The Dream Time

The Australian Aborigines refer to the time of their ancestors, when they were the only human inhabitants of Australia, as the “Dream Time.” It was a time when all humans and animals lived in harmony in this vast continent which has such extensive desert areas. It was a time when those living on earth and those who had passed to spirit communed on a daily basis. Speaking and asking advice from the “old ones” was a natural part of everyday life. It was truly a time of innocence, when human beings used all their faculties, spiritual as well as physical. The Aborigines never enjoyed an opulent life style, such as that enjoyed by so many today in the Western world but they were undoubtedly extremely happy and contented.

For all our opulence, technical expertise and ingenuity, happiness is not something one readily associates with modern western society. On the contrary, anxiety and stress are far more in evidence, even though we all enjoy great happiness from time to time, it can hardly be claimed that we are contented. It can be argued of course, that it is that very discontent that has been the catalyst for many of the technological advances of recent centuries. Without discontent, the argument runs, we would be satisfied with far less and not have advanced much beyond the Stone Age. I wonder! That selfsame discontent is what has been responsible for advancing greed and envy as well as leading us into disputes that have often ended in war.

Discontent has also been responsible I believe, for the unhealthy emphasis on materialism that is a large feature of modern technological society. The interesting thing about this is that both discontent and materialism are never satisfied; they feed upon themselves and people grow ever more discontented, ever more materialistic and the result? Complete dissatisfaction and an inner yearning for something that is missing but many know not what. I believe it could be a yearning from within for a return to the Dream Time when human beings led an existence that was balanced, both spiritually and materially; a time when physical life and spiritual life were almost indistinguishable; a time when life on Earth and life in the Spiritual World were seen as part and parcel of the same thing. The legend of the Garden of Eden shows that the Aborigines were not alone in having a Dream Time in their past. All human societies began the same way and only the uneven pace of evolution brought about the huge differences that now seem to exist.

This comparison persuades one to think about the purpose of earthly life. Is it really designed so that we can learn to exploit the resources of Earth to the ‘N’th’ degree, to force the physical world and all that is in it, to do our bidding so as to provide us with the greatest possible physical comfort and enjoyment? Or is it designed as a test to see how effectively we are able to bring our five physical senses under the control of our higher selves? How effectively we are able to live a physical life in the knowledge of the spiritual life? How effectively we are able to introduce the values of the Eternal Spirit into our day to day activities?
Just as many Native Americans find themselves unable to adapt to modern city life and seek comfort in the false arms of the bottle, so it is with the Aborigines. It is a sad reflection on modern society that we appear to find it impossible to incorporate the old with the new. We seem incapable of providing environments where the old can be enjoyed unhindered in the same way as the new. We even find it impossible to bring ourselves to seriously study the true cost in human terms, of our headlong dash to possess more and more, to control and compel. It is as though we are so frightened of what such a study might reveal, we are not willing even to ask the question!

Clearly we cannot turn the clock back to the Dream Time but we can recognise that, despite its apparently less comfortable and technologically advanced results, humanity seemed immeasurably happier then. Stress was unheard of, disputes were settled on a local basis and did not become huge wars and there was no reason to spend huge amounts of time and resources on developing ever more terrifying means of destroying one another’s physical bodies. Instead of dismissing such legends out of hand, we should study them and see how we can use the knowledge gained to restore a long overdue measure of balance to humanity.