The Levels of Personality

Freud’s original conception divided personality into three levels: the conscious, the preconscious and the unconscious. The conscious: the conscious as Freud defined the term, corresponds to its ordinary everyday meaning. It includes all the sensations and experiences of which we are aware at any given moment. The unconscious: according to Freud, is the unconscious, that larger, invisible portion below the surface. This is the focus of psychoanalytic theory. Its vast, dark depths are the home of the instincts, those wishes and desired that direct our behavior and is the repository of forces we cannot see or control. The preconscious: between these tow level is the preconscious. This is the storehouse of memories, perceptions and thoughts of which we are not consciously aware at the moment but we can easily summon into consciousness.