DREAMS AND VISION

ANIL MITRA, COPYRIGHT © 1978 – 2008
[reformatted January 1, 2024]

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For more on the nature of dreams, see Dreams

OUTLINE OF CONTENTS

ACCOUNTS OF DREAMS

DREAM POEMS AND DREAM IDEAS

SUBJECTIVE ASPECTS OF THE DREAMS

SIGNIFICANCE, MEANING AND NATURE OF DREAMS

REFERENCES

COPYRIGHT

TABLE OF CONTENTS

1 ACCOUNTS OF DREAMS

1.1 An ocean dream. I was six or seven years old, the year about 1954

1.2 I lived by mountains, lakes, winters, snows, and red sunsets. Spring 1978

1.3 In the universe there is a great eagle. November 4, 1979

1.4 Saturday 1980: my life a collection of empty Saturday evenings

1.5 Conflict with my father. February 1986

1.6 Violent dreams. 1987 - 1988

1.7 Animal thinking. February 16, 1988

1.8 Animal being. February 16, 1988

1.9 Dreams and interpretations. 1988

1.10 Forest dream: outline of a repeated dream theme. Most recent: spring, 1989

1.11 Her mother. Spring, 1989

1.12 Railway journeys. Repeated dreams

1.13 The tunnel. Spring 1989

1.14 Transforming faces. July 4, 1989

1.15 The green plant. July 1989

1.16 Sea-river journey. A repeated dream. 1988 - 1990

1.17 Water - land - bridge: beauty but no destination. Repeated a number of times…at a phase in my life when in the midst of a project of significance, wonder and excitement…Spring 1989

1.18 Generic dreams: flying climbing, obstacle, embarrassment

1.19 My father turns into loaves of bread. July 23, 1989

1.20 Ritual and mystery in India. I am a subversive. Train journey. Autumn, 1989

1.21 In India: I want to get back to America and get a job. October, 1989

1.22 My favorite cousin: exposed and shriveled - he died December 1985. 1989

1.23 Easter island heads. Workers in a tropical rain forest. Others have light, refrigerator, ice cream and fun. October, 1989

1.24 Her old boyfriend becomes ambassador to Israel and takes her with him. October, 1989

1.25 Girlfriends and sisters. February 1990

1.26 A vision of my father's voice: “you are my incompetent.” March 10, 1990

1.27 I am the lover of all things. 1991

1.28 There are times of day which approach perfection. 1991

1.29 I AM… In woods that are deep. April 1991

1.30 I will go into nature. 1991

1.31 I prefer windswept desolation to little days. February 1991

1.32 In the words of the tourist. November 1991

1.33 Pagan verses of an arrowhead. 1992

1.34 Musical perfection. On the meaning of these dreams. April - May, 1993

1.35 There were erotic events in Trinity County [on the nature of love]. June 1993

1.36 Ursus. August 22, 1993

1.37 Undomo: an African dream. August 23, 1993

1.38 On dreams: meaning, significance and value. August 23, 1993

1.39 We gathered by nightfall. February 7, 1994

1.40 At an eastern European wedding. February 13, 1994

1.41 Perception. Morality. Reality. April 24, 1994

1.42 Children's' singing voices. Trinity Alps, 1994: camping up long canyon about 1 mile from the trailhead

1.43 Sex and other things. Trinity Alps, 1994

1.44 The bird. Integration of reality into a dream. May 2, 1995

1.45 The slave train. From the trinity alps, October 1995

1.46 Death: an encounter and a dream. From the trinity alps, October 1997

1.47 An erotic interaction with C.M. March 25, 1998

1.48 Dying in the snow melt…in Scotland. March 25, 1998

1.49 A gyrating ball of brilliant colors. August 26, 1998: Arcata

1.50 Map of the world concept. December 28, 1998

1.51 Rational and animal being. March 1999

1.52 Dreams from the Trinity Alps 1999

1.53 In the house of rooms: Trinity Alps 1999

1.54 A cinema in a dream: Trinity Alps 1999

1.55 For love does so fly its protected wings. November 24, 2001

1.56 The river. January 24, 2002

1.57 Flying. March 28, 2002

1.58 Higher Power. July 17, 2002

1.59 Crying. July 17, 2002

1.60 Poetry is stone and stone is cold and cold is logic. October 5, 2003

1.61 Losing love. October 7, 2003

1.62 Dream love. October 7, 2003

1.63 A woman who never touched a person. March 2004

2 DREAM POEMS AND DREAM IDEAS

3 SUBJECTIVE ASPECTS OF THE DREAMS

4 SIGNIFICANCE, MEANING AND NATURE OF DREAMS

4.1 Proto-dream

4.2 Origin of memory, dreams, imagery, symbols, language…in development…in evolution…function

4.3 The significance of specific dreams, dream images and symbols for the unconscious

4.4 Interpretation in dreams

4.5 The structure of dreams

4.6 Dreams, hallucinations, and consciousness

4.7 Dream phenomena

4.8 Dream contents

4.9 Dream quality

4.10 Unusual dreams: “acid drip”, “slave train”

4.11 Concepts from dreams…metaphysical from the power of dreams

4.12 Sex and dreaming and metaphysics

4.13 Dreams, food, and other functions

REFERENCES

COPYRIGHT

DREAMS AND VISION

1 ACCOUNTS OF DREAMS

1.1 An ocean dream. I was six or seven years old, the year about 1954

In a cabin in a wooden ship. The cabin floor, walls and elaborate beams are made of wood. There was a crew member or a roommate a wiry man with a sailor's hat and a shirt with blue and white horizontal stripes. I remember stars and spiraling neon colors.

The first of many ship/ocean dreams.

1.2 I lived by mountains, lakes, winters, snows, and red sunsets. Spring 1978

Earth was invaded by an alien swarm

Who left behind a deadly fallout

Humans went to live below

The surface of earth—

Shutting behind them doors of steel

I sought others—but found none…

I lived by Mountains, Lakes

Winters, Snows and Red Sunsets

I sought for

And was able to arrive at

Some understanding of Truth

Years later when

Survivors emerged,

I was able to communicate

What I had learned

1.3 In the universe there is a great eagle. November 4, 1979

In the universe, there is a great eagle

Who flies from world to world picking

Souls

He is not visible to mortals

But he infuses them with the spirit of

Truth

The good spirits are placed in the sky

Where they inspire the living

When a great soul returns to the world

There is a magnificent explosion

1.4 Saturday 1980: my life a collection of empty Saturday evenings

The universe might be a sea

Of infinite monotony

My mind would become not a dark cavern

But only a narrow squeak without the sound of its own echo

My body could be a form of

“ever turning into dust”

Ever hanging in between vague agony and tired lust

I would be denied even these grand negatives

Even my own private prophetic vision;

I would have no love but my love

Would reject me;

No knowledge but my knowledge

Would despise me;

No parents but my mother would die

Leaving my father with a tube discharging

Vile old liquids from a hole in his stomach

I am not alive yet will not die

But be a collection of dim Saturday

Evenings

1.5 Conflict with my father. February 1986

A strange dream with many diffuse elements. Hijli, an apartment with layered beds; Himodutti Das borrows my hiking boots for someone to play soccer - at the University of Delaware. In Hijli Haresh Chandiramani says “Hi Girls” and seemingly turns into my father with whom I have a long argument. While I am making my initial point he interrupts and insists that he has the right to speak. I initially acquiesce but, after much diversion, become firm that I too have this right, and he gives in. Then we hug because he wants to hug. He seems lonely and scared.

After the dream I was reflecting on a meaning - “To me thinking is so important an activity that in its consequence all authority must be subject to it…” when I realized that this was one of the points to the discussion with my father.

Observations—

A. Thinking is an approach to coping with parental control, authority, reality?

B. Thinking is important.

C. Rewards.

D. The dream is different from my usual struggle dream - this time I “win”…at the price of another's loss.

E. The loss of the other has always been an element for me.

F. Is the previous item a block…or a positive element to be synthesized into myself.

G. This is one of the foundations of my synthetic approach and perhaps this is my path to openness etc.

H. Would I integrate this to social/material needs?

1.6 Violent dreams. 1987 - 1988

Gouging people's eyes out with a hollow thin-walled pipe.

1.7 Animal thinking. February 16, 1988

Animal thinking…I dreamt I was thinking like an animal…without words, with images…it was easy, an enjoyable and enjoyed dream.

A rejection of verbal thought?

1.8 Animal being. February 16, 1988

I dreamt I was an animal being without language…but with timeless awareness…the awareness that is part of open perception.

1.9 Dreams and interpretations. 1988

When the reality censor is “asleep.” Possible functions:

A. If censorship or criticism dominate, creativity is diminished.

B. Censorship then produces tension.

Interpretations?

Dreams as interpretations of apparent perception arising from an altered state, i. e. the dream consciousness is an altered conceptual consciousness pertaining to an “illusory” [internal source] perceptual consciousness…the perception and the “interpretation” are bound together as one entity? Our common metaphysics disables facilities to understand, bind and distinguish vision and thought, dream and wake consciousness.

1.10 Forest dream: outline of a repeated dream theme. Most recent: spring, 1989

I have had a number of repeated dream themes in which the outline is the same or similar and the elements vary

Outline of the forest dream

The way in - usually from unpaved roads actual or imagined on the boundary of forests near the house where I grew up

The canopy of trees and the green light

The lions underneath the canopy. Fear…and security in the canopy

Path by the streams. On the other side of the streams:

Secret place of wonder and danger

Return

Back to the secret place with others

The way out

On waking: feeling of wonder

1.11 Her mother. Spring, 1989

To preserve privacy, I have substituted “Her” for the name of my friend—

She is off an adventure

I dream I am asleep near a fence

…and dream I wake up, and am anxious

Someone else is lying close, reaches her arm over her head in line with her body; my arm is outreached in the same way

Our hands meet, palms stroke…there is comfort

She is wearing light summer clothing

She: it is “her” mother

1.12 Railway journeys. Repeated dreams

Numerous rail journey dreams. A primary mode of transportation in my youth.

1.13 The tunnel. Spring 1989

The tunnel continued to spiral and grow. I had this dream once

1.14 Transforming faces. July 4, 1989

I had been working all night - preparing for a “Tiffany's Food of India” booth for the 4th of July Fair on the plaza in Arcata. I went to sleep at 6:30 AM and slept for 45 minutes. I do not recall whether the following was a dream or a hypnopompic or normal hallucination.

“Since levels of brain arousal during sleep and wakefulness also are mediated via reticular formation activity, sleeping, and dreaming merit consideration as hallucinatory activities. As a person falls asleep, he passes through a period of “partial sleep” in which awareness of the environment drops rapidly but in which the level of cortical arousal [which falls less rapidly] remains sufficiently high to permit some appreciation of external stimulation. Thus, the so-called hypnagogic phenomena occur.” __Britannica, 15th edition.

The dream—

I see faces - one at a time:

The ethnic types are from West Bengal

Each face transforms into the next

Although I do not recall the faces vividly, I recall that I awoke with the impression that they had been vivid

The faces are talking

I do not understand what they say

G. is interpreting them…into my right ear…

1.15 The green plant. July 1989

I had sex with a woman who I did not recognize

Afterward, a plant grows from her vagina. A green flower with a thin green stem

I related the dream to her sister who said I had said a day or two before “She is budding and growing.”

1.16 Sea-river journey. A repeated dream. 1988 - 1990

Ship journey by sea

Chaotic happenings on deck

…or sometimes below

…variations: a passenger ship; or a navy ship…I am an officer in training

I am in control…at the helm

…or not in control

Open sea

Land nearby: exotic…in my own life: the Suez Canal

Now we are surging up a river, a canal

Shallow, narrow

Almost grazing the sides - but not quite: a close fit

1.17 Water - land - bridge: beauty but no destination. Repeated a number of times…at a phase in my life when in the midst of a project of significance, wonder and excitement…Spring 1989

On land - a bridge leads across water. The bridge sways…is not structurally sound, seems unsafe

I take the bridge

Assorted adventure

And reach an island

On the island

Sometimes just a stopping point

At least once: a place of comfort, rest, friendship, security

A second bridge leads away

I travel onward, on the second bridge

By foot, car, or bicycle

The bridge ends abruptly…it is broken, or construction is incomplete

The end is sometimes a drop to the ocean…sometimes an incline down into the ocean and the bridge continues submerged

In either case I continue on

The water is calm, green, and beautiful

I do not get to any destination

There always is a destination but I do not know what it is…

On waking: relief and wonder

What is the dream about?

The island is the present

I stay in the present - on the island: comfort

Or

I have learned much, feel accomplishment…although never complete

But future development is the realm of the unknown and must include pure experiment - otherwise the unknown would not be unknown

“Deep water”

1.18 Generic dreams: flying climbing, obstacle, embarrassment

Many dreams.

1.19 My father turns into loaves of bread. July 23, 1989

For six months I have been feeling the following imperative: contact with “depth,”…with the sources of my nature - and had had some understanding.

I was angry with the content of some letters from my parents.

Tonight, in a dream: I had defended something essential but destroyed some property. My father became enraged and approached me to hit me. He turned into loaves of bread which I destroyed and then, in my anger, I smashed some appliances with my right fist.

1.20 Ritual and mystery in India. I am a subversive. Train journey. Autumn, 1989

A complex dream with many elements, only a few remembered…what is its significance?

In the house where I grew up. Begins with my father and family. In my bedroom. He is banging on, breaking down the door. He is in. We talk. The house is in East India.

We go to a South Indian religious ceremony. People are milling around. The ceremony begins. People begin doing a strange dance. My father joins in, but I do not. I walk around observing. As a part of the ceremony a Bengali woman from East India initiates a child. She talks in her native language - Bengali - that is foreign to the crowd. The crowd begins to murmur disapproval, disperses.

On a train. I am in a carriage at a railway station. I get out. The train begins to leave - fast. I jump back in. In a different, larger, carriage. Strange, diseased, threatening people. I go to the restroom to urinate. The walls are coated with drying urine, the floor is slick and slimy, the train is rocking, I am making contact with the diseased human excrement.... Outside, in the sitting space again, I have a wound to my hand - it is bleeding. Someone gives me a bandage and absorbent wool -admonishes me for not putting it on properly.

The train stops, I go out. Immediately, it starts moving fast. I run. I am struggling to gel: back on. I am failing. Finally, I succeed but the door will not open. An official calls to me “You must stay there.” I bang on the door. Someone on the inside tries to open it but it is not a door after all - it is a bathroom window. I cannot get in but the fact that I made an attempt to makes me a subversive. The journey continues - I on the outside of the train. As we rush through tunnels, I brush against the walls but there is no harm. Finally, the destination: the train enters a building. I am now al the front of the engine. We go through a sequence of wooden doors with glass panels. These doors are shut but the engine forces them open. My back brushes against the doors. We stop. [Now as I write I recall parts of other dreams. Also, somehow: canyon walls and pine needles.].

Now the open I am stopped by Indian agents: I am a subversive. Search and question. I evade them. I move on.

At: another religious festival. A group of people in a grassy field. Partially walled in. They are worshipping together in the middle as they face a leader. I am outside, on the periphery. I begin my own dance. Circling the central group, running, moving my arms up and down, reaching toward the sky. People join close behind me, very close, touching, we form a snake. Pumping arms, chanting, running, we form a circle around the central group. There is a feeling of magic - of the potential infinite, of mystery.

The Indian agents finally catch me. They arrest me. They take me for questioning. The officer is an attractive woman: khaki shirt, blue jeans, and black wavy hair. She questions me. “Are you a man or a woman?” “A man, obviously.” “No, it is not obvious.” She does an erotic body search. She says, “Externally, a man, now go into the restroom and collect a sample of your urine for a biochemical sex test.” In there, I urinate. As I do, the walls close in. Closer, closer, feeling claustrophobia. Feeling the walls touch me. They begin to press. “OK, OK. I'11 tell the truth.” They open the door. “We will let you out but, first, I must call the President of India to take your confession.”

1.21 In India: I want to get back to America and get a job. October 1989

Servants happy, A's coming over, wonderful food, bread in the pantry, wiring problems. $1,500 in my account from Dad - I must go to America and get a job.

1.22 My favorite cousin: exposed and shriveled - he died December 1985. 1989

A dream.

1.23 Easter island heads. Workers in a tropical rain forest. Others have light, refrigerator, ice cream and fun. October 1989

Link to Easter Island Heads

1.24 Her old boyfriend becomes ambassador to Israel and takes her with him. October 1989

S. M. is Jewish Ambassador to Israel, C. goes with him.

1.25 Girlfriends and sisters. February 1990

…since C.' conversation with G. caused her to want to stop her relationship with me—

1. A dream with Julie, G. and C. in which Julie was different but C. and G. were as they are. C. was rejecting.

2. Later. A dream with C. and G. in which C. was accepting. We kissed in love.

1.26 A vision of my father's voice: “you are my incompetent.” March 10, 1990

My imagery is usually vivid but this time - it was dark, early morning about 1 AM - I saw, in the dream-wake, a dark void that remained my visual “image.” Out of the void came a voice, “you are incompetent, you are incompetent, you are incompetent.” I recognized the voice as that of my father.

1. Was it a voice or an idea?

2. Was the recognition of the voice as my father's imposed or found?

3. Some comfort: it was a voice from without, not a fact from within.

1.27 I am the lover of all things. 1991

I Am The Lover Of All Things

Beginning[s]

Ends[s]

Cycle

of darkest night and brightest sun

depths of deepest black despair

hope of universal light

of my own death, dismemberment, and dissolution

The blood red of my own being

and freshest breath of life

1.28 There are times of day which approach perfection. 1991

There are

Times of day…moods of climates and varieties

Of weather…phases of moon…expressions

Of light

…that approach perfection

1.29 I AM… In woods that are deep. April 1991

I: AM

In woods that are deep

In dark woods, I sleep

In dense woods are beak and claw,

I sleep in nature, raw

In cities that are deep

In dark cities, I sleep

Amid dense populations, sleeping,

I sleep in cities, weeping

In the city of mind, deep

Amid dark symbols, I sleep

With dark thoughts, tonight,

I sleep, I sleep without light

In the eternity of existence, deep

In dark existence, I sleep

Dark star, dark hell,

I sleep, I sleep well

I am the woods so deep

I am the dark woods in which I sleep

I am the dense woods, I am beak and claw,

I am sleeping, I am nature, raw

I am cities, deep

I am dark cities of sleep

I am dense populations, sleeping,

I am sleeping, I am the weeping

I am the city of mind, deep

I am the dark symbols of my sleep,

I am the dark thoughts of the night,

I am the sleeping, I am the sleep without light

I am eternity, I am existence, deep

I am darkest, existence of my sleep

I am dark star, I am darkest hell,

I am sleep, I am sleeping well

1.30 I will go into nature. 1991

I will go into nature

Feel the kiss of the earth on the

palms of my feet

My lips against the bark of trees

My groin within deep transparent pools

Moon over mountain piercing

Cold silver-black nights

[romantic in poetry]

Slicing through my libidinal nature lust

Exposing inadequacy

Trembling at the ice cave of darkness

The mirror of existence

1.31 I prefer windswept desolation to little days. February 1991

A cry is uttered and heard

I feel

I am lonely for myself

For vacant gray sky

And solitary raven's cry

Aww-rr-wk

Center and edge

Red blood

I prefer wind slept desolation

To little days

1.32 In the words of the tourist. November 1991

In the words of the tourist

Who came here and said

“Jamble-town is jamble-likely

More than go to bed

The sea's in the ocean

And the ocean be

Just another drop

Of infinity”

1.33 Pagan verses of an arrowhead. 1992

I woke up Tuesday morning

And as I tossed in my bed

There they were - not one -

But a ring of poems

Dancing, lilting in my____

Regard these as proof

As Nola has said [February 7, 1992]

That Anil Mitra has air in his head

Mothers against drunk driving

Fathers against daughters dancing

Parents against pagan love

My son is dead

My sweet son

Hiking in Copper Canyon

Home of the Tarahumar

Easter, 1982

He listened to the beat of the native drum…

He watched at darkfall

From midnight to dawn

From one ridge

Across a branch canyon

Another artery in the body of the Sierra Madre

Across to the next ridge

Across to a notch in the next ridge

Where the Tarahumar had lit

A ring of torches

My sweet son

Who loved dance of all kinds

Discos

Stars

Gods

Rivers

Skies

Festive fires

On a canyon wall

He watched the fires at the notch

He had his eyes on the heavens

In his mind he saw infinity

He watched the mystery - ignoring the trail

And now my sweet son is dead

1.34 Musical perfection. On the meaning of these dreams. April - May, 1993

A number of dreams in which I conceived and then sang and or drummed music. The music was, in concept and actuality, intricate, beautiful, precise, and clear.

The question: was the after-dream sensation implied in the previous paragraph based in reality or illusion? The sensation itself was wonderful and real. The question, however, asks whether I had the perceptual experience while I was dreaming was correspondingly wonderful and actual or whether the perception was something different, perhaps less, and the resulting waking recollection was some kind of illusion or deception. Meta-questions are [1] whether the distinction implied is full, partial, or null, and [2] whether the question is valid, whether it makes sense and whether it is a mask for other related and deeper questions…questions that can be validly asked on the basis of a fuller metaphysics of experience that, possibly, invalidates the surface question. A first step in this direction is to pin and place the question. The question is pinned by recognizing its elements; it is placed by varying the elements to form similar questions, perhaps a family or questions, which form a comparative basis. The elements of the question include the dream events or perceptions, the waking experience, and the relation between the dream event and the waking perception i.e., the dream event and the waking experience of it. Note the simplification introduced by referring to dream event rather than dream reality, or perception. Related questions are “what is the relation between waking events and experience…and is this so different from the dream-waking relationship?” This forms a line of approach to the broad issue of a metaphysics of all experience.

Another comparative approach is to explore the relations among the modes of experience, the states of consciousness, in other persons, groups and cultures. This requires that we dwell on the possible relativisms of our own metaphysics …but this does not, in turn, imply any kind of absolute relativism or absolute absolutism.

The intensity of the waking experience, the after experience of the dream points to elements of reality …and if the waking experience involves elements of illusion or deception then whence such beautiful deception.

What is the status of the distinctions among the modes of experience: dream, waking and other?

Regardless of the metaphysical issues, does not the experience point to some real but untapped internal capacity? Does not the capacity for the after-dream sensation or experience suggest that there is some real, internal capacity? After all, whence the experience, based fully in my own person that would “normally” require a symphony, a gifted performer? One way to know is to actualize. What does “real” mean, here, if not actualizable? An alternate explanation is that, as suggested by the experiments of Wilder Penfield, the dream state allows for the triggering of memories or memory collages. But, what then of the unparalleled experience, its beauty, its novelty…that I had certainly not heard these particular scores or experienced these particular contexts…had I merely forgotten them?

If I were to demonstrate this reality, this capacity, what would that imply and mean for dreams, their relation to all experience? What is the meaning of the experience, in a dream, of a sunset, or of death? What is the distinction between the capacity, even when awake, to recreate vs. reconstruct the real? A caution, though, that some dreams point to or reveal something real does not imply this for all dreams. Conversely, the fictitious nature of some or even most dreams does not mean that all dreams are pure fiction. This calls into question the nature of the meaning of fiction.

1.35 There were erotic events in Trinity County [on the nature of love]. June 1993

There were erotic events in Trinity County, California when Carl Tuck, M.D. lent me a car, an Indian Ambassador[1], license plate WBD 8580 to drive to the coast to connect.

.

I approached the Campus on the coast seeking G. On the gravel driveway to the campus Kanchenjunga, the mountain came into view. Mt. Everest, it was rumored, could be seen on a clear day. I parked about half a mile from campus.

A number of dirt roads crisscrossed as they led to the University. The approach was hilly and forested and the paths were not visible from each other. Not all paths led to campus. One path was a secret forest path that followed a railroad track. Another path led to a magical natural bathing area now brown and now mild-blue water with trees and gnarled roots at the banks and green bamboo shoot reeds in shallow water. The crisscross reeds undulated with the current in the river fed pool.

Education appeared to be somewhat scarce on campus. The main features of the university were a main gym room with weights and an attached shower room; a room like a sauna with a central open floor surrounded by many ledges on which human bodies could drape themselves clothed or otherwise, alone or with partners, relaxing alone or with their partners and being, doing and loving together; a viewing room from which one could watch the panorama of plains, hills, snows and mountains - living mountains that could be focused on by willing in which situation the default view of focus that persisted without willing would be a dynamic and changing view of Kanchenjunga - a view of changing perspective, depth of field, distance, shade and time of day, relative stature among the peaks and between peaks and plains; and numerous other vague, indefinite places to be enjoyed for their pleasure and magic, feared for their unknown terrors and looked upon with keen anticipation and razor sharp fear for their potential for peaks of experience. No education as such was noticeable on campus but there were many students, many cars, many police, and much love.

Throughout all this G. floated into and out of presence - somewhat but by no means totally under my control. As I sought her attention and affection my success was only partially and randomly under my control. But whatever I did whether definite or vague, real, or magical, practical, or esoteric, wonderful, or dreadful, lovely, or vilely ugly, G. and her presence encouraged me.

At one point I woke up at thought: if there is magic, if there is a world beyond the world, if there is a God of Religion then this all absolutely imaginary and unreal as such…but there is a world of magic, of beyond, of God which are all very connected to our ordinary world and separated only by time and by our chosen and not chosen illusions and delusions…and in this sense the world of the magic beyond is very much more real that the “real” world, the “this is how it is in the real world” real world…very much more real because it is both unlimited and limited and because it is complete since it contains its own incompletion whereas the real world is merely limited and, as any academic, professional, or commonsense person will tell you, the way things must be.

But things must not be any particular or unparticular way.

I have been introducing the dream ambience.

After I parked the black ambassador, my Father Tuck's car, I walked toward campus with feelings of both omnipotence and inconsequentiality. I first approached the gym. I worked out and built up a glistening sweat. I thought to shower but did not.

I sought love and this is what I found. A woman, a wonderful woman. She was naked, with a lovely figure, a mean of the Rubinesque and Atlantan ideals. She was lithe and strong but gently curved with rounded thighs and bosom. Her bosom was the swell of her chest. Her hair was dark, long, and wavy. She lay back wanting to receive love. I reached out to her. I was drawn to her vaguely by her presence and acutely by her pubis which was covered only with short one eighth inch long hair providing a darkening hue rather than a black mat, was bounded by the creases of her groin and defined by an elevation, by a central slit and by pink and flesh red color. She reached out to me. She was drawn to me by my desire for love and my desire for her.

Her pubis was cheesy. It made me think of infection for it was infected. My hand was drawn to it and her hand to my groin. Love was definitely felt and welled. As my fingers caressed her mound and slit thus experiencing love and my mind caressed her body feeling desire for complete and not just genital union thus expressing connection, a discharge began to drip from between her legs. The discharge was copious and flowing and there was enough to coat my fingers giving them the glistening appearance of a glazed Chinese dish of meat as well as to form a continuous drip from my fingers and directly from their source in vertical streaks in alignment with gravity.

The quality of the discharge, as felt by me was: a glistening translucent light red - the discharge was mixed with blood from what I imagined to be a sore; an infected liquid; a corrosive substance; but still a true expression of love and to be truly loved for itself. So, I was torn over this fluid and this situation being drawn to it by the true elements of love and yet I was fearsome of it because of the potential for infection, of chemical burn and what I anticipated would at any moment be a cheesy, pungent acridity and yet at the same time a true beautiful woman scent in my nostrils.

This was thus a conflicted situation which I desired and sought to escape. There was welling but no culmination of desire; there was the wish to leave but no actual departure - only an ongoing wanting and an ongoing vortex of mixed-vague centrifugal feelings without clarity or acuity.

Yet at the same time the situation was purely lovely as was my friend. Because: although we all fear contamination, we are all contaminated. Therefore, a relationship which contains explicit contamination is wonderful. And I thank my friend for her courage in desiring my desire and for bringing to me her lovely form and her acid drip. That drip connected me not only to life but to life-death, i.e., to all existence and non-existence.

I did not want to say farewell but there was finally a vague disengagement. All this happened in some secret place on campus.

Next, I wanted to bathe but a group of naked men athletes would not permit me to enter. There seemed to be no reason for it other than that I feared that they would not permit my entry and that they were compelled to realize my fear. And yet there was among them some recognition of my need. A vague number of them assisted me in my search for my next need. One of them, more present than the others, was tall and slender but not thin, lithe with flat stomach, athletic legs, lean but with strong chest and arms, solid neck, and black hair. He was wearing only white underwear.

Of course, there was attraction vague and particular but the attraction, while attractive, was not recognized as such nor was it actualized but, rather, transformed into a working together to resolve our needs: mine to satisfy my need and his to help.

What was my need? I do not know but I was compelled to go on. My new friend led me to the pool with the milk-blue water and its milk-green water and I hung between the shore and the water thinking I was entering the water but not actually entering. For though I wanted to be cleansed because I feared acridity, infection, and chemical burn I did not want to lose my fluid connection with my real love. This fear-love sense continued to pervade events.

Onward to the viewing room. Kanchenjunga was alive. We were almost with it on those mountain snows even though we were actually behind the glass window. I knew that Everest lay behind looming, challenging, infinite and impossible. I willed Everest into view, but it did not come. I felt let down but thrilled about my intimacy with the changing forms of Kanchenjunga.

The viewing room led into the room with the central theatre and the ledges on which to drape love and its acts. There was a mix of people in the room all present within themselves or the immediate group but mostly marginally aware of the totality of the scene. Love was the issue and the purpose and all presented love. I felt, one by one, the love of a number of persons but most of all I felt the love on a ledge of a woman with brown skin, black hair, and a pink tank top. She presented to me her person, her personality, and her love organs. Her love organs were a penis, a translucent accessible penis, and, below the translucency, an entrance for loving and entry. I do not call the entrance a vagina for it was not shaped as such. And, whereas one seeks a vagina, this entrance was seeking, enchanting, loving, open. And the penis, while not massive, was rigid, now brown and pointing into the air.

She presented to me this possibility for love, but I did not physically avail of it. This was not through a lack of desire or through a repulsion for this situation was desirable as was every part of her anatomy: limbs, protuberances, orifices for love, inspection, and activity. Nor did I not avail of the situation from physical impotence. I was loving the love field around her and making love with it. Thus, virtually, every organ of mine made love to her and every organ of her through the joining of our love fields. Love was through the field; love did not need to be sought or made it was there, present without search or will. Indeed, there was the suggestion at every moment that her penis might love her seeking opening even without entrance into it. There was the suggestion that she might apply oil to her penis and slowly rub it into massivity and emission of magic fluid by an up and down motion of her hands and then, with increasing massivity, with her hugging self-loving arms and lips. There was also the suggestion that every particle of my self was pregnant with love for every particle of myself and her. These suggestions constituted the interacting fields of love.

We felt the reality of these fields. Thus, sex was and is a pure form of real love.

I needed to take my pink love with her love field back to Trinity County. Thus, I went back to search for my father's black Ambassador.

I walked back to the place of the Ambassador, taking with me my two loves: the fluid on my fingers which now engulfed me and my love's love field. I carried with me visions of Kanchenjunga and possibilities for magic, but the car was not where it had been.

I hesitated to ask the police to help as I feared incarceration due to my pure state of guilt. Yet with the encouragement of my male friends the police were contacted, and a massive search undertaken. The police searched over the paths to campus. They were assisted by my male friends but hindered by a group of subversive students, male-female pairs, who wanted to maintain their own private and spatially limited love of actualization by exclusion: who thus needed to prevent the actualization of the potential love fields from interacting and growing and spreading.

The police and my male friends searched but they found nothing. This was frustrating and confusing. For the disappearance of the car was not only an impediment but, because of the potential for disapproval involved in the loss of the car and the states of love, threatened reality.

In the meanwhile, I left the search scene and, accompanied by G. and some friends, sought the railroad path. We found a rail car and entered it. It gathered momentum. This was frightening. While rounding a curve, the car derailed, and we spilled down the hillside into the pool with milk-green water and the reeds and I was purified.

I found a lower path back to campus. We realized that I had forgotten where I had parked the Ambassador. Fortified with this awareness we located the car even though the subversives had built a new road over it. The Ambassador was thus found and there was resolution. We therefore returned to Trinity County to experience its erotic nature.

1.36 Ursus. August 22, 1993

I have been taking care of my neighbor Jeff's large, black, male cat, Ursus, this summer. A year ago, Ursus had been “terrorized” by Don, a previous roommate who had lived here until September 1, 1992.Don was protective of his own cat, Robina.

Over the past year Ursus has become friendly. He would sit close to me and sleep at Jeff's house.

The dream.

Ursus and I were close and affectionate. We stroked each other. Ursus was in love. He asked, “do me.” I did not want to do that and said, “I don't do cats.” Ursus then said “Well, if you cannot do me, please stay with me forever. Do not ever leave my side.” I responded “Ursus, even though you are a very nice cat and I like you very much, I can't stay by your side forever.” He said “Well, then we must never be together again. We must never see each other again.” As we lay in bed I was worried about his claws. Then, after we got up, I worried about avoiding Ursus, respecting his wishes.

1.37 Undomo: an African dream. August 23, 1993

A dream of travel in Africa. We were trekking with Africans, in primitive country. We were with Africans, traveling in primitive land among other Africans. We had just crossed one river and were approaching another—the Undomo river—and preparing to cross it.

The Undomo was wide, with clear water reflecting the sky, with eddies, streams, currents, and wavelets stirred by the wind forming glittering sparkles in the sun. The native and sympathetic though not westernized Africans broke into song, “Undomo, Undomo.” Deep, sonorous, a song of kinship with the flowing water - the river Undomo. One living being singing to another. Moving. I began to sing with the Africans. At first, we matched the deep, sonorous tone and the rhythm in step with the flow and power of the water. And then at a higher pitch I began to sing, still chanting “Undomo. Undomo.” In an intricate, and yet more intricate and beautiful modulation added to, built upon, the underlying rhythm. The underlying rhythm that reminds me of direct, attuned, deep and strong connection. Then, the Africans responded with even higher pitch, greater intricacy, modulation, and beauty…

The modulated versions remind me of the earlier dreams “Musical perfection.”

1.38 On dreams: meaning, significance and value. August 23, 1993

1. Continued dreams: on waking and going to sleep again without a period of full wakefulness…the meaning?

2. The significance of repeated dreams.

3. Meaning of dreams. What is the anchor here? Theory? Freud, Darwinism, universal indeterminism or evolution, neurology, myth, primal culture? And what of meaning found in symbols not intended by the author?

4. Value of dreams. Meaning , directives, ideals, omens: the dream as something else… The dreams as dreams: valued in themselves, their beauty, power, reality, and their intrinsic reverberation in life.

5. The word “dream” has connotations and associated prejudices that make it unsuitable for use in proper understanding and judgment.

1.39 We gathered by nightfall. February 7, 1994

It was the most wonderful nightfall

1.40 At an eastern European wedding. February 13, 1994

A music dream: a vocal with instrumental accompaniment. The vocalist: a man with long hair, beard - graying, handsome, European. The instrumentalist: heard but unseen. When I woke up, I remembered the score.

1.41 Perception. Morality. Reality. April 24, 1994

There was an “I” - neutral and observing; and an “Anil” - acting, with “evil” intent. “Anil” had a malleable body which, even though he was evil, was used for good - if only to protect Anil and I.

I imagined a cup and the question what would happen if the cup stopped interacting with the rest of the universe.

Repeat of the content of the previous paragraph…with the cup replaced by a significant portion of the universe.

1.42 Children's' singing voices. Trinity Alps, 1994: camping up long canyon about 1 mile from the trailhead

There was a gale force breeze most of the night. I crawled under a large fallen tree trunk where I slept amid rifle like reports of breaking branches. I heard the voices of children from India singing all night while awake. Quite pretty.

1.43 Sex and other things. Trinity Alps, 1994

Wonderful sleep and dreams… in one I was driving a two-level bus and ran over a boy – took him to the hospital. My parents were there acting as though I was run over. In the meanwhile, two women, one wearing a sari [only] and with glasses and slightly attractive, the other naked, extremely attractive, both very dark complexion – Indian – invited me to their bed. The one with glasses said I could not join them because I had smallpox. I joined them any how and the naked woman and I began to share loving caresses. Then I woke up. The dream was a collage of U.S.A., England, Indian and was unusual [for me] in that I was object and subject. [Usually subject.]

1.44 The bird. Integration of reality into a dream. May 2, 1995

This is an effect that is the opposite of the waking dream - either hypnagogic [in the semi-somnolence preceding sleep] or hypnopompic. In this dream something in the world appears as part of the dream. This is, of course, common - the telephone, an alarm, someone calling…present, at first, as part of the dream. The interesting thing: from the classification point of view: the dual effects of dream entering waking reality…and the reverse. From the ontological point of view: the categories of wake and sleep consciousness and their relation. From the psychological point of view: is it true that in dreaming consciousness is isolated from sensory input and motor output; we know that this breaks down in the borderline between wake and sleep and in pathological cases…but only in these cases? Are there functional exceptions?

The dream occurred shortly before and during waking, morning. Previous meals: lunch of soup and sandwich; 36 oz of beer at midnight, went to sleep at 3 AM and woke at 8 AM.

The waking dream included a bird fluttering over me and integrated into the story of the dream.

Upon waking, I first became aware of an unusual presence in my room…and then recognized it as a bird which must have flown in through the opened window.

The remarkable features of the specific circumstance:

It is clear that I perceived the bird while asleep. The bird was not immediately present as a bird in my waking consciousness and therefore the mechanism of perception, the “location” of its registration, and the issue of dream-wake communication are in question. The general issue of dream-wake integration. Is it a [partial] mistake to analyze dream consciousness [as estranged from reality especially immediate reality] and waking consciousness [as literal reality] as separate categories of consciousness. Is this the modern tendency to discretize, concretize and trivialize? Of course, the integration is known from other considerations…but here is a concrete illustration though perhaps only an instance.

1.45 The slave train. From the trinity alps, October 1995

I am driving a black box car to an exam when all lights go out and in dark night, I drive the front of the car over a precipice.

Next, I am driving on a crowded city street followed by a large blue sedan with stainless grille with immaculately attired Native American passengers wearing dark glasses… who drive into my car and push me despite my yelling: “You can’t” … and the reply, “We can influence the police.”

Then: I am wearing green-striped pajamas, and a beautiful naked woman says, “My young sister’s in love with you” and “Spend time with us”…and I think “mmmm” but say, “OK”, “But I can’t” and “I’m nooooot in love with her.”

We approach a classy hotel at a street corner, and I say to a friend, “I’ll be a little hurried.”

Then, the most unusual thing: the slave train. [As it passes, I continue to go back into the hotel, encounter acquaintances, look for police, look for the Native Americans from the blue sedan.]

The slave train is going by the hotel, in the street.

Going where? Who knows? Strange men – strange creatures… walking one-by-one. Yokes about their necks… yokes yoked to each other. Walking by one by one, some laboriously, some defiantly, some with lively defiant step… accompanied by strange, beautiful dirge-like music… guarded from the free people by armed police… Bizarre: all men, many barely clad wearing underwear… mostly grotesque, misshapen, some healthy, handsome, attractive… one horribly misshapen man chanting themes of defiance: I am in awe. Some go to congratulate the slave for his defiance. I want to but do not have the courage, but I remain in fear and awe… another more ape than man, blood-red lips and gums, white teeth; monosyllabic groans of anguish; …another with his hair braided into a snake-like waving tail of “defiance”…

…Then dirty, dimly lit carriages of olive green; it is night now and what is in there??

…Then open flat cars with women sitting, some young and beautiful [all clad only waist down], others mutilated, missing a breast, an ear, all “sex slaves”.

…I am moved to do something, but I am concerned about the blue sedan, the slave traders, fixing my own car, with the two sisters, my pajamas… doing something for the slaves…and where do all these naked young women come from.

1.46 Death: an encounter and a dream. From the trinity alps, October 1997

“ I have just had four of the most intense days of my life. I was in an early winter storm at the Mountain Lake where I was planning to spend two sun-filled weeks. The whole thing was eerie and intensely beautiful. But a lot of my gear got wet after two days of storm and I felt it was a life-threatening situation because the way out of the lake is over a rocky wall which could have been icy due to the storm and therefore treacherous. I felt much panic and struggled to control the panic. Finally, when the snow and hail turned to rain, I decided to get out on the assumption that if there were ice on the rocks it might melt. The ice had melted but the adrenaline had me breathing as though I had run a mile as fast as I could even before I had begun to walk out. Even without the ice those rocks are rough, but the adrenaline enhanced my strength, my balance, and my sense of what I needed to do.

“Once out of danger I spent a miserable, wet, cold night in a wet sleeping bag; meeting and sharing a meal and a tent with a hunter brightened the night. That night I had a dream. I was traveling in a bus with friends. The bus was approaching a bridge over a chasm. A bicyclist appeared in front of the bus and the driver lost control in attempting to avoid hitting the bicyclist. So, the bus broke through the side rail. As we plunged nose down to certain death, I had the following reactions. First, I said farewell to everyone on the bus, but I was not able to speak loudly enough for anyone to hear. Then I said welcome to eternity. Next, I wondered how the impact would feel from contact to blackout. Finally, I woke up and wondered whether I was alive.”

1.47 An erotic interaction with C.M. March 25, 1998

I was lying prone with only pants on. C.M. was lecturing and had her hand down the back of my pants, palm down and reaching toward the crack and beyond. It felt good.

She was lecturing on Entropy and did not understand her topic well. The audience, nursing staff at the hospital (ESSVEE) did not understand the topic at all. I said to C “They have no idea what you are talking about.” She brought her face close to mine in silent agreement. We breathed together and it felt good.

1.48 Dying in the snow melt…in Scotland. March 25, 1998

We were in an apartment in Scotland. This was a black and white dream. Eli was there, sitting, sprawled on a sofa, on his back, legs stretched, arms behind his head. We knew that the snow of the mountain was melting and was causing a flood that would engulf the town. We would probably die. I said that we needed to act. Eli said he could not do anything because he did not have any gloves. I went into the streets. There was a bridge. There were people, an air of panic but people walked silently and calmly. The light was in shades of bright white and of black. The mountain was melting, and the flood slowly approached. I knew I had to do something. Soon the water began to lap around my feet, it did not feel cold. Then I Was submerged in the water with gray light around me in all directions except for a dark spot - some kind of source or sink. I felt fear but not panic. I had only fear and I felt alive with although I knew it was the end. That is the animal way - the way of feeling without judging the feeling or giving it meaning - the fear means I am going to die and so on. Then I died and was awake.

Note—

The “animal way” is not to distinguish animal from human. The labels are used to designate three modes: the animal way of feeling without judgment or meaning, the “human way” of attached meaning - I will die, or I am immortal…and the way of the absolute in which attachment of meaning is unnecessary because I know what I am whether immortal or finite. All beings partake of these modes.

1.49 A gyrating ball of brilliant colors. August 26, 1998: Arcata

On the borderline between dream and hallucination, wake, and sleep. This was more than a dream - the ball remained even after I woke up and tried to not see it just in order to make sure I was awake. It occurred after I had taken Singulair [Montelukast Sodium] for allergies [seasonal asthma.] The medication had the effect of dehydrating me. The ball itself was of brilliant colors. It rotated and moved. The colors stretched and interpenetrated within the ball and flared in and out at the boundary in a vortex pattern as they also faded into the dark of the night.

1.50 Map of the world concept. December 28, 1998

I live in the world and - unavoidably, as part of that condition of living in the world, as part of my very being, not just explicitly, consciously, or as part of culture - I have an idea of the layout of the world.

Not just of geography - of space, matter, and time - or of emotion or thought---but of ALL of the world.

In philosophy, this is metaphysics.

All beings have an ontology.

These need not be exact or explicit…the idea of exactness, as an absolute category of the nature of knowledge is an idea that, though much loved, is foreign to the real nature of being. Such ontologies are part of the evolutionary, experimental nature of real being.

I am in process - in life, in evolution, in the universe…climbing the mountain barefoot…redoing my maps as needed.

Come science and philosophy with their army of foot soldiers wearing heavy mountain boots bristling with spikes, going up the main trail, trampling on green things…with the priests making grand proclamations and wearing gray locks…and the captains - large meat eating, stern, wielding whips, drawing blood from the weary soldiers “No, stay there, don’t stray there…”, “Hey, you, good lad - here's a morsel for your efforts…”, “Don't go there…there is no there…”,…and the people at the foot of the mountain repeat “There is no way but the one way.”

This is how we incorporate being: By experiment without predetermined maps…exploration is also map building No rules for map building. No final identity. What are we? Worlds, being, and maps are part of the process.

1.51 Rational and animal being. March 1999

You automate and then you automate the automation

The artificial intelligence of artificial intelligence. The intelligence of intelligence

You are pressed against life so hard there is no time, way, or scope for complete rationality

In trying to be perfectly rational you discovered yourself as an animal

You are melting into reality

1.52 Dreams from the Trinity Alps 1999

[10.11.99]

First two nights—

“10-15” dreams, consecutively of constructing a Website, page after page, link after link, incredibly detailed, knowing that the dream construction is not an actual or possible site, remembering all dreams.

Imagination in the waking phase between dreams.

1.53 In the house of rooms: Trinity Alps 1999

The House of Rooms

® Circulation ¬
a	Turbine	b

a = from other dreams

b = to other dreams

[The labyrinth-like underground connection of all dreams.]

1.54 A cinema in a dream: Trinity Alps 1999

An action adventure with my father as a Custom's Officer and I pass through the office. A car drives through the parking area and leaves – scouting. Next a black sports car “screams” in, rams against the building and the action ensues... most entertaining.

When the action is over, I say to my father, “The action was rather slow, but the character development was good.”

1.55 For love does so fly its protected wings. November 24, 2001

For love does so fly its protected wings.

1.56 The river. January 24, 2002

This was a dream with many sub-plots but, writing it today, April 2, 2002, I remember only the following—

I was in a house with at least two stories, I was on the ground floor. Many people were coming and going. The room had a brown ambience, the walls were varnished wood. I wanted to meet people. People came and went. The front door was open, it was daylight outside. A number of men entered, striding, with dark purpose, went to a room in the back. Soon a channel formed, curving through the front room. Water began to flow in the channel. Then bodies, dead, whole. Then, in sequence, wounded bodies, mutilated bodies, hacked limbs, limbs and blood, water with streaks and jets of blood – diffusing, and, finally, a river of pure blood.

1.57 Flying. March 28, 2002

I have had so many dreams of flying in a commercial airplane. Usually, the flight has stopovers and there is mad rushing around from one flight in one airport to another flight in another airport. We drive directly to the planes. The planes enter terminals. Often the terminals are empty as are the planes – except for employees. This dream had all these elements.

But it was a dream suffused with confidence. I was flying the plane. I had no experience, but I felt no self-doubt. I was confident.

1.58 Higher Power. July 17, 2002

Traveling in the mountains of Mexico and South America. I was traveling with a native woman. Sunlit canyon wall, green; blue sky. She was leading the way, and the way was not clear. I said, “she’s following her higher power; I will trust it.”

1.59 Crying. July 17, 2002

I was with a well-known leader. I admired him. I wanted to be like him. This was a given before I began to travel with him. Traveling with him, he broke down and cried a lot. This was, for him, a source of power.

1.60 Poetry is stone and stone is cold and cold is logic. October 5, 2003

There is no poetry, no such thing as poetry

…everything is poetry

And all is nothing; nothing all

in the mystery of the green space

in the mystery of cobble stones

bleak and cold

in the mystery of sand

dry… moving… clouds of quartz and pseudolocusts

who are stories of sand so appealing from that point

in so infinity called as such

‘whipping up upon the faces…

And what is that mysterious mystery who made me think

…and made me think that and made me think?

Poetry is stone and stone is cold

And cold is logic

And logic against your cold finite expectation

Because you are tired

And want to ration your tired ness –ize

Is fertile and fecund and warm like the wet

Warmth of birth

And the thing we love to kiss wetly

The way man sees and does not see

But where is wonan in that stone-space

Cold and wet as a stone to sharpen knives

Upon which to sit in immortal comfort

1.61 Losing love. October 7, 2003

I have had a number of dreams about M recently, always affectionate, and sometimes intimate and always with her boyfriend present; he does not mind but she chooses him. Recently, talking to a friend, I admit the residual loss – and this was good for me even though it turned the potential friend away.

In this dream I was lying in bed with M, and we had on only underwear. I was attracted to her.

Attraction does not mean action because it is in itself so wonderful – when I and another know we are attracted; it is wonderful and being in the presence of the other is wonderful. It is not a time to be wasted; action will come when it comes. This attitude, however, has upset a number of people. But if love is infinite, there is time and there is space for all things.

I said to M, “your boyfriend is better for you than I!” Why did I say that? If I love her then I must; unfortunately, it may be taken to mean I do not love the other enough. If you are not jealous, controlling… you cannot be in love. What a world view. Anyway, M’s response was “Yes, sometimes he’s ingenious.”

I told M what her loss meant to me: the depth of it…

And then woke up; and felt how lovely and attractive she is; something I have not felt in a while and even though the feeling diminished it remained.

The dream does not require interpretation. It is a simple story: loss is shutting me down. The negative side: I do not seek love because I am afraid to lose it. The positive: I do not seek it because I do not want to lose my Journey. Others have said, “You love your work – Journey in Being – more than me.” That is not true, but it could be said that I love myself more; my work – Journey – is a deep expression of myself. And I gave and give much even if it is not what the other wants; is that because I am selfish or because I do not have what is wanted?

1.62 Dream love. October 7, 2003

My brother, Robin and I are in love with two of our cousins M and K; I am in love with the younger cousin, M, and Robin is in love with K. In the dream Robin looks and acts like F the young, about 18-year-old daughter of a friend; M is a young, beautiful, olive skinned Caucasian with shoulder length black hair and is wearing a pink dress – I do not know who she resembles; K looks just like a onetime girlfriend C.

So far so good; it is just wonderful and there’s fun, an atmosphere of intimacy, no sex but it is wonderful.

Then: Robin wants M. Ok, ok. So, now I have C and I am stroking her long brown legs softly; this goes on – it is just how we started the first time, in the back yard and she is wearing a white cotton halter top and pink pants…

Then everyone leaves – except Robin, M’s dad J who suddenly materializes and I. My parents also materialize but leave with M and C. At this point everyone looks and acts themselves: Robin is Robin, M is M, J is J, my parents are who they always were, C is C, I am I, and K is no longer there.

J takes a long and noisy bath. Robin and I are wondering what next. When J comes out, he expresses displeasure at what has been happening. Not because of the interest in his daughter but, he says to Robin and me, “Your mother might harm me”.

Cut to a scene of my mother and everyone else. She looks stern unlike her usual self. She is concerned but has no objections or apparent intent to stop anything or harm anyone.

I wake up. Post sleep, post dream state when ego is still lazy, half awake. Good time to do something, think the unusual. I realize I am attracted to N who works at a local coffee shop. I like it that she is in her 30’s and not 20’s, that she is professionally inclined – I like women with goals. Anyway, I visualize her, wiggle with pleasure – yum – and say, “that wiggle, that pleasure is for you, N.” I determine to contact her when I get back. I am glad I gave her my card.

1.63 A woman who never touched a person. March 2004

In the dream, I am at work and there is a new worker – a petite brunette wearing a white shirt, black corduroy overalls and brown sandals.

After the introduction, she said “I have never touched a person.”

So, I took her hand in my right hand and made it touch my left hand in a gentle motion. I thought, “Now you’ve touched someone.”

I turned into a tiger.

2 DREAM POEMS AND DREAM IDEAS

The poems are “dream poems” in that, in each case, I found the complete poem or poem-essence and the associated mood reverberating in my conscious body after a period of sleep. The notions of dream idea, dream story, dream literature is similar to the concept of dream poem. All these ideas are actually dreams with the variations being in form and content of the experience. An emphasis is the variety of continuities between dream and waking consciousness. Some of the dream accounts are accounts that include elements of both modes of consciousness.

1.2 I lived by mountains, lakes, winters, snows and red sunsets. Spring 1978

1.3 In the universe there is a great eagle. November 4, 1979

1.27 I am the lover of all things. 1991

1.28 There are times of day which approach perfection. 1991

1.29 I AM… In woods that are deep. April 1991

1.30 I will go into nature. 1991

1.31 I prefer windswept desolation to little days. February 1991

1.32 In the words of the tourist. November 1991

1.33 Pagan verses of an arrowhead. 1992

1.37 Undomo: an African dream. August 23, 1993

1.39 We gathered by nightfall. February 7, 1994

3 SUBJECTIVE ASPECTS OF THE DREAMS

[Some commentary accompanies the dreams in Section 1.]

Comments on the mood induced by the dream, and elaborations of the sense of the dream.

4 SIGNIFICANCE, MEANING AND NATURE OF DREAMS

[Some comments accompany the dreams in Section 1.]

…Generally, and for me

4.1 Proto-dream

Before “meaning” or significance…

Some people say… dreams mean nothing, they are just “baggage”… the “trash heap” of the mind. But “baggage” and “trash heap” are a meaning. Someone is attaching a meaning.

Do dreams come with given meanings? Or are we free to interpret or assign meaning? Both!

What is the nature of that meaning? Simply that in dreaming conscious control is at least partially turned off.

The “given” meaning is the meaning from the unconscious; this is the interpretation. The assigned meaning may be ad hoc; a better concept is that the assigned meaning is the inspiration. The interpretation and the inspiration are not fully identical or fully distinct; and they do and may interact.

But… consider the question, “What is significant – the dream or the meaning?” What does that question mean? After a dream and without interpretation or inspiration, there is an effect of the dream – the dream alters the emotional and cognitive environment and the tendency to act and manner of action of the dreamer. This, as I said, happens without “meaning.” Thus, “What is significant – the dream or the meaning?” Or there is a significance of the dream in the effect on the mental state and tendency to act. Perhaps there is an effect upon action without intervening conscious alteration of mental state.

… but dream, significance, interpretation, and inspiration can interact.

On an evolutionary hypothesis… stated below. The hypothesis. Originally, mind is not under the control that we experience. Divide into perception - this has to be environment bound… and conception - this is not so bound. But originally, even perception need not have been quite bound. The experience of perception was a stab at reality; even if a little “correct” it would give an advantage. Later in evolution, thinking would be like that… like dreaming. Seemingly random images… stabs at thought. That too would give some advantage. Then, a little control would give better adaptation and so on. But why, then, dreaming at all. Argument 1: dreaming is free creation and re-creation… and one positive source of “new” ideas. Argument 2: sleep is rest. Ego-control requires energy. Sleep includes rest from ego-control. Therefore, in sleep there is reversion to the more primitive mode of thought, which, per argument 1, is also adaptive: the balance between control and free flow. Of course, free flow also occurs while awake but this does not negate dream-value… we can eat apples and oranges. There are two additional modes of rest in sleep: first, the sensory system - allowing what are soft images while awake to be stark while asleep and second the volitional motor system. That reality-perception and voluntary motor control are concurrently suspended is “fortunate.”

The images in dreams come from the mind. The two possible inputs are: memory and creation. Creation includes re-combination, which may be a large proportion of “creation.” What are the relationships between dreams, consciousness, hallucinations…and the unconscious?

Why are muscles paralyzed in dream / REM sleep but not in deep sleep?

Still…

There are many modes and grades of knowledge. There are degrees of independence from environment binding. The free modes are “free thought.” Emotion is relatively binding. In free thought there is a sometime need to reattach emotion… music, drama, poetry, myth… In sleep, the primal modes are more easily accessed. Thus, the unconscious of dreams is not identical to the usual unconscious of waking mind. Dreams are thus, even if not so of essence, connection to depth and the past. The depths condition the imagery and the emotional tone attached. This conditions motive toward action or inaction. Interpretation is on top of this.

A dream occurs. A meaning does not necessarily come attached - meanings are not necessarily given. A meaning is assigned when awake. That assignment also involves imagination. This is adaptive and subject to evolutionary enhancement. In a given society there is a channeling of dream and meaning.

At stages of bio-cultural evolution, waking dream -hallucination- may play a similar role. Depending on the needs of the society this may be adaptive or pathological. That assumes that the needs of society are one-dimensional. There is a distribution of need. The main need is labeled “norm” and the minor need “pathology.” There is room for hallucination to be both functional and pathological depending on the case.

4.2 Origin of memory, dreams, imagery, symbols, language…in development…in evolution…function

Dreams go back to a place before projections, adult structuring, defenses.

Dreams are more like the reality of being in process amid the creation and destruction processes and forces of the universe.

To the Australian aborigine the World of Dream, legendary past, and waking present blended inextricably into one synthetic experience - he lived in these worlds at once. For him, the land was sharply marked out with sacred places mixed in with everyday space. Gods were reborn in sacred spaces and a mythical being dwelled there: you could pass them on the way to the hunt.

The Idea of Dream Space. April 6, 2001 - I woke up and recalled dreams of the night, and in doing so I also recalled a number of other dreams of the past. Some of these dreams were seemingly unrelated to the dreams of that night. All recollections were soon after waking up and were quite vivid. I wrote down some notes to remind myself of the recollections which I would elaborate later. Here are the notes. “Arriving at a resort” ... “Wild place in Africa” ... “Staying in a local motel” ... “ Climbing down Everest” ... “Copper Canyon Journey” It is now 2:42 pm April 10, 2001. I remember the Copper Canyon dreams. Arrival, travel, hiking... all scenes repeated many times and all quite different from my actual Copper Canyon experiences. However, I cannot recall what the other notes referred - or the reflection is vague even though I remember that the recollections on the morning of the 6th were vivid. Why? It seems, and there are other reasons for my thinking this, that there is in my mind a dream space that is quite separate - despite connections - from the “awake space”

Dreams as sources of knowledge: primal world; dreams of Jung, Kekule…as revelation…as inspiration/motivation…as eruption of the real individual.

In asking about the evolutionary origin of dreaming…what are we really asking? Generically all such questions are as follows - at least have the following component. We are interpreting the patterns and relations of the present through [postulating if you are some kind of empirical purist - but not a thoroughgoing one because then you have nothing] time. Therefore, to ask the question in a way that gives us an answer - perhaps the most productive answer - we are asking about the relations between dreaming and other things. The relations are layered of course: there are relations among dreams and the class of mental phenomena; and relations among mental phenomena and the world. Even if we do not explicitly ask questions in this way - if evolutionary analysis gives us results the questions have been asked implicitly or asked by someone else on whose work we depend.

We expect that in origins those phenomena and facts that are now differentiated were united in a simpler precursor. This is one way of evolution: differentiation. It is not the only way: there is convergence, and symbiosis….

Perhaps dreams and autonomous waking consciousness have origin in an earlier free-floating consciousness much like dreams though more primitive.

What is the origin of the more primitive free-floating dream like consciousness[2]? Perception and memory must have unitary origins. There is support for this in the idea that, in the brain, memory and processing are tightly integrated…and that earlier in evolution before the development of a large prefrontal cortex which permits memory of events there was only a more dreamlike generic non-contextual perception and memory of facts. The origin of recall must be by spark and association.

Autonomous consciousness must have arisen in the ability to hold an image. From this point, controlled processing is possible. This is the genesis of thought and its forms and modalities. Control is partial of course, there is no need for complete control - it would be suffocating and produce nothing. Therefore, waking autonomous consciousness is a mix of free and controlled processes. The function of autonomous consciousness is [greater] adaptability. Dream or free-floating consciousness may still be functional but risky. Therefore, relegation to sleep may retain some of the function while reducing the risk. Note the compartmentalization of dreaming from external sensory input and motor control. Alternatively, dreaming may be a vestige of an ancient functionality. But, if the above account is correct, it is probably not a vestige and maintains functionality a complement and, perhaps, as a foundation. When waking consciousness is not able to function due to its incapacity or incapacitation the dream is available. Dream consciousness may be primal, but this is not primitive. These considerations have also answered the question “Why dreams at sleep?” Some animal species of intermediate grade must normally “dream” while awake.

Recall, also, the enormous cultural selection of preferred activity; and of what is seen to be normal.

These ideas are related to Julian Jaynes, The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind, 1976.

We see here the relation among the modes and states of vision including waking, dreaming, hallucination…but waking encompasses “normal” waking, hallucination, dreaming…relevant here is my point outline “Sources of Vision” which lists some modes and ways of cultivation. And the relation between modern knowledge and the modern concept of knowledge and the very different [and yet inclusive] adaptive concept in which knowledge has only to be adaptive…and therefore includes dream, hallucination among its processes [how much modern, not just primal, revelation is hallucination, and dream and while logic and method may analyze, dream, hallucination and the unconscious provide the raw material without which there is nothing to analyze] and magic, religion, and science and rationality among its modes. If we chose walking in the universe as our destiny, or if that is our destiny - or even if we are to feel uncomfortable with the unknown the primal modes are necessary.

In “Neuro-psychology”, a review-sketch I reviewed another authors work. It included some considerations on dreaming and sleep. Deep sleep, REM sleep, deprivation, brain rhythms…The author asked why we dream. And answered in a somewhat tired old way characteristic of displaced but self-centered modernity that marginalizes non-rational, non-autonomous, non-waking consciousness. Reviews the ideas of freewheeling, and consolidation. Freewheeling is the non-functional description of the non-autonomous state. Consolidation relegates dream to a secondary role.

What is the meaning and significance of dreams? Why should analysis be necessary to reveal meaning? What are the terms of analysis, Freudian, mythic, primal, and otherwise of analysis?

Meaning of dreams vs. the effect, and influence of dreams…by their effect on waking mood, ambience, and categories for consciousness not only in conscious use but also through unconsciousness or non-conscious factors…dreams and waking consciousness…effect of waking consciousness and its contents on dreams and dream consciousness.

What are dreams – neuro-physiologically, and psychologically in terms of other mental phenomena and processes? Consider the idea of a neural spark, recombination, and association. Consider the following modes of association…cognitive-cognitive, cognitive-affective, conscious-unconscious….

What are the characteristics of dream images, processes, and states? Similarities and dissimilarities between waking and dream consciousness…and various altered states of consciousness including the consciousness of schizophrenics and in other “disorders”. Why are dream states relatively context free?

What are the relations between dream and waking states? Borderline between wake and sleep: hypnagogic and hypnopompic visions and events. Hypnagogic and hypnopompic events and dreams are not usually considered to be psychotic events - what are the conceptual bases of this idea?

4.3 The significance of specific dreams, dream images and symbols for the unconscious

Possible meanings of particular contents, meanings in dreams, emotive results of significant dreams, the fact of beautiful and apparently creative experiences in dreams, the meaning of seeing a calling in a dream, cultural uses of dreams, relationships between dreams and action, evolutionary origins of thought, language, symbolism, and dreams

A modified extract from a letter [that repeats an account of a dream described above] to a friend:

“Like music, dreams are full. I do not always “interpret” my dreams. That is, I do not feel it is necessary to seek some meaning that is hidden or not obvious.”

“…Back to dreams. The dream is sometimes its own meaning, I think. I read Black Elk Speaks. Are you familiar with that book? It is the beautiful story of Black Elk, a Sioux “shaman” who lived during the destruction of the Plains Indians' way of life. The Sioux would act out their dreams in life... I once had a very significant dream about my quest. I have had a number of dreams about music. One time I was singing something most beautiful and haunting and intricate. It was an original composition. The composition and the performance were way beyond what I think/thought myself to be capable. I woke up in a magical mood. That mood, in itself, was a meaning of the dream and points to a kind of meaning of dreams in general: dream affects life. But what was the significance of the power of the dream-music? Does it mean that people have untapped potential - this is a possible implication. At least I know I have the capacity to feel and experience beauty in my sleep. But what is the source of this beauty which when I am awake seems to need an external object and which when I am asleep is not or seems to not be completely under my control? Or is dream/hallucination explained psychoanalytically and somewhat predicated upon an assumption of incomplete control over dreaming and dream content -- the projection of my desires and so on? And if it is projection/illusion then what is the significance of the affect - in this case the affective state and its consequences which include behavior and thought and dream concepts - upon waking and in waking life. The reverberation of the dream and the positive emotion remain upon waking; normally this state cannot be produced while awake without an external source of music.”

4.4 Interpretation in dreams

The question is not about interpretation of dreams…but, what is the role of interpretation during and after dreams. It is not as though interpretation is something that we do late in history, but interpretation is a natural part of dreaming and of the influence of dreams on waking states.

Examples can be simple. On May 31, 1994, part way between wake and sleep [hypnopompic] I “saw” vague images: clothed arms, legs, torso of an indefinite female figure that transformed into a definite female figure which I interpreted as someone I knew. What are the roles and relative boundaries between transformation [dream processing] and interpretation.

4.5 The structure of dreams

The significance of the Structure of Dreams for the Structure of the Unconscious.

The suspended animation, meaning, judgment aspects of dreams…piece wise structure, lack of coherence, suspension of context…chaos…dreams are like not being an adult…lack of control.

4.6 Dreams, hallucinations, and consciousness

4.7 Dream phenomena

Repeated dreams, themes, variations, continued after waking, controlled [the dreamer has at least an element of control… usually on the sleep-wake boundary], dream compartments: repeated themes which appear to have/ form their own reality status… discovered in the wake-sleep boundary or after waking – to which I do not have direct access while awake, stark, vivid, realistic, recollection: difficult, ephemeral.

4.8 Dream contents

Life elements…and no apparent connection with life elements.

4.9 Dream quality

Transcend [day] reality.

Dreams in which I experience great and creative beauty - even if an illusion and so on what is the significance of the fact, I can have the illusion and actually experience the creativity and beauty, a wonderful thing, so that even upon waking I feel the afterglow of lovely music.

4.10 Unusual dreams: “acid drip”, “slave train”

4.11 Concepts from dreams…metaphysical from the power of dreams

The Metaphysics of Dreams and Sex. The following considerations define this topic. Human knowledge grows in the following way… ® projection and hypothesis ® action ® outcome and learning ® … Dream meaning through symbolism is an example/ case of the correspondence theory of truth…

4.12 Sex and dreaming and metaphysics

Wittgenstein’s life…Acid drip of love…”Pure” sex is “real” love…Sex and motivation…Why are philosophy and science devoid of animal particulars [A cycle of learning including dialectic and rhetoric occurs inside larger circles of evolution and cutting the circle at any point is incomplete; e.g., proceeding directly from projection to action is anthropomorphizing.

Consider: Power of sex and its drive, How this power impacts other areas, Sublimation, Sex as symbol and archetype.

Combine the foregoing: Sex, human knowledge, growth leads to an image of the universe after sex and the correlates of sex.

4.13 Dreams, food, and other functions

REFERENCES

C. G. Jung, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, Ed. Aniela Jaffé 1961; tr. 1965.

Sigmund Freud, The Interpretation of Dreams, published in 1899 as Die Traumdeutung.

COPYRIGHT

COPYRIGHT © ANIL MITRA, December 2008

FOOTNOTES

[1] My father's car in India was a Landmaster, the production model prior to the Ambassador.

[2] Relate these issues to original lack of distinction between dream and wake consciousness; origin of symbolic capability and language; linear, nonlinear and priority models of thinking, knowledge, and design; social theory [factors] of the origin of language, knowledge, and design.