Is it really you? The ultimate identity of a dream character

One of the most persistent and unresolved questions in the field of dream study is, "When I dream of you, is it really you?" Standard answers range from "No, it's a part of you," to "Yes, if there is a 'felt sense' that it's really you," to "Of course." Most psychotherapists are loathe to venture beyond the first answer, fearing that to do so would encourage a client to project onto others, who might already have a tendency ascribe his or her own issues to others. But in the case of lucid dreaming, the vividness and interpersonal "otherness" that dreamers often report challenges the strictly "internal" source of dream imagery.

A more sophisticated answer, which emulates the principle of indeterminacy in physics goes something like this: The image is a not an object, nor a symbol, nor an aspect of dream "content," but rather a mutable interface between the dream ego and the unseen, intrusive content that is surfacing in the dream. The source of the content can be "local" or "nonlocal," or a combination of both. That is, the
dreamer may be accessing a memory, or may be receiving information/essence beyond the boundaries of the self. In the act of perception, the dream observer sees clearly, or perceives through filters that distort the incoming content, thus co-creating an image that changes constantly as the perceiver's response to it shifts in real time. So that's where I arrive at the term "mutable interface" to describe what the dreamer actually sees. The image is a moment-to-moment vectoring of the dreamer-dream content interaction.

So the question, "Is it really you?" necessitates a deconstruction of the image into "projected" and "received" components. If the dreamer can say that he or she is open to the dream character, and has no distorting feelings that can be projected upon the person, then the essence of the person may be free to express itself through the mediating image. But this is rarely true. We almost always have impressions, biases, fears, needs, etc., that are projected onto the significant others in our lives. So the resulting image is likely to be a "cocreated" product that has to be analyzed as such.

I dreamt of my deceased mother in a lucid dream two nights ago. She appeared younger than she was when she died, and her face was lit up in a golden light. At first I felt that she was soulfully present, but then her face began to look less familiar, and so I concluded in the dream that her essence was fading away, leaving behind an inaccurate rendition of my mother's actual self.

But then again, who can ever know the answer to this question? Van Eeeden, the first lucid dream theorist ("A Study of Dreams,"1913--you can find it on the web), believed that a "felt sense" is the only way to know if a dream character's soul is manifesting through the dream imagery. But this criterion is highly subjective, and not likely to satisfy a more empirically minded researcher. Henry Fielding's words from his book Tom Jones come to mind: "Until they produce the authority by which they are constituted judges, I shall not plead their jurisdiction." In the domain of the soul, empiricists can never really compete, because there is no foundation upon which they can base their conclusions.

So is it really you? Only I can say.

The Tantric Principle in Lucid Dreaming

An aspect of my own lucid dreaming experience has been the concurrent activation of powerful energy and sound, which in the East is referred to as the kundalini. Just two nights ago, I meditated at 5 am, and then returned to bed for a while. As I drifted into a half-sleep, the energy awakened. At first it sounded like wind coming in waves, as usual. But as I meditated on it, it increased in intensity and became a constant flow, flattening out instead of coming in pulses. (When I was younger, this would be uncomfortable, but at this stage in my life, it is quite pleasant.) As I meditated on the energy, trying to put aside my ego assessment of what was happening, I noticed that my field of vision was brightening and revealing a subtle lattice-like pattern as it became whiter and whiter. Meanwhile, I was aware of dreaming, as well. I was lying down on the slope of a hill, with a couple of colleagues who were waiting with me for entrance into a conference where we would speak or teach.

When I was younger, the activation of this sound-energy would often escalate into a full-blown kundalini activation. That is, a full-body vibratory experience of light and ecstasy. This still happens, but not as often. More recently, the activation has usually stopped with the flat flowing sound. At the moment that it flattens out, I discover that I can roll out of my body and enter into a fully conscious lucid dream/out of body experience. Robert Monroe, in his book Journeys Out of the Body, said that without first awakening this sound/energy, he could not leave his body. I have found this to be so true.

What can we make of this energy experience as a component of the lucid dream? As early as 1974, when I wrote my master's thesis on lucid dreaming, I suggested that lucidity and the white light were subjective and objective aspects of the same thing; that is, heightened consciousness. The Tibetan tantric system gives us more insight into the relationship between consciousness and energy by stating that the two are interchangeable, or reciprocally related. This means that any movement in consciousness has a corresponding movement in energy, and vice versa. Lucid dreamers do not always report a concurrent energy experience. Indeed, in my experience, it is relatively rare. Perhaps some lucid dreamers simply do not experience the energy as much as others do. But in the tibetan tradition, dream yoga is considered one of six accelerated yogas - accelerated because they involve activation of the kundalini. Well, this is good news and bad news, because the kundalini awakens dormant memories, some of which are disturbing and heretofore repressed or at least forgotten. Thus the energy component "forces the issue" into consciousness, and thus can result in destabilization of the ego as it confronts necessary unfinished business and emerging archetypal forces. All good in the long run, certainly. But in the short term, it can awaken fear as the ego struggles to retain is supremacy.

In the Tibetan tradition, meditation is treated as a slower, but less destabilizing approach to enlightenment. By focusing on awareness, the energy awakens, but only a a byproduct of mental activity. This approach (mahamuudra) is advocated unless the seeker has a guru who can oversee the dynamic process of kundalini awakening.

For myself, I believe I've had a rather rough ride over the past 40 years of meditation, lucid dreaming, and kundalini awakening. I wouldn't trade it for anything, but I have grown to respect the power of unseen forces, and counsel  others to take a more cautious approach, especially if their journey includes frequent kundalini awakenings alongside the quest for lucidity.

Lucid Dreaming Course Coming this Winter

I am working with Ryan Hurd (of dreamstudies.org) and Alice Grinda (www.aliceinwakedreamland.com) to launch an intensive lucid dreaming training program on Shadow | Community of Dreamers this winter. Shadow will be launching a smartphone app that works wirelessly with a sensor that will awaken you when you are dreaming, and allow you to dictate your dreams into your phone, and then have them converted to text and uploaded to a cloud server. In addition, Shadow will be creating a vast online community of dreamers who will be able to share dreams, learn from each other, and be able to participate in training programs such as the one that we are developing. I Skyped with Ryan and Alice for the first time last Wednesday, and we have started to pool our knowledge and experience in order to create a dynamic month-long program. I will be announcing the program as we get closer to the launch sometime in February. 
 (WWW.DISCOVERSHADOW.COM). 

Darkness in Dreams

Last week, I was an invited guest at Craig Webb's online dream class. I have known Craig for several years as a fellow IASD member, and a serious lucid dreamer. He wanted me to be available to his class as a lucid dream pioneer. It was a great meeting, and I had a chance to review a great deal of my own history in the field. One class member, whose name was Jim, asked me about a phenomenon that has recently concerned him--darkness in his dreams. He described being in darkness, unable to see anything. I immediately connected with him, saying that for the past several years, many of my dreams have been characterized by darkness. While the darkness may suddenly shift to bright settings, I spend a great deal of my time "groping" through dark scenes.

I am finding that darkness is a phenomenon that many people experience. I saw a woman for the first time in therapy three days ago, who told me a recurring dream that has worried her. She is on a mountain road, with sheer drop-offs on both sides, and a very narrow passage between the cliffs. Suddenly, it becomes pitch dark, and she does know how to make it through safely. It's important to know that she faces two severe existential issues: the normally fatal disease of scleroderma (now in remission, thankfully), and an adult daughter who has suffered a psychotic break and now lives the streets of LA. My client is deeply aggrieved by her daughter's predicament, and by her inability to help her. As if the narrow mountain passage is bad enough, lacking any way to gain feedback from the situation so she can negotiate the challenge has brought her to a standstill.

Darkness in dreams may represent, simply, a sense of feeling alone and lost in life. From a deeper perspective, it may signify the beginning of trusting another source of support, which is, as yet, not evident. Sometimes we have to be brought to standstill before we learn to rely on deeper resources. I am inclined to have hope for my client, as I have hope for myself. Perhaps we are poised on the threshold of a new life that bears little resemblance to the one that preceded it. Regardless, I am there for her, and so at least there is another voice in the darkness.

Free Course on the Five Star Method Available from DreamStar

If you're interested in learning the FiveStar Method of dream analysis, but aren't interested in receiving CEs or the Certificate in Dream Study, you can take the free version that can be found in the course management area of the DreamStar site, at www.dreamanalysistraining.com/moodle2. You can login to the 7-module course without cost, and participate fully in the learning process, which includes posting in the DreamStar Cafe--the course discussion forum. I hope you will join me there!

FYI, the FiveStar Method originated in my early work in lucid dreaming back in the 70s, and evolved in the context of doing psychotherapy since the early 80s. Of course, I think it's the best approach around, but if you're a therapist or coach, I think you will find it especially conducive to the competency-based orientation of modern therapy and coaching. 

Galantamine and Meditation-induced Lucid Dreams

10/2/13

For over a year now, I have been using galantamine––an extract of the snow drop lily––along with meditation as a catalyst for lucid dreaming. I have found that the combination of the two results in a lucid dream almost 100% of the time. Dreams have been long, visually stunning, and sometimes full of light and deep interpersonal connectedness. But not always. In the past three years, I’ve experienced darkness in most of my longer, more memorable dreams. Whether lucid or not, darkness has been a predominant quality of my dream life. I have wondered whether it was an existential element, signifying decline and the approaching end-of-life, or whether it was, from alchemical standpoint, the deepening of the mystery my journey. I often find myself groping through dreams of darkness trying to find my way, only to suddenly see a brilliant light that dwarfs the previous darkness. It may signify that I have come to a point in my life where there is no clear authority, no clear direction. I’m reminded of Dante’s opening statement to his Divine Comedy which goes something like: "In the middle of the road of my life, I awoke in a dark wood, and the true way was wholly lost."  Here are a few other lucid dream highlights of the past month and a half. With all of these have followed ingestion of 8 mg of galantamine, usually in the latter half of the night.

 In one dream that lasts a very long time, I find myself in a beautiful setting surrounded by old buildings that are exquisitely beautiful.  As I have often thought of late during such lucid dreams, the texture of the visual imagery is so rich and complex that I reflect on how impossible it seems that my mind alone could be creating it. I seem to cross a threshold into an area where there is more of a gathering of people in some kind of deeply purposeful activity. I’ve since forgotten all that I experienced, but the experience seemed to last for an hour. I do recall being with some artists  who were creating the most exquisitely beautiful jewelry and sculpture that was mounted on the wall and hanging from the ceiling. Some of it was constructed from precious jewels of bright and vibrant colors, and the light shone through it in a spellbinding way.

In another one, I become aware that I’m dreaming and I go and look for light or encounters with higher beings. I find a small village in the countryside, and walk-through the village for a while before concluding that what I’m looking for is not there. I turn and push off and begin flying up through the trees toward the south and come upon a old cathedral or castle. I find myself inside this huge stone enclosure, which has windows that are not rectangular, but more the shape of a keyhole or some curvilinear opening. However, I cannot pass through the windows nor do I find any doorway through which I can gain access to the outside again. I hear voices and look in through a window, and see people milling around below me. I’m up high as if on the second floor or near the ceiling of his stone building. I finally decided since I’m dreaming, I will simply go through the wall and so I do. As I passed through the southern wall I enter a dark wood, which only has a slight greenness to the darkness, and a slight mottled quality to the otherwise amorphous dark field. I grope through the darkness looking for the master. Suddenly I feel an arm and I’m shocked by the presence of another person. I can suddenly see, and see that there is a woman between me and Julie, who was sleeping. The woman is unknown to me, so I asked her who she is. She tells me her name which I’ve since forgotten. I asked her why she is there. She says that she’s come to make sure that robots do not take over the earth. She goes on to tell me that she’s from another star system and introduces me to a small group of people who have come from her star system to visit our world. When I expressed interest in visiting her world, I’m told that it’s best that I remain where I am because my work is here not there. In another experience, I am drifting off to sleep after meditation. I hear the energy, which I’ve heard all my life when I’m on the verge of leaving my body. The Tibetan Buddhists refer to it as the “gift waves,” and believe that it signifies the presence of a master. Robert Monroe, author of Journeys out of the Body said that he could not leave his body if the energy was not present. It’s been happening quite often lately as a byproduct of the meditation-plus-galantamine regimen that I’ve been doing about once or twice a week. Anyway, when the energy rises, it comes in waves as if a valve is opening and closing. But it responds to my state of mind, and if I meditate upon it, it becomes more intense and eventually flattens out into a constant stream of energy. I do this, and as the energy increases, I feel pressure on my back as if someone is clinging to my back. He or she seems to hold on more and more tightly, so I whisper to it, “I’m not afraid of you.” I feel absolutely no fear at all, a fact which I marvel at.  The being says something to me, which I cannot understand through the sound of the energy. Then I reach up and grab it with my hand and pull it over my shoulder. It tumbles off the bed onto the floor and so do I. I see that it’s a small black cuddly animal of some sort, resembling a small bear or pig with fur.  It seems startled that I have been so bold, and it scurries away before I can take it in hand. Julie is sleeping nearby, and the dream ends.

 In last night’s dream, I was supposed to be speaking on dream work in front of an audience of about 100 people.  The meeting room was very tastefully done, and part of a larger community center comprised of many such auditoriums. I leave the room for a few minutes for some reason, but when I try to return I cannot find the room that I’m supposed to be in. I open two doors, only to find that there are other classes or presentations underway. I am confused and lost in this rather rich interpersonal setting. People are everywhere, and I simply milled through the crowd looking for the place that I’m supposed to be in. At some point, I become aware that I’m dreaming. I continue walking about exploring and observing the interpersonal dynamics around me the buildings in the rooms. I go through several doors, only to find myself increasingly unattractive and tiny rooms. I finally decide simply to fly through the wall and leave the place, and so I do. As I pushed to the wall, I find myself up high as if I’m on the third floor of a building flying over a very attractive grassy open expanse. Below me I see many people who are visiting and enjoying each other in a kind of unorganized social setting. I go down to be with them, and I playfully show them that I can fly. I then go up in the air higher and higher looking for the light, which I do not see in this dream.

Would I recommend using galantamine?  On one hand, all that it does is to increase acetylcholine, which is a necessary neurotransmitter that increases cognitive performance.  It’s not a controlled substance, and has no serious side effects. You may experience headaches and indigestion if you're a sensitive type (like me), but that’s about it. It has been used effectively to treat mild to moderate dementia in Europe, so if you're forgetting things, hey, you might reap a double benefit. The prescription Alzheimer's drug Aricep accomplishes the same thing (i.e. it's a cholinesterase inhibitor, or impedes the breakdown of acetylcholine), and has been shown to induce lucid dreams in a very high percentage of people who take it, as reported recently in Stumbrys, Erlacher, Shadlich, and Shredl's important survey of lucid dream induction method (Consciousness and Cognition, 21 (2012)), which is available online at www.elsevier.com/locate/concog.
I believe that any artificial means for inducing lucid dreams needs to be paired with spiritual practice. My wife asked me just the other day, for instance, what was the purpose of becoming lucid?  Good question!! I mean, what's wrong with ordinary life? Since the very beginning of my work with lucid dreaming back in the early 1970s, I have always been concerned about the wholesale promotion of lucid dreaming without regard for a higher purpose for the journey. So, if you’re going to use galantamine, I recommend pairing it with some form of spiritual practice so that whatever it stimulates or awakens in your dream life occurs in a context of seeking something above and beyond your own ego’s desires. If the ego is at the helm, all kinds of detractors will rise up to challenge you. But if the master is driving the ship, well, you're in much better hands whether on sunny beaches or in the midst of a cyclone. But once you feel satisfied that the endeavor is legitimate, you might want to try 8 mg of gulantamine in the middle of the night. I usually take it around 4:00 AM, meditate for 20 to 30 minutes, and then returned to sleep for a couple of hours. As I’ve said, it works almost 100% of the time for me. But then again, I don’t do it every night. It’s been found that the effect of gulantamine  wears off if you use it too often. A good source is HealthSupplement Wholesalers.com. Let me know how you do!
By the way, please take advantage of my free course on learning to use the FiveStar Method of dream analysis--an approach to dreams based on my early research into lucid dreaming--at www.dreamanalysistraining.com/moodle2. I have just launched the Course Management System, which includes the Certificate of Dream Study training program.

The Importance of Not Seeing too Directly into the Beauty of the Soul

I introduced my lucid dream about the veiled women to raise the question, Why the veiling of their presumed beauty? The first wore a dark mask, the second a blue fabric veil. It reminds me of Robert Johnson's analysis of the myth of Tristan and Isolde in his book We. Johnson argues that the relationship with the anima (or animus) should remain "chaste" and not eroticized. As you may recall, Tristan's fate all turns on whether he will have sex with Isolde the Fair, King Mark's queen. Well, they do, and all hell breaks loose. Until then, the relationship is magical and potent; but afterward war breaks out and Tristan's future is dark.

If the relationship to the inner self becomes eroticized and exploited, then the image of the soul is projected onto the world, and becomes identified with a real person. This is a burdemsome, impossible mission for the carrier of the projection, and she/he will surely fail in living out that expectation. Johnson says that by maintining a chaste relationship with the inner self, and by having a sexual relationship with a "real" person (Isolde the White), the Tristan within us lives out a balanced life in which his soulfulness gets expressed in creativity, feeling, imagination, and the like.

I have found that in my deepest lucid dreams, my feelings for the characters (who are, sometim, esperhaps actual souls) are hard to describe: they are so deep, so timeless. Holding the woman in the black mask gave me a feeling of having "come home." But it was not my home, at least for now. By not being able to see her, some degree of mystery remained, and a necessary distance was preserved. Johnson might say that I was fortunate not to see the face, for I may have overly personalized that moment. The lucid dream in all of its intensity and felt reality could have effectively fixated me on the image of her face. That connection with the soul, while being perhaps the "best thing we have," may also be the rocks upon which our ship goes to ground. In the Odyseus, Ulysses wants to hear the song of the sirens, but he is wise enough to have his men tie him to the mast of the ship. Without that grounding, the relationship with the anima can overwhelm the ego and find its expression in the external world, to our detriment. So it is grace itself that inserts a certain obliqueness into the relationship with the inner self, in order to keep our attention oriented to the real world, and committed to real relationships that can afford us what we need in this world of form and necessary compromise. If Tristan could only have been content with Isolde the White, his wife, it would have been a near-perfect world, but the vision of the anima lured him into thinking it could be a perfect world, and that is always an ill-fated belief.