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Death & Sleep
‘I
die daily’, wrote St Paul (1 Corinthians 15:31).
Contrary to popular belief, I do not believe
Paul is talking about dying to matters of the flesh, nor is he talking
about facing
persecution and physical death daily.
Rather he is talking about dying to the dominance
of the waking consciousness, so that we may embrace our spiritual
consciousness
during sleep.
So,
sleep can teach us how to die and connect us to our deeper self.
The 4,000 word essay Falling
for Sleep by
Rubin Naiman also makes this clear and more. The following is
basically remixed from this essay (into <500 words):-
- The
mechanisation and medicalisation of sleep has happened since the
Industrial Revolution, when productivity – and thus
wakefulness - became so
important. Sleep was neglected and encroached upon, demoted to merely a
complex
biomedical process. Attempts were even made to eliminate sleep, and
artificial
lights and computer gadgets are still threatening this.
- We
are caught in wakism, a subtle but
pernicious addiction
to ordinary waking consciousness that limits our understanding and
experience
of sleep. Hyperarousal is an
inevitable consequence of our wakism; it refers to a turbocharged pace
of life
that is not modulated by adequate rest. Hyperarousal is rooted in an
arrogant
disregard for natural rhythms, and this has serious side
effects.
- Hyperarousal
and insomnia both encourage drug and substance dependence.
Caffeine, energy drinks and stimulant drugs help stoke perpetual
motion, while
alcohol, marijuana and sedating medications provide temporary,
artificial
respites.
- Sleep
is now only a physiological process that is tweaked with tips and
sleeping pills. However, sleeping pills produce a kind
of counterfeit
slumber. They do not heal insomnia; they suppress its symptoms. Ongoing
reliance on sleeping pills undermines our sleep self-efficacy, or trust
in our
innate ability to sleep. They also result in dependence or addiction,
and
significantly increase the risk of serious illness
and death.
- Sleep
has become impersonal and something outside our awareness, only
assessed in metrics (e.g. sleep stages, sleep length). Contemporary
medical
views presume that there’s nothing in the world of sleep
worth personally
investigating. However, medicalisation obscures sleep’s true
nature, concealing
the personal, transcendent and romantic dimensions of sleep.
- We
are in dire need of restoring our sense of sleep’s mythic
dimensions
– of reimagining our personal experience of sleep. Mythic
perspectives suggest that there is something
in the deep waters of sleep worth accessing, and invite us to
personally
investigate it. From a mythic perspective, deep sleep is a state of
profound
serenity. But we commonly fail to notice it due to our pervasive
wakism. Deep,
natural sleep threatens our wake-centric self. The Dalai Lama
teaches that
the psychospiritual experience of falling asleep is identical to that
of dying.
Our familiar, waking self dies in sleep. Sleep is a return to
our default
consciousness, our deepest Self.
- Sleep
loss, then, is not simply a medical problem; it is also a critical
spiritual
challenge. Our epic struggles with accessing deep sleep are struggles
with
accessing deeper aspects of ourselves. As wakists, we presume that who
we are
is limited to our waking-world identity. Essential parts of who we are,
however, are obscured by the glare of waking life. And these become
more
visible at night – in the deep waters of sleep and
dreams.
- Sleep
is more an art than a science. It is about humility and vulnerability.
We do
not work to get it; rather we stop working to receive it - as a gift,
an act of
love.
- We
need to fall in love with sleep (again).
The spiritual
teacher Omraam Mikhaёl
Aïvanhov tells us:
- "At
night, while you are asleep, the conditions
are right for you to learn in the invisible world. And even if you are
left
with no clear memory of what you learned, you can sometimes feel the
next
morning that new elements have been added to the way you understand
things.
Each day is a new life. Each morning you are born into the world, and
each
evening you leave the world. It is important that you live this last
moment of
your day well, for it sets the conditions for the following day.
Whatever your
day has been like, as you go to sleep try to dispel everything that
might
obscure your consciousness. Call on the highest thoughts and feelings
to
accompany you on the sacred journey you are about to make into the
other world.
You will then enter the new day with feelings of light, peace and joy."
- "At night
while they are
asleep, true disciples leave their body and join their Master, with
whom they
continue to learn. They read the most secret books in the libraries of
the
universe; they participate in magnificent ceremonies. And even though
the human
brain is not yet capable of remembering such events, sufficient traces
may
remain to leave a feeling of such calm and sweetness in their heart
that on
waking they say, ‘Where was I last night? What I saw was so
beautiful!’ We must
understand how sacred our sleep can be when we fall asleep with the
desire to
leave our bodies and attend these spiritual schools, for it is there
that we
receive true Initiation."
"Every human being streams at
night into the loving nowhere." (Rumi)
"This place is a dream. Only a
sleeper considers it real. Then death comes like dawn, and you wake up
laughing at what you thought was your grief." (Rumi)
Resources
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Also see:-
Death &
Immortality
|
Death
& Sleep
