Dream & Waking States

[M Suresh]

  After so many earlier  postings on dreams the reaction of  many of you to
  this post would  be "Oh not that  again!".  But I am somewhat new to this
  group and had another idea on the difference between the dream and waking
  states.  So please bear with yet another posting on dreams.

  I am only giving another difference between the two states and not trying
  to disprove the opinion of anyone especially of Gaudapaada or Shankara or
  Ramana Maharishi.

  The  commonality between  the 2  states is  that one  does not  doubt the
  reality  of either  the waking  state or  the dream  state while  in that
  state.

  Let  us  consider another  fundamental  capability  pertaining to  the  2
  states.  The ability to  analyse the other  state while  experiencing one
  state.  We find that we can analyse  the dream state in  our waking state
  and pronounce  it as  just a  bunch of mental  creations,  having no more
  reality than that.  But can we do  any kind of an analysis  of the waking
  state  from the  dream state?  We find  that such  a thing  is impossible
  because  the dream  state  steals  the entire  waking  state reality  for
  building the dream experience.  One just CANNOT question about the waking
  state as  another state when dreaming  because one is deluded  that he is
  awake while  dreaming,  the very basis of the  dream state is  the stolen
  reality of  the waking  state.  In my last posting on  the subject  I had
  only said  that I had not  encountered the situation.  But on analysing I
  find that such a situation is impossible.

  So in the dreaming state I can at the most analyse the dream state itself
  since I am pretending to be awake.  I have had such a dream.

  The dream  was that  I was walking  along a familiar  road and  musing to
  myself about Ramana Mahrishi's pronouncement  that the world was a dream.
  I was  saying to myself "What  nonsense is this concept  about this world
  being a dream.  I suppose I am expected to beleive that this road and all
  the people  on it are part  of a dream!",  just then a fire  engine comes
  along ringing its  bell and I continue with my  thoughts "..and I suppose
  this  fire engine  which  would have  been  built by  so  many people  so
  meticulously is also part  of a dream".  The dream ended with that when I
  woke up  to the  alarm clock's  ringing ( which  was translated  into the
  dream as the fire engine's siren/bell ) thoroughly amused at the irony of
  the whole dream  in which I was  denying having a dream  dreaming all the
  while.

  Coming back to the comparison between the waking and dream state, we find
  that it is possible to analyse the dream state from the waking state, but
  the reverse is not  possible.  So the waking state is a higher state from
  which you can look down upon the dream ( and deep sleep? ) state but from
  the lower dream state you cannot look upto the waking state.

  So in my opinion the waking state  is superior to the dream state as long
  as the  talk of states  comes in.  But if one denies all  states ( ajaati
  vaada ) then that is okay.

Namaskar,
Suresh.