Return to ASD HOMEPAGE Appendix B: Letters on Dreams and Spirituality
I put out a request for comments about dreams, spirituality and the Net which was poorly written and got back responses about dreams and spirituality in general. I didn't include them in the article, but have included them here online as an appendix to the article. My apologies to the respondents who may have expected to appear in the DreamTime issue on Dreams and Spirituality. - Richard
The Cyberphile this issue rcwasd06.htm includes the Second installment of aHistorical Notes on Dream Sharing in Cyberspace with references, an update on the ASD Web Site Links and how to join the Spiritual Online Dream Community.
Subject: Spirituality
Date: Tue, 21 Jan 97 14:09:28 -0500
From: John Herbert jherbert@micron.net
To: "Richard Wilkerson"
Hi Richard. You have asked about my viewpoints on Dreams and Spirituality (for the summer/spring issue of the asd newsletter).
The dreams that I have had which I considered obviously "spiritual" have all had a unique feeling to them - specifically, a numinous feeling conveying a sense of awe which permeates the dream. There is also a "direct knowing" aspect to those dreams, as if I intuitively know they apply only to me. In applying "only to me," however there is still a sense of universality involved, perhaps an understanding that while I am unique, there are others who stand in essentially the same relationship (different undestandings and vewpoints notwithstanding) to the devine and to a universal knowing as I do.
In general, I believe that we can have dreams that have a spiritual feeling to them, and we can also have dreams that may not seem spiritual at first review but which, on deeper reflection, can address issues of spirituality.
>From my observations, spirituality issues seem to crop up in a surprising number of dreams whose metaphors at first glance seem to apply only to the "reality" of the dreamer's outward concerns. What seem to be happening, however, is that the dream is also addressing deeper level, spiritual issues.
To me, there is an underlying blueprint that governs our long term spiritual growth and which supports our overall path in life. As we test different routes through life, we often take variable routes. I feel that if we stray too far from what is deeply intended for us, we can get a dream that not only comments on the immediate situation, but also reminds us that there are long term spiritual consequences that also affect us.
Regards, John
John W. Herbert
jherbert@micron.net
Subj:Dreams Spirituality on the Net.
0nine? years ago. it may fall into the'spiritual' catagory. Feel free to use it if
required. Just use name 'Stephen' as name.<p>Dreams and Spirituality.<p>I had
this 'dream' about nine years ago. I am recalling it from memory asthe original record is
lost.<p> I am in a park like setting. Scattered all around are small domed hutsof
light branches and sticks woven together.My companion and I are inside one with another
person who is lying down. Weare trying to help him? leave his body. All about us in the
other domespeople are doing the same.I can see the 'consciousness' within the person's
body. A blue head withinthe dark mass of his body.<p>As we ease him out of his body
it is now myself flying up. I ascend into the higher dimensions /realms. I spend some time
there. Talking to people. The message, the result of theconversations is that although I
am involved in the earth experience, thisis my true home.<p>The only word that could
describe the feeling and the imagery of this realmis 'glorious'. All I can recall is
talking to people and the light and the'glorious' feeling and that this was where I
belonged, came from.<p> Realizing that my mind could not retain what I was
experiencing when Ireturned I selected a key phrase to repeat to myself while I
returned.This was:" To dwell in the house of the Lord forever." (Not for any
'religious' reason, it just seemed to sum up the experience)
I could feel myself returning through the different dimensions/octaves as I repeated the phrase to myself and consciously returned to my body. (note: It was not a 'being outside the body, looking down and re entering, it was more a return from within, being aware of descending and opening my eyes still aware with no change in consciousness. I was still repeating the phrase and knew why I was doing so)
Hope this helps.
Stephen.
ubj: mini interview Date: 97-01-15 17:31:33 EST From: iodreams@deeplistening.org (Ione) To: RCWilk@aol.com
Hi richard- I've love to give you some words from me on Dreams and spirituality. I've been working on a small book of dream meditations- so will scrounge around and see what comes up before end January. Meanwhile, This AM while working with a long time client with whom I speak on the phone since he moved to California, I had occasion to work with him on a dream of his that he'd told me when we first began working together 8 years ago!- He's considered it a "Great dream", one of major importance to his life, one that accompanies him through his life of recovering from a deadly illness. The dream involves resurrection of his mother, who had died while he was a teen-ager. As he told the dream again it began to unfold in my consciousness, and I was as usual seeing my own version of the dream. While it was happening I was struck at how different the dream was visually and how different it felt to me since first I'd heard it. My friend was aware that new things were happening in the dream since the original telling. The content of the muttered argument in the bedroom that brought his mother back was clear now. He knew just what was being said. Her unseemly behavior held clues for him this morning that were unfathomable before. I marveled once more at the living quality of dreams- their quite literal timelessness- noticing with delightful surprise how one might say, they continue their own lives somewhat parallel to ours, undergoing their own transformations. What a privilege to be able to tap into their numinous reality through the years. Best to you, IONE
Subj: article reference material Date: 97-01-14 21:21:36 EST From: Heratheta To: RCWilk
my dream is my spirit interacting with the spirit world. i am soul, non-light, while my body in entropy is spirit, light, black to white and all the colors in between. a dark and a light spirit were about to come together in my dream and i moved out of the way. they collided. that awoke me to a spirit in the room. it glistened before me as if to say i'm still here. i took a 90 degree tack to it and saw it move away into invisibility. to see my spirit and those spirits near me is to see my body dying and so i avoid that dying, those ghosts, be they incubii or succubii. recently a friendly soul told me of their experimentally using my escape technique from the spirits or ghosts i call dreams, and said " when the dream was severed i was free". the spirit-dream is like boomarang taffy stretched out in the beginning of a dream and coming back karma-kind at the end, stepping transcendentally away is my way to be free of spiritual warfare, to be at peace with myself, and to be more cognizant of my spirit.
Subj: Re: Dreams and Spirituality Online Date: 97-01-14 12:45:22 EST From: lucid@magnet.ca (Craig Webb) To: RCWilk@aol.com
You can take anything you like from The D.R.E.A.M.S. Foundation web site (which is quite a bit more functional now, though still a ways from complete - www-sca.PSY.UMontreal.ca/dreams_foundation/), and I would appreciate especially if you can mention the lucid living wilderness canoe trips which I run (see article on-line: www-sca.PSY.UMontreal.ca/dreams_foundation/dumoine1.htm).
As far as other quotes, I'll add a few here. I think that the world wide web is actually an outer world manifestation of an inner truth (as are all things, but some more apparent than others) in that it represents the intricate ways we are all linked together and in communication in a framework which cannot be seen by physical eyes. I call it the "innernet" or dreamnet, and the word play holds more than just a pun, for the only changed letter is from a "t" to an "n", i.e. from the realm of "t"ime into the realm of "n"o time. I would hazard to say that it basically is or will soon become the collective conscious, to adjust a phrase from our friend Jung. I particularly like the idea and operation of cyberspace, because it frees people from prejudices of age, sex, colour, religion. In other words, each person is represented pretty much only by the quality of the information they present, and by the charm of the way they present it, and also by the smarts and effort they put into how and where they present it. That is the way it should be, although, I would like to see the net become more multidimensional (visual, sound, smell, touch, etc.) after such prejudices fall away. It bridges the divisions between countries and language barriers. In less than 2 years, if it doesn't exist already, I predict a WWW browser that automatically translates web pages as they're read so that language differences become invisible. The language prejudices is an especially sensitive subject for me since I live with it everyday as a resident of Quebec, with all the fuss going on between French and English.
As always, a pleasure to connect with you again.
Warmest wishes for the coolest dreams,
Craig
And also DreamGate - Electric Dreams Links
End of Part II and III |