Story Dream: Mephistopheles.

Last night I had a "story dream" -- one with a formal plot beyond just "me doing things". It was a dark fantasy scenario, humans versus demons. A group of people were trying to trick the demons into releasing some human captives. In the meantime, I had to distract the Demon Lord Mephistopheles by asking him questions.

So I used the classic conversation starter, "How did you become a demon?"

Mephistopheles told me that he was the primordial Void that had existed before Creation. In the beginning, he was all there was, & he was Nothingness. Then he became aware that something had differentiated from the rest of him, and that something was Existence, which later became God and the Universe. He perceived Existence as different, separate, & alien to himself, so the rest of history became a struggle between it and him.

As for what he looked like: from what I can recall, he was "just a guy". I really wasn't very interested in the appearance of his humanoid avatar.

New Project: Creating the Ability to Walk & Type.

My current project: to create for myself the ability to walk, to type, & to perform other physical actions. Walking and typing are on top of the list; walking for reasons of obvious convenience, typing because I want to be a writer. I currently have some kind of inflammatory joint condition, which I am holding in check with herbal remedies, but not well enough so far to completely eliminate it. My intent is to fix this problem using the methods in the Elias material, as well as other works that I find useful & informative.

I prefer to think in terms of "creating" rather than "healing", since I don't feel comfortable with what I call the "New Age healing mentality". The "healing mentality" contains a lot of assumptions which, I have come to realise, are not absolutes but simply belief systems, & most are not ones with which I would care to align.

For example: the notion that physical illness is always the manifestation of inner pain & suffering, & order to cure the illness it is necessary to heal the "inner wounds". Now, this is certainly true for some people at least some of the time; not because it has to work that way, but because their belief systems construct it that way. I tried this paradigm on for size just to see if it would fit, & the conclusion I came to is that it is quite foreign to how I & my reality work. "Inner wounds" are just too melodramatic for me. If I try to think that way, it feels artificial, like hype.

(As I've said, these concepts do work for some people. If you have a paradigm that works, by all means, use it. Elias says that we do not need to eliminate belief systems, just become consciously aware of which ones we are setting into effect.)

Now, there are clearly psychological issues connected with the physical symptoms. For example, the finger problems relate to communication, the freedom to communicate, being judged by others for saying controversial things (like this post, for instance). But the way this feels to me is more pragmatic than dramatic. I don't need to heal my wounded inner child, just dig myself out of the hole one step (or keystroke) at a time, by demonstrating to myself my ability to communicate openly & publicly.

I'm going to use this blog to record & share my experiences -- and, in the process, gain new insights. Sort of killing two birds with one stone: communicating while developing the ability to communicate. Perhaps this will set up a bootstrap effect.

On a Clear Day You Can See Downtown Cleveland: Abstract Translation in Dreams.

I've had a couple of dreams about someone in the past who was what would now be called a "Third-World dictator". I've always been intrigued by such personalities, and I would find it fascinating to have the memories & experiences of such a lifetime, and use them to gain a deeper understanding of history and the creation of mass events. So I'm choosing to align with the belief that I either already have such a past-life focus, and/or am in the process of adding one via mergence. Since time is nonlinear, I'm not especially worried about which.

So, as I went to sleep, I meditated on the word "dictator" (perhaps not what most New Agers would consider the most enlightened of mantras). The aim was to generate the energy of a general concept without filling in the blanks, but leaving the specific details up to the unconscious. One is more likely to gain an authentic past life through this method; if you specify details prematurely, there is a greater chance of "confabulating": creating thoughtforms which, although real on their own level, do not correspond to physical events. I have nothing against thoughtforms, but I want to manifest a lifetime that shows up in the history books.

I didn't dream specifically about the dictator that night, but I did have one dream which was powerful & significant:

I looked toward the direction of downtown Cleveland (which, in the physical world, cannot be seen from my house), and saw the buildings in the city's center as clearly as if I were right on the highway approaching it. I realized I was witnessing a rare meterological phenomenon: if the sunlight was bright enough, and the weather conditions right, it was possible to see things at great distances, as if the scene was magnified & projected. The city was so bright & intense, I could see the individual windows. I was filled with a sense of awe & wonder. I pointed at the city and tried to get my relatives to look at it, but they weren't interested.



Now, my interpretations:

For me, a large city is a symbol of collective reality. It is a visible, tangible expression of mass consciousness materialized in physical space. Skyscrapers are a symbol to me of mankind's highest ideals & achievements. I recall seeing the two tallest buildings in the city, the Terminal Tower & the Key Tower. To me, these two towers represent the concepts of competition & duality, and the roles these factors have played in humanity's advancement.

Seeing something clearly at a great distance represents perceiving/constructing reality via the inner senses, which are nonlocal and unaffected by physical time & space. Therefore, this dream experience involved connecting to collective reality via the inner senses.

The enhanced visibility was said to be due to exceptional brightness of the sun. Sunlight represents consciousness and awareness -- so this symbol was saying that it was really my own heightened state of consciousness that allowed me to use my inner senses in this way. In the dream, however, it seemed to be dependent on external conditions, indicating that I am still largely dissociated from this aspect of consciousness. I have not yet learned to say "I" to it enough to include it within my conscious doing-and-choosing.

As I thought about this, I realized that I had actually manifested a dream about my chosen topic, only at a higher level of abstraction. By meditating on the concept of "dictator", I was asking my subjective to connect with the lifetime of someone who played a public role in history. My subjective answered the request, only it went up one node higher in the file directory. "Oh, you want the part of consciousness that interacts directly with collective realities? Okay, here's the folder. Let me open it and pull out a file."

Commentators on dreams & other unconscious phenomena have often remarked that the subjective sometimes seems strangely literal, and sometimes weirdly metaphorical. I think the reason for this is that the distinction between "literal" & "metaphorical" belongs to the conscious mind, & not to the subjective itself. The abstract level is not necessarily less real than the concrete but is, in a sense, even more so, more pure & potent, closer to the source, like a stream that is just beginning to wind its way down a mountain.

I am beginning to move in the direction of what I want to manifest. Becoming able to recognize successful manifestations, whatever form they take, is one of the exciting steps on this journey.

Rocks, Water and Nietzschean Ethics.

I've been thinking about Nietzsche's "Revaluation of Values": his maxim that whatever creates strength and power is good, whatever causes weakness is bad. I think this principle is valid, as long as strength is defined in a broad sense rather than a narrow one. In particular, I would include the Taoist idea that apparent weakness can sometimes be strength; that the soft, yielding and pliable can in some situations triumph over the hard, rigid, and resistant, as water wears away stone.

I am reminded also of the Taoist theory of the elements, which contains as sequence similar to the game of "Rock-Paper-Scissors", in which the elements are presented in the order in which one element destroys or overpowers another: fire burns wood, water extinguishes fire, etc. The sequence comes round in a circle; the weakest element is also the most powerful.

Thus, an ethic based on power as the primary good need not be a crude, simplistic creed of "Might Makes Right", but instead can utilize a complex, subtle and sophisticated understanding of power as true efficacy, incorporating characteristics such as adaptation, feedback, and sustainability.

Below: A beautiful landscape in the "Rocks and Water" style by the contemporary Chinese artist Zhang Qiu Yue.