understood, and in some moments you just need to not interfere with its work, which can be difficult for the conscious mind, which longs to control everything and is accustomed to taking part in any difficult task.

• Learn to trust “causeless” bodily sensations and emotions, books, objects, sounds that suddenly attract attention, thoughts, decisions, and questions that arise out of nowhere. By unraveling the language of your unconscious, you will succeed in gaining active longevity.
• Pay attention to the art-therapeutic techniques of searching and working with unconscious negative attitudes. You can discover some of your attitudes on your own, and to find deeper ones, contact a specialist psychologist. Finding and transforming negative attitudes into positive ones is extremely important in order to eliminate internal obstacles to a full and prosperous healthy life.
• There are also areas where, on the contrary, the subconscious mind needs to be helped to hear about your conscious desires so that it can begin to contribute to their fulfillment. Remember the parable of the dog sitting on a nail. In order to finally get off the ground, you need to find proof that the fulfillment of what you have planned is vital to you. Procrastination can lead to serious undesirable consequences for future life and health.
• Don’t forget about your main superpower — intuition! Get as many diverse experiences as possible, learn how to make different things with your own hands, meet new people not from your circle, read more books from unfamiliar areas. All this enriches the unconscious knowledge and skills base that your intuition refers to when it shows what it is capable of.
• Following the example of centenarians, teach your subconscious mind the value of inner harmony, a positive attitude to life, the importance of proper nutrition, physical activity, the benefits of social contacts and learning new things. Think about it more often, give reasonable arguments, use affirmations, find confirmations and like-minded people, and then soon enough the subconscious mind will “adopt” all new valuable information and automatically begin to push you towards a lifestyle and actions that will help make life active, happy and long!