The Illusory Self (continued)
Most people are still completely identified with the incessant stream of [the thinking] mind, of compulsive thinking, most of it repetitive and pointless. There is no “I” apart from their thought processes and emotions that go with them. This is the meaning of being spiritually unconscious. When told that there is a voice in their head that never stops speaking, they say, “What voice?” or angrily deny it, which of course is the voice, is the thinker, is the unobserved mind. It could almost be looked upon as an entity that has taken possession of them.
Eckhart Tolle
from A New Earth; Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose