All change is towards reality; the reality itself cannot change || On Vivekachudamani (2018)
Questioner (Q): All experiences unfold in consciousness and are fundamentally subjective in the sense that there is no objective world out there independent of consciousness. This brings me to the concept of illusion. If the world and our experiences of it are illusions, then the world is devoid of meaning; it does not matter what I do with my life or how I relate to the world because it’s just an illusionary dream. But don’t dreams have their rightful place? Don’t dreams tell us something about the dreamer? Doesn’t this illusion called the world have a meaning? Doesn’t the world tell something about the observer of the world, and is not the world illusion necessary and fundamental?
Acharya Prashant (AP): You have rightly said that it is all subjective. The world is subjective. It is with respect to you. It is in your own frame of reference. So, even when you say that the world is necessary—well, yes, it is necessary, but only to you. Just as the world exists only to you, so, if the world is necessary, the necessity is only to you. And ‘necessary’ is not a precise word; the precise word would be ‘unavoidable’. Sometimes ‘necessary’ and ‘unavoidable’ mean the same, but in this context a better word is ‘unavoidable’. You cannot do away with the world; it is indispensable. The world is indispensable, inevitable. And if you want to do away with the politeness, then the world is inexorable.
Given that you exist, and given the fact that you exist as you think you exist, your world—not the world, because there is no objective world—your world will continue to exist as it does, and the world will continue to exist as a help, unless you turn it into your own subjective nightmare or your own subjective roadblock. The way you look at the world can be both a help and a nemesis. How is it a help? It tells you about how you are. And it can be your nemesis when you start thinking that the way you are is the way you ought to be.
