Book Review of Conscious: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind by Annaka Harris (2019)
Why I Read It
Conscious was introduced to me at a playdate. A fellow parent shared theories he'd recently read about and explained that consciousness may be separate from behavior, meaning a person can act and speak without deciding to do so. That parent then asked me a question, and when I responded, he asked why I answered that way. I truly didn’t know and said as much. Excitedly noting that my reply supported the aforementioned theories, he asked if I wanted to read a short introductory book about them. Of course, I said yes.
The Central Idea
In eight chapters and just over 100 pages, Harris (2019) challenges common assumptions people make about the world. After defining what consciousness is (experience itself) (p. 3), she proceeds to ask and attempt to answer various questions about it. Some of her conclusions are as follows:
matter can vividly experience life without it being noticeable from the outside (p. 14)
smartphones are conscious (p. 80)
the self is an illusion (p. 96)
there is no present moment (p. 104)
our realities are questionable (p. 109)
She offers few personal links to the material but cites numerous verifiable supporting documents.
Where It Meets My Work
Conscious challenges the idea of human identity. If someone is not in control of their thoughts or actions, can they really be authentic, trust themselves, set and preserve boundaries, and make their own decisions? Based on the evidence Harris presents, it appears not (p. 34). The author leads readers to believe they are merely passengers experiencing the consequences of their consciousness’ drive, which makes the book especially relevant to my work with identity and choice. At first glance, this text appears to challenge my work from every angle. Upon further inspection, I found that it also supports my beliefs and expertise in some respects, making its relevance to me especially strong.
Until I read this book, for example, I didn’t know that my belief system has a name: panpsychism. One of the author’s citations states that “panpsychism is simply a hypothesis… that the intrinsic nature of energy is experience…” (Strawson, 2017). My Reiki practice has affirmed this time and time again. If a person’s energy flow slows or becomes blocked, it affects their thoughts, body, and experiences. For example, if a person has often been silenced by others or made to believe that their words have no value and their truth isn’t heard, their throat chakra energy will likely become obstructed. Such a throat chakra has some telltale signs, including but not limited to:
agreeing with the majority
pretending to be someone they’re not
lacking creative expression
socially withdrawing
physical discomfort in the throat and neck
Reiki can help get energy moving again, though a partial blockage may remain. In my personal and professional experience, Reiki combined with practical actions (singing, stating affirmations, journaling, making simple decisions, stating true opinions, etc.), talk therapy, and sometimes prescription medication is most effective for a severe throat chakra impediment. Conscious helps me explain how energy, choice, and healing are linked.
Harris also quoted articles that define intuitions, or “gut feelings,” as instances in which we know something without knowing why or how we know it. The articles further explain that intuitions are often helpful and “... more reliable in many situations than the fruits of conscious reasoning” (Dijksterhuis & Nordgren, 2006, pp.95-109) (Dane et al., 2012, pp.187-94). While the same articles stress that intuitions can turn out to be obstacles or even untruths, I appreciate the acknowledgment that intuition is real and powerful; this is a pillar of my credence and makes Harris’ research relevant to my work with decision-making and trust.
What Got Under My Skin
So much of my personal healing journey and the work I do centers on self-definition and living authentically, which is why this book hits so close to home. It took me 28 years to realize that it was okay and expected for me to have my own wants, needs, successes, and more. Trauma therapy (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR), specifically) showed me the different parts that make up my authentic essence beneath what has happened to me and what I have been programmed to do and say.
Defining who I am after more than a quarter-century of serving others inspired me to show fellow millennial women how to come home to who they are, too. Thus, Untamed Soulworks was born. I use my tarot reading skills and Reiki energy-healing training, combined with personalized spellwork, to empower millennial women to unearth their truth and live unapologetically. Self-identity matters so much to me: without it, I never would have reclaimed authority over my life, and my business and methodology wouldn’t be successful.
Therefore, it deeply challenges me to consider Harris’ argument that self is an illusion (2019, p. 96). Since humans are made of energy, energy is experience, and experience is consciousness, I struggle to separate self from consciousness. She quotes a publication by Michael Harris which emphasizes that drugs, disorders, medical events, and more “tamper with” physical functions and, by extension, the whole inviolate “self” those functions belong to (Harris, 2017). When I think of self, I don’t think of bodies and bodily functions; to me, a body is a vessel and does not define a person. I also don’t believe that people view themselves as inviolate. Some people may feel whole and unbroken, but every single person is or has been altered in some way, whether by a drug, condition, or experience. To me, this is exactly what makes them unique selves and keeps the book relevant to my grasp of identity.
Where I Push Back
As much as I trust in science and revere its value, I know it has limits and can’t explain everything; consciousness is the perfect example of that, and the uncertainty is part of the book's relevance to me. We may never know for certain whether the idea of self is real or constructed, but does its reality actually matter? If I feel like I am going through life as a self, what is wrong with describing my experience that way and choosing to make the most of who I am now and who I am working towards being? Sure, maybe my consciousness has already decided all of that, but clearly my brain hasn’t gotten the memo. So what is the harm in thinking that I am making my own decisions and designing the life of my dreams?
Though I understand the points made in this book and find some of the arguments compelling, I haven't been swayed into conceding that I have absolutely no control over my words, actions, or future. What is the point of living if you are just along for the ride, and what does that mean for how we live now? This book matters because it urges people to examine how much control, if any, they truly have. It shapes how they think about agency, choice, and how they live.
What I'm Taking From It
1. I completely agree with the author that consciousness “…is one of the strangest aspects of reality” (Harris, 2019, p. 3). Harris achieved her goal of shaking up people's assumptions about how the world works. One example is her examination of whether humans should treat AI interactions as evidence of consciousness. She describes the controversial “philosophical zombie” thought experiment, popularized by David Chalmers, and argues that a fully functioning brain must be conscious while questioning which behaviors require consciousness (pp. 19-21). I doubt many people have realized their smartphones are conscious (p. 80), let alone considered whether they should call an ambulance in the future when a humanoid robot says it is hurt. This book compels us to question where consciousness belongs.
2. Although I tend to challenge myself to “be here now,” and ask my clients to experience the present fully while they’re in it, the “present moment” does not exist. Humans experience things slightly after they happen, since sensory signals take time to reach our brains and be integrated into a form we can comprehend (pp. 25-26).
If your brain “…decides upon a story of what happens…” (Eagleman, 2015, p. 53), do you actually know what happened? Conversely, do trauma reactions cause information to hit your brain faster, therefore allowing you to remember details more clearly? In my personal and professional experience, trauma survivors are usually in one of two camps: those who remember every single detail and those who remember nothing. My background in death investigation made me wonder whether consciousness plays a role in witness credibility. Witnesses have proven unreliable, often giving differing and inaccurate accounts of the same event. They also tend to misidentify perpetrators. The author writes that “…consciousness is essential to ethical questions” (Harris, 2019, p. 33), and I couldn’t agree more.
3. My personal convictions have always been different from those of people around me. That truth was confirmed in the first several pages of Conscious when I read “Is it like something to be you in this moment? Presumably your answer is yes. Is it like something to be the chair you’re sitting on? Your answer will (most likely) be an equally definitive no.” (p. 5)
As soon as I read the word “chair,” I immediately imagined I was the chair and thought yes. The chair bears the warmth and weight of my body. It feels the texture of my jeans. It is grounded in stability. I believe that everything is conscious, but not necessarily sentient. So the chair might experience me weighing it down, but it likely doesn't feel tired from holding me up. It was interesting to see proof in black-and-white print that I'm as unusual as I thought, which makes the book even more personally relevant.
The Untamed Question
Considering all of this, along with the parts of the book I didn’t write about, the following question lingers: if there is no self to discover, what does it mean to live a life that feels authentically yours?
That question brings us full circle to the work I do at Untamed Soulworks: exploring who we are, our beliefs, what we inherit, and what we choose to carry. You can explore more of my work here:
If you're ready to go deeper, I offer tarot readings, Reiki energy healing, and personalized ritual tools designed to help you reconnect with your truth and live intentionally and unapologetically.
To uncertainty and curiosity,
Jerica
References
Erik Dane, Kevin W. Rockmann, and Michael G. Pratt, “When Should I Trust My Gut?,” Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes 119, no. 2 (November 2012): 187–94, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2012.07.009
Ap Dijksterhuis and Loran F. Nordgren, “A Theory of Unconscious Thought,” Perspectives on Psychological Science 1, no. 2 (June 2006): 95-109
David Eagleman, The Brain: The Story of You (New York: Pantheon, 2015), 53
Annaka Harris (2019). Conscious: A Brief Guide to the Fundamental Mystery of the Mind. HarperCollins.
Michael Harris, “How Conjoined Twins Are Making Scientists Question the Concept of Self,” The Walrus, 6 November 2017, https://thewalrus.ca/how-conjoined-twins-are-making-scientists-question-the-concept-of-self/.
Galen Strawson, “Physicalist panpsychism,” in Schneider and Velmans, eds., The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness, pp. 376-84
