I’ve been reading a couple of fascinating books which both draw attention to the idea that “we contain multitudes” – and seem to me to have massive implications for who we think we are.

You’re probably way ahead of me with The Biology of Belief by Bruce Lipton, already a classic of the personal development world.

“Imagine a population of trillions of individuals living under one roof in a state of perpetual happiness. Such a community exists – it is called the healthy human body.”

But it seems I’m ahead of the curve with Why Everyone Else Is A Hypocrite by Robert Kurzban – so new, it’s not even out in the UK yet.

One of the things I love about this book is that it still makes the point that we contain multitudes, but at a scale I can handle. I can’t really get my head round trillions! But I needed significantly more than the duality of “right brain, left brain” to explain what I was observing in my clients.

Kurzban convincingly argues that the mind can usefully be thought about as being made up of modules, with each module specialising in doing a different job. Its an idea that makes sense: if nature “wants” to get stuff done efficiently, specialisation just works.

But here’s the big point. The modules don’t know all about each other. One doesn’t necessarily know the others exist, let alone what they are perceiving, or what they are doing. In fact, a lack of information flow between the modules is the default.

Which means that… <drum roll> “the part of the brain that’s doing the talking doesn’t have access to the relevant information.”

Kurzban says: “We should be wary of the notion that conscious modules are necessarily going to have really big roles to play in what the brain, as a whole, is up to. It might seem like they should, but it might be that we only feel this way because consciousness is the only thing the brain does that feels like something. My guess – and I think the evidence of psychology is with me on this – is that whatever the conscious modules actually do constitutes relatively little of what the mind, in total, does.”

The implications of this are pretty huge – I’m still trying to process them.

But in terms of my work with clients, it gives things a different perspective. Clean Language coaching seems to help people bring aspects of themselves that were unconscious into consciousness. There might be “parts negotiations” or something resembling the old six-step reframe. There might be sequences of insights and revelations, all from inside the client’s mind.

As the process continues, it seems to help people change in a big way.

But in fact, is it only scratching the surface of the multitude that’s there?

And if so… then what happens?

While my head keeps spinning, may I offer a couple of possibly-relevant videos?


As always, your comments are most welcome below!