Just spent 10-15 minutes or more in alternative reality
Woahhhh.
This wins the prize of longest *single* vivid dreaming episode.
Most notable event:
--> Finishing moving out of a small one-story house in the woods. Some guys helped me move something large and wooden (table?) into the trunk of my car, which I recognize awake as my Mom's red sports car. I tipped them well and they thanked me, and went out by the street where they could drive away. I assumed they did, but it would have been far enough away for me not to hear. I turned around for literally a couple seconds and back, and the car was gone! I immediately suspected they stole it, until I checked my pocket and my key was still there. There was no way they could have rigged it in two seconds, two feet away from me, and driven off without me hearing or noticing. Ergo, the car vanished. (I had been driving in it earlier -- actually, I was trying to drive it in sand, which was rather unpleasant, and it stalled at least once.)
Comforted that it must have disappeared from existence and wasn't stolen, I calmed down (LOL =]). Oh well! I didn't even really want the car anymore, and maybe there's a reason for this I don't understand. So I took my two suitcases and got on the bus.
Bus riding in dreams, I think, has been/become a metaphor for how spiritual growth feels. You can't DRIVE spiritual growth. It's just a matter of stepping onto a path, or stepping into awareness, and riding it along for the process. You can get off and get on, but the directions and turns it makes? -- You've just got to ride with it. In my dreams I generally have an idea of where I want to get off, but the path in between is an unknown.
Driving a car seems more like the ego when it has too much power, because that's what the ego is about: driving, controlling, displaying oneself as separate or independent (e.g. a red sports car!).
What about moving in and out of houses lately?
I was moving out of my very small, isolated, house alone in this dream... and in one of yesterday's dreams I was moving into a huge, open, sunlit mansion filled with friendly people -- mostly other students who were starting some kind of school with me. (Hello, spiritually evolving "Aspects" of me? Or at least, aspects trying out a more expanded "home" of mind, i.e. frame of reference, should this slightly but qualitatively increased Presence continue.) The only non-student I seemed to remember was a friendly, plump, female cook about 35 years old.
These HUGE BUILDING dreams I apparently get whenever my awareness practice is breaking ground or improving in some way, which I've already noticed in real life. (K/chakra surprises, increased time spent in witness mode, increased draw toward meditation for its own sake.) Another pattern is that there often seem to be other people my age with me. Off the top of my head I remember the HUGE: airport/hotel, fantastical downtown block, gym, other huge house (with only a few housemates), and now this huge communal student mansion.
Awareness is where I observe my ego-mind-body as not Me, and instead take the position of the open, nonattached, inner witness or observer... It dramatically expands my view of life. The maximum development possible under this duality -- nonjudging witness versus everything else -- ranks according to Hawkins as just below the first level of "enlightenment" worthy of the term [level 600 "Peace"]. Enlightenment apparently transcends all dualities, including the observer-observed split. (Even higher levels of enlightenment supposedly resolve even more abstract, lingering dualities.)
Interesting...
The whole thing was a quite positive dream, emotionally. I even found a smile on my face when I woke up. =]
Another positive note? I'm waking up from these long, vivid dreams quite refreshed, no matter if it's the day, evening, or morning.
~Odyssey
This wins the prize of longest *single* vivid dreaming episode.
Most notable event:
--> Finishing moving out of a small one-story house in the woods. Some guys helped me move something large and wooden (table?) into the trunk of my car, which I recognize awake as my Mom's red sports car. I tipped them well and they thanked me, and went out by the street where they could drive away. I assumed they did, but it would have been far enough away for me not to hear. I turned around for literally a couple seconds and back, and the car was gone! I immediately suspected they stole it, until I checked my pocket and my key was still there. There was no way they could have rigged it in two seconds, two feet away from me, and driven off without me hearing or noticing. Ergo, the car vanished. (I had been driving in it earlier -- actually, I was trying to drive it in sand, which was rather unpleasant, and it stalled at least once.)
Comforted that it must have disappeared from existence and wasn't stolen, I calmed down (LOL =]). Oh well! I didn't even really want the car anymore, and maybe there's a reason for this I don't understand. So I took my two suitcases and got on the bus.
Bus riding in dreams, I think, has been/become a metaphor for how spiritual growth feels. You can't DRIVE spiritual growth. It's just a matter of stepping onto a path, or stepping into awareness, and riding it along for the process. You can get off and get on, but the directions and turns it makes? -- You've just got to ride with it. In my dreams I generally have an idea of where I want to get off, but the path in between is an unknown.
Driving a car seems more like the ego when it has too much power, because that's what the ego is about: driving, controlling, displaying oneself as separate or independent (e.g. a red sports car!).
What about moving in and out of houses lately?
I was moving out of my very small, isolated, house alone in this dream... and in one of yesterday's dreams I was moving into a huge, open, sunlit mansion filled with friendly people -- mostly other students who were starting some kind of school with me. (Hello, spiritually evolving "Aspects" of me? Or at least, aspects trying out a more expanded "home" of mind, i.e. frame of reference, should this slightly but qualitatively increased Presence continue.) The only non-student I seemed to remember was a friendly, plump, female cook about 35 years old.
These HUGE BUILDING dreams I apparently get whenever my awareness practice is breaking ground or improving in some way, which I've already noticed in real life. (K/chakra surprises, increased time spent in witness mode, increased draw toward meditation for its own sake.) Another pattern is that there often seem to be other people my age with me. Off the top of my head I remember the HUGE: airport/hotel, fantastical downtown block, gym, other huge house (with only a few housemates), and now this huge communal student mansion.
Awareness is where I observe my ego-mind-body as not Me, and instead take the position of the open, nonattached, inner witness or observer... It dramatically expands my view of life. The maximum development possible under this duality -- nonjudging witness versus everything else -- ranks according to Hawkins as just below the first level of "enlightenment" worthy of the term [level 600 "Peace"]. Enlightenment apparently transcends all dualities, including the observer-observed split. (Even higher levels of enlightenment supposedly resolve even more abstract, lingering dualities.)
Interesting...
The whole thing was a quite positive dream, emotionally. I even found a smile on my face when I woke up. =]
Another positive note? I'm waking up from these long, vivid dreams quite refreshed, no matter if it's the day, evening, or morning.
~Odyssey