by
Paul
Benhaimenjoy our sleep and often our dreams. These dreams often seem
so real. Consider the story of a man who dreamt he was a
butterfly. When he awoke he could no longer tell whether he was a
man who had dreamt he was a butterfly or a butterfly who was
now dreaming he was a man.
When we sleep we are in the Chinese Yin state, we drop
everything, as we do in meditation. We watch our thoughts drift
past until they end just before we 'sleep'. To do this we must
become unattached to our daily thoughts. The reality of such
thoughts whilst lying in bed is often non-existent, apart from in the
mind. Is this mind our true selves? By dropping the mind, we drop
the ego, we drop the I and we drift off 'to sleep'. Insomnia is often
caused by a problem with dropping these thoughts, which can only
be done with awareness and non-effort. The more we try, the
more energy we give to such thoughts, to the mind, the ego, the I,
and the more they distract us from what we are.
These thoughts are often fuelled in the physical plane by
what we eat. Caffeine, chocolate, and high sugar and
carbohydrate foods are obvious examples of things to avoid within
four hours of going to sleep. Nothing at all for the last two hours of
our waking day is required to prepare our body for the night's
digestion. We now understand something about why cravings
must be kept at bay by watching our mind. This is part of the
reason behind having a main meal at midday and a light snack in
the evening. One last word on this subject must be on sleeping
tablets. Reliance on such drugs is often a way of producing a
temporary barrier between ourselves and our minds. When we
stop the tablets, the same problem will be there. If you deal with
the problems now, you have the opportunity to find new energy for
life that you never knew existed.