One way to describe the nature of this world is to use the metaphor of a dream. When you’re dreaming, you experience all these objects and events. You have perceived histories with the people in your dream and may go through conflicts, communications, responsibilities, and phases of good and bad fortune. In the dream state, your unconscious mind can create any scenario and characters it desires.
What are your dreams made of? What are the people in your dreams made of? Who are they really? What are the situations and obstacles in your dreams made of? Every one of them is made of nothing but your own consciousness.
Think about it – you pick something up in a dream, and feel that it’s solid and separate from you, but it’s neither solid nor separate from you. It’s your own consciousness manifesting as the illusion of that object and all the other objects in your dream.
If a spiritual person came up to you in your dream and said, “We’re all one!” your dream persona may think the person is a little strange or “out there.” But the person would be absolutely right. Everything in your dream is created from the same creative consciousness of your so-called “unconscious mind.”
This dream metaphor is similar to what some of the world’s most profound philosophies say this entire universe is. You are one with the creator of the whole thing, but you disguise yourself and cover the truth. Then you get to experience your life as real and existing outside of yourself. It’s exciting because you never know what will happen next!
Above all the goals and concerns you may have within your waking-state-dream, the foremost goal from a spiritual perspective is to know that you’re dreaming and to WAKE UP!!!
Shifting into a higher perspective
Shifting into a higher perspective means living with a “universe is Consciousness” attitude. This shift means that you know it’s all God even when it doesn’t all feel like God.
This shift doesn’t mean that you have to follow a certain set of behaviors. Being in a higher perspective doesn’t mean that you never feel sad or weep, but that when you weep, you weep fully; and when you’re done weeping, you stop.
When you live in a “universe is Consciousness” perspective, you’re not trapped by the past or afraid of the future. You have equal respect for everyone and everything. You know that everyone who comes before you is a manifestation of Consciousness — even telemarketers (although it is fine to cut conversations short with certain forms of supreme Consciousness!)
First cause versus second cause
A vase that sits on a table in your dream is made of your very own consciousness. It may take on the appearance of glass, metal, or clay, but the first-cause “substance” of which the vase in your dream is made is consciousness. You could call the other perceived qualities of the vase second-cause.
If you drop a glass vase in your dream, it is likely that the vase will appear to shatter and equally possible that you may cut your dream-finger while picking up the glass fragments. Aha! Physical evidence that the experience is real, right?
Here are observations of the first and second causes in this dream experience:
Second-cause: The shape, color, and sharpness of the glass shards are second-cause qualities of the vase.
First-cause: Your own creative consciousness is the first cause behind the dream vase as well as your bleeding dream finger. According to the ancient spiritual sages, a higher-level form of the same first-cause consciousness that creates your dreams has also created your waking state and the so-called real world.
Universal first-cause is the mother of this whole creation. First-cause can change anything, create new worlds, and answer any prayer.
With an awareness of the divine nature of this world, you can look at everything as an opportunity to interact with the Divine. Look for God in all the right places, which is everywhere. Touch God, feel God, taste God inside and out.
See God in nature, in trees, in birds and other animals, in the sun and the rain, and in the moon and stars that shine at night. See divine Consciousness manifesting in and as your loved ones, your not-so-loved ones, and of course yourself.