The stranger explains. “Right now you think you are a person talking to me. But that’s just who you temporarily appear to be in this dream. The real you is the dreamer. And this whole dream-world exists in you.”
The stranger is reassuring. “Don’t worry. You’re just beginning to wake up. This is a dream of awakening. It is designed to make you progressively more conscious, until you’re conscious enough to realise that you’re dreaming.” You are confused. “But I don’t understand. How do I wake up?” The stranger looks you straight in the eye. “You can wake up anytime you want. You simply have to want to wake up more than you fear it. And there is nothing to fear. Waking up feels good. Knowing you are dreaming is the secret of enjoying the dream.”
You are no longer frightened of all the terrors that may afflict you in the dream, because you know that the ‘real you’ is safe. Even if the person you seem to be were to die it would be OK, because actually you are the dreamer.
He turns to you briefly and grins. “Enjoy the dream. And help everyone else to enjoy it as well, because we are all you.”
I feel privileged that you have invited me into your mind to share these ideas with you. And I don’t want to abuse your hospitality by wasting any of your valuable time. So I’ve kept things as concise as possible, by distilling down the simple essence of lucid philosophy. But that makes for rich reading, which means this book needs to be savoured not gulped. Speed-reading may lead to mental indigestion. The more consciously you read, the more likely you are to experience lucid living.
When I compare life to a dream I do not mean to denigrate it as some sort of meaningless fantasy. Life is too wonderful to be called an illusion, unless we whisper the word in amazement, as we might when witnessing the most astonishing magic trick.
What could be more magnificent than this glorious universe, in all its multifarious extravagance, its awesome vastness and delicate detail, its impersonal precision and intimate intensity, its harsh necessities and lush sensuality? Lucid living is realising how marvellous life really is.
I can’t promise to wake you up. Lucid living is like falling in love. It happens when it happens. You can’t force it and you can’t prevent it. But I can take you on a blind date with some extremely bold and beautiful ideas. And – you never know – it might be the beginning of something big! So let me introduce our first insight …
Life Is A Mystery
The idea that life is like a dream seems preposterous because we presume we are already wide awake. But most of the time we are so unconscious we don’t even notice the most obvious thing about existence – it is an enigma of mind-boggling enormity. Life is the mother of all mysteries – quite literally! Yet we are normally so asleep that we manage to go about our daily business as if being alive is nothing remarkable.
Here we are. Meeting in this perpetual moment we call ‘now’. Participants in this bizarre business we call ‘life’. Awaiting the inevitable ending we call ‘death’. What’s it all about?! Do you know? Does anyone really know?
That puts things in perspective, don’t you think? Our predicament is so profoundly puzzling it is astonishing that we aren’t permanently perplexed. Most of us rush around as if there is no more to life than making a living and not thinking about dying. We never stop to wonder.
It is as if we are mesmerised by our assumptions about life into a semi-conscious trance, which anaesthetises us to the awesome strangeness of existence. That is until the bubble bursts and we unexpectedly wake up.
Whatever form the wake-up call takes, for a marvellous moment we shake off the numbness we call ‘normality’ and find ourselves immersed in overwhelming, unfathomable, breathtaking mystery. Have you ever had an experience like this? The fact that we normally take life for granted, when it is actually so utterly mysterious, shows how unconscious we usually are.
Now Is All You Know
We believe we know what is going on, but really we don’t. Most of us assume our everyday understanding of life is right. But can we really be so certain? I want to suggest that all we actually know for sure is what we are experiencing right now. And if we really pay attention to our experience of this moment we will discover that life is like a dream.
So, the only way to really understand life is to examine your own immediate experience of living. Isn’t that an empowering realisation! If you want to know what is going on, you can’t rely on me or anyone else to tell you.
You must find out for yourself by paying attention to what you are experiencing right now. And – I want to suggest – if you do become more conscious of this present moment, you will discover that life is like a dream.
Lucid living isn’t believing the theory that life is like a dream. It is directly experiencing the dream-like nature of reality in this present moment.
You Are Not A Person
I am suggesting that life is like a dream. Right now you appear to be a person in the life-dream. But this is only your ‘apparent identity’, it is not who you really are. Your ‘essential identity’ is much less concrete and much more mysterious. You are awareness witnessing the life-dream. Take a look with me …
The ‘I’ is aware of an ever-changing stream of experiences right now.
Isn’t the essential ‘you’ no different now from when you were much younger? What is this essential ‘you’ that is constant and enduring? It is awareness. Awareness is the constant background of all your experiences. Awareness is the unchanging witness of all that changes. Awareness is a perpetual presence that is always present.
The World Exists In You
In a dream you appear to be a dream-persona in a dream-world, but essentially you are awareness and the dream-world exists within you. In the same way, right now you appear to be a person in the life-dream, but essentially you are awareness and the life-dream exists within you. Let’s examine the moment …
You are timeless awareness dreaming itself to be a person in time.
All Is One
When we dream we appear to be one of many characters in the dream-drama. However, everyone and everything in the dream is being imagined by one dreaming awareness. I want to suggest it is the same right now. We appear to be many separate individuals. However, we are all different characters in the life-dream that is being dreamt by the one life-dreamer. Let’s explore this together …
We are formless awareness dreaming itself to be many individuals with different experiences in the life-dream. We appear to be separate, but essentially we are one.
Lucid living is realising you are both the hero of your particular story and the imagination that is conceiving the whole cosmic drama.
You Are A Paradox
You are both the source of the life-dream and a character within it. You are the life-dreamer imagining yourself to be a particular person in the life-dream. While you identify exclusively with your life-persona you will remain unconsciously engrossed in the life-dream. Lucid living happens when you become conscious of both poles of your paradoxical nature. Give it a go …
Try it again … You appear to be a person in time. Flip it around. You are a permanent presence witnessing an ever-changing flow of appearances. Try it again … You appear to be a separate individual. Flip it around. You are the life-dreamer experiencing existence from a particular point of view. One more time … You appear to be a character in the life-dream. Flip it around. You are the life-dreamer and everything is you.
Waking up to the oneness of your essential identity doesn’t negate your individuality. Quite the opposite. Lucid living is understanding just how important your individuality is, because it is by dreaming itself to be you as an individual that the life-dreamer is able to experience the life-dream.
Waking up doesn’t mean withdrawing from life and becoming detached. Quite the opposite. It means wholeheartedly engaging with the life-dream as an amazing adventure of self-discovery.
Being One Is Loving All
Since time immemorial wise men and women have been assuring us that love is the only solution to our problems – and they are right. Only love can heal the divisions between us, because love is the realisation that we are one. When we assume we are just separate individuals we act in our limited self-interest, regardless of the suffering we may cause others. Being lost in separateness leads to selfishness and suffering. But becoming conscious of oneness leads to the selfless desire to create universal wellbeing.
It means harming others is hurting ourselves. It means revenge – even against the most hideous criminals – is hurting ourselves again. It means war – no matter how righteous – is grotesque self-mutilation.
You Are The One
Sometimes when people talk about awakening they describe the dream of life as a pernicious illusion we need to escape, but that doesn’t feel right to me. The more I dissolve into the oneness, the more animated I feel as a unique individual. The more I feel filled with limitless love, the more I long to share it. The more I wake up, the more precious this dream of life becomes to me. So this is my heartfelt message to you, dear friend …
You are the life-dreamer dreaming the dream of you. It is an amazing, transformative, bittersweet dream, full of laughter and tears, triumphs and losses, hope and despair. If you give yourself to this great dream it will awaken you to what-is. If you consciously engage with this deep drama it will teach you kindness and make you wise. So why not dare to commit to the adventure of your life? Because essentially you are always safe, even when the life-dream becomes a nightmare. That’s right, isn’t it?
You are the one you’ve been waiting for. I am writing these words to wake you up, because I see what a wonder you are.
You are infinite potential playing at being a person. The creativity that created the whole universe is within you and it wants to express itself through you. Can you hear the call to share your gifts with the world? You are the mystery of life made manifest. I am in awe of your vastness and touched by your fragility. I see your greatness and your smallness – and I celebrate both.
You are different from me and yet we are one. And it is only because we are both separate and the same that we can love one another. That’s beautiful! I want you to see yourself as I see you. So that we can help each other to make this journey of life. So that we can inspire each other when we feel lucid and in love. And comfort each other when we feel lost and alone. So that we can walk each other home.