DISCOURSES Volume II - Avatar Meher Baba Trust

86 DISCOURSESMost dreams are purely subjective and subconsciousexperiences of the subtle body and they have no special spiritualsignificance, except that they can be occasions for forging newRare types of dreamssanskaras or spending up old ones and thatoccasionally they shed light upon thehidden complexes and unfaced problems of personality. Suchdreams can never include something which is not in some way apart of the past experience of the person. They allow scope fornovelty only in respect of new combinations of items which havealready appeared in past experience. The rare types of dreams arethose about persons and things unknown in this life but known insome past life or lives. Still more rare are the dreams of personsand things which have never appeared in this life or former livesbut are going to appear in this life in the future. Ordinary dreamsare thus utterly different from dreams which have occultsignificance.Very often, when the aspirant is having psychic unfoldmenthe has occasional experience of the subtle world in the form ofsignificant visions, lights, colours, sounds, smells or contacts. AtBeginnings of occultexperiencefirst these experiences are fitful and theaspirant is likely to treat them ashallucinations. But even when he treatsthem as hallucinations, he finds it impossible to resist theirdirective influence because of their intrinsic potency. The spiritualjourney, however, becomes more smooth if the aspirant learns tocultivate the right attitude, towards occult experiences, whichconsists in taking them for what they are worth. This balancedattitude is just the thing which the aspirant in the initial stages findsit difficult to maintain.The beginner is apt to exaggerate the importance of hisglimpses into the inner worlds and develop an ungovernable