Posted by giveawayboy on December 24, 2001 at 17:07:21:
In Reply to: Re: my dream talk w wayne posted by John on December 24, 2001 at 10:17:24:
: Bill, you appear to lie in this kind of world all the time. Or rather they are intermingled in a way that can't be easily separated. I admit to being wrapped in it much of the time myself, although in a different way. That is why I have such wierd ideas and views on things.
[As I walk to work the palm trees are screaming at me. And cats keep pointing at things. We need to be circumspect.]
: I think it should be developed, cultivated. Seek out both visions and force them to mingle. You can already mingle your waking vision into your dreams, but can you go the other way? I have tried this, and honestly this is a big focus of my mental energy from time to time. Sure it can be scary, and who knows where it leads?
[This is where mindfulness exercises can help. (See OUR APPOINTMENT WITH LIFE: Thich Nhat Hanh) It is then that you rediscover the kingdom of God is not just at the end of some timeline, but that it is in this life, in our very heart, and in mystically profound things like doing the dishes, making some tea or laying down in the living room w a friend and listening to your Indigo Girls greatest hits CD twice in a row.]
: But I think it bears exploration, as long as it is done in a context of goodness and grounding of communication with others so that one doesn't end up a babbling schizomaniac with no ability to function.
[Yeah, we need to NOT LOSE our sense of interconnectedness. We are not independent and individual. We are distinct but made for intercommunion. This means w the Deity and also w each other. Infact, the Deity has arranged it so that there is a direct relationship between our communion with God and our communion with our neighbor. To transgress one is to ultimately transgress the other. It is all one thing. Our exploration MUST take us to our own backyard. Our journey MUST end back at home.]
: Why is it that I dream always the same way and in my mental image of myself I appear a certain way. To my mind this is whpo I most desire to be. As I grow and learn myself more this image changes but the root is the same, even under very different environments the root is the same. So then I think is it possible to align my physical self with that image of myself in the dream reality? I think so!
[This could not be more true. I have found this to be the case. The more I stick to my guns about who I see myself to be, in that very primal way, the more I see it manifest in my daily encounters. There is always the potential for vain imaginations, but that only points a huge, brightly colored stick at real, healthy imagination. I think many people in our culture, which has distanced itself from wonder, have ceased to exercise that muscle. It is sad too, especially among the people of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who have such a heritage of wonder. We have a basis for the exploration you talk about. It can and should be done humbly, but vigorously. And NOT TO DO IT, is not only foolish, but it is sin, since it is being a bad steward over the vocations God has placed in and on us. Are we not created to do good works? If so, what are these works? If we are supposed to do them, then why are we not allowed to explore the possibilities of what those might be? My bet is that God wants to see who wants IN THE GAME. Who is a participant. Let's have the ambition of Jonathan to say "Behold we will cross over to the men and reveal ourselves to them". Don't we all remember that the whole creation is crying out for the sons of men to be revealed (apokalupsis--manifested). The word apocalypse has been misunderstood. It is not about tribulation. It means to uncover or disclose something that was previously hidden or unknown, like a bride under a veil, like a married couple knowing each other for the first time, like God, hidden in us, finally, through grace growing in us and doing it's work, being seen by others. This is the exploration and exercise I'm talking about.]
: Many primal cultures do this. They ARE the warrior, the shaman, the hunter, the healer, the lover. Their paradigm for viewing this world allows them to express those things in physical reality. So I'm trying to do that in so much as I can. It makes me feel alive and whole.
[I think our culture lost this when we lost the sacred. I think that religion and myth are helping us to rebulid the context so that this dynamic conversation (which never stops) can be picked up or received once again. It's like someone destroyed our antennae and we have been without a signal for several decades/centuries, and now we are starting to get it back. We are beginning to see things in terms of those TYPES that you mentioned and now we can start filling in the missing parts of the conversation.]
: Maybe you will want to do the same. Maybe you will want to be able to communicate these parallels in your dream without the implicit need to qualify in which reality they happened. Maybe you will want to learn how to effect the power tht you communicate in dreams in the real world.
[Well said, now you have shot your arrows deep into my heart. That is the whole goal I think, seeing them both as flowing from the same TRUE RIVER and finding in them not disparity but flow.]
: Now will you be able to fly? I doubt it. But what is at the essence of the flying? How did that affect reality around you? Perhaps that could be done. What do you think?
[I don't think we can give up on the dream of human flight. We all need to be the Wright Brothers. People NEED to fly. There is this built-in desire for this. I can't deny it any longer. We MUST CEASE to listen to this mumbo jumbo about men being made to live on the ground. Yes, there is a normative sense where this might be true, but there is also a sick sense in which such talk equates to slavery. But there is also the slavery of seeing flight in terms of a mechanical process that lifts objects into the air. Flight can also mean sitting in God's presence, hearing the ocean of humanity with the ear of Chenrezig or simply walking into the next room and saying something nice to the person you live with.]
: What makes me sad and irritated is that so many people live to escape into games or movies or books or whatever, but this is all pretend. It's like we never really grew up, we just figured out better ways to make beleive.
[This is why I always had impatience w videogames. That and lack of hand-eye coordination. To me they were always settling for something a little less than what I was wanting. I was wanting to let that dynamic that I saw others connecting to in a game to be unleashed in real life. I wanted a construct for this. I always saw some circle where people could gather and rediscover those mechanisms in everyday life. I do not judge those who enjoy videogames though, since I believe they are great tools for creating that context and creating hope for it to be actualized. But, to me they are like schematics for something that could be even more dynamic. For me, videogames were always so klunky compared to the wind blowing out from the dark electric forest in front of my head.]
: I mean I like movies and books too, but it is because they inspire my mind into the possibities that could be real! So whatever it is that you love, that you are passionate about, become that! Do what it takes to get there! Refuse to live in the mundane virtual reality that the Order has placed on us (to allude to one of Bill's older dreams). This bland world of jobs and houses and retirement and careers is not all there is.
[Amen! Well said! You slay me! And you can even use those everyday things as the lightning vehicle to get into the otherworld(See Teresa of Liseaux)]
: for example, Thistle just posted that she wants to move to Rivendell. Well GO! Of course I know it isn't a real place, but what was it that fascinated you about it? The architecture? The ancientness of it? The natural beauty?
[It was while living w the Meigs in Lutz that I realized that I DID LIVE IN RIVENDEL(L). Once you encounter that TRUTH staring you in the face, and you let it shake you to your core, you will just know. For me it was as simple as reading a street sign. Cari already lives there. She just needs to keep letting that manifest.]
: Places like that exist! And if they don't, build them, they obviously built the set, so it can be done! Was it the Elves? I love elves as well. But it isn't because they are elves, it is because they are mysterious and pure and good. They live sacred lives and they posess great skill at things. All of these things are acheivable! And it doesn't have to be about money or limitations. Work with what you have.
[Exactly, we enchant what we want. Middle Earth is enchanted since Tolkien was enchanted w it. The realms of the elven folk are enchanted today and we don't see them since we have ceased to be enchanted ourselves. Once we can reconnect with the mystery that enchants, we will all be enchnated once again. As Christians we see this not so much as magic but as 'relatio'. We see it as communion with God and reconnection with creation. When we enter that sabbath rest, we are enchanted. We are, as the Orthodox teach, divinized. We behold the consuming fire and become as He is. Then we can start to that the elves never really retreated behind the industrial complexes, but that they were here all along, and it was us who lacked vision. And that is why we were perishing. Now we have a moment of grace to gain it back again.]
: Imagine how great it would be if we could all make use of our talents to help other become what we wanted to be. to help each other live in the world that we desire to live in. I have a sneeking suspiscion that these seemingly different worlds and desires all play together in the plan that God has laid out for us.
[I think what we lack here (myself included) is the discipline to stay with each other long enough to realize this goal. The slightest things cause us to drift apart. We need to be like Jonathan's armor bearer: DO all that is in your heart, AND I AM HERE WITH YOU, according to your desire.]
: Dream as big as you want everyone, they can and do come true, and we can help each other do that!
[John, this fills me with hope!]
: Wow, I surprise myself at how fitting these thoughts are on the commemoration of the single most powerful event in human history. The day that such a powerful being broke every rule of nature and physics and justice to restore his lost race. It's epic, it's staggering, it's fantastic, and it happened. The dreams of centuries of people both past and present came true in that event.
: One child to rule them all
: One child to find them
: One child to bring them all
: And in the light to bind them.
[Yes! Yes! Yes!]
Bill