Freud broke new ground when he suggested that the mind is not clear, transparent consciousness but mostly unconscious. He suggested that we are not aware of most of the thinking we do - that much of our life and reasoning is grounded in hidden layers of unconscious desire and random, unrealistic thought, which emerge to the surface only after passing through several filters.

The deepest layer of the unconscious is called the ID. Here, ideas, desires, fantasies, urges and quite bizarre associative thoughts lead to all sorts of quite laterally related, inconsistent and unrealistic, unconscious activity.

Above this is the EGO, part conscious, part unconscious. Here, only 'reality-orientated' ideas are expressed, seeded by the id. Rational trains of thought move along their separate ways, solving problems, understanding the world, expecting things to happen, governing our reasoned actions. Sometimes, these move up into the realm of consciousness - but the same train of thought can continue unconsciously by dipping down again. Have you ever noticed how you can solve a problem when you don't know you are even thinking about it? Or how the word you were looking for suddenly springs unbidden into your mind when you have started thinking about something else? You were thinking about these things, unconsciously, all the time.

But the ego is not its own master. Above it sits the SUPEREGO, censoring its thoughts! It conforms your ego to moral and cultural standards, like Big Brother, watching your every move. It often represses things which burst into the ego from the id. Sometimes these things can only find expression in strange ways : bizarre dreams or 'Freudian slips'.

I have found some psychological computer tests to probe beneath who you think you are to who you really are. We will play with these and see if they work. One, for example, analyzes your personality from your colour preferences. We will test someone, without letting the group know who it is, and see how the programme describes them. Can we correctly guess who is being talked about?

See you on Thursday... You might learn something about yourself!