We've Been Living in a Dream World
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We've Been Living in a Dream World by Jean-Claude Koven
"Most people are other people," Oscar Wilde once remarked.
"Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their lives a
mimicry, their passions a quotation." As he so wryly observed,
the vast majority of us are not who we've been pretending to be,
and the lives we've been living until now are molded according
to rules and values that are not our own. Most of humanity is
stuck in someone else's discarded chewing gum and has yet to
break free.
Unless you have been brave enough to forsake this trap, here is
your likely portrait: your religious convictions are those of
your parents or community; you root for your hometown sports
teams; your political allegiances conform to the party system
that society offers; you are an avid observer of the cultural
pageantry, like the Super Bowl and the Oscars; your holidays are
the standard ones, such as Christmas, New Year's Eve, and
Independence Day; you look to your political and religious
leaders for guidance and protection; you feel driven to
succeed--to make more money, to live a better life.
These are worthy and desirable choices that hold families and
societies together. They make you who you are, you might argue.
True, but only if you are content with admiring the wrapping and
never looking inside the box. If you dared to look, you'd
discover how these basic thoughts originate in a fundamental
belief formed during the first years of your life: that survival
depends on obeying the rules. Children typically bend their
perceptions and interpretations of reality to match those of
their parents and others who care for them. They find clever
ways to please in order to receive attention and belong. As they
grow up, the people and issues may change over time, but the
initial patterns of conformity remain deeply ingrained in the
subconscious.
The price for surrendering to consensus is steep. It is nothing
less than the loss of individuality and curiosity. Without these
two magnificent attributes, you disengage from the grandness of
the creation and implode into the holographic illusion humans
have come to call reality. You become one of Oscar Wilde's other
people, thinking someone else's opinions and assuming they are
your own.
We are trapped in the daily drama the culture and the media feed
us: mortgages, sporting events, tsunamis, sex offenders, AIDS,
terrorism, global warming, corrupt governments, and economic
inequities . . . all demanding our attention. The matrix plays
us like an instrument. A thirty-second news bite can push our
buttons. We get hooked and riled, liberally lacing our
collective guts with corrosive biochemicals unleashed by our
righteous indignation.
This condition is virtually universal. It is also the underlying
cause of the world as we know it. People cling so tightly to
their personal and social identities that they are blinded to
anything that does not validate them. The inevitable product is
a world of war, greed, and competition, driven by paranoia and
fear.
The way out is easier than anyone might imagine. However, very
few summon the courage, for it requires them to leave the
comfort of their known world and walk alone, unaided by the
crutch of belief and dogma, into the domain of pure
consciousness. Most people would rather get caught up in the
business of earning a living, raising a family, or helping their
community than deal with the unsettling immensity of All That
Is.
Yet it seems that all humans are meant to take this epic journey
of discovery at some point in their series of lives on this
planet. If you choose to walk this path, you will find yourself
gaining a new perspective--that of consciousness, where the
mind, with its judgments and emotions, ceases to dominate and
the heart is your only reliable guide. The great issues of your
daily life that once commanded your attention now seem
wondrously arbitrary and irrelevant--simply interesting
experiences that lasted far too long and became unnecessarily
weighty.
You now see the illusion for what it is: a game-board projection
designed so aspects of the Oneness can experience duality, fear,
and separation. It is no more real than a programmed matrix in a
computer game. You and I are merely units of awareness projected
into the matrix, defining ourselves by the points through which
we view and believing what we see to be reality. Who did the
projecting? You. Who is the projection? You. There is only you.
How do you get to this liberating place from which you can see
the larger picture?
The cosmic formula of creation is gloriously simple: Attention +
Intention = Manifestation. Nothing in the universe evades this
law. The reality you perceive is entirely a function of the only
two forces at your command: your attention and your intention.
Bring conscious awareness to this equation--consciously monitor
your attention and intention and what you are manifesting--and
everything changes.
Through this ongoing process of self-observation it will become
increasingly clear that the part of you that is projected into
the illusion is in trouble. This realization in fact marks the
beginning of your journey out of the illusion. Once you begin to
couple the law of Attention + Intention = Manifestation with the
concept of Oneness, you begin to see a completely different
picture. You are All That Is. There is nowhere for you to go,
nothing to attain, no lessons to learn.
If you buy into the reality that you are an earthbound human
stuck in the struggle of life, presto, there you are. If you
focus on the part of you that is watching you flounder in the
illusion, snap, you're free. It can't get much easier than that.
Yet why are so few of us awake?
The written or spoken word can do no more than point the way.
And trading one belief system for another accomplishes nothing.
The answer lies elsewhere. Waking up is a consequence of
induction. Just a few years ago you might have placed yourself
in the presence of a guru or master and, through devotion,
discipline, or some other practice, gradually assumed some of
his or her enlightenment. Now, using the law of A + I = M, you
become your own master. By focusing your attention on the part
of you that is watching the rest of you floundering in the
illusion, you are taking a giant step in restoring control over
how your attention is commanded. If you add the intention of
reclaiming your essence, you complete the formula that can only
result in the manifestation of whatever your curiosity seeks to
explore.
The payoff of having been so deeply mired in the illusion that
you nearly succumbed is compassion for those still stuck in the
matrix, coupled with a large dose of humility. You have learned
that the illusion is perfect exactly as it is. The only thing
that needs to change is the point from which we view it. Now all
that's left is for you to summon the courage to begin the
journey home.
- 30 - __________________________________ Jean-Claude Koven is a
writer and speaker based in Rancho Mirage, CA. He is the author
of Going Deeper: How to Make Sense of Your Life When Your Life
Makes No Sense, the Allbooks Reviews editor's choice for the
best metaphysical book of 2004. Recipient of USABookNews.com
best metaphysical book award. For more information, please visit
www.goingdeeper.org. __________________________________