Doing Whatever You Want Isn't Freedom, it's Slavery

I’ll do what the heck I want. I’m free!

Baby, that’s not freedom, it’s being a prisoner of your mind. Don’t get deceived.

Your mind comes up with a thought of craving and you pursue it. You avoid something your mind shows aversion to.

Tell me, how come you are free if all you do is just follow the dictates of the mind?

Whether we have 'Free Will' or not is an article for another time. But long story short is, we don't.

You say you decide whether to eat that cookie. You say you’re making a conscious decision. But you’re mistaken.

When you say you decide, your decision is based on a thought that arose in your mind without effort or will on your part.

Can you will yourself to think a thought?

Do you tell your mind to think this particular thought now and that one three seconds later?

And even if you can tell your mind what to do, does it listen?

No, right?

By now, all of the meditation junkies know that thoughts arise and disappear of their own accord, right?

So, when you say you do what you please, it’s simply you following the dictates of your mind, which is producing new thoughts every moment, sometimes of attraction and sometimes of aversion.

And this is slavery, right? Following a master(mind).

Can you will yourself to think a thought?

What to do instead

See, the problem is I usually don’t have solutions. But I can help you to think and ask better questions.

I am just observing and learning and sharing that.

But my intuition or insight tells me that instead of reacting to thoughts, can 'I' maintain a distance and just observe the thoughts?

Just observe without judgment or reaction.

When I try to do that, just observing, I wonder if it is even possible.

I wonder if I could do that, then who or what exactly is observing?

Can 'observing' observe itself?

Ask these questions and you might find an answer!