A recent dream

at the very start of the dream, i was visited by some gangsters. i don't really remember how that happened, but basically i was some small-time crook working mostly by myself and a very large gang was leaning on me. i knew they were probably going to take all my money until i couldn't pay anymore, at which time they'd kill me.

an old gangster came in to talk to me. he told me it was time to kill: i had to kill someone, anyone for any reason. i just had to go out and kill someone so that the gang would have respect for me. he was smiling about this. he was a nice old (60? 65? 70?) man, generally very calm, but he was excited and happy about this fact.

the next thing i remember, i was walking along a crowded beach. i had no intention of killing anyone. i think there were some dark clouds visible looking out over the sea. i was thinking about how nice it would be to have the powers of nature at my command. if i could make one of the gangsters be hit by lightning and make it clear that i was the one who made it happen, they would leave me alone because i would have powers they didn't understand.

just then, the doors to the beach swung open, the sky went dark, the water went completely dead still. the sound of a soft organ (or maybe a nice harmonium) began to play. when i say "the doors of the beach", i mean a row of doors that was continuous as far as the eye could see. they were like theatre exit doors. the enclosure they were bound to (that is, the "walls" and "ceiling") was the sky. outside the doors was outside of the sky of the beach. it was a bit like the end of the truman show.

when everyone had fled, the doors slammed shut and a male voice started singing with the organ/harmonium. he was singing about how this was the end, no more ____ (you name it, pretty much). here, a funny thing was happening that often happens to me in dreams: one part of my mind was thinking ahead of the dream, and another part was experiencing the dream. i was conscious of a mental scramble to find the right words and notes to represent the moment, and there was only a certain amount of "buffer" time before whatever i thought of had to occur, and i would experience that.

anyway, though i'd known that something like this was coming, the reality only fully sunk in then, and i became afraid. i started to climb up the doors. i knew they would open soon and a juggernaut would come through that would run me over without taking notice. this "juggernaut" was a huge vehicle and its power was incomprehensible. it was there to replace all other force.

there was to be no more violence except that of the juggernaut. mankind would sit with its hands in its lap from that day forward, because it had chosen to flee the beach. if there was any kind of quarrel, the juggernaut would sort it out for the quarreling parties.

on the other side of the doors, mankind was becoming undifferentiated, homogenous. when i say that, i don't mean that each person was becoming like the next. i mean that mankind was returning to some primordial liquid state. i could picture a ball of some kind of liquid ("liquid light"?), and from this ball, occasionally the (increasingly) vague outline of a human limb or head would pop out like a pseudopod only to return to the blob-state. MANKIND HAD CHOSEN TO LEAVE THE PHYSICAL AND PHENOMENAL UNIVERSE, because it was afraid.

i remember thinking that i never realized that a world without violence could be so terrible. the non-violent world i would like to see is a result of development -- the improvement and increased sophistication of mankind. this version of a non-violent future was a result of the cowardice and laziness of mankind, who would rather leave the world altogether than face fearful things and improve from them.

That seemed like a very thorough recount, to me. Have you worked long on refining your skills in this area?

Have you tried experimenting with any entheogens? There are a few teas traditionally used to enhance 'dream vision'. If you can get beyond the flavor, they can have potent effects!

neutralrobotboy wrote:There's a bit of ground work I feel I need to do beforehand.

Dale Pendell's Pharmako/Gnosis: Plant Teachers and the Poison Path will be an invaluable aide in preparations of this nature.

I learned one exercise (from Osho's Book of Secrets) that produced some dramatic results for me... It's really quite simple. Every few hours, stop whatever you are doing, look around and ask yourself: is this really happening, or am I in a dream? Consider the possibility seriously that you are actually asleep, in your bed, and dreaming. Do this at least five or six times a day for several weeks. Once it becomes a habit, it is bound to happen that you will ask yourself the question sometime when you really are dreaming...

neutralrobotboy wrote:Funny story: I tried this method (essentially) at one stage a while back and repeatedly had experiences while dreaming where I asked myself if I was in a dream and came to the conclusion that I wasn't! Hehe.