Dreams that happen when we are asleep in bed at night are usually something people barely remember if at all. I remember most every detail of many of mine. They are in full color, have smells, light, shadows, people, animals, places, emotions. I feel like I actually experience them. Sometimes I'm me, sometimes I'm watching me be pretty much me. Sometimes while dreaming, I realize I'm repeating a dream I've already had. When that happens, I get the feeling I remember what and how things happened the last time and I think to change them for a better outcome this time around and I change the experience.
I usually bore people to tears recounting my varied, detailed dream experiences. A few of my closest friends get me on this front and find it fascinating, remarkable even. I have one friend who can always break them down for what they might mean in my waking life.
So, what about dreams we have in our waking life? Like of taking a fabulous vacation, finding a true love, graduating from college, beating cancer, making a big difference in the world, winning the lottery, having children and grandchildren, learning to speak another language...what makes us dream those dreams and reach for them? First through our subconscious, we feel a pull to certain places, things, people; a little urge that might seem like a passing fancy. Then maybe our consciousness gets a little clearer on it and we investigate a little. Can we really have, be, or do that? So we decide mentally, "Yes!" and then with our words and actions, we bring these dreams to fruition. Or not. But the point is, most of us have had a dream we ourselves made come true by our own volition. So at that point, this life becomes a dream – you living what once was just a notion.
I think it might even go a step further. What if we (humanity) are living representations of a bigger dream? Like actors on a stage, playing roles, saying lines, gaining experiences, interacting with the rest of the cast. And this is a HUGE play! None of it any more "real" than the ones we conjure in our sleep. We think we feel pain and pleasure, ups and downs, fears and bravery, connection or rejection...the list of dualities goes on. And we react to all of it as if it were true; a part of ourselves, a requirement of this life.
Well, what if one day you woke up from this whole life and realized none of it had been real? Just like after a sleeping dream. What if sense pleasures were imagined as good, and trials imagined as evil, when actually the opposite was true? That sense pleasures had tricked and deluded you, while trials caused you to seek some deeper meaning and ultimately taught you what you actually knew all along, but forgot!
What if you woke up from the dream of this life to a beautiful and all encompassing light and the experience of complete peace and joy beyond description? No ego, no senses, no thoughts, no words, just being – where everything and nothing were the same because duality had ceased to exist. And along with every other verity, you knew you had always been a soul, perfect in every way, created in the image of the Divine.
And there you have it!
