Aj, I meant the latter of your proposed definitions when I initially used the word subconscious. I do agree with you that self-reflection is driven by mindfulness. The exercise of pscyhoanalysis (or broadly, the exercise of trying to discover your unconscious)is actually trying to bring your thoughts/feelings from unconscious to conscious state of mind (thus, being more mindful.) I think as you rightly pointed out, there are many ways to become mindful and I think the selection of method itself reveals one's personality. For instance, some people would prefer to seek deeper understanding of their actions in a more neuroscience-like way by trying to identify which external/neuro stimuli is being triggered and I feel that is an equally reasonable option exercise to reach a higher level of mindfulness. (I guess this sentence conclusively shows that I know nothing about natural science in general, but you get the point..)

Your method of writing a diary and asking those profound questions about how you feel and what you really think sounds very effective as well. I do not mean to push my idea too hard but I just find it interesting that some psychoanalysts identify writing a diary as one of the methods to pierce into unconscious state of mind.(Again, psychodynamic/psychoanalytic theory is about bringing unconscious to conscious mindfulness. I am not sure if you have experienced the same thing, but sometimes when you start writing and continue to do so, you start to write about things that you never realized before and your thought gets processed during the writing process. Although this is not really the level of 'unconscious' and I think this example is more about your 'subconscious' state of mind being processed to conscious, I think the same method can be used to reach a deeper state.)

You may be right that the answers to really important questions are not as hidden deep as one might think. And I,too, believe that with a more holistic understanding of one's choices by using whichever method that one finds helpful, one can find the answers more easily than one might think.