Life is But a Dream

Row, row, row, your boat, gently down the stream…

One day the realization comes that life is but a dream.

We’ve never experienced a world out there. All we have experienced is an interpretation of a world that appears to be out there.

Every human being (and every other creature) is having their own unique experience of this moment. Who then is experiencing the ‘real world’? Nobody of course. There is no world beyond interpretation. It’s all empty. It’s the stuff of dreams. The dreamer creates the dream, and the dream creates the dreamer.

All teachers are characters in a dream, and all teachings are part of that same dream. None of it can be trusted fully. To wake up is to realize this. It is not about waking up from the dream (dream characters don’t get to wake up). Liberation comes from realizing it is a dream.

As the teacher Nisargadatta once said:

“The very idea of going beyond the dream is illusory. Why go anywhere? Just realize that you are dreaming a dream you call the world, and stop looking for ways out.”

Or to put in even more simply:

Row, row, row your boat,

Gently down the stream,

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,

Life is but a dream.