Dream Yoga
My meditation teacher has given us a dream yoga practice to try. When I have a dream you I am to wake myself up fully by getting out of bed and getting a drink of water or some such. When I get back to bed, I ask for healing and transmutation, then focus on my highest spiritual thought. It is not necessary to remember what the dream was about.
The theory is that when you are dreaming you can work out your issues and karma within the dream so that you don't have to go through the same process in waking life. The idea meshes quite well with my own primary working theory of dreams, which is that they are the unconscious mind cleaning house and working through the dross of the waking life. According to my teacher, the Tibetans believe that we astrally project during dream time.
I have been attempting this practice for about three weeks now. I have gotten so that I wake up after I dream, usually only once a night (though I assume I dream more often than that), usually about four hours after I have fallen asleep. I can generally remember to mumble "healing and transmutation" as I stumble to the bathroom. But I'm having some trouble thinking my highest spiritual thought in the middle of the night. Last night I sort of waved my arms in the general direction of "God everywhere...uh, love and, uh, compassion. Everymumble been my mother once, mumble. Gratitude." I must remember to bookmark a particularly good poem by Hafiz tonight before I go to bed.
Also, have I mentioned that I have chronic insomnia? I've managed the waking up bit, but the getting back to sleep bit is still giving me problems.
Seriously, though, I think this will be a helpful practice, once I get the hang of it. It reminds me of when I was learning my multiplication tables in the third and my teacher said that if she woke us up in the middle of the night we should be able to do our times tables. I really *should* be able to have my highest spiritual thought in the middle of the night. If I can be at my highest at a time when currently I am usually (if awake) complaining about being awake, I should be able to have it available at any time.
And that would be very useful.
The theory is that when you are dreaming you can work out your issues and karma within the dream so that you don't have to go through the same process in waking life. The idea meshes quite well with my own primary working theory of dreams, which is that they are the unconscious mind cleaning house and working through the dross of the waking life. According to my teacher, the Tibetans believe that we astrally project during dream time.
I have been attempting this practice for about three weeks now. I have gotten so that I wake up after I dream, usually only once a night (though I assume I dream more often than that), usually about four hours after I have fallen asleep. I can generally remember to mumble "healing and transmutation" as I stumble to the bathroom. But I'm having some trouble thinking my highest spiritual thought in the middle of the night. Last night I sort of waved my arms in the general direction of "God everywhere...uh, love and, uh, compassion. Everymumble been my mother once, mumble. Gratitude." I must remember to bookmark a particularly good poem by Hafiz tonight before I go to bed.
Also, have I mentioned that I have chronic insomnia? I've managed the waking up bit, but the getting back to sleep bit is still giving me problems.
Seriously, though, I think this will be a helpful practice, once I get the hang of it. It reminds me of when I was learning my multiplication tables in the third and my teacher said that if she woke us up in the middle of the night we should be able to do our times tables. I really *should* be able to have my highest spiritual thought in the middle of the night. If I can be at my highest at a time when currently I am usually (if awake) complaining about being awake, I should be able to have it available at any time.
And that would be very useful.