(Almost) Jhana while sleeping - Questions

[AskingQuestions105]

To give a little background of myself, I've gotten to 1st jhana twice in regular sitting meditation. I'm still very familiar with the feelings/sensations of 1st jhana.

 

How it happened: I was dreaming that I was in school, and we had new seats in our classroom. I found my seat and then class started. But it wasn't a normal class, we were told to meditate, and I insantantly knew to go for jhana. I sat on the floor in the dream and began meditating.

 

There came a point in the dream where I had so much physical sensation in my head, and the teacher was actually feeling my head. This sensation became so intense that I sort of realized that I was actually doing this physically (non-dream) during my sleep. 

 

It was as if the physical me was using my dream of meditating as its anchor, but the dream me was using breath as its anchor. Even though physically I was laying down, it felt like I was sitting like I was during the dream.

 

After I realized I was having the same piti physical sensations in real life, it grew even more, but its as if my desire for jhana came back, and I wasn't able to enter. It was kind of cool though, because whilst I was having the dream, my mind was able to use the dream as its anchor very well to physically almost attain jhana without any feeling of effort,  wantingness, or control. However, once I realized I was having piti in real life and getting close, the effort, wantingness, and control came, which hindered me if you will.

 

I guess I'm just wondering if there's any significance in this. I'm not really asking if this was a 'true' experience, because I can tell it was happening in my physical body.

 

Even though I didn't attain jhana, it felt even more profound than my cushion jhanas I've experienced and basically all my other meditation experiences, as my mind felt way more concentrated and one-pointed with the most inexplicable ease. 

 

I guess I'm also wondering, why? Why'd it feel so much more highly concentrated, with so much less effort, practically none? I'm not even sure how I'd go about 'replicating' this to an on cushion experience, because it all just sort of 'happened'. Thanks.

 

Sidenote: This was not a lucid dream either. I kind of just recognized piti sensations in the dream, and then shifted to recognizing them in my physical body.

Edited March 2, 2021 by AskingQuestions105