What is the Aware Mind?

The mind of awareness generally refers to the seven consciousnesses—the awareness that perceives the six sense objects. In special cases, it specifically refers to the mind consciousness, because the awareness of the mind consciousness is the strongest and its scope the broadest.

Hun (the spirit-soul) always refers to the mind consciousness, which can engage with the states of the six sense objects and can discern the states of the six sense objects. It is precisely because it can discern the states of the six sense objects that one can be frightened into panic, with the hun leaving the body, the hun flying and the po scattering, losing the hun and dropping the po, and the hun no longer keeping to its abode. The manas always guards the body, never leaving it, never losing it, never scattering from it; otherwise the body would become a corpse. The eighth consciousness is even more so.