Free will: who's in control?

So if the conscious mind isn’t in control, what is in control? As we’ll see, the answer may be: nothing in particular. The closer we look at the mind, the more it seems to consist of a lot of different players, players that sometimes collaborate but sometimes fight for control, with victory going to the one that is in some sense the strongest. In o

At first, we realize that we do not control the world outside us. I don’t decide when it rains. Then we realize that we do not control what’s happening inside our own body. I don’t control my blood pressure. Next, we understand that we don’t even govern our brain. I don’t tell the neurons when to fire. That’s more difficult. Ultimately we should re

You are not in control of your mind—because you, as a conscious agent, are only part of your mind, living at the mercy of other parts.15 You can do what you decide to do—but you cannot decide what you will decide to do.

Our free will allows us to take our attention off of what we are thinking about. Free will is like the steering wheel on a car.

Chew on this: in many ways, free will is an illusion. We are forever sending and receiving “orders” to and from those around us, as well as those at a distance, but the truth is that we typically perceive these “orders” as coming from within ourselves. The more conscious you can become of which voice you are responding to, the more you can take con

There comes a moment in life, often in the quietest of hours, when one realizes that the world will continue on its wayward course, indifferent to our desires or frustrations. And it is then, perhaps, that a subtle truth begins to emerge: the only thing we truly possess, the only thing we might, with enough care, exert some mastery over, is our min