no, i don't describe the soul as consciousness. consciousness implies reflection (self-awareness), for which, as you describe in your analogy, a duality of active-passive is needed. in other words, something other to yourself is needed to reflect yourself back to yourself, therefor making it your own. this is the process of knowing ('Ereignis', literally translates to: 'making something your own', to lend a concept from Heidegger). this root of self-consciousness is what can be called (conscious) ex-istence (derived from latin, litt. 'to stand-out'; in other words, 'a given that has always already been directed at something'. Once the soul is presupposed, and since we are not conscious of it as existing, the conclusion is that it is indivisible. as such, the soul would be 'a before before the before' ad infinitum, if that makes sense.
Why do i say that is is good? this Good is platonic in nature, it is not to be confused with the divisible duality of good and bad. rather, it is a higher synthesis of both in ontology. ontology does not know good or bad, for that would turn it into what Heidegger calls ontotheology. He disavows of that because the personal point of view is entered into an ontology, therefor robbing it of generalized abstraction, ie. it would cease to be a representational framework; as opposed to an opinion. Platonic 'Good' is the totality of the good-bad duality before any actual (ontic) judgement is made regarding it. (in Heideggers system, 'ontic' refers to actuality; while ontological refers to the theoretical-representational, the 'working mechanism', if you will. a representation of something is not how something actually appears in actuality, it marks the difference between an actual can of soda, and you imagining a can of soda in your mind.)
Why do we name it Good, and not Bad then, you might ask. well, that reasoning is in my first post in this thread. to reiterate; once the self-consciousness has entered the scene, it simply cannot imagine for itself (thus it cannot 'ereig' or take posession of) the reflection of itself to itself as ultimate evil. hard as you may try, you cannot seriously mean that you want infinite exponentially increasing pain without end for yourself, given that this has become a true possibility that lay before you.
i'll also point out a problem with your recollection of nothingness: given that you can recall 'it', it means it has a space and time, and therfor, its not (or no longer) nothingness. one cannot define nothingness in terms of itself, for when you image it, you already rely on somethingness, which you attempt to deny in its totality. you see, this 'split' is already given even in the word nothingness itself, namely no-thing-ness. since its definition relies on a duality that reflects itself back to itself in order to frame it, it has already become a something the minute you became conscious of it, because that is what consciousness is, to hold something within a frame of opposites in your mind. The singularity that the soul would be is only known through a 'trace' (famous concept of Derridas), a kind eerie pointer that cannot be grasped; like a dog chasing its own tail. and there we stumble on the limit of thought. In the history of philosophy, all of this can be traced back over Kants Copernican revolution and his Schemata, to Descartes dualism and the mark of infinity, and beyond..
and I like the dream analogy as well, its a good one. I remember also using it (in my own words of course) when trying to frame some of the big philosophers concepts when they try to refer to the unspeakable of Being in those endlessly complex tomes of them
still do really, its a very viable analogy
