With thinking and dreaming you miss life

”DOES AN ENLIGHTENED PERSON EVER DREAM? CAN YOU TELL US SOMETHING ABOUT THE QUALITY AND NATURE OF AN ENLIGHTENED PERSON’S SLEEP?”  

No, an enlightened person cannot dream. And if you like dreams very much, never become enlightened. Beware! Dreaming is part of sleep. The first thing is that for dreaming to happen you have to move into sleep. For ordinary dreams you have to move into sleep. In sleep you become unconscious. When you are unconscious, dreams can happen. They happen only in your unconsciousness.
An enlightened person is conscious even while asleep. He cannot become unconscious. Even if you give him an anaesthetic – chloroform or something like that – only his periphery goes to sleep. He remains conscious; his consciousness cannot be disturbed. Krishna says in the Gita that while everyone is asleep the yogi is awake. It is not that yogis are not going to sleep in the night; they also sleep, but their sleep has a different quality. Only their bodies sleep, and then their sleep is beautiful. It is a rest. Your sleep is not a rest. It may even be an exertion, and in the morning you may feel more exhausted than you ever felt in the evening. A whole night’s sleep, and in the morning you feel more exhausted – what is happening? You are a miracle!
The whole night was an inner turmoil. Your body was not at rest because the mind was so active. And the activity of the mind is bound to be an exertion for the body, because without the body the mind cannot act. The activity of the mind means parallel activity of the body, so the whole night your body is moving and is active. That is why in the morning you feel more exhausted. What does it mean for someone to become enlightened? It means one thing: now he is perfectly conscious. Whatsoever goes on in his mind, he is aware. And the moment you are aware, certain things completely stop. Just through awareness they stop. It is just like this room is dark and you bring a candle: the darkness will disappear. Everything will not disappear. These bookcases will be here, and if we are sitting here we will be here. By bringing the candle only darkness disappears. When someone becomes enlightened, now he has an inner light. That inner light is awareness.
Through that awareness sleep disappears – nothing else. But because sleep disappears, the quality of everything changes. Now whatsoever he is going to do will be in his perfect alertness, and that which needs unconsciousness as a prerequisite now becomes impossible. He cannot be angry – not because it is a decision not to be angry; he CANNOT be angry. Anger can exist only when you are unconscious. Now unconsciousness is not there, so the base is not there and anger is not possible. He cannot hate: hate exists only when you are unconscious. He becomes love – not because of any decision on his part. When light is there, when consciousness is there, love flows; it is natural. Dreaming becomes impossible because dream needs, first of all, unconsciousness, and he is not unconscious. Buddha’s disciple, Ananda, said to him, after sleeping and living in the same room, in the same place with Buddha, ”This is a miracle; this is very strange. You never move in your sleep.” Buddha always remained in one posture the whole night. The way he would sleep in the beginning, that would be the way he would come out of it, and his hand would remain in the exact place where it was put.
You might have seen Buddha’s picture showing him sleeping. His posture is called ”the lying posture.” He would remain in this same posture the whole night. Ananda watched him for years. Whenever he would look at Buddha sleeping, he would be the same the whole night. So Ananda asked, ”Tell me, what are you doing the whole night? You remain in one posture.” Buddha is reported to have said, ”Only once did I move in my sleep, but then I was not a buddha. Just before, just a few days before the enlightenment happened, I moved in my sleep. But then suddenly I became aware and I wondered, ’Why am I moving?’ I moved unconsciously without any knowing on my part. But after enlightenment there is no need. If I want I can move, but there is no need. And the body is so relaxed...”
Consciousness penetrates even in sleep. But you can have a fixed posture the whole night and you will not be enlightened. You can practice it; it is not difficult. You can force yourself; then within a few days you will be able to do this. But that is not the point. If you look at a Jesus moving, do not think, ”Why is he moving?” It depends. If Jesus moves in his sleep, he is conscious. If he wants to move, he moves. For me, it happens quite the reverse. Before coming to awareness I slept always in one posture the whole night. I do not remember ever moving. But since then I have been moving the whole night. Even five minutes are enough for me in one posture. I have to move again and again. I am so aware that it is not a sleep at all really. So it depends. But you can never deduce anything from the outside. Always, this is only possible from the inside.
For an enlightened one, awareness will remain there even in his sleep, and then dreams are not possible. They require unconsciousness – that is one thing – and they require suspended experiences: that is the second thing. And for an enlightened one there is no suspended experience – no incomplete experience. Everything is complete. He has eaten his food; now he is not thinking about eating again. When he feels hungry he will eat again, but meanwhile there is no thought of eating. He has taken his bath; now he is not thinking of the bath tomorrow. When the time comes, if he is alive, he will take it. If the situation permits it will happen, but there is no thinking. Acts are there, but not any thinking about them. What are you doing? You are constantly rehearsing – constantly rehearsing for tomorrow as if you are an actor and you are to show someone. Why are you rehearsing? When the time comes, you will be there.
The enlightened person lives in the moment, in the act, and he lives so totally that it is not incomplete. If something is incomplete, then it will be completed in a dream. Dream is a completion. It happens because the mind cannot allow anything to be incomplete. If something is incomplete, there is an inner uneasiness. It wonders how to complete it. Then in a dream you complete it, and you are at ease. Even if it is completed in a dream, for the mind it is a relaxation. What are you dreaming? You are just completing your incomplete acts which you could not complete in the day. In the day you may have wanted to kiss a woman, and you could not kiss. Now you will kiss her in your dream, and your mind will feel relaxed; a tension is released.
Your dreaming is nothing but your incompleteness, and an enlightened person is complete. Whatsoever he is doing, he is doing it so wholly, so totally, that nothing remains suspended. There is no need for any dreaming. Dreaming in the night will cease and thinking in the day will cease. It is not that he will become unable to think. He can think if he needs. If you ask him a question he will think immediately, but no rehearsal is needed. First you think and then you reply, but his reply is his thinking. He thinks and replies. That is also not good to say, because actually there is no gap. It is simultaneous. He thinks out loud, but there is no rehearsal, no thinking, no dreaming. He lives life. With thinking and dreaming you miss life


Source: Osho_Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 2