> How is it that we can so easily describe some things about our brain states, that we'd never realize by physically looking at what brains do and how they behave.
As a software developer, this should be simple. Programs have their own state that you can understand without knowing the exact formulations of electrons in the processor that ultimately make up that state.
X = 5 sure but good luck figuring that out looking at the motherboard of a running computer.
That's the "hard problem" of conciousness stated simply, and the answer to it would seemingly have to involve some quite direct access to some part of brain state physics - meaning that the physical properties involved are quite "basic" in some sense.