Freedom From Ourselves

We all want to know how to be the best version of ourselves.  We want the world outside of us, the world that "happens to us" to be nothing but wonderful.  We all want to be loved.  We all want to be appreciated.  We all want to be a success.  We all want answers.   Essentially, what we are all seeking, to various degrees, is a sense of self that makes us feel complete and subsequently "free."  This desire to be "free," to feel as if we are moving towards settling all the inner and outer desires of our life, is what, we believe, pushes us to become who we desire to be.  But how are we to be "free" if we are always pursuing something?  How are we to be free if we always desire something?  It is only human to desire, right?  It is only human to keep pursuing, right?  Let's look into this...

Our anxieties, our self-incrimination, our self doubt, our feeling of lack all derive from something so simple...

Through the conditioning of our culture we push and push and push to reach some sort of inner and outer achievement, acquisition, or status too where we feel fulfilled.  Our freedom than becomes dependent upon our accomplishments or some specific status we desire to achieve.  We say to ourselves... "I will be a good man, unburdened, when I do such in such"..."I will be a great woman when I find the way to calm my heart."  Freedom, in this state, is contingent upon the success of the goal we seek to accomplish.  Seemingly, we are "more free" from the burden of ourselves, of the inner self that judges, when we can cross off our personal checklist that too which we desire to do, have, or become.  But let us examine the logic in all of this.  If we are trying to work backwards, attempting to negate the desire born from within by accomplishing something...from where do we start?  The answer is that we have been conditioned to believe that we will always have something to which we seek to achieve in order to achieve some "better" status of who we are.  Subsequently, we always feel as if we have something missing in our lives...we will than always feel as if there is some gap between who we are now and who we believe we are to become.

Please be aware...If we are conditioned to find freedom in doing, having, and or becoming...how are we ever to be free?  This game of always having to do, be, or accomplish something is never ending, is it not?  You say you will be free when you attain such and such amount of money in your bank account, you say you will be free when you run off too your piece of land, you say you will be when you find love etc., but the mind that is always chasing freedom in pursuits and accomplishments is simply that...chasing...and is a mind that is always chasing peaceful and at ease? 

{As a side note, can we see how the entire consumer society is based upon this conditioned principle?  Are we not feed, in a conscious sense, a seemingly infinite amount of advertisement that tells us what to desire, tells us how to behave, tells us how to love, how to eat, how to have fun etc.?  We are taught to seek freedom in our indulgences, but how free are we if we are tethered to gratifying something that is in a perpetual state of desire, that something being the conditioned ego?

Where did this sense of indulgence that we feel even come from?  Is this something innately human or is it something that is conditioned into us?  I will leave you to answer that, but question this...would money exist in a "free" society, would "better" and "worse" exist in a free society, would "rich" or "poor" exist in a free society...would war exist in a free society?  Only when we become aware of this conditioning process can we begin to move forward as a society and as individuals.  Well, what is "moving forward" anyway...well, I will leave that for your heart to discover...I digress...}

The individual that does not look into ones own mind to witness the conditioning, is always going to be tethered to some idea or too some notion of having to do something.  The idea we have about ourselves is conditioned into us.  Of course we all display unique temperament, but to what degree is the "John" that we have come know a product of social conditioning?  Are you not more than the "mental box" to which the conditioning keeps you in?

This clinging onto a projected image protects us from actually being with the "what is."  The image propels us into the fantasy world and the world of the ego.  The ego, the idea of oneself or what that idea of oneself is "soon too become," is an illusory energy formation.  When we concentrate on the ego and live from this place we believe we are warding ourselves from misery, loneliness and the like, becuase we believe we are giving our lives some sort of direction, some sort of identity which to follow.  Yes we are giving our lives "direction," but are we even aware of where this "direction" leads us, energetically speaking?

Again, are you aware of the conditioning?  If we are directing ourselves constantly to be attaining more, seeking to become more, seeking to have more of anything, whether it be love, money, sex, or social recognition, etc.,...are we not declaring to ourselves and to the universe that we have a void to fill?

In actuality, the ego, which we believe is guiding us to freedom is actually doing the reverse to us.  It is keeping us tethered to wanting, to desiring, and the like.  The ego wants more of itself...it wants more "me" and will seek this through attempting to satiate its desires.   These ideas of how we should be, what we should do, what we should attain etc., are nothing more than "mind stuff" which projects us into the future and away from the now.  How can there be any freedom when we believe salvation exists in attaining something that is bound to the future?

The ego and the isolation it presupposes is the illusion that leads us to believe and see as fact that we are "islands" amongst each other.  Yes, we are individuals, but we are more than that.  We are both individuals and a collective human race simultaneously [as well as collective living ecosystem which extends to the cosmos and beyond].  Yet, the consumer society and those who benefit most off of it, have a vested interest in keeping the illusion of individualism alive.  Our true nature is that we, as individuals, inhabit an ecosystem, an Earth, that is inherently interconnected.  Each part, whether that part be a single human individual, an ocean, or a chimpanzee in Africa are tied in some way or another.  We do not need science to prove this to ourselves.  The feeling inside knows this truth.  Yet, if we have been cut off from this feeling within through mass conditioning, of which has influenced us to live primarily from the mind and not from sensation, we get lost in the endless abyss of the mind and thus lose sense of this feeling within.

As for the sake of humans, there would be no society without the individual, yet there would be no individual without the society...When we cling onto the ego for individual identification we become unaware of the great connection we all have.  It is this connection, when lost, that we leads us to feel an overwhelming sense of isolation and subsequent fear.  The "I" must compete against each other to secure what the "I" needs.  The elite in control of media [who live solely from fear] have us believing we are "one nation under all" yet, when nations are pinned against one another it becomes, in theory, a global race to the bottom for resource acquisition.

The thing is, if we as countries are competing against one another we are inherently competing against each other as individuals even in our own countries.  The profit motive, the motive which is conditioned into us, is what leads us to believe that war is a "normal" way of life.  We egotistically wave around our nationalistic flags while we have been conditioned to become desensitized to the brutality that all this has all caused.  [And as a side note, do you really think that you were not conditioned to believe that "terrorism" is some real threat to our sovereignty as a nation?  Has the media not attempted to condition us through their relentless campaigns to fear dark skinned bearded men living in caves half way around the world? - seek to see how the media and those who control it have tried relentlessly to keep the ego illusion alive and you in fear].

The struggle we see in ourselves, as well as the world, exists becuase we believe we must compete against another, we must be compared against another.  It is the comparison and judgment of another that leads us to act to fulfill the conditioned desires of the ego.  It is the comparison and judgment of another that leads to us believe that we are indeed actually separate and not inherently connected.

All of our insecurities arise from this separation and we try incessantly to be, do, or accomplish something in order to override this insecurity.  We try to become better than that person, we try to become more cunning, smarter, richer, etc., than the next person.  We try to be "freer" than the next person.  Therefore, if the mind only knows and acts from this separation, from this conditioned sense of self, how can we ever as both individuals and as a collective society ever be free?

What is freedom anyway?  If there is always a desire to become something, to accomplish something, to figure something out etc., is there freedom?  If we are in a perpetual state of trying to uphold the image to which we believe we are can we free?  Are we not limited to the image?, the image being the conditioning of ones life...How are we free if this conditioning attempts to project one forward in their life in a way that keeps our minds in the tomorrows of what we are going to become.  Does this image than, this conditioning than, put borders around oneself, whether those borders be ideological, and such?  If there are borders than around oneself...can you really be free?  Go deeply into that...not with your mind...but with all of you.

Is freedom than the cessation of "having" to do something, "having" to be something, "having" to feel something?

What is it than to be free of desire?  If there is nothing left to be, do or accomplish, we may state that we are no longer human, we are not living...But go within here, and feel this...can the mind really understand what it is to be free?  What is "free" anyway?  Of course the mind can analyze, interpret, and make rational and logical deductions as too what this experience can be like...but how can any attempt to know something of which is beyond mind be understood by mind?

So where do we go from here?

Simply be aware...and see what you discover.  Witness the conditioning mind and how it is simply an accumulation of the past.  Let go of this by allowing yourself to be who you are in this moment without any judgment.  You do this not by trying anything, not by applying any formula, not by seeking any guru or the like...you do it by simply becoming aware.  When you become aware of the process the awareness burns through the unconciousness like a light into the darkness.  When a tought comes up, just be aware of it.  Witness to see if you judge anything, yet do not seek to change this, just be aware.  This takes a diligent mind, a focused mind...but that is what it is to be fully awoken.  Just be you...your awareness is inherently patient.

Know that you needed to become conditioned to know what it is to live beyond your condition so that you may know, on a deep and profound level, how expansive the human experience can be...so you could know what freedom really is.  This is all a part of our soul's journey...mine as well.  You may not find words, ideas, notions, and the like as too what this experience brings to you.  You may not find the "holy grail," you may not find just what you were looking for...but you just might find the feeling that tells you everything!