Hi Anne,
Anne:
If referring to awareness/consciousness-of-objects (this is a subtle point), that is the 5th skandha, viññāṇa/vijñāna (consciousness): awareness/consciousness-of-objects is like a coin having two sides, you get both or none; the ‘consciousness’ side of this ‘coin’ doesn’t exist apart from the ‘objects’ side. Because the ‘consciousness-of’ side is co-dependent on the ‘objects’ side, it is referred to as not-self; one could consider it a functioning or manifesting; without it we couldn’t practise mindfulness!
In addition to “the 3D manifold of ordinary sensory experience”, the "objects" side of the ‘coin’ can include such as sensations, thoughts and perceptions, inner activity, and awareness/consciousness of being aware/conscious. Unifying ones object-field of consciousness in this way is, I think, an important step in mindfulness practice (the saying “the world [of ones experience] is consciousness” seems a reflection of this). I expect you know about this.
I think another way to express two-sides-of-the-coin point can be by the analogy of a relationship. When two people talk, between them is something new forming: the relating. The people are simultaneously contributing stuff and reacting to stuff and creating stuff: so "relating" is dependent and constantly in flux, being changed by and changing the stuff (the conditions present at the relating: bodies, environment, emotions, sensations...)
We generally just don't see an embodied "relating" and "relationship"; there is just the space between people, the interacting happening between people within dynamic conditions.
So another way to express viññāṇa is like this; viññāṇa is the relating-ness that arises dependent on form -- it doesn't arise alone, it is the invisible arising with form. Dynamic, dependent and not visible, it is very much there like the "relating" between, say, two people --- that being that is continually created by two people interacting.
A sense of self comes from that neutral viññāṇa which is very "clean" and "simple" -- just outgoing, turning towards/touching --- when it becomes bound up by volition and sensation, which result together in gratification; it is hard to see that "I" is an embodiment of the relating-ness (viññāṇa) of the skandhas, and that that "I" develops more and more in interacting with its own skhandas, other dhammas (stuff) and other viññāṇa that are developing similarly, the turning towards gratifying sensations, which continual turning towards sense-gratification can lead to greed, which greed interaction can lead to ill-will. (Painful sensory experience can also lead to colouring the viññāṇa with aversion/recoil/ill-will.)
If a self sees itself as a distinct, separate entity, then it is blocking out its obvious contingency with other stuff, with other nearby similarly developing beings.
When a self realizes (perhaps by clearly observing viññāṇa and the other skandhas) that what "it" actually is a resulting of interacting conditions, it changes how it relates, because it understands that its experience will be dependent on the forms (conditions) with which it exists and how it relates with this stuff as well as the other "viññāṇas" interacting and affecting it, too. A "domino" effect of contingent being. A long-term understanding causes relating to become friendly and/or neutral; a short-term assumption can develop the viññāṇa into a sense of "I" but built nearly entirely and continually on sensory gratification.
This is not an "all-one" nor a "no-self" realization nor is it a "non-dual" realization anymore than it is a non-plural or a non-singular, which words mean something else entirely from what is "interbeing", contingent identity, dependently originating; these are different views or experiences resulting from detecting dependent origination (aka: contingent identity).
And if this contingent identity is understood, then it can cause behavioural changes: this "own consciousness" realized as a contingent, fluid "identity", aka. dependently originating, interbeing, is eventually aware of its own volitional contributions to the relating/to the interbeing in which it is constantly being born into, from and bearing.
So realizing dependent origination, one can experience viññāṇa in its neutral-going-towards/touching-relating --- its seeming natural, initial state when first arising and conditioned only by the khandhas. And one can return viññāṇa to that by continually studying sensations and restraints on sense-gratification/aversion. To be completely thorough in this area is yet beyond me.
And, again, realizing dependent origination, one also can behaviourally aim towards "skillfulness" as a result of increasingly clear awareness of being an aggregate and dependently arising, and specifically being a human interbeing with particular conditions (aka: amid other dynamic stuff and sentients) and attempt to train apt behaviours in skillful ways relative to one's own unique human conditions (i.e., in a buddhist context that could be brahmavihara conduct).
[edited: trying to write this more clearly]