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Originally Posted by JustASimpleGuy
Vivekananda used the metaphor of polishing a mirror to describe one's spiritual practice. The more polished the mirror, the greater degree it manifests, reflects or is illumined by unmanifested consciousness/awareness. So a rock is a dull mirror, a tree more polished, an animal still more polished and man much more polished.
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The dust in that metaphor is a human merged consciousness focusing on and experiencing conceptual delusional reality as opposed to "what actually is" before it is related to through the conceptual. The rock is not alive, therefore not conscious or aware, the tree is not able to focus on created conceptual reality as it does not have a brain to make such stuff, so a tree has no dust and perceives directly "with a dust free mirror" but obviously the consciousness of a tree is not the consciousness that merges with a human body and mind, so what the tree is aware of is related to the structure of the tree consciousness itself and the aspects or qualities it contains as well of potential senses in the organism of the tree, chemical, root structures, leaves etc.
Trees and plants are actually aware of things humans are not but then their potential of understanding is limited by their design. Brains and brain size and brain DNA is related to how much intelligence one has and intelligence is related to how much one can understand or be aware of. So while a tree can "know" or be aware of a pest eating it's leaves or roots, and therefore react with chemicals to repel such pests, and can also alert other plants in the area by chemicals released in the wind or through connected root structures, it cannot know the origins of the pests as a human can or how to eradicate or deal with them in advanced ways.
Likewise, animals, depending on brain size and structure, may not be able to conceptualize, (great apes and dolphins can for example) so may not have the ability to create "dust" but like plants, freedom in choosing what they are aware of is limited by their design. It is more of an automatic process as changes in perception "rotate" according to their programming and internal and external factors. Dogs and cats go though different moods and emotions as humans do, though they live much more in the moment as thought as reality is not a process in their brains. Most lower animals are also free of "dust" in this regard. The most intelligent animals have dust but it does not become dominant in them as it can in humans.
The reality is humans are intentionally designed to have conceptual human created content dominate the organism and consciousness. To have the created dust be the bright shiny object that attracts the attention. The reason for this is the human incarnation exists to entice the consciousness to develop more awareness as a means to escape this unpleasant conflict filled experience.