Question: Does the soul gain any experiences to help its evolution from negative dreams, as it does from real experiences in life?

Sri Chinmoy: ‘Negative dream’ is a very complicated expression. A positive dream we know is something that is inspiring, something that is aspiring in and through us. But negative dreams can be of various types. If, because of a lack of aspiration, somebody dreams about the lower vital life, sexual life, these dreams do not help the soul at all. But if one dreams that he is trying to do something, such as study, but he is failing in his outer examination, or if he wants to be pure and devoted but he is not getting his wish, these kinds of negative dreams can be beneficial. These negative experiences, these temporary pangs, will not stand in one’s way as they might if they were experiences in the outer life. One suffers for five minutes, but when he wakes he is determined to do the thing and to be successful. New determination and new aspiration enter into him and he becomes stronger and more powerful.

We have to take these kinds of dreams as experiences which are helpful at times to make us strong. The son of a boxer is fighting with his father. The father is teaching him how to box, and all the time, the father is striking him and knocking him down. Or a wrestler is teaching his son how to wrestle and the son is being pushed and shoved. These experiences of the buffets of life do help the soul, because they make everything that composes one’s existence — the physical, vital, mental and psychic — strong in the battlefield of life. These experiences add to the soul’s reality and the soul’s light because the stronger the soul becomes, the more opportunity it gets to work through the person for the manifestation of its own light.

Negative dreams of this kind definitely help the soul, just as dreams of progress and success help the soul. If the dream is just about success in the vital world, the soul does not gain anything. But if success is achieved by virtue of one’s divine qualities, one’s sincerity and devotion, then the soul gains. And if the dream is of progress, of progress in the spiritual life, that progress will definitely offer substantial help to the soul.