What if the mind or brain makes empty awareness? What if the knowing presence is just the brain ‘being mellow’, like the brain has a blank screen on at all times? Awareness is present no matter what. It is what I refer to as myself. How can I test to see if awareness isn’t just some white noise or something manufactured by the brain?
There is no experiential evidence that awareness or knowing presence is located in either a brain or a mind. The brain and the mind appear to awareness. Awareness does not appear to or in them.
Knowing presence is not just the mind ‘being mellow’, because it is present equally when the mind is agitated and peaceful, therefore it is not dependent on the state of the mind. As you quite rightly say, awareness is present no matter what. Test this out in your experience. Establish for yourself as a fact of experience that you, awareness, are present throughout all appearances of the mind, body and world, irrespective of how peaceful or agitated those appearances may be.
Awareness is like a TV screen: it is the entire substance of every image and at the same time it is completely unaffected by whatever appears on it.
This understanding is peace, because it is seen clearly that awareness cannot be disturbed. It is freedom, because it is seen clearly that awareness can take any shape from moment to moment. It is happiness, because it is seen clearly that awareness is always full of itself, needing or wanting nothing. It is love, because it is seen clearly that awareness is intimately one with every appearance.
See that awareness is the only element that is present in all experience, irrespective of the particular character of each experience, and that it is the only thing that remains over when individual appearances of the body, mind and world disappear.
