Author: Douglas M.

Dream Drugs

On By Douglas M.In Dream Interpretation, Dreams, Inner Voice and Vision1 Comment
peyote flower by zapdelight, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic License   by  zapdelight 

I would imagine many people have had the experience of taking a drug like marijuana or alcohol in a dream and feeling high or intoxicated while within the dream, but having the effect disappear upon awakening. This has happened to me a number of times over the years. What’s perhaps less common, but in my experience possible, is to take a drug in a dream or vision and have it produce an effect in the waking consciousness. I’m going to share two examples of this. In one instance, the effect was immediate, and in the other there was a slight delay.

The first example I’ll give occurred about 16 years ago in Mexico in the part of the country where peyote grows wild. I was out there with a group of people including Dominique, a French Canadian woman and peyote connoisseur. On that day I had not eaten any peyote. It was about mid-afternoon, and I was having a sinking spell so I laid down to rest. I didn’t fall asleep but entered that twilight space between waking and sleeping and had this vision:

I was with a group of people gathered around a fire. A deep, and powerful voice kept repeating the word “Amor” (which means love in Spanish) and I could actually feel the sound waves from the voice penetrating my dream body. Then Dominique put a piece of peyote on my tongue. As soon as the piece touched my tongue, it sent a jolt through my entire body and I was abruptly brought back to full waking consciousness.

At first nothing interesting happened, and I just got up and started to resume waking activities. After a few minutes though, I suddenly found myself filled with a large upwelling of love wanting to find some means of expression. Fellow Harm’s End editor Donny was there in the desert with me and my first instinct was to go and find him. On my end I was irked with Donny about some things, and the love helped to see that those feelings really weren’t legitimate. When I found him I told him that, and was able to clear the air as well as my vital. After that the love began to fade and then was gone. All in all I would guess that the experience lasted about 30 minutes.

Roughly a year later I had another memorable experience with a dream substance. This time I was in Nicaragua and was once again with Donny. We were staying in a hotel near the border with Costa Rica and had plans to cross the following morning. At around 4 am, I awoke from a dream in which I had been drinking coffee. Since it was still dark outside I tried to go back to sleep but found it impossible to do so because I was COMPLETELY awake. Normally I feel quite horrible if I try to get up early in the morning, but this time there was no grogginess whatsoever and my body felt energized and ready to go. As I lay there I sensed that Donny was also awake, so I told him about the dream and what I was experiencing. We concluded that there must be some purpose behind it, and that the most likely reason was to give us an early start. So we got up and went to the border only to sit there and wait for three hours for immigration to open at 9 o’clock. Go figure. Despite that however, Donny and I remained convinced that forces had moved us out of there at an early hour for a reason even if we couldn’t see it.

Unlike other posts of mine there’s no real concluding lesson or moral to my sharing of these experiences. I’ve really just thrown this out to show what’s possible and maybe spark the interest of a reader or two towards their inner life. If this possibility perks your interest then why not try for yourself? Put your intention in that direction before sleeping and see what happens. Give it a fair shake if you don’t have immediate success. I do recommend though that you approach this exercise and dreams in general with the intention to learn or to grow. While dreams can serve as entertainment for the human vital, especially if you’re a skilled lucid dreamer (I myself am not), that isn’t in my opinion their true purpose. Rather I feel dreams are an aid for our growth and development and should be approached as such.

Nailed her on the Cross of Love Forever

On By Douglas M.In fiction1 Comment
Let’s make it last forever by quinn.anya, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic License   by  quinn.anya 

Having finished, he turned to her and took her in his arms kissing her deeply. And though most of him was lost in that moment of sweetness, part of his mind could still marvel and reflect on the mystery of love. And what a miracle it was that he was holding in his arms! She was perfect. From her seductive brown eyes to her dainty little toes, physically she was everything he’d ever dreamed of in a woman—slim and petite with long curly black hair and a generous mouth he never tired of kissing.

Had he really only met her a month ago? It seemed hardly possible as he remembered all that they’d shared in that short time, not just physically and emotionally but mentally as well. He’d shared himself with her in a way he never had before with another person, and she with him as well. Yeah, she was the one. There was no doubt about it.

Finally their lips parted and their eyes met for a moment in a look that said more than any words could. Then smiling they turned to admire his work. It hardly seemed to do justice to the way they felt about each other, but there it was carved in stone for all to see on the wall of the Shiva temple in Tiruvannamalai. It read: Justin and Lucille Forever. Sure it had been a stupid and adolescent thing to do, but somehow it just felt right to do it. Especially considering what he was going to ask her.

He was nervous of course, but he knew he better get on with it. It had taken him longer than he’d anticipated to do the carving; so he only had about five minutes until the guards he’d paid to look the other way came to escort them out.

So without further ado he turned to her and spoke. “Lucille,” he said, “I don’t think I have to tell you that this last month has been the happiest of my entire life. I think you feel the same.”

She smiled and nodded.

“Gosh Lucille, I never thought in my life that I could feel this way—so complete. When I came to India I was hoping I would hook up with a nice girl to travel with, but I never expected to be plunged into a bliss like this. I know it seems crazy to ask you this after just one month, but I know you’re the one for me Lucille. I know you’re the love of my life.”

Then he got down on one knee and pulled out a small box from his hip pack. He opened it to reveal the modest engagement ring he had purchased and asked her, “Lucille, will you marry me?”

And without a moments hesitation she said, “Yes.”

Then with fumbling fingers—from joy now not nervousness—he placed the ring on her finger and kissed her hand. Then he rose and taking her tenderly into his arms he kissed her again and just let himself go completely into that moment. Then after a while their lips parted and smiling he took her hand and they walked out of the temple.

One month later the happy couple returned to the United States and, while still riding on the crest of their romantic infatuation, Justin and Lucille were married. And for Justin it was the happiest day of his life.

**********

     The second happiest day of his life was the day he got divorced. In fact, after the divorce was declared final he was filled with such a sense of joyous peace and liberation that he wondered if he was experiencing what the Indians called samadhi. Fortunately, it had been in many ways an uncomplicated affair. They had never had children or bought a house. It had just been a matter of deciding who got the furniture and the dog. It was a clean break and he was glad of it because in all honesty he hoped that he would never see her again.

Strangely though, he couldn’t resist the impulse to take one last look at his now ex-wife as she was leaving the courtroom. When he did his joyous state was eclipsed by feelings of profound disgust and revulsion, not just with her, but with himself as well. Looking back he could scarcely believe the ugliness and immaturity that had come out of them both during the course of their seven-year marriage. Sure it had been like heaven on earth at first during what he called the ‘honeymoon phase’ of their married life, but as the ardor of their narcissistic attraction waned, they discovered that they really didn’t have that much in common, and that they really didn’t know each other at all. Thus began what he called the ‘love/hate roller coaster’ phase of their marriage, which went on for years and was a mixture of good times and bad. But as time went on, and despite many hours in marriage counseling, the good times got shorter and the bad times got longer until there weren’t any good times any more; there was only the ugliness. Then one day he came home from work to find that she had moved out. A few days later she filed for divorce.

Lucille passed out of the courtroom without so much as a glance in his direction, and he was quite grateful for that. All he wanted to do now was to shove the ugliness away into the deepest darkest corner of his being so that he could try and forget that two human beings had ever behaved so poorly or heaped such abuses onto one another. Breathing a sigh of relief Justin rose slowly from his chair. The negative feelings dispersed and the joy returned as he realized once again that it was over. He was free and by God it was time to celebrate! So with a lightness in his step and whistling a happy tune Justin walked out of the courtroom. He would never see Lucille again.

Shortly after the divorce Justin had a vasectomy and proceeded to have numerous romantic relationships. He would always end them though once he could see that the ‘honeymoon phase’ was over. He also had a close relationship with his sister and her family, so he never felt any want for not having his own children or grandchildren. In short, he had a happy and relatively uneventful life and at the ripe old age of 92 he had the good fortune to pass away peacefully and painlessly in his sleep.

After a time he found himself on the summit of a beautiful snow covered mountain. He was naked except for a loincloth, and his body looked the way it had when he was about thirty. He wasn’t cold however and found that he was filled with a deep peace and detachment. As his mind marveled at this astonishing chain of events he suddenly realized that he wasn’t alone. There seated on a boulder in meditative posture was an old man with a long beard who was also only clothed in a loincloth. The old man smiled at Justin who asked him, “Is this a dream?”

“No,” said the old man, “Actually, symbolically speaking you are on the mental plane. That’s why you feel so calm. Given that you passed away peacefully in your sleep and that you were more or less at peace with your life, your consciousness was able to rise here initially.”

“Passed away? You mean I’m dead?”

“Yes my son, you are dead.”

“So, is this heaven?”

“That depends on what you mean by heaven. As I said this is the mental plane. However, now that your vital being is free of the shackles of your old and frail physical body, it will soon feel the pull to gratify its old desires and habits. So you will have to go down to the vital plane where you will go through the process of letting go of your desires as well as working off some of your karma. Once you’ve gone through both of these processes your consciousness will be able to rise to the mental plane again and beyond.

As the old man finished Justin felt himself filled with a nameless gnawing craving and the sky rapidly began to darken.

“It’s begun,” the old man said as he leaped from the boulder as nimbly as a doe. “Stay calm. You’re only making the transition to the vital plane. Just take my hand.”

Justin did so and everything around them became darker and darker until they were in complete blackness. Though he could see nothing, he had a strong sense of moving. It was a bit unsettling but he could feel the old man’s hand and that made him feel better.

Then quite abruptly he found himself with the old man floating in the sky above a quite normal looking middle class suburb.

“This is your first stop on the vital plane,” the old man said, “And that nice white house with the light blue trim over there is your house. Let’s go inside shall we?”

Then they descended and passed through the roof of the house, and then though the first floor to the ground floor. Justin found the whole thing a little disorienting. Feeling a bit giddy he slowly looked around the room until his eyes reached the couch, and his giddiness abruptly changed into horror.

“Oh my God,” he said, “It…it can’t be!”

But it was. There seated on the couch and looking every bit as unenthusiastic about the situation as himself was Lucille.

Anxious for an explanation Justin turned towards the old man and his horror now changed to incredulity as he realized the old man had changed into Shiva. Then in a lightning flash of understanding, his mind put it all together.

Tiruvannamalai. Shiva temple. Justine and Lucille Forever.

He gasped.

FOREVER!

“But…but,” he stammered, “We were just kids we didn’t know what we were doing!”

Indeed,” spoke Shiva, “You humans rarely know or understand the consequences of what you do. Unfortunately however this does not exempt you from the fruits of your actions.”

“But…but…you said this was just my first stop.”

“And I spoke the truth,” Shiva said, “But time is different here on the vital plane. So don’t worry. It won’t be forever. It might seem like it though.”

Still reeling, Justin turned to look at Lucille who had started to cry. Speechless he turned back to Shiva who spoke again.

“You see Justin it wasn’t love that failed you, but your inability to overcome your own egoism. When you defaced my temple you two inadvertently called upon yourselves the task of rising above your smallness and finding the secret of eternal love. And since you failed to do it on the physical plane you must now do it here on the vital plane where it will take considerably longer and be exceedingly more difficult. On the physical plane the limitations of your physical bodies served as a check on your vital beings’ behavior. Here you have no such protection. In addition, as you will no doubt discover, you cannot inflict lasting harm on your vital sheathes in the same way that you can on a physical body. So you will find yourselves wallowing in even greater abysms of littleness than those you plumbed on the physical plane.”

Upon hearing this, Lucille started to downright wail and Justin himself felt tears coming to his eyes. With a choked voice he asked Shiva, “But what do you mean by eternal love? How are we supposed to find it?”

“Well,” said Shiva, “Ultimately the secret is to learn to love God only, and to love all things as God and God in all things. So your task is to find and love God in each other. Along the way you will have to overcome the ‘ugliness’ as you call it, and become completely unselfish with one another, always putting the needs of the other’s soul before your own. It’s a difficult task, but you will have my help since your actions at the temple called me into your relationship as well. And I am the destroyer am I not? So my power will be here to help you to crush your egoism. That being so, there is no need to despair. All things serve the One’s great hands, and in truth you two have been granted a great opportunity. Through this process you two will start on the road back to the Divine, and it will help you to eventually find eternal love on the physical plane as well which is where you ultimately need to find it.”

Then Shiva paused, and Justin could hear that Lucille had stopped crying for the most part and was listening as well. Despite Shiva’s encouraging words he felt a sheer animal panic rising up to take possession of him as his mind went back to the horror of the last months of their marriage.   During that time the last vestiges of their restraint with one another had vanished leaving them seemingly powerless before the ugliness. The thought of being that powerless again was almost more than he could bear. Pleadingly he looked at Shiva hoping for some consolation and the god again spoke.

“At this moment you most pressing need is to cultivate forgiveness and to let go of the resentments you are harboring for the wrongs that you inflicted upon one another. Once that is accomplished then things will be easier.”

Shiva paused again and Justin felt arise within his breast a burning bitter indignation mixed with a strain of almost pure hatred which adamantly denied any possibility of forgiveness. He clenched his fists and ground his teeth as the intensity of the feelings grew. It took possession of his mind which began to dredge up material from a long list of unpardoned grievances in order to justify its obstinate refusal to forgive. Then Shiva spoke one last time and the sound of his voice brought Justin back to his senses.

“I know that the task of overcoming yourselves seems impossible, but it is not. Before I go I have a parting gift for you which you will no doubt find helpful. I would like to point out however that unlike the characters in this play you two do have a way out.”

Shiva handed Justin a book. The title of the book was No Exit and it had been written by a guy he had never heard of named Jean-Paul Satre. Then with a smile of perfect serenity Shiva vanished and they were alone.

For a few moments there was silence. Inside himself Justin could still feel the smoldering resentment, and he could sense Lucille’s ill will as well. Then he felt her anger suddenly swell and crash into him like a tidal wave accompanied by an outflow of angry words. “You and your bright ideas,” she proclaimed bitterly, “This is all your fault!”

Justin tried not to react, but then seemingly against his will the smoldering embers of resentment ignited in a flame of pure rage that wanted to tear Lucille limb from limb. He had always successfully resisted that impulse, and had never even so much as slapped her during their marriage. But he remembered Shiva’s words and the knowledge that he couldn’t permanently hurt her dispersed all restraint. He turned around and when his eyes met hers Lucille saw immediately what he intended to do, and Justin saw her become afraid. But then something in her rose to the challenge, and her rancor took possession of her as well.   For a moment they stared each other down, and then with battle cries of merciless savages they leapt at one another and commenced to vent their long restrained fury.

Meanwhile however, from their deepest within, their souls smiled at each other and chose to lead silently.

The End

Every woman’s shape is your mouth.

On By Douglas M.In Inner Voice and VisionLeave a comment
Image source: http://www.womensbeautylife.com/
Image source: http://www.womensbeautylife.com/

Recently I received this line from the inner voice:

Every woman’s shape is your mouth.

On one level I think this line was drawing attention to the way I let myself get sucked into chit-chat at work, and how I can be critical in a negative or gossiping way.   Whether it’s ultimately true or not, we have a cultural conception that women gossip more than men. Looking at the line through that cultural lens the ‘woman’s shape’ of my mouth struck me as that gossiping element.

When I told Donny about the line he validated that interpretation, and also suggested it had something to do with desire. A few days later that interpretation hit home when my parents and I went out to eat at one of our favorite restaurants, Citrola’s. We eat at this restaurant enough that we’re recognized by the staff and even have a favorite waitress, Lynn. Lynn I would guess is in her late 50’s or early 60’s, but has a body that looks younger. She’s very slim and petite and of course colors her hair. She also has an attractive face though there are enough wrinkles there to tell you she’s no spring chicken. I’m sure many men of all ages find her attractive. I’m no exception.

That night at Citrola’s Lynn was not our waitress, but since she knows us, at one point she sat down next to me at our booth to chat. As she sat there I was feeling the color of attraction and to be honest was indulging it some. Sitting there though I thought about the line and realized what it was saying. It was pointing out how wide my range of attraction is. How ‘every woman’s shape’ stimulates my ‘mouth’ i.e. the desire to consume the object of the attraction. Now of course I’m not attracted to every woman I see, and I certainly wasn’t ignorant that I could be attracted to a woman old enough to be my mother, but lines from the inner voice, like dreams, are exaggerated to make a point. Here what the line was also pointing out and really driving home is something I’ve seen many, many times before, but apparently had to be shown again. Namely what a brainless, primitive thing the desire is.

Now for those who might be wondering why anyone would want to give up sex or sexual desire here’s a line I got about two and half years ago about sex.

Immense Adam block.

 Adam here I feel represents the soul or Purusha since, on one level, that’s what Adam represents in the Hebrew Genesis. The line clearly points out I’m blocking my soul by indulging in the sex feelings and movements. In fact, it spelled it out so clearly that this particular line was a real turning point for me. After that I really started working at trying to not follow the sexual movements. Over two and half years later they’re still not gone, but Sri Aurobindo points out how hard it is to completely get rid of those movements and even said to one person that only the descent of a higher consciousness will completely get rid of them. My continuing job at the moment though is to not follow them or clip them off as soon as I catch myself doing so. I’ve come a long way with this from where I was when I got the ‘Adam’ line, but this latest line provided motivation to step up my game. That was at least a big part of its purpose.

If you’re still scratching your head as to why someone would want to give up sex you can read more of what Sri Aurobindo says about it here.

Synchronicity with the ‘Will’ Card in the Eternity Game

On By Douglas M.In SynchronicityLeave a comment

will card

I drew this card ‘Will’ from The Eternity Game recently and the word Destiny was upright. That evening I read this quote from the Mother. As you can see the words ‘your destiny’ and ‘to the great day of realisation’ were in italics and thus emphasized. I take it as a reminder of where I need to point my will.  I should also add that this card represents the third eye chakra in the game.

If you go deep enough, into a sufficiently complete silence from all outer things, you will find within you that flame about which I often speak, and in this flame you will see your destiny. You will see the aspiration of centuries which has been concentrated gradually, to lead you through countless births to the great day of realisation—that preparation which has been made through thousands of years, and is reaching its culmination.

The Mother from “Questions and Answers 1954” pg 271

For more on the Eternity Game please click here.

Portrait of a Grouch

On By Douglas M.In Dream Interpretation, DreamsLeave a comment
Oscar on my bag by cbcastro, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 Generic License   by  cbcastro 

In a recent post, I pointed out how people in dreams often represent the presence in us of what we would consider their defining characteristic. I had a lucid dream recently, which is a good example of this:

I’m in a bright, well-lit house, and I realize I’m dreaming. I’m walking down a corridor and there’s a big mirror ahead of me. In the mirror I can see that there is a picture of the Mother (Mirra Alfassa) down the hall behind me.   So I turn around intending to head toward the picture, but now there’s a painting, a portrait, of Janet there instead. The entire background of the portrait is black and Janet, clothes hair and all, is kind of a smoky white or light grey color. She has an odd look on her face, which is hard to describe, but it was most certainly not positive. I go up to the painting and, assuming something’s wrong, I tell her I’ll call or email her.   Then I go around the left side of the portrait and enter a room hoping to still find the picture of the Mother. I don’t see it, but then a force picks me up, and I just ask the Mother to take me. It carries me up through the wall and roof of the room to the outside of the house. Then the dream starts to go black so I just close my eyes and move through the blackness for awhile before I wake up.

First of all let me point out that the Mother along with her partner Sri Aurobindo are my teachers, and the ones who are in charge of my spiritual welfare. They therefore appear in my dreams from time to time, and the Mother’s presence in this one let’s me know that there’s something here I need to pay attention to.

Now regarding the symbol of Janet, Janet is a former coworker and friend who’s been in the midst of a long battle with cancer. I haven’t been very attentive to her situation as of late, and I feel on one level the dream was showing me things are not good with her at the moment. After contacting Janet, I found out that things indeed aren’t good, and I made arrangements for my mom and I to take Janet out to lunch next weekend.

On another level though I feel the Mother was trying to draw attention to something in me represented by Janet, something I need to work on. Now while Janet has many positive qualities, on the negative side anyone who has ever worked with her knows she is very much a grumbler and complainer, to the point that people have referred to her as a ‘negative’ person. She is also very inflexible and very resistant to change. Having this dream prompted me to have a closer look at how I act like Janet.

I find my ‘Janetness’ is more of an issue at work, and in general it’s more of an inner grumbling than an outer one.   Lots of things come up that I don’t want to do or think is the wrong thing to do or think is eating up time that could better be spent doing something else. Despite what I’m feeling on the inside though, I do what I’m asked even if I have issues with it and don’t usually outwardly show my feelings by complaining or protesting.   I do also at times express things negatively or pessimistically in speech, but not to the point where anyone would refer to me as a negative person. On the contrary, most people would probably say I’m a positive person, though I’m not as positive as I might seem on the surface. I’ve just developed a certain amount of self-control, and I suspect that’s the way most ‘positive’ people are. This sort of self-control though is very important and we certainly shouldn’t knock it, but it’s necessary to go further.

So what’s the cure? I think ultimately the only complete cure is to transition to a higher consciousness to which these movements are completely foreign. What, however, can you do in the meantime? Well one thing I pointed out in another post is to try and remember that ultimately everything comes from the One1, and if a task falls to you in a situation like your job where you can’t really refuse, you can try and accept the fact that the Divine himself has thrust this work upon you, and then do it as best you can for that reason. That requires a mental effort though and isn’t always so easy at least for me.

Then there’s also the element of active rejection. I recently read a wonderful passage by the Mother about this, and it seems like a fitting end to this post. She tells us:

This is the dark side. And so, the moment one sees it, if one looks at it and doesn’t say, “It is I”, if one says, “No, it is my shadow, it is the being I must throw out of myself”, one puts on it the light of the other part, one tries to bring them face to face; and with the knowledge and light of the other, one doesn’t try so much to convince—because that is very difficult—but one compels it to remain quiet… first to stand farther away, then one flings it very far away so that it can no longer return—putting a great light on it. There are instances in which it is possible to change, but this is very rare. There are instances in which one can put upon this being—or this shadow—put upon it such an intense light that it transforms it, and it changes into what is the truth of your being.

But this is a rare thing…. It can be done, but it is rare. Usually, the best thing is to say, “No, this is not I! I don’t want it! I have nothing to do with this movement, it doesn’t exist for me, it is something contrary to my nature!” And so, by dint of insisting and driving it away, finally one separates oneself from it.2

Notes and References

  1. To avoid confusion I think I should point out two things. The first is that the concept of everything coming from the One is still just a belief for me, though it’s a belief I feel for which I have enough evidence that I can do my best to try and take my stand on it. The second thing is that, even if I’m correct that it’s all ultimately coming from the One, that doesn’t mean everything that comes is good or appropriate. Until you’re in that higher consciousness that knows spontaneously what to accept or not accept, you can’t take leave of your discrimination and common sense.
  2. Collected Works of the Mother Vol 6 “Questions and Answers 1954”, pg 263.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So You Wanna Get a Hold of Human Evil? – Synchronicities With The Wasp

On By Douglas M.In SynchronicityLeave a comment
Wasp colors by quinet, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic License   by  quinet 

Recently I wrote a post on how my dreams used the symbol of the wasp to draw attention to my anger.   Interestingly, the day after posting that article, the wasp entered my life again, but not in a dream. Rather, these were synchronic encounters in waking life that happened in conjunction with strong movements of anger that day.   Events in the waking world can also be our teacher just like a dream can and this example really illustrates that point. Let me tell you what happened.

The daily operations of the chamber of commerce where I work are mainly handled by my co-worker Rhonda and I, and this necessarily involves a lot of collaboration and hashing things out. In general, Rhonda and I get along very well, and I find her very easy to work with overall.   Sometimes though, as in any close relationship, vital reactions come up in both of us that aren’t voiced or shown on the surface. Most of the time I can just drop these reactions, but at other times they’re played out inside in thoughts and emotions that either run their course until they die out or I successfully reject them.

On this particular day Rhonda wanted me to add our business expo to a dropdown list on the chamber’s website. I didn’t say no; I just responded that normally we only have the really big events on there. Then, rather uncharacteristically, she said in a rather snippy way, “It’s becoming a big event and it needs to be up there!” Well my vital didn’t like basically being given an order, and a smoldering resentment opened up like a black hole inside me.  I was able to detach from it, but it got in a bit, so it didn’t subside immediately. My vital wanted to lash back and thoughts on how to do so were coming up. I just tried to ignore them while at the same time acknowledging to myself that she was right.   We are trying to grow that event so it made sense to add it to the drop down list.

Shortly after this I had to leave the office to go and tidy up our mobile welcome center, which had been out of commission for a while. As soon as I got there I encountered a wasp flying around the door of the trailer. I remembered how the anger had risen earlier, but I was more concerned with avoiding getting stung. I got out the can of wasp spray we keep inside, but it flew off and didn’t return. When I got back to the office I noticed a little of the anger reaction still lingered from earlier, but it wasn’t really a problem.

I would, however, encounter a wasp again later that evening when I was taking our dog Rosie for a walk. During the walk, I saw a plastic grocery bag lying on a neighbor’s lawn, so I picked it up. As I was examining the bag, I suddenly spotted a wasp clinging to it and quickly dropped the bag and crushed the wasp under my shoe. Encountering the wasp again like that struck me as quite synchronic. I wondered how it might apply to my situation at that moment, and I thought about how I often get annoyed and impatient with the way Rosie takes her takes her good sweet time sniffing and investigating things instead of taking going to the bathroom like I want her too. So I tried to be conscious of that and resist that impulse to get irritated with her.

Then when I got home, I noticed some outside lights we have set up on an outdoor timer were switched on almost two hours early.1  I know there’s a button on the timer you can hit to turn it off or on manually and override the programming, and I figured that somehow the timer had been manually switched on. So I hit the button to switch it off, but when I did so the screen flickered erratically back and forth for a second or two between On and Off before it finally turned off.   That didn’t seem right to me and made me wonder if something was wrong with the timer.

I went out back to our lanai as my mom and dad were coming up from sitting on the dock. I mentioned what had happened and told mom I thought the timer might be faulty. Without warning my dad exploded into a short rant about how stupid the timers were, and how nobody sees the lights, etc. He was obviously testy so I tread carefully around him until he’d seemed to settle down later.   I figured the second synchronic encounter with the wasp had been foreshadowing dad’s outburst, and I think it was indeed doing so, but there was one more thing that was going to push my button before the night was over.

Later that evening mom asked me to vacuum and wash her car the next day before she left in the afternoon. Dad almost always handles washing our cars, but for some reason she really wanted it done the next day. Like Rhonda earlier, she was basically giving me an order and also did it in a snippy way. That got my goat, but I still tried to tell her in a nice way that was fine, but I’d just like to use the pressure washer and would need dad’s help to start it. Then she made a comment that all I’d need is a bucket and soap and that ticked me off even more. I have lower back problems, and anyone who does knows how difficult that can make just about anything. The kind of bending over I’d need to do to wash the car with a bucket and soap wouldn’t be easy for me, and she knows that.   The thing is though, in general I just stoically endure the back pain and don’t complain about it. Because of that, sometimes mom forgets my limitations and has even said that she sometimes forgets because I don’t complain.   My mind understands that, but my vital was not happy with her for forgetting.

I went in my room for a few minutes and thought things over. Then I went back out to the kitchen, and though the anger was still kicking around underneath, I was able to calmly explain again that I’d be happy to wash the car, but I wasn’t going to do it without the pressure washer and needed dad’s help to start it.2 Then I explained to her how it’s not easy for me to do it with just a bucket of water and soap, because in order to keep from bending over I have to constantly keep going down on my knees (I’m not flexible enough to squat) and getting back up again. I explained to her I could do it with just the bucket and soap but I’d need a cushion or something to put under my knees. At that point she just said forget it, but I reiterated that I could do it with the pressure washer if not the next day then definitely on Friday. I never did end up washing the car either the next day or Friday, since dad thought it was a waste of time with all the rain in the forecast. I did however vacuum the car the next day.

As I stated at the beginning of this post, this example is interesting because it shows how symbols can meet us through synchronicity in the waking world as well as in dreams. Going farther we can see that these kinds of synchronicities give a glimpse into the intricate interconnectedness and interpenetration of all things. They help us see that there’s a hidden meaning and intelligence in the cosmos, one that informs and presides over its unfolding behind the mask of apparent unconsciousness in the universe’s outward appearance.

Another thing worth drawing attention to is the way that, in the evening, the anger first manifested in my dad and then later in me. This shows how things like anger are a vibration that’s ‘in the air’, and can invade more than one person or even be passed from person to person. That may have happened also with Rhonda and I earlier, but it’s less obvious.

In closing, I’ll say that I believe these little synchronic glimpses are just the tip of a massive iceberg of interconnectedness that we can only truly appreciate from a higher or cosmic state of consciousness. It’s too stupendous to fit in the littleness of the ego. What would such a consciousness be like? I don’t know, but this passage from Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri casts some light on that, and seems like an appropriate way to end this post:

Interpreting the universe by soul signs
He read from within the text of the without:
The riddle grew plain and lost its catch obscure.
A larger lustre lit the mighty page.
A purpose mingled with the whims of Time,
A meaning met the stumbling pace of Chance
And Fate revealed a chain of seeing Will;
A conscious wideness filled the old dumb Space.
In the Void he saw throned the Omniscience supreme.3

Notes and References

  1. Interestingly this was one of the two timers that were mentioned in my previous post on the wasp.
  2. My back also prevents me from pulling the starter cord, so I need my dad to start the pressure washer for me.
  3. Complete Works of Sri Aurobindo Volume 34 Savitri, pg 76

 

A Small Opening of the Crown Chakra

On By Douglas M.In SynchronicityLeave a comment

reality
I drew this card from The Eternity Game a few days ago and the word that was upright was ‘Reality’. An interesting thing happened that day. At work as things were going wrong, or obstacles came up or when my boss set me to a task that I though was a waste of time, I was able to detach myself from my reactions by remembering that behind all things is the guiding hand of the One and that I’m in no position to judge the rightness or wrongness of how things unfold. Usually though that’s something that takes a mental effort if I can do it at all, but on that day it was easy, spontaneous.

This card ‘Truth” stands for the crown chakra in the game and I think I must have had an opening there that day, one that enabled me to remember easily the truth, the ‘Reality’ of how things really are albeit only in a mental way. The next day I was back to mental effort, but that’s the way these little openings are. The same way the scarab beetle on the card crawls out of the dung and emerges into the light, one day I hope to occupy the consciousness that constantly lives the Truth.

For those interested in learning more about The Eternity Game please visit http://www.medhananda.com/eternity_game.htm

Mad as a Hornet! – The Wasp in Dreams

On By Douglas M.In Dream Interpretation, Dreams1 Comment
Angry Wasp by L@uReNCiO, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic License   by  L@uReNCiO 

Like a lot of people I can be irritable, and while I have a tighter grip on it in public, it comes out at people close to me like my mother.   Even there though I have a pretty good level of control most of the time, but I find I have spans of days or weeks sometimes where I’m more agitated, and the irritation is more difficult to restrain. I had been going through a period like that recently, and the movement was shown in my dreams using the symbol of the wasp.  This makes perfect sense as there are few things as hostile as a wasp, and we’ve all heard the phrase “mad as a hornet.” Here are the two dreams I’ve had during this recent upsurge of irritation which feature the wasp and took place within a week of each other.

Monday Sept 7, 2015

In this dream I’m in Briarcliff Circle in front of Todd Brim’s house. There’s a house being constructed across the street, and at the top of it there’s a huge wasp’s nest with big six inch wasps crawling around on it. I’m talking to RJ Snyder, and he says he’s going to pay $5000 to have it removed. And I say, “Why don’t you just call pest control and have them do it for free?” The street the house is on goes up a hill and RJ and I walk up to the top. I tell him I’ve seen other strange things in this neighborhood, and he tells me that Dhina is running around with my voice recorder and he finds that unnerving.

Sunday Sept 13, 2015

 I’m in the garage and someone there wants me to video him with the GoPro camera. I really can’t though because the piece of plastic that frames the lens is out of place. I look under the workbench and see a wasp’s nest. I go into the house to get away from the danger and then out to the pool. As I’m walking around the pool I encounter a mirror and can see my face in it. I can see it’s really sunburned from the bottom of my eyelids on down, red as a lobster. There are a few small patches of unburnt skin though.

Like many older people my mother struggles with technology, and this is the main thing that pushes my irritation button as far as she goes. This annoyed part of me feels these things really aren’t that hard and she ought to be able to figure them out, or at least be able to remember how to do something after I’ve shown it to her a couple of times, etc. etc. Over the recent Labor Day weekend her questions and requests were coming up more than usual, and as the irritation got worse it started to come up when she would ask me about virtually anything and not just tech questions. It was just like the way some kids or teenagers will get riled when you ask them to do something, acting like you’re really imposing on them. Dhina, who is mentioned in the dream, is an Indian boy I know and is a perfect example of this kind of indignant teenager. The fact that he has my voice recorder I believe represents my speech, since my irritation manifests both as a vibe of annoyance and also comes out of my mouth. So the dream is showing me I’m acting like Dhina. The part about calling pest control I think has to do with calling on the divine for help with the irritation and not just my own resources, which the dream portrays as spending $5000. The house is something under construction in me, though I’m not sure what. That I make it up to the top of the hill is good as it shows an overcoming of the irritation on that day at least.

Though I fought back well on Labor Day, the problem continued during the week and through the next weekend. The morning after the second dream I once again gathered up my will to try and cast off the irritation’s grip on me. We had recently gotten an Amazon Firestick for our TV, and I had agreed to show mom how to use it, so I knew a test was coming in advance.   I think the dream foreshadows this with the filming with the GoPro, but in the way dreams most often do it, which is analogously and not exactly.

Perhaps though it’s more accurate to say that an event in the inner world (shown or translated by the dream) gives rise to an event in the outer world, and the relationship between those two events is analogous and not exact. Regardless I think we can see the connection here. That I flee the wasp’s nest is a good sign and reflects my effort to get away from the irritation.   I’m not sure what going from the garage to the pool might signify though the garage seems to represent dreams according to the experience of my collaborator Donny and it makes sense to me. I think the sunburn is again showing the problem with the irritation manifesting as speech since it’s mainly on the lower part of my face. And we all know how a person’s face will turn red when they’re really angry. The location of the sunburn also shows that while the irritation had gotten into the speech and action center of the mind (the throat chakra), it hadn’t reached the seat of the intellect and higher reason (the third eye chakra).

While it doesn’t feature the wasp there is one more dream I had in between the other two that also drew my attention to my irritation and merits being shared:

Thursday Sept 10, 2015

I’m sitting on the front porch with Dad and this girl I’ve known for about a year. She’s blond, has a lot of tattoos and is dressed in a crop top and a short skirt. She has a punk look to her. I have a computer and am looking at her Facebook page. Her cover photo is showing her left forearm (I’m pretty sure it was the left) and it has the words “black mamba” tattooed on it. I’m telling her how it doesn’t feel like a year has passed since we’ve met, that it only feels like a couple of months.

The day before this dream I had set up some outdoor timers on the front porch for some decorative lights we have outside.   Then on the day following the dream my dad went out and added a needed extension cord but thought he’d messed up the settings on one of the timers in the process. Mom told me this and muttering something indignant I went out to the porch to see what was wrong. As I was examining the timer (which turned out to be fine) the fact that I was on the porch made me remember my dream and I saw how the irritation strikes like a snake. A snake in my dreams represents some kind of hostile force or lower vital movement, and I think that’s pretty universal, though I believe a snake can represent a positive energy or movement in some cases too. My vital itself is represented in the dream by the girl, and that too seems to be fairly universal symbolism though a woman figure could certainly represent many other things.   For example if you dream about a woman you know it might represent some hallmark characteristic of hers that you’re currently exhibiting. My dad in this dream is this kind of character and represents my irritation since like many men he’s irritable with his spouse.

So what’s the lesson here? I guess for me it’s that things like irritation are hard to get rid of, and uprisings like this are part of the process until the defect is fully integrated or simply disappears by the process of spiritual transformation. There’s a fine line though between recognizing that and giving a vital movement permission to continue. The fact that my dreams stepped in like this tells me it’s no small matter and I have to continue to be vigilant in rejecting it. I do want to be rid of it though (as well as a great many other things) and that’s an important step.

It also never hurts to look at things through the eyes of understanding as Donny reminded me when I related the dreams and the irritation to him.   He reminded me to look at my mom with the eyes of the soul, see her as innocent, like a child. The fact is it’s just hard for her to figure technology out.   And when you also consider the fact that she and my dad let me live with them for free and feed me to boot, a little patience and understanding while serving as house tech support isn’t much to ask.

Notes and References

  1. The reader will probably notice I don’t mention anything about the character of RJ or the significance of Todd Brim’s house while discussing the dream.  Both RJ and Todd Brim are what you’d call “a ladies man.”   The day following the dream I had an uprising of sexual desire, and the dream seems to have woven the two vital movements, the anger and the sex desire, together into one dream. Maybe that speaks to some connection between anger and sexual desire?

A Review of ‘Joan of Arc: A History’

On By Douglas M.In Inner Voice and Vision, ReviewsLeave a comment
Edward Reginald Frampton (British, 1872 by sofi01, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.0 Generic License   by  sofi01 

This new biography of Joan of Arc by author Helen Castor recently caught my eye on the new release rack at my local library.   At the time, I honestly knew precious little about Joan of Arc other than she fought against the English, was burned at the stake and heard what she claimed were divine voices, so I was curious to know more about this historical spiritual figure and checked out the book.

I don’t know how other biographies of Joan have handled things, but this one rightly takes its time in setting the scene, starting with the British invasion and then navigating all the different twists and turns of the war until Joan arrives on the stage fifteen years and eighty-six pages later.   In doing so, the book really gave me a stimulating glimpse into the mind of the times I previously didn’t have. The middle ages weren’t something I knew a whole lot about either other than what stuck with me from high school history i.e. there were kings and knights, the pope and the Inquisition, the bubonic plague, a lot of wars, and your average person was basically miserable and oppressed.   The book shows a lot about what a powerful force religion was back then. It’s not really clear from the book how your basic peasant looked at things, but the nobles and the clergy looked for evidence of God’s favor or disfavor or even whose side God was on in events like the outcome of battles. And if you lost a battle in a particularly ugly manner, like the French did at Agincourt, the clergy would debate amongst themselves as to which sin it was and committed by whom that brought the misfortune upon them. They also used signs and portents to determine what actions to take and when to take them. It was also not uncommon for people to claim to hear divine voices, and thus the means of discerning who was hearing the divine and who was hearing the demonic was a topic of no little import amongst the clergy of the time.

With the groundwork patiently and properly laid by the author, our firebrand Joan then enters the picture as the strategic river city of Orleans is under siege by the English. We quickly see that Joan is remarkable for more than just hearing voices. The book makes very apparent the incredible force of personality of this simple God-loving peasant girl who balked convention by wearing men’s clothes and who rose to a position of military leadership at a time when that was unthinkable.   France was desperate to be sure because if Orleans fell that may have spelled the end for the French and they knew it, but Castor clearly shows that what was equally if not more important was Joan’s intense will and conviction in her God given mission to drive the English from France and to give her King his official coronation.   That conviction revives the reeling French morale and inspires Joan’s men to achieve a series of stunning military victories.

But even after her fortune turns and Joan is captured by the English, her incredible will and resolve persist as she endures seven months in captivity followed by a grueling trial for heresy. I couldn’t help but marvel at the way a nineteen year old girl with no education to speak of stubbornly and courageously stands up to some of the greatest legal and theological minds of the day, confounding their attempts to manipulate her and refusing to repent her heresy even after they get what they need to convict her. And I equally couldn’t help but understand her moments of weakness and despair, such as when she attempts to jump to her death from her prison and later, when faced with being burned at the stake, her decision to sign a statement of abjuration.   I mean who wouldn’t have such moments under such circumstances? In the end though, Joan chooses the fire and recants, though history isn’t totally clear on that.   As the book points out, the English may have taken away her woman’s dress and left her with nothing to wear but her men’s clothing which was a breech of her abjuration. Regardless, this time Joan goes through with it, calling the name of Jesus as the fire takes her life.

Even in death though Joan’s promise was fulfilled, and the English were driven from France twenty years later. Five years after that Joan was vindicated and her conviction of heresy overturned in a trial as equally biased as the first.  Then, nearly 500 years after her death, she was canonized as St. Joan. Thus today it’s generally assumed that St. Joan was hearing divine and not demonic voices. I too held the belief that Joan was divinely inspired, but reading this book gave me the chance to take a more in-depth look at things. I must admit that after taking that look I find myself of the same opinion, though I don’t discount the possibility that there was some undivine admixture in her voices. Regardless of that, however, the way she came on the scene at such a critical moment and the fact that France’s salvation was in such an unusual package, speaks to me of divine intervention.   In addition, her stupendous and unwavering conviction and the effect it had on both her troops and her country, though short lived, suggests to me that a power much greater than hers was at work through her, and that for whatever reason the English conquering France would have somehow gotten in the way of the divine plan. It seems to me that Joan may have been what in Hinduism is known as a Vibhuti. For those not familiar with the term Sri Aurobindo defines it by saying that “A Vibhuti is supposed to embody some power of the Divine and is enabled by it to act with great force in the world.”1

But regardless of whether I’m right or wrong about Joan, I would encourage anyone intrigued by this review to take a look at what I found to be a riveting and engaging look at this fascinating historical figure and her times. And if I am right perhaps like me you’ll catch a window looking in on the workings of divine intervention.

References
1.  Collected Works of Sri Aurobindo Vol 22, pg 406.

An Example of Prevision in a Dream

On By Douglas M.In Dream Interpretation, DreamsLeave a comment

The Fortune Teller by Cowgirl111, on Flickr
Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 Generic License   by  Cowgirl111 

Over the years I’ve had the experience a number of times of dreaming about someone I’ve known and then the next day or so I meet someone who either looks like them or resembles them in terms of character, or sometimes both.   It’s a sort of foreshadowing, but one I at least can’t see until after the fact.  So having said that let me share one of these experiences.

I was sitting in large classroom auditorium, maybe about half-way up the rows.  Seated in the same row as me were my boss Bud, my coworker Pete, and my former coworker Cindi.  Bud had apparently brought Cindi back as our director of sales. 

Cindi was the director of sales for nearly two years at the chamber of commerce where I work. During those two years in addition to working at the chamber Cindi was also always going from one side job to the next, things like pyramid schemes, selling supplements etc. She was just that sort of person and I think a lot of us have know someone like that.

Now I’d basically forgotten about this dream until about three days later when a woman, Alberta, walked into the chamber saying she wanted to join for two types of products she was selling.  The first was a type of make-up and the other was a type of essential oils that Cindi used to peddle.  Alberta seemed to be cut from the same cloth as Cindi since it seemed this was just the latest thing she’d undertaken to make money and she had probably tried many other little schemes before.  There was also some similarities in personality between Alberta and Cindi, but no physical resemblance.

Alberta came into the chamber frequently for maybe six weeks or so for various things related to her business ventures. Both my co-worker Rhonda and I were very involved in her process and tried to help her. I don’t recall at what moment I made the connection with the dream, but at some point I realized that “Cindi”, in the form of Alberta, who had a similar character, had indeed returned to the chamber but as a member and not as our director of sales. Then one day Alberta just up and vanished.

In closing I’ll say that there doesn’t seem to be much practical use for a dream like this other that to remind us that things are taking shape in the inner reality before they manifest out here.  That I think though is a valuable thing of which to be reminded. I also think its very possible this dream was showing something psychological in me represented by the return of Cindi.  If I have other dreams about her I’ll try to pay attention and see if I can connect it with some movement in me.