Simply stated, virtual reality is an experience that on first glance appears real but on further examination is found not to be real. The experience seems real, looks real, and sounds real, but it is isn’t.
Consider the water mirage on the distant desert road, an echo, or railroad tracks appearing to meeting in the distance. They all seem real, but they aren’t. They are a virtual reality. Or consider the night dream. From the perspective of the dream state it’s real – the emotions, the images, the body reaction. But when we awake in the morning, we discover that the night dream was in fact unreal. Finally, consider a virtual reality headset. We put it on and we can be skiing, bungee jumping, or any other activity. We become immersed in whatever comes through the headset, and if didn’t know otherwise what seems in the moment to be very real is likewise unreal, a virtual reality, a simulation of reality.
Each of these examples is well known to us and does not cause us grief or distress, as we know that a mirage is untrue, the virtual goggles are only a playful digital display, and we awaken from the night dream. Undeceived by these experiences, no harm is done to our life or psyche.
But consider our ordinary day-to-day life and activities – the usual experience of people, places, things, and mental activity. From the perspective of ordinary consciousness, it’s all very real to us, but can it be just another example of virtual reality? Let’s look at this startling possibility.
In ordinary day-to-day consciousness there is a sense of outer and inner. Some experiences seem to occur outside of us and others inside. Is this actually how reality is? There is also the experience that people, places, and things are distinct and separate from us. Is this actually how reality is? The people, places, and things that we experience appear to have substance, stability, and autonomy. Is this actually how reality is? And most often we are immersed in a personal drama of one sort or another that appears quite real. Is this actually how reality is? We could go further, but it suffices to say that we experience our world to be solid, divided into inside and outside, comprised of distinct and separate entities, filled with drama, and more or less seemingly permanent.
To ordinary consciousness this is how things appear to us. But as we have seen, awakening from dream consciousness and the night dream exposes the dream as actually unreal. Similarly, awakening from the “day dream” exposes as well the unreality of our ordinary day-to-day experience. Our usual world and life reveals itself as a virtual reality. And that, changes everything.
Awakening from the night dream requires that we step out of dream consciousness into wakeful consciousness. This shift offers a larger view of our situation. The same is required if we are to recognize the illusionary nature of our ordinary reality. We must step out of ordinary consciousness into a witnessing or observing consciousness, a meta consciousness. From this more expansive and uninvolved viewpoint, we can see that ordinary day-to-day reality is also a virtual, mentally constructed, illusory reality.
That is a difficult one to bear. What seems so real, true, and tangible to us at the level of wakeful consciousness is seen as an extensive inner drama projected outward to simulate an external world, things, people, and events. There are 7 billion inhabitants on our planet with 7 billion different worlds.
Understanding that our seeming outer ordinary reality is in fact virtual, allows us to live with others in this illusion without distress and suffering. We can share enough of our illusion to function together and attach to none of it. However, when our inner virtual reality differs from others or we become attached to our story as universal truth, it can become a source of considerable personal and cultural strife. To avoid that we must each strive to create the healthiest illusion possible.
Since our experience of ordinary reality arises and appears in our consciousness, we can influence the details and character of day-to-day life. We can take steps to create as healthy a personal perspective as possible – reading, studying, self-improvement, and psychological development can help in that effort to create the healthiest day-to-day human life.
Living in but not attaching to ordinary reality allows more ease, simplicity, and inner peace. By recognizing that ordinary reality is a virtual reality, transient and not truly existent, we can enjoy, but cease to attach to what is unstable and unreal. This motivates us to turn inward to the final and true reality – our inner and unconditioned awareness and beingness, the heart center of our being.
Stripping away the obscuring dreamscapes, we discover the spacious and ever-present deeper and true self to be the foundation and source of all life’s experiences. At this center of our being we find unchanging stability, serenity, and freedom. We abandon distress and suffering and discover oneness and wholeness. We become experts at navigating two worlds – the true reality of fundamental being and the virtual reality of ordinary life.
And in time, we will come to the final recognition that there are not two worlds. In actuality, they is one.