Freedom Is an Embodied State
Why you can transcend the mind without living in a cave
There is no opposition between freedom on the one hand and success and material wealth on the other.
The opposition is between freedom and any conditioned idea. Whether that be success, or romance or a steady income.
A conditioned idea is a circumstantial one. If it were not for a specific set of good or bad feelings associated with an idea, you would not believe it. Whereas truth is enduring, and does not depend on belonging to a given time or culture in which an idea is hitched to some inner pleasure (the pleasure of being right, moral, important or ‘in the know’). Truth is also intricate, innocent and recognizes non-linearity. A conditioned belief keeps firing whenever the original stimulus is repeated.
Even though the listener is not the same man, and it is not the same stimulus.
People’s confusion lies in the fact that they see freedom as a concept. A concept is fungible: just like two 100 dollar bills, freedom for a 20 year old man in Somalia is seen as having the same properties as for a 78 year old woman in the US. In each case, freedom is supposed to be a removal from whatever (also fungible) idea the person has of worldly success.
But freedom is not a concept. The word ‘freedom,’ as opposed to the state, merely allows for a reminder to shift position and look in that direction.
Freedom is an embodied state. To me, it is a pervasive absence of tension in the body. Since an absence of tension attests to getting beyond conditioning, and beyond the need to manage the movement of emotion, this makes it very useful for earning money and making friends.
