Can the brain go beyond being free enough to know the limit of its freedom, to being absolutely free?
Is it enough for the brain to desire absolute freedom and do what it can to bring it about? Or is desire (and its opposite, fear) the limiting factor?
Can the brain be free of its submission to desire/fear and be absolutely free?
If it can, how?
If there is no “how”, can the brain do nothing?
Can the brain be negatively, passively, aware of the movement of desire or fear (or whatever it is that is limiting it)?
The brain is aware of desire and fear when they arise, but its awareness isn’t usually “negatively, passively” but reactively. That is, of desire, the brain wants more, and of fear, the brain wants less, and that’s the problem.
For the brain to be aware of desire and fear without reacting in the usual way, it has to be as dispassionately interested in desire and fear as it is conditioned to react to them, so that there’s a possibility of going beyond reaction.
As we discussed elsewhere, unless one has experimented with being aware of outward things - flowers, trees, birds, clouds, etc - then trying to observe the movement of desire or fear or greed or envy, etc, doesn’t have very much meaning.
If one is incapable of observing passively a tree or a bird or a cloud (which are not a threat to the brain), then one will not be able to observe passively the movement of desire.
So my sense is that one has to begin with the art of seeing first. The question of whether the whole brain can be free comes a little later. What do you think?
You seem to think I haven’t begun “with the art of seeing first” because I don’t talk about my relationship with nature, trees, etc., so you think I’m getting ahead of myself.
You may be right. My seeing my be artless.
I’m only going by what you have (or haven’t) said previously.
But putting this aside, my feeling is that attempting to become aware of the movement of desire without first being aware of simple outward things, of nature, of the outward world, is unrealistic.
Desire is too quick to be noticed unless one is highly alert and awake to its initial movement. But maybe something like worry, or dull background anxiety, is more susceptible to being observed? Because it is a slow, nagging phenomenon that slowly wears us down, we can become aware of it passively and watch it without doing anything to interfere in that observation. What do you think?
Yes, some emotions are prominent and others can be subtle and subliminal until they are full-blown and undeniable.