Hostility, competition, love, furniture, money, narrative, excitement all mark the dreaming of this life. There’s always a trail that we are following in a dream. It’s real, it’s vivid, it’s saturated with emotion and meaning. It doesn’t have to make sense in a usual way, only that it appears as real, in the moment. It makes sense in its own way. That’s always the case in a dream in sleep. We don’t even question it. Not until some moment of lucidity stirs aware of a question, “Oh, wait a minute, I’m dreaming. Wake up!” And then our eyes open and the world that was so complete and true a moment ago is suddenly nowhere, replaced by ordinary surroundings, sensations, thoughts, what we believe is really real.
But is it? What happens to this reality, when we close our eyes and awareness drifts, disappears, to re-up in some other realm, which we call “dream”. It’s worth looking into what is it that distinguishes the sleeping dreams from the waking dream? This question is an approach to awakening in both. The characteristics of continual change, profound transformation, infinite possibilities and continual emergence mark both states. Do you find this to be true in your own experience?