Selection from The Unity Model of Marriage by Leon James.
www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy26/409b-g26-lecture-notes.htm
Mental Anatomy and the
Individual's Threefold Self:
Affective, Cognitive, and Sensorimotor
The immortal spiritual body with which we are born, contains our mind, that is, our mental organs, which are called the affective organ, the cognitive organ, and the sensorimotor organ. These three mental organs are in the spiritual-mental body in the same way that the physical body contains the circulatory system, the respiratory system, and the nervous system. The circulatory system includes the heart and all its veins and capillaries reaching and permeating every organ and cell of the body.
The circulatory system in the physical body corresponds to the affective organ in the mental body, whose operations give us the subjective experience of feeling and willing. Feelings in the spiritual body, or the mind, correspond to the circulatory system in the physical body, because feelings nourish the life of experience. Feeling and willing give us
an affective consummatory life such as needs, wants,
desires, satisfactions, pleasures, interests, attractions, etc. (as well as their
opposites),
and
an affective conative life such as intentions, motives, purposes, endeavors, resolve, compassion, love, etc. (as well as their opposites)
The respiratory system corresponds to the cognitive organ whose operations give us the subjective life of thinking, reasoning, and intelligence. Thoughts in the spiritual body, that is, the operations of the cognitive organ, correspond to the respiratory system in the physical body, because thoughts guide our feelings and clarifies them, just as oxygen cleans and purifies the blood. Thoughts give us
a cognitive appraising life through memory,
imagination, words, meaning, concepts, topics, knowledge, logic, common sense,
conversation, etc.
and
a cognitive planning life through rational reasoning, inventiveness, predictions, hypotheses, fantasies, schedules, blueprints, management policies, etc.
The nervous system corresponds to the sensorimotor organ whose operations give us the subjective life of sensing the environment outside the body and of acting upon that environment through motor determinations. Sensations and motor determinations in the spiritual body, or the mind, are like the nervous system in the physical body, because sensations give us the life of experiencing the world outside of us and motor determinations give us the ability to make our bodies move and interact with the environment. Sensations and motor determinations give us
a sensory noticing life such as seeing, hearing,
tasting, touching, pleasure, pain, heat, cold, etc.
and
a motor execution life such as moving, pushing, pulling, dancing, chewing, verbalizing, writing, drawing, etc.
Here is then a summary of the exact correspondence between mental anatomy and physical anatomy (try to memorize this after you studied the details given above):
an affective consummatory life in the spiritual body (= circulatory veins in the physical body)
an affective optimizing life in the spiritual body
(= circulatory arteries in the physical body)
a cognitive appraising life in the spiritual body (= respiratory inhaling in the physical body)
a cognitive planning life in the spiritual body (=
respiratory exhaling in the physical body)
a sensory noticing life in the spiritual body (= nervous afferent input in the physical body)
a motor execution life in the spiritual body (= nervous efferent output in the physical body)
The affective life of feelings cohere together as a cumulative whole called the affective self.
The cognitive life of thoughts cohere together as a cumulative whole called the cognitive self.
The sensorimotor life of sensations and motor determinations cohere together as a cumulative whole called the sensorimotor self.
Every person can therefore be studied, described, and understood as a threefold self.
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