Queen Lila's Second Journey - Deeper into the Dream

Rama said: "O Sage, you have mentioned Queen Lila before. I know she entered her deceased husband's dream and found him alive in another world. But I have heard there was a second journey, even deeper. Can you tell me of that?"

Vasishtha nodded: "Lila's story goes deeper than most can imagine. After her first journey, she understood that reality is layered. But she had not yet understood the final truth. The goddess Saraswati guided her into a second journey."

"What did she discover?"

"In the first journey, she found her husband Padma alive in another realm, living as a king, with no memory of his 'original' life with Lila. She assumed that her world was the 'real' world and his was a dream. But Saraswati challenged this: 'By what measure do you call your world real and his a dream?'"

Rama interjected: "Surely her world was original—she was there first."

"Was she? Saraswati took Lila into the consciousness of the second Padma—her husband as he now existed in that other world. And within his consciousness, Lila found... another complete history. From his perspective, he had always been king in that world. He had married a different woman, fought different wars, built a different kingdom. He had no sense of being a 'dream version' of anyone."

"Then which was real?"

Vasishtha continued: "It becomes stranger still. Within that second Padma's world, there was a sage meditating. And within that sage's meditation was... Lila's original world. Everything she had thought was primary and real was itself contained within a dream within a dream. The nesting went on infinitely in both directions."

Rama's mind reeled: "Then there is no bottom, no top, no original?"

"None. Lila searched desperately for the 'real' layer—the foundation upon which all dreams were built. She traveled through realm after realm, each containing the others, each believing itself to be base reality. Finally, exhausted, she stopped searching."

"And what happened then?"

Vasishtha smiled: "In stopping, she found what she sought. She realized: there is no 'real' layer versus 'dream' layers. There is only consciousness, appearing as infinite layers. The very concept of 'real versus dream' was itself a dream. The one awareness in which all layers appeared—that alone was real, and it was not a layer at all. It was the space in which layers seemed to exist."

Rama struggled: "But she had a body, a perspective, a location..."

"All of which were appearances within consciousness. Lila's body existed in a realm; that realm existed in another's consciousness; that consciousness existed in another realm; and all of it existed in pure awareness. When she recognized herself as the awareness rather than any of the appearances, she was free—not of the appearances, but of the confusion about them."

"Did she return to her 'original' world?"

Vasishtha nodded: "She did. But now she understood it differently. It was no more 'real' than any other world, but it was where her karma was unfolding. She continued to live as Queen Lila, but with complete knowledge that Queen Lila was a character in an infinite play. She loved her husband—now understanding that she was also her husband, and the kingdom, and every consciousness in every realm she had visited."

Rama asked: "What practical difference did this make?"

"She could no longer suffer in the old way. Fear of loss diminished, for what could be lost when all layers were equally dreamlike and equally present? Grief transformed, for the 'dead' were simply in other rooms of the infinite mansion. Even her own death, when it came, was just a transition from one appearance to another—no more significant than moving from one dream scene to the next."

Rama pondered: "Am I also in a nested dream? Is this conversation itself within some greater consciousness's meditation?"

Vasishtha laughed with delight: "Now you are asking Lila's question! And the answer is: it does not matter. Whether this is layer one or layer one trillion, the recognition is the same. You are the awareness in which this layer appears. Know that, and you are free. The layers can nest infinitely—your freedom is not affected. The dreamer is not trapped in any dream once the dreamer knows it is dreaming."

Rama bowed: "I shall hold this teaching: not to find the 'real' layer, but to recognize myself as the awareness in which all layers appear."

Vasishtha blessed him: "Lila would embrace you as herself. For in truth, this conversation and her journeys are occurring in the same infinite consciousness. There is only One, Rama, dreaming itself in endless forms, delighting in the play of apparent multiplicity."