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Is the matrix reality?
Awake
The Matrix was an amazing and ground-breaking movie starring Keanu Reaves as “Neo.”
Neo means “new” which is an apt name as you’ll see…
What IS real?
In the movie, humans are used as power sources for machines that have taken over the world. And in the movie’s “real world,” humans are no more than battery cells. To keep the humans alive, the machines develop a computer program called “The Matrix” and the humans’ brains are plugged into it…
The humans believe their real lives are the computer program — “The Matrix.” They’re not aware at all, that their whole lives are nothing more than a dream.
Are we dreaming?
The wonderful thing about this movie is the analogy to our own lives here on planet Earth. Sometimes, it’s hard to figure out who the hell we are and what we’re doing here so it’s great to have “food for thought” like this, that can give us clarity about our own lives.
Spiritual traditions tell us the same thing — that we are dreaming, that our lives aren’t real. Now that might sound like hocus-pocus to you but hold on a second…
“Buddha” means “awakened one” and so if Buddha was awake, then it follows that before he awakened he must have been asleep, dreaming, unconscious! And that is the normal human condition — unconscious. Unconscious of our own selves — who we really are.
The real matrix
We live in a world not dissimilar to the matrix in that we spend our whole lives interacting with a program — our conditioned mind and false sense of self, or ego.
The ego is in truth, not real, because we made it up. We made up a false self with ideas about who we are. Not the truth of who we are but ideas about it. Then we use this false self to interact with “the world,” and so we mistake the map for the territory.
The false self possesses us and keeps us unconscious because our total attention is in it — just like when you are dreaming but you think the dream is real. There is no higher level of awareness that says “This is a dream.”
How to wake up
To awaken — like Buddha, all you really need to do is look at your false self and say “This is a dream.” Easier said than done — Buddha himself spend 49 days sitting under a tree meditating whithout a break until he awakened — so the story goes.
The ordinary level of awareness is higher than a dreaming state — it can recognize a dream as “not real.” So, an awakened mind can recognize the ordinary level of consciousness as “not real” as well.
Learn to stop bullets
The leader of the resistance called Morhpeus, says that Neo is “The One,” the one who will ultimately master the matrix and set humanity free.
At the end of the movie, Neo does master The Matrix and is able to stop bullets at will. In our own lives, these bullets are thoughts that we identify with. So, mastery of your own life and to awaken from your own dream is mastery of thought.
When you can stop a thought like Neo stops bullets, pick one out and look at it curiously, then drop it if you choose, you have mastered the real matrix.
One way to wake up is by intense suffering caused by ego. It’s an automatic process because the ego causes suffering and then realizes its own dysfunction. But we don’t want to do that!
A less painful route is meditation. We either choose to wake up or we’ll be forced by suffering. Either way, we’re all destined to wake up…
All the best,
Mike Kinnaird
Habit Guide: How to be Happy & Healthy
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