“The Unconscious Determines Everything”
Photograph by John Diamond, M.D.
To us he is no more a person
now but a whole climate of opinion
under whom we conduct our different lives.
– W.H. Auden, “In Memory of Sigmund Freud”
Freud’s most important contribution: all our activity, mental and physical, is determined by our unconscious. Our decisions are never really based on logic.
We never think or do anything for the reason we do. Our opinions are never what we really believe – even devotedly believe – they are.
We live in a world of what the Vedic scriptures calls maya, the climate of grandiose self-deception.
We just don’t know! That’s the unconscious.
