(Clearwisdom.net) After I started my cultivation, I often had dreams. Gradually I developed a bad habit. Upon waking up in the morning, the first thing I did was recall the previous night's dreams. Sometimes the dream was very vivid, and I clearly knew that I was enduring tribulations in the dream. Sometimes I could feel that Master was giving me hints in my dreams. There were also those times when I couldn't remember the dream clearly, but I still wanted to carefully think about what I had dreamed before I got up. Obviously I had become attached to my dreams and to Master's giving me hints in my dreams.
More recently when I woke up after dreaming, I felt that I had not done what I saw in my dream at all. How could I have done such things? And sometimes my dreams were very long. After I woke up, I was very tired, and when I opened my eyes, it was already very late, past the time when I should have gotten up. I sometimes dreamed so much that I was even unwilling to open my eyes, as I was still immersed in my dreams.
When I realized that this was not a good thing, I started sending forth righteous thoughts to eliminate it. Although the situation became a little better for one or two days, I had a relapse. It was because I had become attached to my dreams and the old forces had exploited this gap. I also experienced interference from the demon of lust. In the beginning I thought that I had already passed through the tribulations of lust. I discovered that was not true. Sometimes when I had issues in my mind that I didn't know how to solve, I wanted Master to give me hints in my dreams. Sometimes I indeed felt that I was told what to do in my dreams. But this wasn't real. It was demonic interference. On one or two occasions, I almost believed what I had been told in my dreams, but fortunately other practitioners warned me of this issue.
Today when I studied the Fa, I suddenly came to understand that when we encounter issues, we should not get attached to Master giving us hints. Isn't the encountering of problems an opportunity to improve? If we relied on Master's hints on all issues, what would we still need to cultivate for? Isn't it the same as looking externally for help? It is not right for me to have this attachment of pursuit. Relying on Master's help to solve all my problems is, in certain respects, my being not respectful of Master. Furthermore, even when Master really sees us having poor enlightenment on some issues and gives us hints in our dreams, Master will never tell us exactly how to do things. Those who tell us to follow some precise way to do something are all demons. Once we have developed this attachment, foreign messages can easily come to interfere with us, and this attachment can also be easily exploited by the old forces, which will then cause severe troubles for our cultivation.
Therefore, we should never get attached to things that we see in our dreams or that we see or hear in our meditation. "Once your mind is not right, you will be ruined at once." (Zhuan Falun)
This is my personal understanding. Please point out anything improper.
October 31, 2008