University of Minnesota - UMN Executive Leadership Insights
The Power of Your Subconscious Mind
Book

The Power of Your Subconscious Mind

Joseph Murphy
Martino Publishing, 2011
Buy book or audiobook

Read or listen offline

Amazon Kindle
automatisch generiertes Audio
  • 0.5×
  • 0.75×
  • 1×
  • 1.25×
  • 1.5×
  • 1.75×
1×
automatisch generiertes Audio

Editorial Rating

7

Qualities

  • Innovative
  • Applicable

Recommendation

This 1963 classic by Irish-born American minister Joseph Murphy (1898-1981) strongly influenced the New Thought, New Age and self-help movements. Its brief chapters offer a clear, engaging and encouraging treatise on how to lead a better life, forge better relationships, become more prosperous and improve your health. Murphy repeats some points in different chapters, and his vocabulary and reasoning may seem odd or casual. For example, he groups all the functions of the autonomic nervous system as part of the subconscious. Some of his scientific assertions weren’t standard findings when the book came out, and now more of its science has become outdated (well, it’s been a while), so step in for the mindfulness and guidance he offers, not the hard data. getAbstract finds that his philosophical approach will interest anyone with a New Age bent and those seeking calmness through a blending of psychology and spirituality.

Summary

Your Mind

You have only one mind, but it has two areas with different functions. One part is your conscious mind. That’s your “objective mind,” your waking mind or your “surface” mind. It can make choices. The other part is your subconscious mind. It is your “deep self” and your “sleeping mind.” Your conscious mind can reason. Your subconscious mind doesn’t reason or argue. Your conscious mind is the gardener, but the subconscious is the garden itself. Your conscious mind plants seeds in the subconscious, which blossoms with what you planted.

Principles of the Conscious and Subconscious Mind

You will be happier and more successful if you learn how your mind works. Your conscious mind does the thinking, and its thoughts sink into the subconscious. Your subconscious accepts these thoughts and acts on them. Whatever your conscious thoughts are, they produce a similar result in the subconscious. Think good things, and good will appear in your life. Think bad things, and bad things will appear. The subconscious faithfully and immediately accepts instruction from the conscious mind. Your subconscious stays open “to the power of suggestion.”

People respond to...

About the Author

Joseph Murphy, PhD, (1898-1981), an Irish-born American minister, was director of the Church of Divine Science in Los Angeles for 28 years. He turned it into one of the largest New Thought congregations in the United States. He published 46 books between 1945 and 1987.

Comment on this summary