So, let’s start our journey through lucid dreaming with the Vedic sages, who have practiced the discipline for thousands of years. The Upanishads describe four states of consciousness. The first three are waking (jagrat), dreaming (svapna), and sleeping (suṣupti). Dreaming (svapna), resonates most closely with our Western notion of the subconscious. In Vedic philosophy, both dreaming and sleeping are considered more important, in a spiritual sense, than waking (jagrat).
While dreaming, a sleeping person frequently is required to acknowledge the vibrations emitted by past deeds and karma. Psychic unrest, events of the day, and other intense experiences may also give rise to dreams. Generally, good dreams correspond to dharma, the path of rightness, while bad dreams are adharma, that which is evil or wrong. In Vedic culture, extending from ancient times, the world itself, or what we all think of as reality, is an illusion—that is, nothing but a dream—made by the God Vishnu.
The fourth state is pure consciousness, called Turiya, which is reachable through meditation and good works. To reach pure consciousness is to truly understand the infinite and to cease from suffering and reincarnation. Turiya exists beyond dreams and beyond time.