Here are some distinctions that can help us be more conscious of what we are doing with our mind:
Honesty is the ability to see things as they are. It is transparency of mind; the absence of superimpositions over reality. It results from valuing truth above all else.
Superimpositions are obstructions to our mental vision. They are articles of thought and attitude that we superimpose over reality, preventing us from seeing things as they are. They are like obstructive shapes, clouds or cataracts that afflict the heart and mind. They result from unknown convictions or beliefs, even from preferences. I refer to beliefs that are irrational and partial, and that confine and obstruct the heart and mind, not to beliefs that are logical and that expand and clear the heart and mind.
To distinguish, discern, discriminate or differentiate, is the ability to see the difference between one thing and another. It is the first ability of awareness, and is exercised via any of its faculties. Discrimination includes recognition of grades of differences from slight to great, and therefore is recognition of patterns of similarity within a majority, which is the ability to generalise. The ability to discriminate and generalise are the same ability, with discrimination exercised between two distinctions and generalisation being discrimination exercised across many distinctions. Discrimination is the basis of intelligence, which is the recognition of relationships.
Intelligence is the ability to choose between one thing and another. Passive intelligence is programmed choice; active intelligence is free choice; and creative intelligence is the ability to freely select aspects from a variety of options and blend them together to create a previously imagined result.
In other words, intelligence is the expanse of awareness divided by the distinctions able to be made and utilised. Or stated the other way around, intelligence is discrimination multiplied by the expanse of awareness, combined with the ability to freely choose and utilise.
The degree of intelligence is the extent of the expanse of awareness, divided by the finess of distinctions able to be made, combined with the extent to which all distinctions can be utilised.
Consciousness is intelligence and intelligence is consciousness. The difference is largely referential. Our knowing what consciousness/intelligence is enables us to isolate it and exercise it.
Active thought is the interplay between consciousness and mind. Intellect is the interplay between intelligence and mind. The difference between active thought and intellect is realisation. (Realisation is our coming into reality. It usually occurs in gradually in stages, but may be accelerated.)
Active thought includes intellect, but intellect does not include all active thought, for active thought can also be haphazard or fanciful. Active thought and intellect are performed with the same mental faculties but with different degrees of realisation and purpose.
Mind is that realm in which occurs all thought. It exists in its most subtle or finest state in consciousness where fresh ideas are fist conceived and faintly held, and thickens through coarser grades to its outer reaches where thought is most clearly imaged and formed, and where consciousness can most easily identify itself as being distinct from the thought that it observes.
Thought is form and activity in mind. There is (1) conceptual or emergent thought that is vague or faint when it is first conceived in consciousness. And there is (2) formed thought that is well defined and structured, and which consciousness can view separately from itself. Conceptual thought becomes structured thought. And there is (3) active thought or the moving around of thought, the shuffling, dividing, segmenting, adding together, weighing, and structuring of thought. This active thought is the interplay of consciousness with mind.
Faculties of consciousness are firstly, the senses by which consciousness is aware of formed thought in any format and can discriminate between one thought, or one piece or aspect of thought, and another; and secondly, the ability to freely choose or select from any of those discriminated thoughts; and thirdly, the ability to freely utilise, move and arrange parts and aspects of any thought discerned. The faculties of the first attribute of consciousness, which is awareness, govern, limit and accommodate the faculties of the second and third attributes which are simply divisions of these attributes following up upon first attribute faculties.
Conceptual thought is emergent thought; thought freshly conceived in consciousness.
Formed thought or structured thought is thought that is defined; it may be in any format, which is the mental material of which it is constructed, being mentally visual, audible, odour, taste of tactile, or a mixture or blend of several formats. Formed thought exists at the most outer extent of our mind where the thought is most distinct from the observant consciousness.
Active thought is thought in motion, thought being moved, animated, divided, put together, turned, rotated. Includes moving images, running mental sentences, running thoughts, thoughts of sounds and music, moving day dreams, creating fantasy, comparing options, weighing priorities, shuffling facts about, reasoning, judging – any thought in movement or activity, as opposed to stationary thought. Active thought is the product of all the attributes and faculties of consciousness working with the substance of mind. Active thought is the mobilising of structured thought.
Knowledge, in its purest sense, is what we know, what we have experienced and thereby proved to our self. Knowledge is not information, and is not what we think. There may be widespread assumed knowledge that may be correct, but for the purpose of understanding and knowing our self we differentiate that widespread assumed knowledge from what we have actually experienced and know within our self. We discriminate between what we know and what we only think we know. And thereby condense and tighten up our soul/consciousness and better know our self as distinct from our thoughts.
As with knowledge, so too with facts. There are facts or units of truth that we know are facts because we have experienced them and they are part of us. We must distinguish between what we know and what we only think we know, that is between knowledge, conjecture and opinion. In strictest sense, we only know what we know, and what we have been and what we have become, all else is conjecture.
Reason is the ability to weigh up known facts. That is pure reason and is different from conjecture, which is reasoning with unknown facts, regardless of how verified by outside sources those facts may be. So there is pure reason, and impure reason. One deals with facts, and the other with assumed facts. We should be conscious of the difference when we practice them.
Imagination is thought in structured visual format. It exists upon the screen of mind. The mind’s eye is the visual faculty (organ) by which consciousness views imagined thought. Consciousness has faculties by which it is aware of thought in every format.
Reason is the ability to weigh up known facts. Logic is the adding together of facts. Analysis is the division of facts. Calculation is intelligent surmising, is the use of intellect to anticipate the unknown. Judgement is the weighing and comparing of values, priorities, and the importance of things. Reason, logic, analysis, calculation, judgement, are interplays of intelligence with structured thought, are interplays of consciousness with mind.
Subconscious is the storage place of prior thoughts when they are not within or before the consciousness. Subconscious is behind the consciousness, where thoughts are arranged in their order of accord with conscience. They are drawn into or let into consciousness from the back, held consciously in mind for a while, then let out through the front of consciousness to circulate around to the rear and to settle again in the subconscious. Each time any thought housed in the subconscious passes through consciousness it is re-energised, made clearer, more defined, and stronger.