The experience of
birth, life, death and the world is reality within the waking experience. The
innermost Self is nothing to do with
the experience of birth, life death because it is birthless. The one, which is
born, lives and dies is in the world is the waking entity. Waking entity is not
the self. The self is that, which
witnesses the coming and going of the three states without the physical
apparatus. The experience of birth, life, death and the
world (waking) is an object to the formless subject (soul, the innermost
self). Thus the object (mind or universe
or waking) is mere illusion on the standpoint of the formless subject (soul).
Man has a firm
conviction that he is an individual separate from the world and world existed
prior to him and he is born in in it afterwards. This conviction makes him remain in
ignorance. And ignorance makes him accept the illusion as reality. Thus he is caught up in the web of illusion
experiencing the birth, life, death and the world as reality.
What is this universe (samsara), what is this illusion to
the formless soul or consciousness, the innermost self? Consciousness and the universe both are one
in essence ultimately. Only people who
are stuck to the reality of the universe think the body as body, ego as ego and
the world as world. It never strikes to
them the waking experience in which they exist along with their world also as
unreal as dream.
The dream becomes unreal when waking takes place and the
waking becomes unreal when waking entity gets wisdom and realizes it is not the
self but the self is the formless witness (soul) of the three states. The consciousness is within the three states
as their formless substance and it is apart from the three states as their
formless witness. It is apart because it
is not and entity or identity within the three states.
The person, who stamped their foot on the ground to refute
to show the world, is real, ignore that in dream he would do exactly the
same--stamp his dream foot on the ground and assert it to be real.
When wisdom dawns, the soul, the innermost self, wakes up
in its formless nondual true nature in the midst of duality (waking). For a
Gnani the body, ego and the universe are mere mirage created out of
consciousness.
When universe (mind) is considered not
different from the consciousness (soul), which is the innermost self, then
there is the division of form, time and space.
When form, time and space are one in essence than where is the universe
(mind).
The universe (waking) is both real and unreal.
It is real because it is a manifestation of consciousness, but is unreal, in
the sense, that it is not absolute and eternal like consciousness itself.
Many thinkers approach is more practical, and they are stuck with the reality of the universe (waking), they take it as real. Thus they are stuck to the reality of the illusory experience of the birth, life, death and the world as reality. Thus it is necessary to realize the man and the world confronts him are one in essence in order to realize the form, time and space are one in essence.
