So your one night's dream is actually a series of separate episodes!
In the first episode, you see in your dream you are in college. In the second episode, when you come back to the dream state after your spell of deep sleep, you see you are getting married. In the third episode, when you reenter the dream state, you see you have a son. Maybe in the fourth episode, you see your son getting married.
An important thing you need to understand here: in these different episodes, you do see the same world even in the dream state!
Am I right?
You do see the same world in the dream state.
So please understand: just because you wake up to the same world every morning after the night's break, it cannot be the scale to define this world as reality.
This happens even in the dream state!
Sometimes people ask me,
'Swamiji, I'm not the only one seeing this world, all the people living around me are also seeing this world in the same way. So how can you say it is a dream?'
Understand: in a dream, if you are visiting a particular city along with your family, your dream family will naturally see the same city as you are seeing because they are also projections of your mind!
Understand, it is a very subtle point!
If you can catch this, it will really lead to a very big clarity. It can really revolutionize the way in which you think about your life, the way in which you try to solve the problems of your life. There is a beautiful story:
A person is dreaming.
In the dream he sees a tiger chasing him and starts screaming, 'Oh, a tiger is chasing me! Save me, save me!' His friend is sleeping next to him. He wakes up and he sees that his friend is screaming for help in his sleep, What is the best help he can offer his friend? Just wake him up! Instead, if he tries to hand his sleeping friend a weapon to kill the dream tiger, can you imagine what will happen? The right solution at that moment is just to tell him, 'Wake up!'
If you try to find any other solution, it will only lead to more and more problems.
Who knows, this life in the waking state can be another long dream! You may wake up in a few minutes and discover that your entire life till now was just a dream.
When you realize this possibility, that what you call life can be one more long dream, naturally you will turn much of your attention and awareness to the center, to the consciousness.
I can say, this is the first step in spirituality.
This is the first step towards the psychological revolution.
Again and again, our sufferings are giving us a clear statement: we are holding onto emptiness.
All our suffering is nothing but a clear statement from reality: you are not living with the reality.
The ultimate Truth is: the stuff out of which your dream world is made is the same stuff out of which this waking world is also made.
If your attention is centered on the stuff, naturally the inner healing cannot happen.
If your attention is equally distributed on the consciousness and the stuff, that is what I call healthy life, balanced life. You will have physical health, mental health, and a vibrant life.
If your attention is totally centered on the consciousness, that is what I call jeevanmukti or living enlightenment!
Simply understanding that this whole world is one more dream brings tremendous inner healing to you.
Whenever you are facing a big difficulty or depression in life, if you realize very clearly, consciously, that this whole thing is a dream, you will simply relax, and the inner healing starts happening in you.
That inner healing is what I call meditation.
That restful awareness which happens in you is what I call satori, the first glimpse of samadhi.
Q. If enlightenment means waking up from the world-dream, why do so many enlightened Masters display siddhi (thaumaturgical powers)? Are these powers not expressed in the material world?
First thing: All siddha may not be enlightened, and all enlightened Masters may not display siddhi!
When a person gets enlightened, he wakes up from the dream of this world. Then, he has a choice to consciously re-enter the dream and play as he wishes!