articles.jpg (7423 bytes)ARTICLES

DREAM TREK
By Linda Lane Magallan

Watch Your Dreams with

Nancy Huseby Bloom

INTERVIEW WITH Australian Comic Teacher, Andy Griffiths
by Victoria Quinton

INTERVIEW WITH JANE ANDERSON, Australian author, broadcaster, scientist & dream interpreter
by Victoria Quinton

Dreamworking in Metaphysics
By Jeri Noble

 


DREAM TREK

By Linda Lane Magallan

Flying Wires And Other Mysteries

I once awoke from a dream of an oil rig platform. The skyline of the buildings on the platform was eerily familiar. I just knew I had seen it the day before. So I walked around the house, looking for a clue. I finally found it out in the garage: it was the electric table saw. The outline of the machine was exactly the same as the platform.

Now, one could argue that I took a memory clip of the table saw and transmorphed it into the oil platform. I prefer to think that my astral body was cavorting around on the table saw during the night. (Interesting enough, to do this, my dream self would have had to shrink to a smaller size, like Alice in Wonderland did.) Perhaps because it was during dark of night, perhaps psychic sensing is not as vivid and coherent as physical eyes, my dreaming self could only "see" the outline and not all the identifying details.

In either case, memory clip or astral trip, my dream psyche was acting like a child with a coloring book. She took the outline as is, and filled in the blanks. She "colored" the structure with ideas from her own imagination. This dream-creating process is quite similar to how remote viewing is reported to work. The "best" RVers are considered to be those that fill in the blanks closest to the literal picture. Dreaming selves are much more artistic.

When dreams are compared with original stimulus in telepathic experiments, the items that "come through" the best are the simple elements and outlines. That is, it's far easier to pick up via psychic means: general theme, primary colors, shape and form than say, whole sentences, pictorial detail or identifying object. It's the strong edges that tend to get perceived, rather than the subtleties. Because this is demonstrable in terms of physical objects, I highly suspect that the same process is operable in terms of non-physical "objects."

Dreams don't use physical eyes. They use psychic sensing. Thus, they not only have the ability to tune into the physical world, they can also perceive on the inner planes: what's been called astral, ethereal, etc. In general, this level has been perceived by psychics in terms of light, mist and color. For those folks (like lucid dreamers and dream incubators) who focus attention for extended periods of time, I believe that the mist can coalesce and form structure. This may or may not include the infamous astral chord. The astraland ethereal levels respond to thought and tend to create what we anticipate beforehand.

However, underneath the variegated imagery, there does seem to be consensus.It's as if we all produce different computer programs on the Star Trek Enterprise holodeck, but the gridwork underneath is similar for all of us. Our gridwork is the physical body and brain as well as the bodies of the non-physical level.

I created this theory as a result of viewing my own dreams and hundreds of dreams dreamt in groups. I think few folks actually perceive the grid system as is; most are entranced by the holodeck program which overlays the grid like the white paint on Tom Sawyer's fence. But sometimes the fence peeks through. One of those instances, is, I believe, the case of the wires that have been found in so many flying dreams. They might be seen singly, in multiples or as part of a mesh.

The typical dream goes like this: I am flying; I encounter wires; I try to fly underneath them. Sometimes the dreamer gets caught in the wires; sometimes the wires form an insurmountable barrier. Some dreamers climb the wires; others walk the wires like a tightrope.

Another variation is wider than the wires. It's the window or mirror. Trying to go through glass, dreamers can get stuck, half in-half out or wrapped up in the material. I'm not the first to hypothesize that this sort of experience is the dream equivalent of astral separation.

Besides similar form, the common bond seems to be kinesthetic. We may not all see the same details, but the visual outline plus tactile sensations can alert us to the fact that, underneath the covers, we are having the same sort of dreaming experience.

http://members.aol.com/caseyflyer/fbnc/fbnc01.htm   (Fly-By-Night Club)


Watch Your Dreams with Nancy Huseby Bloom dreaming@omnicast.net  

Week of 2/21/99

Dear Nancy,

I am an investor for a large corporation and have been heavily involved in the stock market, both here in New York and in Hong Kong. I had this dream in late August, when the market was fluctuating wildly and the prospects for profits grim. This dream was extremely vivid, clear and had strong emotions. Could this be a precognitive dream? Philip

"I am with a friend at a restaurant and I'm in a panic to find out how much the Dow Jones has fallen since I last checked. I rush to a stranger at a table who is carrying a beeper that shows stock quotes. I ask him urgently how the Dow Jones is doing. I fully expect it to have dropped dramatically. Instead, the stranger says to me calmly that the Dow is at 9,900. I am in shock and total surprise."

Dear Philip,

Your dream makes me want to run out and invest in the Dow!

Because of your letter, I've been watching the market myself. It hasn't hit 9,900 yet but we have had record highs since the time of your dream.

Throughout the ages, one of the greatest gifts of the dreamworld has been the gift of prophecy. Our intellectual defenses retreat when we sleep and our natural intuition and perception is more available to us. This is a completely normal phenomena. Nearly everyone has dreams that are precognitive, and although they seem extraordinary, they are not uncommon.

Usually, the information we pick up relates to our own personal issues and the people in our lives. But information that is associated with world events, both positive and negative, can also filter into our dreamworld. You might have had this dream due to your interest in the performance of the stock market. Strong connections seem to provide a "psychic pathway" for the intuitive information to come through.

So, my friend, how do we know if your dream is a precognitive one? Currently there is no true test for this, but there are some guidelines to evaluate the dream.

Studies show that there are some specific indications that a dream may be foretelling the future. Very often, these dreams have extremely vivid imagery, often mixed with intense emotions. People who record their dreams on a regular basis learn to recognize these precognitive dreams by their particular clarity. But the best answer is in the dreamer's own mind. What is your "gut" feeling about this dream?

I'll be watching the Dow, and when it reaches 9,900, I will pour myself a glass of wine in your honor and make a toast to the dreamworld.


INTERVIEW WITH Australian Comic Teacher, Andy Griffiths

by Victoria Quinton

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VQ: Do you remember having vivid dreams as a child?

AG: Yes, all the time. I had a recurring one where I was swallowed by a giant black cat. It would just materialise out of nowhere and I'd be drawn into and engulfed by this enormous enormous black mouth. In another dream all my playmates shrank into Lilliputian like figures and ran away all babbling in high pitched voices. Usually when the dreams became too unpleasant I would become aware that I was dreaming and I had a technique where I would shut my eyes tight to wake myself up. Sometimes it would take a couple of shots but I could always do it. Occasionally I would be in a normal dream and become aware that I was dreaming and try to consciously direct it but this usually just ended by waking myself up. I had two particularly vivid dreams: one where I and my two sisters are left alone in a car and the car starts up and starts driving round and round an oval. Another where I and my sisters hitch a ride on the back of a garbage truck up to this tiny little shoe store and the owner pulls a gun on us. To this day one of my sisters claims to have had exactly the same dreams, whereas I am positive that I had them.

We still can't agree on this.

 

VQ: Do you feel that you do utilise your dreams in your writing and teaching?

 

AG: Dreams have been very important to me as a writer. In fact before I began writing formal short stories by simply recording my dreams in an exercise book. I did this for a long time before I tried to create my own. It has always fascinated me that the dreaming brain can just come up with all these amazing situations and scenarios so effortlessly, whereas when I consciously try to write a story it's much harder. I love the unpredictablity of dreams, dream logic, dream humour, transitions from one piece of action to another and it's certainly an effect I strive for in my stories. I have always been inspired by Alice in Wonderland and the stories of Franz Kafka--the dreamlike state they evoke seems much more real to me and closer to how we really experience the world than attempts to portray the world in an 'natural' linear fashion. I think our waking state is much closer to a dream state than we realise. I read recently a quote on writing by on Jon Luis Borges which I can't quite remember but went something like, 'A story is nothing more than a guided dream in the reader's mind.' You can take people on little rides and go anywhere you like. I've also been reading a version of this idea in a book called 'You'll see it when you believe it' by Wayne Dyer who goes further and suggests that the whole of our waking life is actually a dream created by us--we consciously or unconciously create the situations in which we find ourselves--we attract certain people and ideas into our lives according to our ideas about ourselves. Whether you believe this literally doesn't matter--it's still a very powerful metaphor that makes us aware of how the thoughts in our brains affect the world outside us and how that in turn influences our thoughts. The more I write stories the more interested I

become aware of my ability to write my own life.

To find out about Andy's work

go to

http://www.andygriffiths.com.au   

The new book is called JUST STUPID and follows on from JUST TRICKING and JUST ANNOYING.

 


INTERVIEW WITH JANE ANDERSON, Australian

author, broadcaster, scientist & dream interpreter

by Victoria Quinton

DECEMBER 1998

VQ: Were you interested in dreams as a child?

JA: I was captivated by the dramas, colours, senses, emotions and strange'other wordliness' of my dreams as a child. As a small child (under the age of 5) I had recurring dreams of wolves massing to kill me and of my bed being full of snakes. At the time I thought the scenes were past life memories. As an older child (5 - 10) the recurring themes changed to water scenarios, where I would either be able to see the beauty of a lake's hidden depths or I would experience water being drained from swimming pools the instant it was my turn to jump in and have fun. By that age I had grown into a natural understanding that my dreams were metaphors reflecting my waking life, though I also sensed them as being great adventures and preferred to enjoy (or suffer!) them as such instead of facing their meanings. As an adult, looking back, the picture is so clear. This is something which intrigues and amazes me about children's dreams: that they reveal a child's sophisticated(unconscious) wisdom of his or her situation.

VQ. Have you had a web site for long?

JA: No. It was published in May 98. I was very sure that I would never have a web site. I resisted for a long time until a series of dreams changed my mind. I then had to re-convince my family that this was indeed a great and worthy idea (one worth spending time and money on!), which was pretty tough as I had done such a wonderful job of convincing them to the contrary in previous years!

When my publishers, Random House, moved the publication of my third book, "The Shape of Things to Come", from February 98 to July 98 I was impatient. Following this news the web site dreams started and I realised I needed to organise the web site and have its address printed inside the book cover. Naturally the timing was perfect in the end! My domain name came through the day before the 'due date' for final alterations and I needed the extra time before the book launch and pubicity rounds to learn the right skills and establish the web site.

My dreams have continued to fine tune the site in both creative and business terms.

VQ. Do you find that the Internet has any influence on your own dreams?

JA: Before the web site dreams I was a bit of a technophobe, especially in relation to computers and the Internet - and a bit of a luddite too. To put the dreams into action I had to learn heaps!!!! As my dreams have helped to create the ideas behind and within the web site, I would have to say that my struggles and learning in these areas have been reflected in my dreams and that resolution has been found within my dreams.

When I have had a heavy day on the site, the first few hypnagogic images as I settle for sleep can annoyingly be those little blue envelopes with yellow exclamation marks popping up beside them! Or perhaps I've just taken the symbol on as a sign of the messages about to be discovered in my night's dreaming!

 VQ. Has it affected the way you interact with others?

JA: The web site has obviously increased the number of people I interact with through my work, but basically I feel it has just added an extra means of communication. My dream (and precognition) work is disseminated through a number of media and my enjoyment of the different forms of media is an important part of both my life and work. I have my book writing, my radio (which I love!), my public speaking .. and now my website as my main means of communicating my work and ideas. So the website (rather than the Internet - I don't spend much time on the Net) has enabled me to interact with more people in both a mass sense and a one-to-one sense. I have been greatly warmed through many of the contacts I have made through the web site, but in-the-flesh meetings are always infinitely richer, for me. (I could write a book on this question- but that's probably enough!)

 VQ. Can intuition be accommodated into a "scientific approach" to dreams?

JA: Read my book! It depends what you mean by 'scientific approach' to dreams. If you mean 'Are dreams explicable in scientific terms?' - then I'd say 'yes' and 'no'. If you mean 'Can a scientific method of study be applied to researching dreams?' - I'd say 'yes' and 'no', with different qualifications! If you mean 'Can a scientist reconcile a scientific education with dream interpretation including intuitional approaches?'then I'd say "Well, I do!". It's also important to distinguish between

traditional (relatively mechanistic) science, and modern (relatively holistic and non-causal) science.

VQ: So you think that a more holistic approach is gaining mainstream acceptance now, by "scientists at large"? Or is it still a left-braindominated field.?

JA: I'm not sure that scientists can be identified as a generalised group anymore. Those working in or interested in areas such as quantum physics and ecosystems, for example, work with the basic premise that all things are inter-connected and inter-dependent, and that the whole can be perceived as having different qualities from a sum-total of its constituent parts. In quantum physics, for example, it is agreed that it is impossible to objectively observe a subatomic particle because the behaviour of the particle is linked to the end perceptions of the watching scientist. The scientist and the particle are inter-connected and linked in an holistic way.

Even in every day traditional physics and biology (the kind we all learned at school), an holistic understanding lurks below the surface of many of the facts. The human eye is like a camera. In a camera, light rays from the object you are photographing are turned upside down by the camera's lens, forming an upside-down image on the film at the back of the camera. When we look at an object (a tree, for example), light rays from the tree are turned upside-down by the lens in our eye, forming an upside-down image of the tree on the retina at the back of the eye. Nerve impulses then carry the upside-down image of the tree to the brain.

Luckily in infancy we all soon learn that although things look upside-down we feel (through our other senses) that they are not, so very early on our brains learn to turn the images up the other way again. When you buy a new alarm clock you hear it ticking loudly, but as time goes by you don't notice the tick any more.

Again the brain changes the incoming information to suit its overall perception of what the world is. We all sense the world in accordance with what our experience tells us we should sense, rather than what may or may not be true. Our brains take an HOLISTIC assessment of all the incoming information, compare it with past experience and 'decide' on the view to be taken. Our brains deal in holistic perception. There are still many people whose brains are deciphering the world according to their school-taught experience that the world is a non-holistic, logically-explicable place where time ticks by and events occur due to cause and effect. My brain tells me this is not so!

There are many scientists who have not educated themselves beyond their specialised fields, and if these specialised fields centre on traditional approaches to science then they can be vehemently protective of their left brain dominant territory. By the same token, creative experimental design involves right brain input and many scientific discoveries have been due to insights gained from dreams. The question is not so much right versus left brain, perhaps, but holistic versus mechanistic-reductionist.

 

VQ: Does your six years of full time dream research have a differentmental weight or colour to earlier six year "blocks" of your life?

JA: It's been mentally much tougher in an intellectual 'work' sense. Dreams, precognition and reality have been extremely difficult subjects to research, especially as I was searching for a fresh understanding. While I do now have my understanding, communicating this through my books, radio and presentations in a way which is accessible to a wide range of people can be mentally demanding too. Until I learned to just get on with my work and state it as I find it, there was the extra mental burden of 'swimming against the tide'. On an everyday level, working as a dream interpreter on radio, for example, the mental workout is akin to doing a cryptic crossword without pause for thought, as you cannot broadcast silence!

My life has been infinitely more colourful in every dimension and perspective since I have been doing this work and the mental rewards can be exhilarating. My personal world is a wonderfully rich and satisfying one, partly because I enjoy my work, but mostly because it has taught me what I need to know about this dream which is my life.

Jane Anderson

http://www.janeanderson.com.au

email: jane@janeanderson.com.au

Milton BC, Qld 4064, Australia

 


noble.jpg (3236 bytes)Dreamworking in Metaphysics

By Jeri Noble

December 28,1998

In this article I use the term "metaphysics" in the sense of using some kind of mental or spiritual technique to create a desired reality. The desired reality can be losing 10 pounds or finding our life mate. This metaphysical technique can include prayer, mental affirmations and treatments, and various rituals. The prayer, "Please, God" is a metaphysical technique. It goes on from there.

In my opinion, a powerful tool in manifesting one's reality is

Dreamworking. Dreamworking is the conscious effort to utilize the unconscious forces of the heart, mind and spirit. It includes dream interpretation and techniques to induce lucid dreaming. There are many different forms of dreamworking and they're all valid. One's dreams are intensely personal, and the only possible barometer of a form of dreamworking, is whether it works for you. What follows is a list of possibilities that you can try.

Discovering blocks to manifestation Inducing dreaming to strengthen motivation Acting Out manifestations Discovering blocks to manifestation of your reality:

Increasing the power of our manifestations is generally considered

to be a good thing in metaphysics. There is always the little "trip wire" in the works however, which is that we can only deal with what our conscious mind knows. We may consciously desire a particular outcome of something with, what we think, is everything in us. If the outcome isn't occurring, there is only one reason for it. Although we may deny it, the truth is that is that there is something within us, which is reluctant to have that outcome occur. This is a proven metaphysical principle, which is easily rationalized away, because the practice of metaphysics is such a subjective experience. We needn't rationalize however, if there is a way to overcome the apparent limitations of ordinary, waking consciousness.

Adding the power of our unconscious mind can give an additional boost to the process of manifesting our preferred reality. Frequently the real "heart" of the matter is in our deepest feelings, desires and instincts. It's not unusual that these forces are more knowledgeable about our real needs and wants than our conscious mind is allowed to be. There can be innumerable reasons for this, most of them having to do with early conditioning. So many of the restrictions that we place on ourselves were relevant to a 5 year old child, but have nothing to do with who we are here and now. Getting more of that knowledge conscious can add another dimension of fulfillment to our lives, enriching them.

Sometimes, it's just trash in the unconscious, but that can be helpful as well. Let's say that you just cannot seem to manifest that new job. Wouldn't it be helpful to realize that you would have to cross a railroad track in your commute and that you hate railroad noise because you heard it when you hurt your foot at age 3? That's the sort of thing that can throw a major monkey wrench into your plans, and you would have no idea why. The unconscious is a storehouse for everything; the good, the bad and the ridiculous. There are definitely pearls amongst the garbage though.

If we are working on a specific metaphysical treatment, prayer or ritual, our attention is clearly focused. Since many metaphysical activities rely upon repetition, those concepts embed themselves deeply in the mind. That's what we want. The more deeply embedded the fulfillment of our metaphysical activity is, the easier it becomes for Universal Energy to move into alignment with it. Whether this is working or not, your mind is full of it. This focus inevitably shows up in dream content, as does anything that you pay a lot of attention to in your day. For this reason, it can be very helpful to interpret a dream in the context of the metaphysical activity you're working on.

In this dream for instance:

"You're walking down a crowded city sidewalk. Inexplicably, you keep having these rough encounters with others; you trip and bump into someone, somebody else steps on your toes, there's an elbow to your chin, you just can't seem to make it even a full city block without someone getting hurt. You finally retreat to the doorway of a small shop and huddle there, breathing hard. You're relieved to be out of all that chaos, yet wondering why it was so difficult. Are you always this clumsy? Are people always this rude?" You wake up.

What reality are you trying to manifest at this time? Let's look at two interpretations for the same dream, but within the context of different people with different metaphysical goals. We'll call Joe's goal, "Getting Ahead in Life". The dream clearly indicates that he feels some opposition to his progress. However the possibility exists that a lack of coordinated activity may be the cause of it. Was he trying to move against the flow? Is the dream trying to inform him that there is a better route to what he wants?

Jane's goal is "Preparing for a Committed Relationship". Evidently, Jane senses competition. There's a struggle involved as well. Would she have made it through the crowds with greater ease if a partner accompanied her? Is the dream telling her that she needs additional protection?

You can easily see that the interpretations would be quite different, but either has the potential for enlightenment. Either Joe or Jane could have a clearer idea of their unconscious messages to the environment and what they were doing that was inhibiting gratification.

Inducing dreaming to strengthen motivation for fulfillment:

Self-hypnosis for dreaming is a powerful technique. If you place yourself in a light trance as you're going to sleep, you can give yourself a suggestion to dream on a specific topic. Dreaming for enlightenment is an ancient tradition, used in many belief systems. Self-hypnosis or a purposefully generated trance state is also used in many mystic and shamanistic traditions. The trance state is directed to practical use in dreamworking as well, providing an additional outlet for visions, omens and signs.

For metaphysical purposes, you can work out the pros and cons of an important manifestation, like changing jobs. In the dream state, the entirety of the mind can be used to evaluate an important decision. This is also a beautiful method for strengthening your connection with the Divine. Working out any "spiritual communication blocks" in the dream state can bring about lasting gain. Since most traditions rely upon a Higher Power of whatever definition, increasing your personal certainty of being "tuned in" can't help but be good. Something else that can be done is to induce lucid dreaming, wherein you know that you're dreaming during the dream. This is considered desirable in every dreamworking system I've heard of. The greater the frequency and quality of lucid dreaming you experience, the better off you are health-wise, in relaxation and metal clarity.

All of these techniques have been tested and most people take about 3 nights to get them to work. Depending on your personal inclinations, these or some variation on them, should certainly strengthen your inner motivation. This isn't the place for a treatise on self-hypnosis, but there are tons of books on the subject and probably many resources available on the net.

 Acting Out manifestations

An affirmative suggestion would be "I'm experiencing all the positive benefits of (my current metaphysical treatment) in my dreams tonight. I can feel, hear, taste, touch and smell all the activities of this new part of my life in my dreams tonight and I clearly remember all of it." This creates a situation known as "embodiment". To embody a metaphysical goal, you need to experience yourself within the goal, living it. Dreams are great for that. Lucid dreams pretty well guarantee manifestation.

This suggestion may also bring up unconscious barriers to the fulfillment of the manifestations. We may find ourselves living out a situation that is uncomfortable for us. Personally, I appreciate that, because then I can work out whether it's a valid objection to manifestation or not, and consciously work with it from there. Perhaps there's a modification required in my goal to make it completely fulfilling. This "rehearsal" provides an opportunity to work out potential "bugs" in the plan.

Most practicing metaphysicians (of any belief system), sometimes find it necessary to overcome inner inhibitions, obsolete beliefs or negative habit patterns. Additional tools that lead to the speedy resolution of these barriers to manifestation can be very helpful.

Just a suggestion, of course.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thanks,

Jeri Noble

 jeri@circlesoflight.com

Circles of Light

http://www.circlesoflight.com