More on Dreams
I'm not entirely sure what it was about my trip to LA that triggered the dreams, but Lord knows they've given me an odd sort of week.
The past 7 nights have yielded up only about two or three hours of sleep each, interrupted by the most random experiences I could have imagined. I dream of simple things, as basic as drinking water from a bottle, being led by the hand by a friend, hearing music from a stereo. But the usual self-awareness I find in dreams, that little bit of control you have without exertion, was gone, replaced by emotions and experiences entirely out of proportion with what was happening at the time.
Take, for one, the drinking water dream. In those three or four seconds of imagery, I forgot what it was to be human. For all intents and purposes, I was the water, rushing over and into endless bumps and crevices, ceaselessly following the only force I could feel, an overwhelming downward pull. The smooth, moving, constructs around me, the heat I was pulling from them, the throbbing sound of liquids flowing not far away; they meant little, barely a curiosity as I focused on fulfilling the force of the Will guiding me on my way. It was an almost animal-like instinct, an overwhelming need with little, if no concept of thought. For several seconds after I woke up, I understood what it was to be water better than I understood what it was to be human.
The dream of being led by the hand was just as short, though no less strange. Just a snapshot of a friend of mine taking my hand and pulling me into a run; why or towards what I have no idea. But the sense of happiness that welled up in me during those few seconds was astounding. I hate to sound cliché, I could actually feel my core quickly filling with a warm liquid, as bright and blindingly radiant to look at as the Sun. With my first, tripping steps, I noticed vaguely the same intensity of light from everything around me; or rather, I experienced it, as such overwhelming emotion left no space for rational thought. Indeed, I wasn't even aware that "thinking" existed until I woke up.
The most recent, I think, has had the greatest effect on my day-to-day life: a simple tune being played out of an old stereo. Again, the dream was entirely experience oriented; for a few moments, I was the music, I knew what it was to be music, to move like music. And since waking up from that dream, everything I've heard, weather from my own $300+ set of speakers, or performed live at the Hippodrome (a good performance, by all rights), even the humming of people I pass in the streets, it's all sounded muffled, like I'm walking around with perpetual pieces of cotton wedged into my ears. I feel like I'm listening to life from the wrong side of a wall, and wondering how others get by communicating like the teacher from Charlie Brown.
Then, of course, as I've told some (read: few) people, I've started having dreams of the accident again. But these, it seems, are the same as always. No overwhelming emotional experiences, just another review of something I haven't quite learned how to deal with yet.
Regarding the former-type dreams, I found it odd that no matter what I was experiencing, I woke up in a state of mild shock, all senses on full-alert, as if there'd just been a loud bang in my room. Most interesting to me was waking up in a panic after the happiness dream. In telling a programmer-friend about this, I got a laugh and the response "Well, what did you expect? You're messing with the Deep Magic." An old techie term for something fundamental that works even against all reason, it originally comes from C. S. Lewis' books, and I must say the label fits. We live all our lives as a conglomeration of parts, some part always contesting with another, everything working in some way to edit the raw experience into what we think of as experience. To see or feel something as it really is (well, mostly), completely devoid of thought, is shocking to a system that draws its comforts from checks and balances, from being in control. The instinctual response to loss of control is fear, and God knows there was plenty of adrenaline in my veins waking up each night.
And yet, in defiance of the biological system looking out for my safety, I find myself wanting to have more of these type of dreams. Perhaps after the "newness" of the experience wears off, I can explore these... things for greater lengths of time. Seems worth the effort, at any rate.
Thoughts?
~Japlin
The past 7 nights have yielded up only about two or three hours of sleep each, interrupted by the most random experiences I could have imagined. I dream of simple things, as basic as drinking water from a bottle, being led by the hand by a friend, hearing music from a stereo. But the usual self-awareness I find in dreams, that little bit of control you have without exertion, was gone, replaced by emotions and experiences entirely out of proportion with what was happening at the time.
Take, for one, the drinking water dream. In those three or four seconds of imagery, I forgot what it was to be human. For all intents and purposes, I was the water, rushing over and into endless bumps and crevices, ceaselessly following the only force I could feel, an overwhelming downward pull. The smooth, moving, constructs around me, the heat I was pulling from them, the throbbing sound of liquids flowing not far away; they meant little, barely a curiosity as I focused on fulfilling the force of the Will guiding me on my way. It was an almost animal-like instinct, an overwhelming need with little, if no concept of thought. For several seconds after I woke up, I understood what it was to be water better than I understood what it was to be human.
The dream of being led by the hand was just as short, though no less strange. Just a snapshot of a friend of mine taking my hand and pulling me into a run; why or towards what I have no idea. But the sense of happiness that welled up in me during those few seconds was astounding. I hate to sound cliché, I could actually feel my core quickly filling with a warm liquid, as bright and blindingly radiant to look at as the Sun. With my first, tripping steps, I noticed vaguely the same intensity of light from everything around me; or rather, I experienced it, as such overwhelming emotion left no space for rational thought. Indeed, I wasn't even aware that "thinking" existed until I woke up.
The most recent, I think, has had the greatest effect on my day-to-day life: a simple tune being played out of an old stereo. Again, the dream was entirely experience oriented; for a few moments, I was the music, I knew what it was to be music, to move like music. And since waking up from that dream, everything I've heard, weather from my own $300+ set of speakers, or performed live at the Hippodrome (a good performance, by all rights), even the humming of people I pass in the streets, it's all sounded muffled, like I'm walking around with perpetual pieces of cotton wedged into my ears. I feel like I'm listening to life from the wrong side of a wall, and wondering how others get by communicating like the teacher from Charlie Brown.
Then, of course, as I've told some (read: few) people, I've started having dreams of the accident again. But these, it seems, are the same as always. No overwhelming emotional experiences, just another review of something I haven't quite learned how to deal with yet.
Regarding the former-type dreams, I found it odd that no matter what I was experiencing, I woke up in a state of mild shock, all senses on full-alert, as if there'd just been a loud bang in my room. Most interesting to me was waking up in a panic after the happiness dream. In telling a programmer-friend about this, I got a laugh and the response "Well, what did you expect? You're messing with the Deep Magic." An old techie term for something fundamental that works even against all reason, it originally comes from C. S. Lewis' books, and I must say the label fits. We live all our lives as a conglomeration of parts, some part always contesting with another, everything working in some way to edit the raw experience into what we think of as experience. To see or feel something as it really is (well, mostly), completely devoid of thought, is shocking to a system that draws its comforts from checks and balances, from being in control. The instinctual response to loss of control is fear, and God knows there was plenty of adrenaline in my veins waking up each night.
And yet, in defiance of the biological system looking out for my safety, I find myself wanting to have more of these type of dreams. Perhaps after the "newness" of the experience wears off, I can explore these... things for greater lengths of time. Seems worth the effort, at any rate.
Thoughts?
~Japlin