Wei Wu Wei makes it very clear, either everything is content in the dream mind is dreaming, or not: you can’t have it both ways, assuming someone existed to insist that’s possible. Either mind is the ultimate subject of ‘everything’ manifesting in this dream, or not, and if not, then there is no such thing as duality.
In working with clients, ‘waking up’ takes place in the dream because if right now is the dream mind is dreaming, then ‘the client’ is a dreamer in the dream, featured in “The Grand Parody” mind is dreaming, filling time defending the fiction it has a self, probably one that is ‘damaged,’ and delivering the defense of this fiction while playing the part of a less than okay person.
This is all content in the dream mind is dreaming, and when you begin to wake up in the dream, truth comes into focus, sometimes quite suddenly, that the dream is on, as usual, and that it features dreamers vigorously filling time defending the fiction the self they have is real, in defense of the fiction the dreamers are real people.
In “The Grand Parody” mind is dreaming, this is “The Main Event” in this dream. Dreamers, in the guise of people, firmly entrenched in the defense of “The Master Lie, that ‘THIS’ is real and not a dream, refer to this as “ego madness.” The last thing they want to know is that the fiction right now is real rides on the fiction someone actually has a self. What makes “The Grand Parody” mind is dreaming a parody is that the defense of “The Master Lie” is “The Main Event” mind is dreaming. If ‘everything’ can only be content in the dream mind is dreaming, then the dream mind is dreaming features “The Anti-truth Game,” or TAG for short, as the centerpiece in “The Grand Parody.”
TAG reflects the sum of all the ways the dreamers in this parody defend the fiction the self is real to defend the fiction they are ‘real people’ in a ‘real reality,’ outside the dream mind is dreaming. Nothing ‘going on’ has anything to do with people because mind is dreaming ‘everything’ just the way it manifests as this dream, including, as “The Main Event,” what it takes for a dreamer in the dream to defend the fiction a self will stand as proof for the fiction people exist, especially if ‘the self’ is ‘damaged.’ It is no accident that “The Victim Parody” assumes center stage in this dream. It is no accident that the most popular personhood skit features ‘the self starring as a tragic figure.’ Time is the venue for “The Grand Parody” mind is dreaming: in fact, time provides the context for what mind is dreaming. The dream happens in time to the degree time and the dream are one and the same thing.
A good part of my work focuses on when the dream featured the dreamer inventing the self it would drag through time to defend the fiction it is a ‘real person’ in this dream. The reason for this is simple: defending a fiction as if it is a fact explains the origin of suffering in this dream. No dreamer in this dream is, or can ever be, a person, and filling time exclusively in defense of this fiction is guaranteed suffering. You can’t lift a 500 hundred pound weight with one hand no matter how hard you try. While it is true mind is dreaming this parody, and almost all dreamers will invent a self to play the part of some kind of a person in this dream, it is also true that any dreamer in this dream, in potential, can wake up precisely because no dreamer in this dream can defect from the fact that is what it is.
Only dreamers in this dream fill time engaged in the game of TAG, and only dreamers get to retrieve this fact and let go of the fiction they can prove they are a person based on an invented self. All dreamers know this at some unconscious level because the dream clearly displays the dreamer’s reluctance to confront the fact we depend on the invented self to play the game of TAG, as if the game is winnable.
No one can win the game of TAG because it takes place in the dream mind is dreaming. The dream mind is dreaming is ‘going on’ right now, and it clearly displays the degree to which each dreamer defends the fiction ‘a real someone has a real self.’ Because there is no one to have a self, this being only a mind generated dream, TAG is highly competitive, featuring the intensity of the dreamer’s investment in the skit it occupies to defend the fiction a dreamer with a personhood skit will prove it is a ‘real person’ in a dream, if it tries hard enough. This is what makes this activity “The Grand Parody.” It is the dream mind is dreaming, and when you wake up, it all comes into focus as comedy. What could be funnier than dreamers in a dream trying to prove they are real people with a prop called “the self?” Because there is no one, literally, to have a self, its defense assumes center stage in this dream. It is what there is to pay attention to, and waking up includes paying attention to what mind is dreaming from one now to the next now.
The dream includes the moment in the dream when a dreamer invents the self it will drag through time to do personhood believably in this dream. Inventing the self takes place as an event in the dream. Because mind dreams “The Grand Parody” as “The Main event” in this dream, every dreamer in this dream will invent the self it will use to play the game of TAG. No dreamer can play the part of a person, convincingly, in this dream without inventing the self first.
The goal of TAG is to defend the lie the self is real to prove mind is not the dreamer of this dream. Mind dreams ‘the dreamers’ to feign defection from mind, using ‘the self’ as the prop to pull off this ruse. Once again, we are back to square one: either mind is the ultimate subject for ‘everything,’ or not. We can’t have it both ways. If ‘everything’ can only be content in the dream mind is dreaming, then that includes, as “The Main Event,” the sum of all the ways mind features ‘the dreamers’ playing the game of TAG. TAG displays all the ways the dreamers defend the fiction the invented self is sufficient to prove truth is false; that mind isn’t the source of this dream in its entirety.
If the dream is what right now is, then all suffering can only take place in the dream mind is dreaming. People don’t exist to suffer: dreamers suffer in the dream defending the lie the self will prove the dreamer is a person. The Buddha was spot on: “all life (in the dream) is about suffering.” Did that esteemed dreamer in the dream specify that the dream was the context for all ‘suffering?’ According to Wei Wu Wei, that ONE was awake, and one with the fact nothing is, or can ever be, any more real than content in the dream mind is dreaming.
It is inevitable that the dreamers in this dream will suffer as long as they fill time trying to prove truth is false, the truth being mind is the dreamer of this dream; the only ‘doer’ there is, and that the dream mind is dreaming includes the option for the dreamers in the dream to retrieve the fact mind is dreaming ‘everything,’ just the way it presents itself, including ‘the dreamers’ filling time in the dream trying to disprove mind as the source of everything.’ “The Grand Parody” mind is dreaming features how mind dreams the dreamers filling time engaged in the fiction that the invented self is sufficient to prove mind doesn’t exist, or if it does, it doesn’t play a major role in the dreamer’s life in the dream.
In the next installment, I will explore the moment in the dream when the dreamer invents the self it will use in the dream to drag our the fiction it is some kind of a person. The problem is there is no one, literally, to have anything wrong with them, so a dreamer can defend the lie it is a less than okay person as long as it can defend the fiction the self it has is damaged. Once a dreamer locks into ‘the damaged self skit,’ the lie it is a real, less than okay person rides on the reiteration of the skit, including the suffering that serves to document the lie ‘a suffering self qualifies as a real self.’ Self sabotage, for example, puts the defense of the invented self front and center, above happiness, well being, and success. In this dream, defending the lie we are the people we insist we are is job one in “The Grand Parody.” The good news is that nothing is any more real than the dream mind is dreaming. This is about as real as it can get!
