Tuesday, June 19, 2007
The Dream
The Buddhists say that we live in a dream. In the wakeful state, we perceive reality as a sort of dream that we are attached to. In sleep, we enter another state of consciousness where we are not attached to those dreams. In death, we enter yet another state of consciousness full of illusions or dreams. So, it's all one big dream. When an individual awakens or becomes enlightened, he doesn't awaken from the dream, the dream is perceived differently, just as our perceptions change when we awaken from sleep. Enlightenment is an alteration of perception, be it from scientific inquiry, meditation, life experience, psychoanalysis, LSD, creativity, or any other form of experiencing whatever reality or life is. I suppose that "Heaven" doesn't exist for a Buddhist unless it is the state where you escape the cycle of reincarnation, or maybe this world is Heaven to a Buddhist. I do know that we create a Heaven or Hell on this planet. Which one depends on each person's perception of their own reality.
Labels: perception reality
