Sellers of Dreams

4 minute read

We arrive upon this earth innocent, without a single thought or problem, only to die buried beneath useless thoughts and a life without meaning, having neither saved nor understood existence itself, although we are always constructing a dream.

From birth, we are programmed to accept a label: a religion such as Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu or atheist; a nationality; a particular colour; or, more simply, one of two categories, good or evil.

Whatever we are, we must wear a label upon our forehead so that we can form different groups, reinforce a belief or live within a dream. Life becomes a continuous competition, an endless struggle in which the weakest person loses, as does anyone unable to adapt to the human filth present within society since its beginning.

Ever since humanity labelled itself intelligent, dreams of the perfect society and the perfect human being have sold like hot cakes. Anyone who disagreed was exterminated, condemned as a heretic and destroyed because sin was said to be their nature.

In this way, we were sold the dream of a perfect being who nevertheless remains hidden within our existence, within the entire universe and even within non-existence. Everything suggests that the universe is a perfect imperfection, that nothing is equal and that suffering hides within happiness. Yet the picture painted since our beginning resembles a marketplace in which the winner is whoever sells the merchandise most effectively.

When we suffer, we blame those outside us or blame ourselves. If neither satisfies us, we find someone or something else: Creation, the Creator, destiny, luck or existence itself.

We are sold dreams that we believe without testing them, even though the founders of religions contradict one another. Some tell us to believe without questioning, while others say the opposite. What is certain is that no one can declare whether everything that exists is or was true. The past has been, the future will come, and the only truth is the present moment, yet even that is fleeting.

We are therefore like a ping-pong ball among the veils of life, passing through its sieve. Some manage to emerge, while others are sifted endlessly.

If we did not live through these dreams, we would certainly go mad and suicide would occur on a mass scale. Some people successfully purchase the dream of a better life by pursuing money, a better social position, or a better and more enjoyable profession - which, in the end, still means money.

Others buy virtuous dreams, believing themselves to be pursuing a religious life and whatever only the soul can understand and experience. Yet they never meet their own soul or the souls of those they love, because life is not meant to be completed, but lived in permanent change.

We are told that we are gods, small gods perhaps, but gods on an absolute and infinite scale. If the dream is not material, then it is spiritual, or the other way round.

And so, amid all this madness, meditation appeared: the practice of ceasing to run, remaining still and attending to what happens both outside and within. Yet these are more dreams, sold even more successfully.

The more impossible the dreams, the greater their temptation and the more deeply they penetrate, because thought begins to fail at this level. Although you appear not to act, you are acting within an invisible realm where everything happens rather than being programmed, a realm that seems beyond familiar time and space.

The more people adhere to a dream, the more reality it acquires and the more powerfully it influences human existence and the entire universe. Had humanity not been directed towards the periphery, perhaps all of us would now live in a mystical realm filled with obscure powers, where divine empires bearing dozens of labels held a monopoly over the human being.

Some say technology has brought more harm than good. I believe that a world enslaved to religion as completely as we are now enslaved to technology would have caused still greater harm, because it would have kept the soul in chains, unable to be freed even if it awakened.

Religions are dreams because they are filled with lies, some good for the soul and others harmful. Although God is Love, love is the most deeply buried and mocked thing in our existence. Its value is nonexistent for our souls. Even if it withstands life's trials for a long time, death eventually cuts through its perfect circle.

Dreams of what follows death are created so that the human being continues fighting until the end, because without that struggle existence would have no meaning. Love appears, makes us happy and allows us to feel the reality of dreams successfully sold. Yet in the end, we suffer because of our own actions, those of other people or existence itself.

When we are born, the only certainty is death. Everything else consists of dreams intended to prevent us from abandoning the easy or obstacle-filled road we must travel through our existence upon this earth.

Some dreams say we possess free will. I do not believe this, because I would certainly have chosen emptiness, the void and non-existence rather than wasting my time upon a destiny in which I either bring suffering or receive happiness from dreams.

First published in Romanian on 30 December 2010. This English translation preserves the perspective of that period.

Original Romanian article: Vânzătorii de visuri.