Mind Over Matter: The 3 Principles
Why you don't need fixing, just a new perspective
I didn’t come across the Three Principles during a peaceful, happy moment in my life. I wasn’t settled, content, or looking for an intellectual curiosity to explore. I found them when I was struggling—when anxiety had taken such a firm grip on me that I barely recognized myself.
And when I first heard what Sydney Banks and others were saying, I resisted it.
Because the Three Principles don’t tell you to fight your thoughts. They don’t give you coping mechanisms. They don’t even acknowledge that you need to "fix" anything. They simply point to the fact that you are always experiencing life through the lens of thought, and thought is always changing.
But at the time, my experience felt so real, so overwhelming, that I couldn’t possibly believe my suffering was just a function of Thought. Surely, it had deeper causes—my past, my personality, my circumstances, my brain chemistry. The Three Principles seemed almost dismissive of the depth of what I was feeling.
And yet, something in me held on.
Not because I fully understood it, but because I preferred to believe that I alone had the capability to reverse what I was feeling. I found it infinitely more empowering than a type of therapy that would tell me I was broken, in need of years of effort to piece myself back together.
So I stuck with it. I listened. I paid attention.
And, over time, I started to see it in action.
The Three Amigos
At their core, the Three Principles explain how every human experience is created. They are:
Mind – The universal intelligence behind all things. The creative force that gives rise to life itself.
Consciousness – The awareness that allows us to experience life.
Thought – The energy that forms our moment-to-moment reality.
Think of it like this:
Imagine life is a movie playing in your mind.
Mind is the electricity powering the projector. It’s always there, running everything in the background, even if you don’t notice it.
Consciousness is the screen and the lighting—without it, you wouldn’t see anything at all.
Thought is the script, the actors, the scenery. It determines what movie is playing at any given moment.
Most people assume their reality is objective, but it’s not. We’re all watching our own unique movie, created in real-time by Thought, brought to life by Consciousness, and powered by Mind.
Sydney Banks put it beautifully:
“Your thoughts are like the artist’s brush. They create a personal picture of the reality you live in.”
In other words, Thought isn’t just something happening inside your head—it’s the very thing that constructs your world. Two people in the exact same situation can have completely different experiences, not because of the situation itself, but because of the way Thought is shaping their reality.
This explains why problems can feel overwhelming one moment and insignificant the next—because your thinking about them changes. The situation didn’t shift, but the lens through which you saw it did.
And once you see this process in action, everything starts to look different.
Knowing vs. Knowing
A common trap people fall into with the Three Principles is thinking they “get it” intellectually and assuming that’s enough. But this isn’t something you can grasp by reading or discussing—it has to be seen directly.
Imagine someone who has never driven a car before. They could read the entire manual, memorize every function, and even ace a written test. They might think they know how to drive. But the moment they get behind the wheel? They’re likely to panic. Because knowing about something is entirely different from knowing it in your bones.
The Three Principles work the same way. You can read about Mind, Consciousness, and Thought a hundred times and think you understand. But until you actually see it unfolding in your own experience, it’s just words on a page.
This is why people sometimes struggle when first encountering this philosophy. They try to “apply” it like a technique, but there’s nothing to apply—there’s only something to realize. The moment you genuinely see how thought shapes your experience, it’s like suddenly being able to drive. You can’t unlearn it. You don’t have to remember or practice it. It just becomes part of how you navigate life.
Sydney Banks put it simply:
“If the only thing people learned was not to be afraid of their experience, that alone would change the world.”
And that’s the key—this isn’t about trying to control or fix your thoughts. It’s about realizing you don’t need to. Once you see the mechanics behind your experience, the struggle disappears on its own.
You Can’t Change Your Thinking (But You Don’t Need To)
One of the biggest misconceptions about the Three Principles is that it’s about “positive thinking” or “changing your thoughts.” It’s not. If anything, it’s the opposite. It’s the realization that your thoughts don’t need to be controlled, fixed, or fought with.
George Pransky once said:
"Trying to change your thinking is like trying to smooth out ripples in a pond with a canoe paddle."
The more you try to control thought, the more you stir up the water. The trick is realizing that thoughts settle naturally when left alone.
Michael Neill describes it like this:
“Thoughts are like a snow globe. The more we shake them up, the harder it is to see clearly. But if we just let them settle, clarity emerges all on its own.”
This is where the principles differ from most mainstream psychology, which often treats thoughts as things to be managed. CBT, for example, encourages you to challenge or reframe negative thoughts. But from a Three Principles perspective, even engaging with a thought gives it more weight. Why argue with a mirage when you could just let it pass?
Never Broken, Nothing Lacking
Another controversial aspect of the Three Principles is its claim that everyone has innate mental health. That’s not a popular idea in a world where therapy and self-help books often sell the idea that happiness requires years of effort and healing. But Sydney Banks insisted that well-being isn’t something to be built—it’s something to be uncovered:
"Every human being is sitting in the middle of mental health. They just don’t know it."
This is what makes the Three Principles so different. It doesn’t focus on fixing your problems. It focuses on your mental health, not your mental illness.
Already, that reframing is powerful.
Modern psychology tends to work like an archaeologist, digging through the past to find what’s broken. The Three Principles, on the other hand, assume nothing is broken. You don’t need to be fixed. You just need to wake up to the fact that you were never broken in the first place.
Bill Pettit, a psychiatrist who integrated the Three Principles into his work, often told his patients, “You are not broken, you are just temporarily caught up in thought.” Imagine how different therapy would look if that was the starting point.
The Truth That Is Too Simple To Sell
The Three Principles will never be mainstream. They don’t promise quick fixes or personal transformation programs—not because change is slow, but because transformation isn’t something you “do.” It’s something that happens the moment you truly see how thought works.
And ironically, when that insight comes, it is a quick fix. It’s a personal transformation that requires no effort. In an instant, you realize you are not your thoughts, your past, or your emotions. You are something deeper. And once you see it, you can’t unsee it.
Sydney Banks described this beautifully:
"One second of insight is worth a lifetime of experience."
So while the Three Principles don’t sell you a roadmap to change, they reveal something much more profound: that change isn’t a process—it’s a shift in perception. And that shift can happen right now.
That’s why I choose this philosophy, along with Stoicism, over any other. Because at the end of the day, I’d rather believe in something that tells me I am already whole—rather than something that convinces me I am broken.
Still curious?
If something in this post resonated with you—or even if it didn’t, but you’re curious—I’d highly recommend looking into the work of those who have explored and taught the Three Principles in depth.
Books to Start With:
George Pransky – The Secret to Mental Health
Michael Neill – The Inside-Out Revolution
Sydney Banks – The Missing Link
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