VI
THE THREE STATES: WAKING,
DREAM AND SLEEP

THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE DREAM
and the waking state except that the dream is short and the
waking long. Both are the result of the mind. Our real state is
called turiya ^[?], which is beyond the waking, dream and sleep
states.

The Self alone exists and remains as It is. The three states owe their existence to avichara (non-enquiry), and enquiry
puts an end to them. However much one may explain, this
fact will not become clear until one attains Self-realization,
and wonders how he was blind to the self-evident and only
existence for so long.

All that we see is a dream, whether we see it in the dream state or waking state. On account of some arbitrary standards
about the duration of the experience and so on, we call one
experience a dream and another waking experience. With
reference to Reality both the experiences are unreal. A man
might have an experience such as getting anugraha (grace)
in his dream, and the effects and influence of it on his entire
subsequent life may be so profound and abiding, that one
cannot call it unreal - whilst calling real some trifling incident
in the waking life that just flits by, which is casual, of no
consequence and is soon forgotten. Once I had an experience,
a vision or a dream, whatever you may call it. I and some
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others, including Chadwick, had a walk on the hill. Returning,
we were walking along a huge street with great buildings on
either side. Pointing out the street and the buildings, I asked
Chadwick and others, whether anybody could say that what
we were seeing was a dream, and they all replied, `Which
fool will say so?' We then walked along, entered the hall and
the vision or dream ceased, or I woke up. What are we to
call this?

Just before waking up from sleep, there is a very brief state, free from thought. That should be made permanent.

In dreamless sleep there is no world, no ego and no unhappiness, but the Self remains. In the waking state there
are all of these. Yet there is the Self. One has only to remove
the transitory happenings in order to realize the ever-present
beatitude of the Self.

Your nature is bliss. Find that on which all the rest are superimposed and you then remain as the pure Self.

In sleep there is no space or time. They are concepts, which arise after the `I-thought' has arisen. You are beyond time and
space. The `I-thought' is the limited `I'. The real `I' is
unlimited, universal, beyond time and space. Just while rising
from sleep and before seeing the objective world, there is
state of awareness which is your Pure Self. That must
be known.

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