While I understand that many people think the mind is complex, the way I see it is simple and that is how I intend to teach it to others, with a completely new, refreshing, and easy-to-understand approach. My mission is to provide information that is unavailable anywhere else, and to get people really thinking; to dispel all the old outdated programmed beliefs and misperceptions about the mind and behaviour, and to offer a new inspirational forum at the College of the Mind, where no-one needs prior qualifications or experience and where they can relax and explore fascinating phenomena. My intention is to free people from the prison of their own mind, to bring them back into studying, simply because they are curious about really captivating subjects, or just want to blow the cobwebs away and expand their understanding. While I am professionally accredited and academically qualified, I recognise that people do not always want to be assessed – it takes the fun out of studying – and so I dispense with all that. At the College, it’s me, the students, a universe of knowledge, and a whole lot of laughter!
Often I tell people three things; that what they might think is weird to them about the mind is normal in my world, that because of my unusual perception, I’m the only person who is going to put things to them in the way that I do, and that I have done and continue to do my own homework. For whatever reason, I’m able to see straight through to the basics of any situation, read the subtext through the conscious noise, and be able to give answers to the question why?
My role is to translate that which has, in my view, been unnecessarily complicated in text about the mind, which often leaves most people confused or concerned that they alone do not understand or have a psychological issue that is abnormal and incurable. I don’t believe any of that. I believe in education, not medication. People are more ordinary and understandable than they think and it often comes as a huge relief to them to hear that. My role is to normalise the abnormal for others and to explain the mind for people to understand that which they cannot see in the clearest and best way possible, to help make a difference in the way we think, behave, and live. When I physically depart this world, my intention is to leave behind material that others will find hope, peace, and comfort in.
The golden apple theme for College of the Mind arose several years ago whilst I was reading for a Masters Degree in Psychoanalysis. From a thought-provoking quote, I had a profound realisation that everyone was entitled to gather knowledge (symbolically represented as apples), no matter if they were a highly intellectual master or a novice apprentice. The original college name Hebe is from Greek mythology, ‘the cup-bearer to the gods’, that spontaneously arose in a conversation I had with a publishing agency that wanted to know my company name. At that time I had just written Pandora’s Panacea and didn’t have a company. I replied, ‘Oh no, I’m nobody really, I just wrote a book that I want to publish’. ‘Right’, replied the operator, ‘I just need a name for the computer’. And thus, in a nanosecond, Hebe College was born – years before I actually developed it. Later, with global interest rapidly growing in my work, I put the college online and evolved the name to the ‘College of the Mind’. Carole Sawo is my real name. Carole means a song, and Sawo originates from very Old English, it means soul. My given name, therefore, translates as ‘Song of the Soul’.
Understanding the human mind and behaviour is not only fascinating, for many, but it also brings a huge sense of relief – and that is what I intend to do, to offer knowledge, understanding, and a host of easy-to-apply practical strategies, all in order to provide people with a happy, peaceful mind and life. I really do wish for others to find congruence in themselves and inspiration in the work I produce, because this is not just another company mission statement. Everything that you see here is a glimpse into a much bigger plan that exists on the holographic script within the mansions of my mind – my soul’s mission.
Carole Sawo