[Added note: At the time I had this lucid dream, I was deeply involved in so-called 'self soul-retrieval' which soon led down a dark alley that I had to escape from. Looking for things to cure about your psyche is highly not recommended. Even in the face of eternal life, life is too short for letting psychobabble become an obsession. Fortunately I survived this dip into the bottomless pit of self-improvement. I left enough psychobabble gibberish in this edited version of my journal to give it that honest, vulnerable touch, without letting on how close I came to unravelling completely. I can't apologize enough for this lapse into psychological inebriation, but if I was able to get through it all, you should be able to get through the taste of it that I failed to omit. --ed.]
2016-09-03 3:30 am
[Meditation.]
3:57 am
[LS] Actor George Clooney points at me: "Await dangers and practice discipline."
4:00 am
[Back to sleep in dream bed using mask. Intent: "Exorcising the Emotional Vampire."]
6:45 am
[No dreams recalled whatsoever. The last two sessions must be setup or configuration for the coming retrieval/healing, as per George Clooney in LS above.]
9:25 am
[Was informed by Mouse while exercising Nitpicker and Potwatcher in the garden just now that the reason for zero results so far in the ongoing "Exorcism of Emotional Vampire" is that I need to stimulate the desire of the long-chronically-untouched "whinebox off-switch" to actually exist, by attempting to use it. Discovered this by trying both ways; not trying to use the switch is much less satisfactory an experience than trying to use it. So immediately upon realizing this, Nitpicker and Potwatcher were given a pop quiz. They found two large marang fruits in the garden that had fallen and rotted unused, so I had every intention of complaining to my wife about this ASAP, when Mouse asked me, in his small voice, "Is this really an exception to what we just talked about?" I decided it was not, and a perfect passion fruit fell in the garden for me to enjoy, as agreement from Mouse.]
9:00 pm
[To bed sitting up, more shopping tomorrow.]
2016-09-04 3:10 am
[Meditation. In and out, dozing. "Dream" mantra .]
3:34 am
[Back to sleep in dream bed, mask.]
[Plan of action: pop up through Library floor, find Bob Neal section, take Down elevator to the past, interview Neal about machine and anything he wants to discuss.]
[And/Or:]
[Find black smarm and remove; regarding broken off-switch on my whinebox.]
5:00 am
[Earlier today I was meditating while riding to Tagum on the bus when I noticed--really as if for the first time--really noticed--some mountains. Was not consciously thinking "I am inducing a lucid dream," as I slipped into reveries of the mountains I miss so much in the States. Told my wife we have to take T. to the mountains. Used the whole day to meditate while shopping. Ignored almost all anger/irritation cues. Trying to stimulate the off-switch to make it want to be used, as suggested earlier by Mouse.]
[The following took place in a locale of grandiose architecture, one of my favorite places to dream. No modern houses, ticky-tacky houses, or strip malls here, everything is very old-fashioned to say the least. In contrast to a comment I made about Grandiose City on Jan. 18, this dream conspicuously lacks the slightest hint of pavement or sidewalk. In Grandiose City, every building and every part of every building breathes life and radiates reality. This is my 3rd phase experience in two weeks!]
[Before bed, I read through a lot of the previous chapters of my journal and read my last OBE, several times over. Have felt something coming on today, a buildup of sixness which is the harmonic of awareness that my lucidity vehicle lacks in general most of the time. When 6ness builds--appreciation, gratitude, passion, etc.--watch out!]
"Seeking the Off-Switch to the Whinebox"
I'm trying to get back to Joybroth's apartment but can't remember which one is his. I'm in a short white funky old beat up apartment house corridor, BRIGHT WHITE painted walls and ceiling, single story, wood, and ahead of me is a door leading outside, closed only by a screen door, letting in a lot of light [the Urumara].
I lean on a door TO MY LEFT, and it pops open, revealing an interior with lots of deep BLUE color, but it's the wrong apartment. A middle-aged woman and her young daughter are inside; we don't recognize each other. I continue down the corridor and find myself inside an apartment ON THE RIGHT with Joybroth and his wife (SC). I'm interacting with Joybroth when SC suddenly makes herself visible. She's wearing jeans, she's shorter and thinner than I imagined, and something about the way she moves draws my attention to her disabled hip which she wants to get replaced.
[This is Stumped-No-More grabbing my attention.]
I'm being interviewed in regards to serving as a ninong in some capacity [wedding sponsor, baptism sponsor--like a godfather or helper officially recognized by family tradition] in an upper-story office. The interviewer is an ageless man in a button-down shirt with short, wispy, thin white hair. The form we're filling out asks for my "Ninong Number" which I am quite sure is 544, so we write that at the top of the form. The man is with a service club [similar to Kiwanis Club, like my long-ago mentor Mr. Murray and his successor Jim Brant were involved in. There is a deep undercurrent of clubbing in this dream, of being allowed into a group, and I'm excited about it, even though it isn't actually mentioned.]
We've just gotten to one final question on the form and it seems it should be a simple matter to finish and move on to the next thing, but unfortunately, I choose this moment to have a wet fart. So I excuse myself, embarrassed because there's a girl in the room. I tell the interviewer I'll be right back, and I go outside to look for a bathroom so I can clean my underwear before things get smeary.
Outside is a strange and deeply interesting mixture of highly textured and detailed architectures which all convey the mood of the day, which is grandiosity: run-down, beat-up, old/recycled; there is not a new or modern building in sight. Every building I see, the mud under my feet, the overcast sky, and the light glowing out of it--everything radiates a strong mood of ancient underlying grandiosity in spite of the mundane events.
The rough, dark ground is like frozen mud dotted with fascinating buildings from a variety of time periods and European cultures. The closest building which I'm passing ON MY RIGHT is a large, dark building made of big, dark red--color of dried blood--porous bricks or carved red lava made to look like large, rounded bricks a foot long and ten inches tall--architecture of a bygone era where imagination was as important as utility. [This building reminds me of "the Castle", an abandoned high school in Sioux City, Iowa which by now has been made into a hotel.] The windows and doors are all gaping holes, not a trace of glass or wood in any of the holes. I somehow know that this building is a gigantic dressing room which a diabolical police force uses as a shower and dressing room. [The Nowhere, the Dream Usher whom I generally fear reflexively when I meet him in dreams.] I don't want to go in there, even though the facilities are exactly what I'm looking for; I would not care for the company.
Just past the building is a neighborhood of depressing hovels made from old pieces of rusty roofing tin, scraps of rotten plywood, sun-bleached plastic tarps--a typical Philippines squatters' area. I don't want to go there either, so I turn around and again walk past the big, dark red building. This time it's ON MY LEFT. It's about three stories tall and there doesn't seem to be anyone around, so as I get to the end of the building, I decide it's worth the risk, there don't appear to be any macho militaristic creeps around at the moment, and it must have the facilities that I need.
Once inside, it's one big maze of tiny toilet rooms leading from one to another with no common corridor. I walk through several, trying to get deep enough in to increase my chances of not being disturbed. I'm SURPRISED by all the privacy doors, as I would have expected a big common area full of showers, for all the macho dudes to shower together in . Then I notice that the privacy doors [the Urumara] appear to be stuck open, not used. I finally select one of the rooms [and this appears to complete the requirements of the quest, as the ablutions were not the point and the scene completely skips over to a new plot:]
I leave the small room [the Urumara] and walk into a large, high-ceilinged, long and wide open room [the Projection Room], and there is Mr. Murray's successor, Jim Brant!
Mr. Brant looks exactly as I remember him: glasses, thick white hair, 5' 1", button-down shirt, slacks, a little stocky, chipper and friendly [with the serious undertone of someone who considers himself to be overburdened and underappreciated but normally tries to not let on.] He's doing something with someone else. I'm very SURPRISED and happy to see him, it's been years. I walk up to him with a big grin to surprise him. He glances at me briefly, but doesn't seem to recognize me, so I LOOK IN A MIRROR, and no wonder. I have a hood over my head and a dark BLUE knitted scarf over the bottom of my face [this is the dark cloth I wear as a crude sleeping mask, just a long cloth wrapped around my head.]
I strip the visual barriers from my face and go back to Mr. Brant, and now he recognizes me. With a matter-of-fact, business-as-usual attitude, he enlists my aid transporting a playground toy. It's an all-metal swinging device, ALL BLACK. A tall central pole has several heavy chains attached to a top pivot with handles at the bottom of the chains. Several children will grab the handles and start running in a circle around the pole, and if they run fast enough and don't bump into each other and no one lets go, they will all be able to FLY UP INTO THE AIR and go WHEE at the same time. I grab the black pole while pinning one of the swinging handles under my hand, because it was swinging around hitting me in the face. Which is what it would do to kids using it who don't know what they're doing, or who are not coordinated well enough to use the toy.
[The symbology in the above is exquisite. My conscious mind could never have come up with a tenth of that much meaning in a simple symbol. It's about the different dream bodies cooperating to merge with each other into a single flying event, and how well they can fly if they do work together, vs. what will happen if they don't.]
The big black swing contraption is not easy to carry, but we manage to get it out of the building and into the back of my dark gray pickup. I WONDER if Mr. Brant NOTICES that I no longer have my red truck.
I head off TO THE RIGHT. I suddenly REMEMBER I have an interview to finish. [Truck, JB, and playground toy are all forgotten as I] walk around looking for the administration building WHERE I WAS BEFORE. All the buildings are equally FASCINATING, and as before, I'm on a large flat area of frozen dark-colored mud [the Nowhere] under a solidly overcast sky [the Nowhere]. The buildings are of a glowingly orangish-yellow stone/brickwork and each one shines with a personality of its own. No two buildings are alike, and they are not set too close to each other. I enjoy STARING at them, WONDERING what one could do in a building like that.
I TAKE A LEFT and the generally yellow/orange architecture, in a dark field of disturbed, dark-colored hard or frozen mud, changes instantly into a beautiful light grayish-blue. The last yellow thing I see is the rear wheel of the contraption I am taking a left in, with the turn of the flat dirt road. I look back because the invisible 3- or 4-wheeled bicycle I'm pedaling seems to have one irregularly high wheel in back, so I glance back, see the yellow world and two yellow wheels, take the left, and look back in front of me [the Urumara]. The dark mud is gone, the yellow buildings are gone, the road is now a flat, slightly upwardly inclined, ever-widening expanse of finely crushed blue-gray stone ending at the edge of a cliff 30 feet head. I am pedaling quickly out onto a promontory overlooking a huge gorge, and a valley set in front of snow-covered alpine peaks.
This is even better, wherever I am, I love this place. My invisible bike requires cranking with both arms and feet, so my arms and feet are gyrating like crazy and I'm moving through the air on a 4-wheeled bike I can feel, and pedal, but not see.
Ahead of me I see, for the first time, beautiful majestic mountains. What are MOUNTAINS doing here? As I pump with my arms, both arms going around and around in front of me together, it's as if I am pumping detail into the scenery. Beautiful bluish-gray chalet villages populate a gorge at the bottom of a valley spread out below me.
Everything is visually crystal-clear, finely etched. Now, I think, if there is a huge valley full of chalet villages spread out below me, and majestic Alpine snow-covered peaks behind that, then it stands to reason that I'm ABOUT TO DRIVE OFF A CLIFF. I see that the road I'm on ends in a sudden drop off to NOWHERE and I realize I'm dreaming.
Everything is suddenly that much richer and the blue-gray color cast on everything is that much more distinctive. The objects and sights are so perfectly etched in amazing detail, the villages below and the mountains ahead, I can see every pebble on the road ahead of me as I triple my pedaling effort with arms and feet, shouting to myself, "OFF THE CLIFF! OFF THE CLIFF! OFF THE CLIFF! LET'S GOOOOOOO!!!!"
[I'm off the cliff in a black void with no transition [the Nowhere]. I assumed I was back in my body, but I was so wide awake and aware that I couldn't get it through my head that I was still in the phase, free to go exploring further, so I settled for the short period of lucidity and activated the physical. Happy and excited, but slightly disappointed that I "didn't carry out my plan of action ." It took writing it down to realize this was the carrying out of my plan of action, which was to recover the off switch to my whinebox, the big playground toy. I am overcome with ecstasy right now and not the slightest bit disappointed. It took two hours to write this down and worth every minute.]
[Also take note that close interactions with people, as with the interviewer and Jim Brant, are strong lucidity cues and these people tend to be my dream bodies, not just 2-dimensional, cardboard dream characters.]
[Once again, the "lucidity" was just the icing on the cake. The whole dream was of crucial importance, and at the end, when I got to bite down on my fear of death and take the plunge, I was literally asking myself, "What if I'm wrong? What if I'm really not dreaming? I will be killed!" That's why I was telepathically screaming "OFF THE CLIFF!" over and over, to drown out the doubt, the Voice of Idiosiffication. I was determined not to let go of the lucidity, but of course I got too excited and went totally blind once I hit the open air. However, the important part this time was not the flying, but the willingness and ability to take the plunge (the Urumara).]
9:52 am
[Work Hard Early = W. H. Early = "Whirly". Just revealed to me while flossing teeth. Whirly is the grizzled, middle-aged, crew-cut, possibly ex-military man who showed me how to stuff a big, fluffy sleeping bag into a small nylon sack and unforgettably said, "Work hard early," which I never have forgotten 40 years later. Whirly is also Stumped-No-More, and the person who was helping me with the Ninong Application in the dream looked like the sleeping bag salesman from long ago. Whirly is now the name of my body of 9ness. This body of 9ness is the synthesis of bodies 2 thru 8. When all seven bodies (corresponding to 7 chakras) learn to stay in balance (cooperate), we get to fly as one body, with full abilities of 7 different harmonics of awareness. Awareness rides awareness back to awareness. Kinda different from leaving awareness behind as a throbbing lump of pure panic, eh? This is one main meaning of the octopus swing in the dream. If a kid jumps off, the adjacent kid gets a chain in the face. If a kid runs too fast or too slow, someone gets trampled. If your hands slip off when you're flying around the pole, you fly in a straight line to a place you had not intended.]