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Hey i made this thread because i still want to read about others experience with transcendent dreams. Most of my dreams that seem transcendent are mainly dreams that put me on the right path. Kind of like a guide. I wanna read what a transcendent dream is really like to others and I'd like to compare so i can build on my experiences and see what other's perspectives are about it.
I will follow your thread with great interest:goodidea:
Glad your interested~^^ But here no hardcore disputing so let's keep it clean. Also, I will come back to this thread tomorrow and see what I can add if no one comments. Idk why I always come at the time I'm sleepy. :sleeping: Its 12:22am.Quote:
Originally Posted by RealityShifter
Good idea for a thread Dawn!
I'm experienced in "transcending", but I only have a little bit of experience with transcendental dreams. You'll get better responses about transcendental dreams from people other than me. :P
In waking life, I practice Advaita Vedanta. It has reflected in non-lucid dreams a few times.
Part of the practice of Vedanta is to transcend the body/mind. To transcend the person. To transcend the physical.
In waking life, this feels like watching my experience as if there's a movie screen in front of me while I sit in a silent, peaceful, blissful void.
Our whole experience is made up of thoughts and senses. There is a witness to that experience which is outside of physical reality.
Using the concept of "I am the witness" or even "I am the void", we can transcend the body/mind.
Let me just be clear that this is not the entire practice of Vedanta and doesn't actually represent the "absolute truth". But it's a genuine way to transcend.
In a few of my dreams, my attention was drawn to "the void". So I put my sense of self in there like usual. I was met with that familiar bliss.
In doing this, I sorta woke up and fell back asleep many times, but I wasn't moving at all. I didn't really have a sense of "body" so different states of consciousness just kinda floated in and out of the void while I remained in complete peace.
This is a good idea, DawnEye, and I'm scouring my memory for a dream or two that I can post that will make sense. The trouble here is that dreams of transcendence, by their nature, are very difficult to "bring back" for yourself, much less to put into words that make sense to others... hmm, just so I don't go on about this, here is a thread I started that discusses the difficulty I mention (at least I think it does; I haven't looked at it in years!); in the meantime I'll try to come back sometime soon with a couple of hopefully helpful examples...Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
Thanks~ : ) Even a little can go a long way so I don't mind. I've never heard of Vendanta before. I'm curious what the name is directly translated.Also, I'm trying but i can't quite visualize the movie screen example. How do you watch your experience as you sit in a blissful void? In my mind it seems like "action" and "no action". The concept is still interesting though. I think I've practiced this concept in certain ways. It really makes me think too. Like it makes me wonder how our attachment to physical varies and whether we transcend in different areas in WL.Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
I also think it's cool how you use the void to transcend. I'm trying to think what could be so blissful about it though. Feels like i'm resonating more with the "I'am the witness" than "I'am the void". However, I think it's cause I'm thinking of how its important to be balanced in WL. In contrast, remembering my experiences being in the void I can see now why you would like it. There is a certain blissful feeling you get without having to worry about your physical body. You are also less likely to be distracted by your senses so in a way you do experience complete peace.
Nice~ :meditate:
Also, I repeated certain things you mentioned because I slowly started to get what you meant and repeating it helped me put two and two together.xD
Thanks Sageous~ : D lol It's alright. I'am curious about why it is difficult so I will check out the thread to see if I can find something. If I find nothing I'll still be looking forward to any dreams you can come up with if possible. ^w^Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
Im gonna combine my posts
Aha :D
The thing is, if you point your focus inward/backward, you'll reach a "void", or a "back screen of consciousness", or "pure awareness".
These three terms all point to the same thing. The witness (also known as the true self).
Before I discovered this thing, I had only had really small experiences of it.
A few times, I smoked a lot of weed, and things got weird. I started to see my entire field of vision suspended in my perception, like an eyeball contained my entire sensory perception and thoughts.
But it wasn't until I properly discovered this thing that the magic unfolded.
Usually we are looking through the filter of our ego. What happens when you become "the witness" is you see the ego from a place of complete stillness, through the eye of truth.
The truth is, there is always a still/silent witness, the eye of truth is always watching in peace, but we never pay attention to it.
How can it be bliss? Well, as humans we are used to a cascade of thought and emotion and hurt. When you pull your sense of self back into the witness, you have created a space between YOU and THINGS (and btw, thoughts and emotions count as THINGS). Therefore things cannot hurt you. You are completely liberated from suffering. And you are of course suspended in a state of eternal peace.
The thing I'm pointing at is in fact beyond words. I'm just doing my best to point in a specific direction in the hopes that you catch it.
Thanks for explaining again Slash. For some reason I'm trying to understand but I can't really get it. I understood the blissful Part but I don't get how eyeballs can contain thought. Do you mean it felt like you were where your eyeball was? Also, I may have misunderstood the witness. I'm trying to see it the way you see it and I'm thinking of it as the part of us that needs no identity and creates balance. Does that make sense? If not maybe I need a simpler example.:confused:Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
Ok haha. Lemme try this. Look at your experience directly.
You've got two eyeballs that produce a single image in your mind.
Forget the eyeballs and just look at the image. What is witnessing that looking? What perceives your perception?
I know how easy it will be to answer "the brain" or "the mind". But let's forget the physical dimension for a moment. Just look directly at your experience. After all, the only thing you can prove to be true is your current perception of this moment. You can't even prove to yourself that you have a brain. You can only prove that you are seeing appearances (in other words, experiencing experiences, or perceiving perception). It's that seeing we want to look at. Just the seeing of your experience. There is a seeing, and there are appearances. At the moment we need to look at these as separate things.
The seeing is very pure. It is simply observing. It doesn't have thoughts or feelings or anything, and it is completely unchanging. Hence, silent awareness.
The appearances are constantly changing in front of the seeing. Sight, sound, touch, taste, smell and thoughts all buzzing about chopping and changing in front of the seeing.
I'll let you absorb that before I say anything else. :)
Continued...
Consider this.
https://i.imgur.com/XSrtybH.png
The image itself represents the appearances.
Your computer monitor represents the seeing (the witness).
This isn't perfect, but I hope it helps you understand what I'm getting at.
Ignore "the void" for now if you want. First get used to the fact of the witness vs the witnessed. It's like black vs white, they are opposites. One never changes, the other is in a constant state of change.
Ohhh.:chuckle:so its whats allowing you to see itself that is the witness and this helps cause it increases your awareness? This sounds like meditating except with your eyes open. How long do you practice percieving perception slash? Also, do you literally sit or stay in a position to do it? I ask this cause if you move, you would have to be aware of other things in your surroundings and in a way wouldn't that distract you?
Aha you're asking the right questions now! :D You've caught onto it! Trust me it's harder than it looks to get people to see this. xD
First thing you gotta know is, the witness, let's call it "pure awareness" is of course always 100% aware.Quote:
and this helps cause it increases your awareness?
But indeed to get in touch with this "pure awareness" can drastically affect your "awareness".
It's like becoming "aware of awareness".
Another step up from being aware of pure awareness, is to move your sense of self INTO the pure awareness. This puts you directly in the seat of the eye of truth.
Ironically, another way to get to the same "place" is to completely drop your sense of self. Your current sense of self is illusory so to drop it reveals "truth".
Meditation actually naturally brings youbackcloser to the space of pure awareness, but you won't be aware of such a thing unless you're already aware of awareness.
What is "truth"? Truth is reality exactly as it is. Reality seen without fabrications or filters created by the ego/mind.
When I first discovered it, I practiced it as much as I could. I didn't know at the time, but I was re-enforcing an "anchor into stillness" by moving my sense of self into the stillness in as many situations as possible.Quote:
How long do you practice percieving perception slash? Also, do you literally sit or stay in a position to do it?
It doesn't matter what you are doing, whether you are sitting meditating, or if you are doing stuff... Pure awareness is always simply watching from its pure place.
When I started, I noticed that when I was in heated situations, I would lose my connection to the pure awareness. I would drop back into my mind and get all mixed up in identifying with my false sense of self, and reacting out of that. So I worked on shifting my awareness back into the pure awareness even in the most difficult situations.
After some time, this "anchor" was so strong that I would go about and not even think about it. I can talk to people and still be in complete peace watching this movie called "Life".
The reason it feels like watching a movie is because I'm not even in control of what happens. I am purely the observer. I am not Stephen. I am watching Stephen's experience.
I Am.
Hehe Its good to know that I caught on to it now. :D I don't have time to read carefully now so i will come back later . Thanks again Slash.
I think I can help a bit with this. I don't claim to know much about it, but I have studied meditation and done a bit of it, and that's how I encountered the observer and realized its nature. Slash, by all means, if anything I say is off, let me know! But here's my understanding.
The way you discover the observer is to sit quietly and switch off the chatter in your mind. There are a few tricks for this - one is to say "Oooooooommmmmmmm" or something similar - it can be silently in your head so to speak, or out loud. This keeps your mental 'vocal chords' busy doing something so they can't be 'speaking' as they want to generally do all the time. It doesn't have to be oomm, but something very simple that you can just keep doing constantly. Sometimes if I'm a little hyper and find it hard to shut off the chatter, I'll count for a while, to get my mind to stop using words, and then taper off from counting to Omm or something. Another trick I've found is to trap your tongue inside your mouth, between the roof and floor of the mouth. If you sort of jam your tongue forward up against the inside of your teeth and gently close your mouth around it it gets sort of wedged in and seems to stop trying to wag all the time. One thing I learned is that there are levels of inner speaking - the most obvious level, and the closest to actual speaking out loud, is what's called subvocalization, and it's basically like whispering but silently - you often actually move your tongue and throat as you're doing it. So if you trap your tongue and relax it and your throat you'll notice right away the level of chatter in your inner mind drops quite a bit and it's easier to maintain inner quiet. When I understood and had experienced this, I realized there are several other levels of inner chatter, each more subtle than the last, until you reach a level where it's not really words at all but just sort of images or ideas bubbling up randomly from the unconscious, vague and sort of random. Those are very quiet and not couched in verbal language, so not produced by the language centers which are n the 'conscious' part of the brain.
I apologize if you already know all this DawnEye, but this is also for readers who might not be aware of it. It does sound like you've done some meditation before, but it's not clear how much you know about this. And I find it's often helpful to go through and re-state the basics - sometimes an aspect pops up that somebody didn't understand before.
Ok, so as you become better able to switch off the inner chatter, you sit quietly and try to keep your mind clear. The attitude is important - if words or thoughts or emotions rise up don't get angry and don't get attached to them - just let them rise up like clouds in a clear sky and observe them, without becoming attached. Let them pass right through your mind and up out the 'top of your head' to dissipate into space. Use an attitude of loving kindness - forgive yourself for having thoughts or ideas - this is the attitude you want to develop and use throughout your life as much as possible - not only for yourself but for everyone and everything.
As you become better at letting the thoughts and feelings rise and pass harmlessly through your mind, you become aware of the fact that you are not your thoughts or your feelings. If you can observe them, then you are not them. This is a different level of awareness from the common one - most people think they are their own thoughts and feelings. But obviously you're something else, something that can observe them and not become attached to them. This something that you are, is the observer, or the void, whatever you want to call it. And by practicing meditation like this you strengthen your awareness of it and you get better at separating your sense of self from your thoughts and feelings - you begin to realize that, in terms of 'positioning' in your headspace - you are somewhere 'behind' them, able to watch them as they rise like clouds to dissipate into the sky.
At some points it seems like Slash is talking about another level of self behind this. Maybe that one is called the void?
Great post Darkmatters!
What you've described there are fantastic ways to "get there".
For me, the "direct approach" worked just fine for me. As soon as discovering it, I could switch between the person and the witness at will, it's like a switch in my head.
But not everyone finds it so easy. Enter, meditation.
Ok what I'm about to say is gonna bring a whole new level of complexity, so Dawn, don't worry too much about the following. I really shouldn't be over-complicating things for you. :PQuote:
Originally Posted by Darkmatters
Spoiler for If you want to explode your head:
Hahahahaha I just edited my post, I spoiler'd it with "If you want to explode your head". Then I saw your GIF.
That was a funny moment.
EDIT: Dat GIF gets funnier the longer I look at it
Lol!! I think this thread just became transcendent! :cackle:
I’ve been following this thread with interest since I’ve never felt that ‘transcendent’ was quite the right word for any of my more exotic dream experiences, but it’s clearly something that resonates for many people. And now I finally understand: it's all about exploding heads.
...Kidding, of course. :lol: But looking everything over, I can see overlap with at least some of my own experiences. I just seem to have followed a different enough trajectory through life to where it's never made sense for that to be something to focus on.
Yeah...my head exploded after reading everything. Lol Also theres a word that stuck with me and it is "drop". Like your dropping parts of yourself till you are just simply there. Reminds me of when I stared outside the car window and passing images would pass without a thought. Until I snapped back into reality.
However, I don't think you would want to drop everything to that point cause than you'd probably end up daydreaming. Thinking about it now "simply is ness" might be before you get to that state. Since it is probably you not having your past experiences or your personality in mind and just doing stuff?
Seems almost robotic to me.Am I digging deeper than what it really is?
Also, Darkmatters when you mentioned the part where
the observer is the void that confused me again.I thought perception was the void. And the observer" is behind the void. I could be thinking too much of it again but i feel some of these names are unfitting and just confuse me more. Its like the names make it seem grander than what it really is.
For example, for the true self. Why would no self be true self?
After rereading Im starting to wonder if what i was thinking before wasn't so off.
Ahah yeah, I do apologize, this thread is an explosion of words filled with all sorts of misleading connotations. I'm gonna do my best to clear up your misunderstandings, because I've basically just created a mess in your mind. :L My bad :P
You're definitely thinking along the right lines here.Quote:
Also theres a word that stuck with me and it is "drop". Like your dropping parts of yourself till you are just simply there. Reminds me of when I stared outside the car window and passing images would pass without a thought. Until I snapped back into reality.
Lemme just give you a little perspective-shift on the idea of "dropping".Quote:
However, I don't think you would want to drop everything to that point cause than you'd probably end up daydreaming.
To me, dropping should be an act of simply letting go of the tight grasp. Usually we go around tightly grasping everything, clinging onto things for dear life. Like, as if something terrible will happen if we let go.
This is something we do without realizing it. It happens mostly through the identification with things. To give you an example, when you identify with pain, it fuckin sucks! Stop identifying with it or let go of your grasp, then, well it's simply pain, it's neither good nor bad.
You can drop *everything* and still completely function as a human being. Difference is, you will feel light as a feather, and free. Personally I think dropping everything is a fantastic little challenge to prove to yourself what happens when you do it.
Yeah is-ness is something easily accessible.Quote:
Thinking about it now "simply is ness" might be before you get to that state. Since it is probably you not having your past experiences or your personality in mind and just doing stuff?
Again, don't look too much into the order I put those layers of self earlier.
Perception (or, better to say "the perceiver") is indeed the void.Quote:
the observer is the void that confused me again.I thought perception was the void.
The perceiver is the observer. Two words for the same thing.
Lemme explain why the observer/the perceiver/the witness/pure awareness/true self is the void.
Look at the perceiver. In any possible way you can, look at this thing which is beyond words.
Does it have any qualities? Does it have a colour? Does it have form or a shape?
I have more to say, but I need you to answer that question first. What qualities can you see in the perceiver?
Double post - connection fart
You might think in terms of the self that you're trying to shed in all this is the self you've constructed throughout your life to represent you, in a dualistic manner (meaning a "you" separate from the world). Once that self is shed, then what is left is the actual "You" that has to date been hidden beneath all layers of crap you've generated to create and sustain the imperfect construct that you think right now is "You."Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
But do you know what? I'm not sure that any of that matters here!
Though this conversation is very interesting and mildly humbling, I think. DawnEye, that a couple of very knowledgeable guys may have dragged you a bit too far into the philosophical weeds over a subject that, to me at least, is a remarkably simple one.
Transcendental dreams, to me, are no more than dreams whose content (be it spiritual, emotional, or just imagery) ranges beyond the experience and knowledge of the dreamer. In other words, transcendental dreams take us to a place that we literally cannot understand with the tools we currently have. So, all voids, perspectives, self/Self talk, etc., aside, the thing that makes a dream transcendental is "just" its presentation of stuff that lie beyond the walls of our human experience. It really is that simple.
Now, all this stuff that Slash and Darkmatters is certainly valuable, and, should you be able to absorb it all in a way that makes your psyche more receptive to things that cannot be defined or understood, which BTW could take years or even a lifetime (so don't be too upset if it's not all making sense just now), things that cannot be defined or understood will still happen to your enlightened perspective. I like to think that there is a whole universe of experience and knowledge still waiting for us, so even if we transcend our current selves, there will be dreams that those selves will not be able to "bring back" in a way that makes any sense. Oh fer God's sake, now I'm doing it... anyway:
Look at it this way: Transcendence happens all the time in waking life: A musician might find a new sound that never existed before (think Jimi Hendrix), an artist might change the very nature of painting (think Picasso), a theorist might assemble an equation that changes everything (think Einstein), an inventor might find a new thing that changes the human condition (think, perhaps, of that first primitive man who tasted a bit of cooked meat). Transcendence happens in lesser ways as well, every day, but the difference in waking life is that both the person doing the transcendental discovery and the people she shares it with can see the results of the transcendence: Jimi plays a guitar, Picasso shows his painting, the nuclear age (not to mention the age of relativism in social interaction) quantify Einstein's theories, and most of us like a good cooked steak. In other words, there is a physical object or concept that can be referred to after the transcendent event, and its existence allows us to form the necessary metaphors and definitions required to understand -- to prove -- that the transcendence happened. In dreams, this is not the case, and that's what makes transcendental dreams difficult.
When we have transcendental dreams, even when they're of the lucid variety, the only thing we have in waking life to measure them is our memory of them happening... And, when we're trying to remember an event that exceeds our current levels of knowledge and experience, that can be difficult to impossible. This is because our memory needs to attach something to the event to record it, be that a metaphor that makes sense or perhaps a similar memory; but if there is no something available, we are left the day after being mystified by what happened.
That mystification doesn't last long, though. A dreamer seems to do a couple of things after a transcendental dream: One is to quickly discard it as nonsensical or nothing relevant to their own life (the most common reaction, in my opinion); another (should they feel there was some power in the dream) is that they will attach metaphors that are not correct, but do work for them, like drawing on religious or, these days, movie imagery that helps what they experienced make sense in terms they can understand; lastly, they cling to what they can of the experience, understand that they cannot describe it, but value what happened and look forward to next time... I'm a fan of the third choice, and also a fan of developing metaphors that can at least preserve these experiences in memory in an accurate manner.
I am going on way too much here. I guess the tl;dr: here is this: Transcendental dreams are very simple events: you are just experiencing, in dreams, content that exists beyond your ability to understand them, and possibly even to remember them as they truly happened. The rest of the stuff here is real interesting, and helpful in its own right, but I thought it worth repeating nature of the thing we're supposed to be exploring here.
Oh, and of course now I'm out of time and still haven't offered up any examples!
Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
Wait, wait, wait something is wrong here. Are you telling that every time up until now, when I was trying to WILD by techniques created by myself, actually I was "transcending". These steps you described so far, I was doing them unconsciously for buttload of time. Every time when my WILD was starting, I moved myself one step further after "The void". Did I just get a brain fart.:holycrap:Quote:
Originally Posted by Darkmatters
Are you doing this with open eyes maybe?
Sageous: Awesome reply! I was waiting for you to chime in. Nice one. :D
Well now don't I feel silly. I assumed transcendental dreams to be events of transcending the physical. Which btw, ironically, is even simpler than what you just explained there. xDQuote:
Transcendental dreams are very simple events: you are just experiencing, in dreams, content that exists beyond your ability to understand them, and possibly even to remember them as they truly happened.
My type of transcendence, would you count it as a "transcendental dream" when I have my non-lucid transcendence moments?
RealityShifter: Can you explain in further detail, your own steps?
And yeah I do this with eyes open or shut.
Actually that kinda answers my question. My thing does count. But it only counts for a tiny tiny portion of what they are. xDQuote:
the thing that makes a dream transcendental is "just" its presentation of stuff that lie beyond the walls of our human experience. It really is that simple.
My bad!
Double post -.-
EDIT: I've sure made a mess here, eh. I think this thread should be sent into the fiery depths of hell.
At the time when I still did not know the names "LD", "WILD", "DILD", "MILD", "VILD". Through a lot of experimenting I created my own steps for inducing LD. The method(steps) I created are similar to Darkmatters steps for inducing this ultra awareness. Only one more step after "The Void" you mentioned was mine WILD, but I didn't stay too much at "The Void", because my goal was different.Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
double post ^^ that is a nice glitch ~_~
It's fine. I wanna see what your seeing though so I'm trying. I don't doubt that i can understand but it might get annoying if i ask too much questions.Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
In what way do you mean identifying with pain? Like when people feel a certain type of emotional pain and identify with it? I get that. You do have to move on in order to not let it tear you down.
Also, I'm getting a thought for how pain could be good and bad for certain situations. Like when it tells you something is wrong with you physically and when it stops you from being able to carry out your daily activities. But than again your looking at pain as just what happens in this world and that we should accept it right?
I see that it makes you feel light as a feather. But dropping everything makes me feel like I would be nothing. Just existing. I dont want to just exist. I want to be complex yet balanced.
Earliar i think i asked if it what was allowing you to perceive was the perciever. Not the perciever as in the observer or you. When you said i got it, i thought that was it but i suppose it was another missunderstanding.
If I'm looking at the perciever in the right way I would say that the perciever, depending on who the perciever is, gains color, form, shape, qualities and can choose certain things. However, they can choose to cut off certain things as well.
Yup... more important is that you can sense and remember those non-lucid transcendental moments... That truly speaks to a mature mind with a strong sense of self-awareness... very cool!Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
I don't think I mentioned it above, but I have occasionally harbored the feeling that we could very well all be having transcendent NLD's regularly; we just can't remember that we had them. That you can remember even moments of such dreams is very impressive!
On a technical note:I think the (new) gods of DV have a routine in place that gets rid of the double posts after they happen, so there's no need to post again to apologize for the double post.Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
Actually, if you edit the double post it stays, otherwise it will be deleted by itself. And I may as well talk about some interesting dream "events" that both happened and were induced a long time ago that got me even more interested in the dreaming world.
Only a few things pop up in my head but what type of things do you mean seperate a person from the world? This is complicated. No one here really knows whether i'am the real me or not and now i feel like i have a load of crap on me. :chuckle: lol I'm just joking around but i do know that though i have refined who I'am to a great extent, I truly do have scraps of myself I choose not to shed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
I tend to stay away from these philosophical disscusions on forums too. On the bright side, i understood what Darmatters was saying except for one thing and I'm starting to see how Slash is viewing it, despite the missunderstandings. Knowing that you understand it so easily is amazing to me. However, I'm being introduced to all these terms so it takes me time.
I recall reading about that on your trancendal thread today. I feel that thats a good way to define them and it helps to identify them, which i wasn't really sure if i knew what it was before.
Hehe :D Sageous, i was upset before because i believed i could understand to a certain extent what was said despite confusion or words but your right that i shouldn't be impatient. Thanks for your positive words. Also, its fine if you did it again.I think its good to know that even our trancended selves dont know everything.
Thx for mentioning those examples. They were helpful in getting me to understand how humans transcend in WL Hmmm.....thinking about your last paragraph now, where you defined it, I'm wondering...what happens if the person comes to understand them? Also, what do people think about the purpose of them if we can't understand them. I have a feeling i read something about its purpose in your thread sageous but i will have to reread. I'm also hoping we can all discuss what we think about it here.
Hehe its okay. Just write me a "I O U" :chuckle: i did read two examples in your thread though so i guess that could count. Still curious if you have anything recent though
^w^~ If not than its okay~ Your other examples were good.
Now, this is really interesting - not the way I was thinking about it at all. But you’ve made me curious: you say a transcendent dream is one that goes beyond the dreamer’s understanding and experience—would that be the dreamer awake?Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
I wonder because it’s fairly common for me to have dreams where I do or know things that seem normal at the time—like, sweeping the floor or driving to work normal—and it’s only when I wake up that I’m left wondering what the hell just happened. And it’s not that things get forgotten because of a lack of adequate words, usually. Whatever happened usually wasn’t beyond my comprehension at the time—but the comprehension itself was state-dependent. I’m left with the conclusion but not the proof, the vehicle of the metaphor but not the tenor—and I’m talking about metaphors that were baked into the original experience, so to speak, not something added after the fact. I’d be hesitant to call that transcendent for a number of reasons—but I’m interested to hear what you think.
Going off topic again but I just read a Buddhist magazine called "no self or true self" after i googled it. The person who wrote it explained that their teacher didn't have to worry to live up to any role. So for him, having no sense of self, was his true self. Even who he was from the past means nothing to him I think, cause childhood apparently "did its little dance" than ended. It was, and than it ended.
I can see how you could live like this. The only thing is I like to recall my past at times even though it ended. I don't really need a role, however, I do think of it at times to keep me motivated. Like the article mentioned some of these things do hinder a person.So if its a problem than you should break free from it. But if you can live with it, without it hindering you than why should you cut it off?
In the end, even with no self or true self we still have a name. We still like things. Dislike things. Think of the past. Etc. We don't fully get rid of it all even though we eventually end up with nothing.
These are just some thoughts that I got after reading the magazine. However, I think I should stop writing about this. I've thought about it long enough for now. :sleeping:
That is a very interesting question. I would say yes, the dreamer must be awake during the dream (aka, lucid) in order for the transcendental moment to occur.Quote:
Originally Posted by LeaningKarst
This is because, as you already noted, nothing is unusual or beyond comprehension during a NLD. You could be skateboarding on Saturn's rings with choirs of angels cheering you on and it will all seem perfectly normal, because "You," with the tools of memory and self-awareness in hand, are not present to confirm that this is not the way reality is supposed to look.
So transcendental moments could happen in NLD's (I personally believe they may happen all the time, BTW, and we just don't remember them as such, for the reason I just noted), but we don't recognize them as such during the dream. Instead, we remember them later and decide that they were something special... and yes, I would also say that we very often decide incorrectly, making all sorts of mystical magical attachments to a dream that was, well, just about skateboarding on a poorly conceived course. Now, the same problem exists -- where there is no metaphor, no filed memory, that can be used to properly describe the transcendent imagery -- but it is compounded by the fact that you are not "there" anymore, but are trying to remember where you were, and using memory as a tool for restoring the moment might just restore it incorrectly because, well, being a transcendent moment, your memory has no way of reproducing the imagery.
Of course, we may have an exception to this rule right on this thread... Slash mentioned above that he has non-lucid transcendent moments, and I believe him. But he has also, I believe, deeply trained his mind to be perceptive of such things, so, being properly prepared, he may be able to enjoy transcendent moments without the presence of his waking-life self-awareness, and his memory has something to hold onto until he wakes up to review the dream. That to me is incredibly impressive, but also incredibly rare (kudos to Slash, BTW!).
I think the best way to approach all this is by seeing it as utterly uncomplicated, with the obvious answers being the correct ones (as they often are with this stuff, regardless of the complex paths people take to describe them).Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
So yes, that self you are trying to let go of is a separate person from the world; that "separateness," or dual perspective, is the thing you need to shed in order to realize the presence of your true Self. Why? Simply because it gets in the way. Let's forget the pile of crap for a sec, and instead see that separateness as sort of a big wall that you've been building since childhood, with each brick being some unnecessary priority (i.e., appearance, persona's, possessions, judgements, fears, nostalgia, and much more). These bricks eventually become stacked so high that you lose track of the individual who first started the stacking, and see only the bricks. By the same process you've come to call the wall your true self, with your true Self -- and its presence in reality -- lost behind the bricks. And so, that constructed self becomes an outside observer of the world, always associ-- OMG, now I'm spraying a word-firehose! Here, try this out:
We are built, biologically, to be brains sitting inside a skull, dependent on our senses to bring us the outside world. Because of this (and helped along by a certain natural solipsism that comes with that physical setup), we tend to see the world as a thing we are observing from a separate place, as though there is a world around us, and then also us. This is a dual perspective, meaning there is a "Me," and there is an "Everything else," and this duality is the default position for pretty much all of us. But self-awareness changes all that, and offers an opportunity to come to understand that we are not lone observers watching a world go by, but rather are participants in a constant state of interaction with reality... we are not alone in our skulls but present, consciously, in the Thick of All Things.... and all this talk of "letting go," or "abandonment of ego," or whatever other happy cliches thoughtful types imagine, is simply nothing more than finding a way to step away from our natural dual perspective and into a much richer non-dual perspective.
In the end, DawnEyes, no matter what they say to complicate it, you aren't actually abandoning your Self, you are reuniting with it, and the core "You" -- the one who put up all those bricks in the first place -- will always be there, memories, identity, and all; the difference is that that core You will no longer need to rely on those bricks to define who you are, or where you are -- you will simply be You, happily free to enjoy the Present without a load of crap weighing you down.
And on the same note:
I think the best way to learn about this stuff, oddly, is to keep your nose out of Buddhist magazines, which by their nature (in my opinion) tend to over-complicate everything, simply because they must keep on finding ways to say the same simple thing over and over again (sort of like all those books and sites on LD'ing, now that I think of it! ;)).Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
Based on what you wrote, for instance, I would find that teacher (or the student who may have misinterpreted his words) somewhat mistaken, because he has chosen to live without a sense of Self. Yes, it is an outstanding goal to live in the present, without concern for the past or future, but to give yourself the delusion that there was no past, or that it has been discarded, is to erase a lifetime of presence in the World, along with the wisdom that accompanies such presence (not to mention that the work involved in supporting such a delusion can be yet another delusion in itself). In a sense, the guy in the magazine is choosing to live not like an enlightened soul, but like a mindless drone... and yes, being a mindless drone can be a very comfortable existence (as the billions of mindless drones in this world would attest), but in the end that drone is missing out on the, yes, transcendental experience of mindfully participating in reality.
I'm not sure this is what you were asking, but it got me thinking:Quote:
Originally Posted by RealityShifter
Yes, by its nature a WILD (or DILD) is indeed a moment of transcendence, at least the first time it occurs. Since being awake (while you are asleep) in a dream is a completely new experience without reference points in memory or waking-life, a first-time lucid dream itself is a transcendental moment, if just a mild one. After that first time, the transcendence is done, because the dreamer has a basis of experience to draw on... well, it's done in terms of WILD and DILD transitions, but of course a whole universe of transcendental experience may still be in the offing...
WILD offers even more transcendental moments, I think, because its process brings you through all the various levels of falling asleep with your waking-life self-awareness and memory intact, so you get to experience as new things like HI, dreamlets, and REM atonia.
You can also tell that a first LD is a transcendental moment by the thousands of posts on these forums that start with something like "Was this a lucid dream?" or "What just happened to me," and entire forum sections are dedicated to dealing with -- often incorrectly -- all the noise that accompanies a WILD dive; all of which illustrates the extreme newness of their experience.
Okay. I probably should have stayed away when the teacher mentioned he was never born but I wasn’t sure if he was speaking in a symbolic way or not. To me it felt like the teacher was more out there than the student though.(At the last moment when I was done writing this post, I went back to a non duality page I opened and saw a sentence that said “don’t try to bring a past experience back but focus on what it awakened?” Could that possibly be what the teacher meant?) But anyways :smitten: I love the brick example. It was easy to understand and cute to visualize, well to me it was.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
The brain example I had to think more about. I know I view myself as present and at times I think of myself as a seperate body. So when I think of myself as present i’am attached to the world and when I view myself as seperate i’am like a floating cut out layer on a digital page? :laughhard: Nice~ I do like feeling present more.
:D Alright. Thanks again for explaining. I feel like I understand everything now unless I end up being wrong again. I feel a lot better to know that It doesn’t mean abandoning memories,identity,etc though. I know who I was before I put up all the bricks so it doesn’t feel bad to not rely on bricks.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
OK, I think I see now—but you have it hinging on a binary lucid/non-lucid distinction, and in my own experience, the borderline is so fuzzy that it really doesn’t make sense to think about it as a borderline. Nowadays, I find that this area of uncertainty is where the most interesting things happen—more so than the unambiguously lucid dreams, even. I’ve heard this called false lucidity, but that suggests it’s a watered-down version of lucidity rather than a state with its own distinctive features, one of which is often an understanding that seems predicated on knowing that I’m dreaming, even if the words “this is a dream” never pass through my mind.
This is why I mentioned comprehension in my post—I’ve had plenty of dreams where it’s an open question whether I was fitting the experience to a decidedly non-lucid understanding or whether the awareness was so expansive that the fact I was dreaming was just too obvious to be worth thinking about. When there are features of lucidity present and the dream doesn’t seem like something you’d have thought up and when you're dealing either with no imagery at all or with imagery that you knew was only a representation at the time - then it’s quite natural to wonder.
Maybe it would be helpful to give some border cases to illustrate—but honestly, I’d just be doing it because I like poking at concepts—or, as the case seems to be here, the concept of going beyond concepts. And while that might be helpful for others as well, it would probably just drag everything back into the weeds. :lol: For my own part, I usually leave the question open because there’s no way of deciding it that’s rigorous enough, and because, considered practically, it usually doesn’t matter anyway.
When I first try to induce lucid dream from waking state. I was getting these dives, but was depending on how much time you can hold your consciousness. If you can hold long enough without falling asleep(you still get a wild), you can get a Full Dive. That can give you a lot of transcending moments or literally can make you brainfart :rolllaugh:Quote:
I'm not sure this is what you were asking, but it got me thinking:
Yes, by its nature a WILD (or DILD) is indeed a moment of transcendence, at least the first time it occurs. Since being awake (while you are asleep) in a dream is a completely new experience without reference points in memory or waking-life, a first-time lucid dream itself is a transcendental moment, if just a mild one. After that first time, the transcendence is done, because the dreamer has a basis of experience to draw on... well, it's done in terms of WILD and DILD transitions, but of course a whole universe of transcendental experience may still be in the offing...
WILD offers even more transcendental moments, I think, because its process brings you through all the various levels of falling asleep with your waking-life self-awareness and memory intact, so you get to experience as new things like HI, dreamlets, and REM atonia.
You can also tell that a first LD is a transcendental moment by the thousands of posts on these forums that start with something like "Was this a lucid dream?" or "What just happened to me," and entire forum sections are dedicated to dealing with -- often incorrectly -- all the noise that accompanies a WILD dive; all of which illustrates the extreme newness of their experience.
My typical full dive was composed of the following steps:
1)Relaxing body and mind
2)Getting buzzing ears, which get more intense as time pass (like thousand bees)
3)Body getting numb/heavy
4)starting to get HI => if i fall asleep here i am getting LD
5)Buzzing starting to turn in voices, which gets more clear as time pass. They are talking to each other, but can start to talk to me too and I can respond to them.
Once I hear a man voice that was threatening me:
crazy voice: I am going to kill you, I am going to kill your entire family, kill kill killllll....
me:shut your trap
crazy voice: I am not gonna stop until I make you crazy and stop you from proceeding forward.
6) Starting to feel intense vibration all over my body, its like my teeths are going to fall. If I get through this, I am getting one of the two
7a)Scary stuff appears.(ugly ass six legged creature with big teeth and many eyes which crawling on my legs toward my head.:holycrap: Waking up screaming.....
7b) As if my limbs and body are melting down:panic:
8)I am falling backward into a void and I am spinning.:boggle:
9)I am landing in darkness/emptiness, I don't have a body and I am composed of pure awareness, a single thought.:poof:
From here I can find myself at strange and more stranger places.:bliss:
p.s. Don't, do it if you have a weak mind, can throw you in a mental hospital:lolxtreme:
I wanna get back on topic now with everyone so I plan on putting some transcendental examples tomorrow. I want to do it before I forget what transcendental means and I get a slight headache from trying to remember. :sleeping:GNight~
I might be wrong, but I don't think you did quite catch the thing I was talking about, Dawn. My bad. :P
But I am glad to see the discussion that's been going on, and I've learned a lot from it too. I get what transcendental dreams are now.
And I am beyond glad that Sageous has come in and made complete sense of this stuff for you, he's cleared up a lot of misunderstandings that I created. What a lad.
I will, at some point soon, post a thread named "Advaita Vedanta". It's actually an insanely simple thing, which I definitely over-complicated in here, so I'll start fresh in there, for anyone that wants to give it a shot.
RealityShifter: That's definitely transcendental. :D
It's okay Slash. : ) I think that's a great idea. I will check out your thread when you make it so I can see what you were really talking about.
These are some dreams here I feel were possibly transcendental.
1)I found this dream from my earlier entries.
"The game ended and I suddenly appeared in a bright yellow room where the walls looked like the night sky. There I saw a big lizard [who looked like a orange iguana] with a small white, kind of fluffy tail. I was eager to pass the second test so i was like "okay,I'm ready." He told me to take a apple and to get rid of the ants that were on the red wine colored arm chair.So I took the apple and started to squish the ants that were on the chair. When I looked at the apple i saw an ant ate through the apple and was kind of still alive.That's when the iguana thing started saying I have a tail like him. But his tail is more silky, softer and white. I was like oh and than he said dogs are smarter than cats. So I guess i had a cat tail."
I don't know if I got the message of this dream before because I saw no notes to it. However, I realized the message was that I didn't have to harm the ants to get them out. I could have used the apple. Than again you can't trap all ants in your home with an apple. So how would this be applicable to a real life situation? probably by not abandoning being kind to nature. :whyme:
2)
"Dawn was showing me how to make a dream journal. He took a yellow folder and broke another yellow folder to make the cover seal for it. He stapled white paper inside it and said that not much people do this but they should try it because it can come in handy. Its also cheap"
I don't recall if I've done something like this before. I remember stapling paper together to make a book when I was little but I don't think I got the idea to make a cover using a folder. Either way this felt like a arts and craft moment where you get a idea.
3)I think this dream was from one year ago.
In the dream I couldn't see myself but I heard my voice(with some reverb) calling my green parakeet. It was a bit fuzzy, the scene was tinted pink and my eye level was more on the level of my parakeet. The scenery was bubbling with emotion of safety, happiness and excitement. As if I was seeing things almost through my bird's perspective.
I was curious during this time if animals had dreams. I dont think I had a dream where I was or was close to being my pet before so this was pretty cool.
4)I was crying more than i should have and fainted for the first time. Instantly i became lucid. I was looking up at the ceiling feeling at peace despite having fainted. I also was curious what was above the walls. Weird thing is I wasn't worried about myself or my body. I just accepted it as what happened. Than when I woke up I felt a sense of calmness and was happy for some reason.
For me it was like a sign that meant there is a time for tears and a time to stop and relax.The lucid dream gave me the opportunity to relax within the dream and I guess fainting gave my body a break.
5) A dream I had last night where I was talking to my dream guide on a phone. I was semi lucid( aware i was asleep but forgot i had moved)and asking him to take me somewhere amazing.He sounded unwilling so I tried to convince him by reminding him of a artistic thing I did for them. I forgot the title of the art though. When he mentioned it before I could I was surprised. I don't get many of these moments where someone knows the answer before I do although it has happened before.
Makes me wonder if I could have figured out my old password in the past with a dream. Although in WL I do know the name so maybe it doesn't count.
Now i have another question. If transcendental dreams really only happen once....what if the first time it wasn't enough. Could the dreamer have a similar dream that boosts the impact of the other dream? Kind of like how when you get a immunization shot and if it wasn't enough the doctor gives it to the patient again another time to have the proper percentage.
:dreaming:Well, I could come up with some more dreams but I'm not sure if they were transcendental for sure. I also don't want to flood this thread so I guess this is sufficient for now.
3 and 4 sound like possibly transcendental dreams.
I'd love to hear what Sageous thinks. :P
: )Yeah but its good to know what you think as well Slash. Like why do you think 3 and 4 are possibly transcendental or you could tell me what you think about my question. But maybe my question is difficult since none of us are sure of ourselves. >. <
In answer to my questioning, I experienced something extraordinary. In fact, some experiences simply defy words, and this is one of
them. In the first part of this experience, I exist without a sense of self
or identity. In the second part, I regain a sense of self. Here is what
happened, as best I can explain (December 1995 ):
As if a floating point of light in an expanse of aware, living light, the
self-less awareness exists. Here, all awareness connects. All awareness
intersects. All knowledge exists within the brilliant, clear, creamy light
of awareness. Awareness is all; one point contains the awareness of all
points; nothing exists apart. Pure awareness, knowing, light.
Then, suddenly aware of the black-gray dream space and the lone
figure standing there, I try to get my bearings. Recalling the aware light
just experienced, I ask the robed figure, "Was that a lucid dream?"
"No, " the figure replies. "To enter a lucid dream, go this way."
He points to the empty space in front of him.
Knowing intuitively that the entry to regular dreams is to the left,
I move right, toward the entry space for lucid dreams. As I cross an
invisible boundary, my awareness hurtles through a tunnel of whitishblue
light, along whose surface I see intermittently various raised symbols
- ovals, triangles, double triangles, circles. I continue moving until
I know intuitively that to enter a lucid dream means going up.
Heading up toward lucid dreams, I feel something I©ve never before
experienced. Around the crown of my head, I feel intense, explosive
blasts of energy, localized but moving in a circular pattern. Bam! Bam!
Bam! Bam! The energy rings in my mind.
Moments later, I know I'm preparing to enter a lucid dream.
Until, as if by magic, I emerge through the floor of a dream scene,
fully lucid.
Page 81 - Gateway to the inner self. Robert Waggoner.
First thing I thought about when I read this thread...
Well, Dawn, I could only draw upon my own experience, and any transcendental experience I've ever known somehow involves a loss of the sense of body.
In 3, you talk about seeing things through the parakeet's perspective. To me that suggests that your sense of body was either completely changed or even gone. And you were experiencing something completely outwith the bounds of human experience.
In 4, you talk about fainting then feeling calmness and not being worried about your body.
Going into a blissful state, that's a pretty good sign of transcendence, to me. Not to mention, the loss of sense of body.
Oddly enough, some of my earliest memories of transcendental experiences were when I fainted, a few times, in waking life.
At the time, the thought of transcendence never even crossed my mind. But when I look back on it, I see that my conscious mind sorta floated away from me and I became almost a blissful, silent observer to it. I say "almost", because when I fainted, I would put all my strength into keeping my conscious mind awake, so I never actually fainted, I just remained slightly conscious while I practically took a fit falling to the floor. Sounds like a big struggle, but honestly, the calmness that came over me was significant and indescribable.
About your question, I assume it's this one:
Who said they only happen once?Quote:
Now i have another question. If transcendental dreams really only happen once....what if the first time it wasn't enough. Could the dreamer have a similar dream that boosts the impact of the other dream? Kind of like how when you get a immunization shot and if it wasn't enough the doctor gives it to the patient again another time to have the proper percentage.
Perhaps the meaning behind that is, you only wake up to transcendence once? Then every time after that, it's just normality...
I mean, when I woke up to transcendence (while awake, not dreaming), it WAS like a one-off thing, like, I can never have that experience again. I can transcend my body/mind at will, but I can never experience the amazement, shock and awe of "waking up" to it. And that was AFTER having experienced a few things that could be considered transcendental, but before that point I had never "woke up" to it, and I never will again.
Note: The way I see it, "waking up" to it, is like a moment of experience, realization and a little bit of understanding, all at the one time.
But I'm pretty damn sure that not everyone has a singular moment that they could say "that's when I woke up". Some people wake up slowly. So I wouldn't entirely agree that you can only have one transcendental "waking up" moment.
But anyways, I don't know if this is what the person meant when they said it really only happens once.
LighrkVader, I love that! Thanks for the share!
The link may get removed tho. Last I checked, links to anything pirated is against the rules. :P
In case you think it was me who said this, it was not what I meant.Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
I think I was saying that you can call your first LD a transcendental event, because you have never before experienced a state of being awake while you are asleep, and after that first time the transitions to LD's are not necessarily transcendent because lucidity is a thing you've already experienced. But that example aside, you can certainly have more than one moment of transcendence; and I for one believe that LD'ing is an excellent tool for encouraging innumerable transcendental experiences (even more than meditation, I think, because you are starting out in a place -- dreams -- where unusual or novel experiences are commonplace). So, even though you can only call your first successful WILD or DILD transition a transcendent experience, there really is no limit to the number of transcendent experiences you might have in future LD's.
Keep in mind that transcendence is simply the discovery of something that ranges beyond your experience or knowledge (and possibly beyond any human experience or knowledge), and when they happen in dreams it is very difficult to "bring them back," because they lack metaphoric handles that your memory can grab to retain them.
Also, not that I want to counter Slash's thoughts (because I don't), but transcendent experiences do not need to require the absence of your dream body, and vice-versa: Pretty much all of my highly lucid dreams do not include the presence of a dream body, and pretty much all of those dreams were not transcendental experiences.
Aha! Mystery solved. :D
That makes a lot of sense actually. And, my understanding of transcendental dreams just 1up'd again.
Yup. It's a good one. I just wish he hadn't gone straight for the LD but stuck around to ask the robed figure some questions first.
As for my own transcendental dream experiences, really all I can think of right now was the first time I reached a high level of lucidity in a super-vivid dream and got to experience the sensational similarity of dream to real life. That centered me into some perspectives that I had already understood theoretically but could not perceive directly... Doing that was a stepping stone into new territory where I could learn to understand, and then eventually, some times after transcendent like experiences learn to "feel" or "know" other basic truths.
I think that's a big part of transcendence. It can often be about things that if someone can explain it well you can grasp it, and agree with it... But that's not really worth all that much. Rather I would dare say that in that state you are in a way being controlled by the idea itself. It's not a part of your being in a true way untill you feel it. (this can obviously be argued against)
Then something transcendent happens, you can't really put your finger on what happened or changed, but now you can feel and experience directly the truth of what you once only understood partially.
Edit: took away the pirate book link. It's cheap on amazon anyway. At least it was...5$ or something. But if someone want's to just read chapter 7, then it would be stupid to have to buy the whole book. PM me if that's the case.
Oh nice post, man.
This is a really nice description of transcendence. It certainly describes my own experience.Quote:
Then something transcendent happens, you can't really put your finger on what happened or changed, but now you can feel and experience directly the truth of what you once only understood partially.
The only thing I'm curious about...
I sometimes refer to my practice of Advaita Vedanta to be "transcending the body/mind".
The very first time, it was exactly as you explained there in that quote.
The thing I wonder is, when I do it now, is it still transcendental? It's completely normal now for me to go in and out of my body, in waking life OR dream. Am I no longer "transcending"? Am I simply "doing"?
Perhaps a better word would be "ascending" now. I ascend and descend from my body. But it's no longer "transcendental" because it's already fully integrated into my human experience...
Much like how a first-time LD is transcendental, but the rest ain't...
Idk. It would be semantic no?
What would it be that transcended, and what would it transcend? If it's just you, transcending you then isn't it a meaningless word? It isn't meaningless the first time it happens. Then it's grand and rare, so a fancy word is in order. Though even then, it wasn't special to anyone but the ego. To the self nothing is new, and neither are you. (haha edit: just realized that's a damn fine quote right there:chuckle:)
But after a while, as you know it's like a switch. As soon as you remember that the switch is there you can just flick it. So it's more like you said "doing" I think is more right. But most of all it's like oscillating... though that sounds somewhat deterministic.
Yeah it's defos an issue of semantics.
"You transcending you"
That pretty much says it, yeah. But there's still an issue of semantics in the use of the word "you".
The "me" that transcends, is kinda like, "sense of self".
The "me" that is transcended, is the body and mind.
Sense of self leaves the body/mind.
I had previously been using the word "transcend" pretty much synonymously with "ascend".
But now that I Google the word, "transcend" means "to exceed the limits of".
So, I used to have a limitation of "I am body/mind" and that's it.
I transcended that limitation.
Now I'm free to, as you say, "oscillate".
Brilliant. xD
Cheers!
hahaha :D We pick up lessons from all over. And then those ideas need time to grow in us. That's I guess one of the things that's nice about meditation. But all it really takes is a safe and quiet place with no disturbances. I learned a lot sitting in front of my Prophet 12 synthesizer. Synthesizers are all about vibration and oscillation. Oscillators affecting other oscillators again affecting others. Chaos and harmony, randomness and will creating a unique and surreal vibration that hits you eardrum making it oscillate. It's a nice way to spend a while in the role of the father, the synth being the mother. get's very meditative very quickly :)
It definitely shapes how I think about the world.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IzyHt-VY24 Edit: not me but I like this one a lot.
Well, no. To me it would be no more a matter of semantics than saying that using the word "run" for when you move your body in a manner that makes it go faster than a walk or a jog would be a matter of semantics. There is nothing special about the word "transcendence." It is not a big word, or a special word, but just a word that does its job describing a fairly simple thing. I think attaching importance to the word itself has, over the years, made its concept less accessible (sort of what happened to the word "lucidity," BTW).Quote:
Originally Posted by LighrkVader
But here we are, wandering back into those weeds again!
So, DawnEye, Just to get back on track, I finally scrounged up a couple of dreams of transcendence that are a bit different from the usual "higher awareness" stuff... I picked these two because they came the closest to making any sense upon being written down... I hope they did! I also hope you'll give them a look, even though they do go on for a while:
First, here is an old, old LD that actually made it into my first book (which is from where I just stole the text, just to save time). At the time I had it, I was a fairly headstrong kid who thought he knew everything about dreams and was about ready for godhood… also at the time I thought that this dream was a very “high-level” LD, though I now know it was not. But what hadn’t occurred to me at the time was that I may have been having a transcendent moment, and a helpful one at that.
The dream had been going on for quite a while, chock full of adventure, but eventually I found myself lounging on the beach of a quiet lagoon, feeling quite powerful in my lucidity but also feeling very alone (now follows the book excerpt):
On an impulse from whose talons of self-deification I should have run, I decided that I would just have to make my own company. With little more than interest in doing so, I `caused' some sand to mix with water and air on the beach near the water, imagining instructions in unrepeatable flowery text. I then watched, fascinated, as lumps of the stuff quickly formed into discernible shapes. I rose from the lounge chair, probably because I felt a need to stand above my newest creations, and stepped closer to the shifting piles of sand. The sand had sculpted itself into three perfect human statues: two men and a woman. In a moment the statues acquired the flesh tones of white people tanned bronze by years of sunbathing (a part of me worried that I had only made people from one race, but I ignored it – I would not allow myself to be bogged down by such petty ethical disputes as skin color). I then took care to dress them in appropriate clothes (linen suits for the men, a sarong for the woman). Once dressed, I stepped back in awe. They were beautiful. Statues of people one might encounter on Fifth Avenue. They were beautiful, but they were also still lifeless sand casts that were no better company than photographs of strangers. I tapped the tall, blond woman's arm. Her soft skin dimpled under the pressure of my finger. I moved closer, amazed, but not surprised.
They were no longer sand. I bent the woman’s bare arm. It moved like a corpse, not a mannequin. I lifted one of her eyelids, gasping slightly when I discovered a dull, blue, perfect eye behind the soft curtain. I lifted the lid of her other eye next. Though she seemed to stare placidly into my own, I knew that those new eyes regarded nothing yet. I released her, stepped back. This is way too much, I thought, there’s no way I should, or even can be doing this. My new power tempted to overwhelm me with imagined potential. It felt like a static charge that I could not ground. For a single sane moment I feared it, desperately wishing to flee. Then I wanted more.
Feeling my chest swell in anticipation, I decided that it was time to breathe some life into my creations. The thought had barely, irrevocably, left the sanctuary of my fantasies when the men opened their eyes, wide. Those orbs were not blue and handsome, but rather red with the blood that filled them. The men screamed in agony, though there was no life defining their ghostly visages. They were horrendously invigorated for a fraction of a second, and then they began to decay. The dissolution from flesh back to sand was very fast, very violent, and possibly very painful. Their feet went first, changing from perfect flesh to bloody bones to swirling sand in a heartbeat. The legs crumbled, and the decay continued upward. Green mucous-blood formed a pool that the torsos fell into as they thrashed in pain. Finally, their empty heads gasped for breath after their necks were gone. In just a few seconds, my living beings were primordial ooze sans life.
I stood in silence over the green muck that remained of my creations, uncertain of my initial reaction. My first thought, after the mind-rattling tremors of terror and shame faded slightly, was that I might have stepped on some mighty toes. I was horrified that my mind still searched for some practical reason behind my failure. It should have been obvious that I was not spiritually equipped to supply souls to sand. I shuddered when I imagined what substitute for life I had tried to breath into my statues. It obviously could not have been the real thing, the true breath, or word that drives genuine creation. But it was something. Something else. I looked at the woman. She was still poised for life, unaware of the fate of her two brothers. She was beautiful: her tall, bountiful body swept with long, flowing flaxen hair. Her high-cheeked face lacked expression as she stared at my contemplation. She resembled no one I knew. I stroked her hair. It was soft, full. I grabbed a handful and pulled very hard, ripping that masterpiece of a head from sandy shoulders with unchecked violence. With my vision blurred by tears, I kicked the rest of her down without pause. After she had been reduced to a few piles of multicolored sand, I retreated a few paces, stumbling over a fallen log.
I numbly climbed onto the log, and raised the lagoon’s water level by a few feet with a gesture, burying my horrors beneath a blanket of liquid clarity. I stared at the spot where my “children” were born and died until the bottom was ground smooth by many tons of moving water.
This next dream is more recent; I think from a couple of years ago, and it definitely falls into the “You had to be there” category:
I became lucid during a dream that had me exploring a Victorian mansion. I was in its parlor, checking out a locked antique safe in the corner of the room. It seemed to glow a bit, and I was very curious about what was inside. My interest in getting it open spurred “full-on” lucidity. Now normally when I gain a moment of high-end lucidity, I usually abandon the dream and head off to whatever it was I was planning to do that day, but this time I really wanted to get into that safe, even though I “knew” now that it was just an image in my dream.
So, with the rest of the dream (and my dream body) long gone, I faced the safe and ordered it to open; assuming, oddly, that I would fail and would need to get creative to break into a construct that I expected to be securely locked. To my surprise, it opened right up, with its door not only swinging open but disappearing. I didn’t need to look into the safe to see what it contained, because whatever it was was coming out to me. And here is the “you had to be there” part:
The object in the safe was a sort of glowing blue wad of energy; like a gallon or so of loose plasma. It had no shape at all, or rather, it seemed to have every shape, constantly shifting from one to another. Yet somehow I felt that its shape was unchanging; the most stable thing I’d ever seen -- and yes, I felt this even as I watched it shifting before me. In this stability I sensed great power, power that was more invitation than threat. I tried to move toward it, conjuring a hand to reach out and touch it, but no matter what I did, the object remained as distant from me as it had been the moment I spotted it in the safe. So, since touching was out of the question, I decided to simply observe, to watch and listen with my mind as open as I could get it.
The object turned slightly yellow when my attention on it fully hardened, and then started making curious shapes in white within its body -- I would call them geometric for lack of a better word, because they really weren’t. This went on for a few seconds, I grew excited and deeply intrigued, and then it was suddenly back in the safe, the door returned and slammed shut, and I was back in the Victorian parlor, staring at the closed safe and feeling my body beginning to wake up.
Upon waking I quickly DEILD’ed back into the same scene, but the safe was wide open and empty, save for a small book that looked a lot like my current dream journal. I tried searching for the object, even recreating it, even opening the book to see if I had recorded its whereabouts within (it was blank) but it was gone.
Well, it wasn’t entirely gone: This had nothing to do with transcendence, but a few weeks later, during a far less lucid dream about a poker game with strangers, I suddenly, randomly, remembered the object, and then there it was, floating on a nearby bookshelf, glowing away and changing shape without ever changing form. Not being too lucid, and wondering (at the time) why I was remembering stuff from another dream, I kind of looked at the object as if it weren’t supposed to be there, and so it quickly wasn’t (this has happened a few times since I had that dream several years ago, with each reaction being about the same).
I wasnt pointing fingers. :chuckle: I just didnt recall reading about multiple transcendental moment in Sageous thread so that was my first impression till i wondered if there were more to it than being woken up in a moment.Thanks for explaining and providing your personal example. (I was a little embarassed that i put mine up. :cheeky: idk why. Vader mentioned he fainted too before so i shouldn't feel like im the only one.) Awkward feelings aside, if you fainted a few times was the transcended part after the first was when you were not only calm but you getting mentally stronger in such a situation, despite not having full control of your body?Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
Also, reading about you woken up Im getting curious about how your perspective changed again. >w< But ill save that curiousity till i read the thread you said you would make.
I understood that part about first lucids. I just didnt remember reading about multiple transcendental moments that built up the dreamer till they actually transcend. I still keep what you said in mind though. Hmm...i might need more examples of metaphoric handles though. However, i'll probably get a better idea with your next post. I kind of figured that an absense of body wasn't necessary but thx for clearing a few things up for us. :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
Oh boy. Those are good dreams sageous.
The blue orb....interesting that you would post that now, because I am quite sure I remember something similar presented itself to Robert Waggoner on several occations leading to the transcendent dream that I posted earlier. Maybe you should check that out if you want some clues. It's all in chapter 7. Maybe it's a guide or gatekeeper of some sort.
Edit: ohoho. This is cool! In the book, in the last dream before the transcendent one waggoner finds himself in a bright white space with the the blue spirit which had in that dream taken a more humanoid form, because he is unable to pin down it's strange shape he jokingly calls it "blue light monster" though he too felt it was friendly. Remember how you couldn't get closer to it. Well waggoner rushed at it, like in a game where the objective is just to run past. And he woke up. Next dream was the one I posted.
^w^ Wow. I know you mentioned you saw your self as like a dream God before but reading about you attempting to blow life into your creations blew my mind. I can definitely see a transcendental moment when your creations came apart in such a gruesome way. You weren't even contemplating their destruction and it occurred. Well, except the part where you took the woman's head off. That was thought of but at the same time its humbling because of your realization.
That blue orb transcendental dream definitely sounds like you had to be there. You found something so amazing in that safe. Now that I think about it, your orb dream seems connected to the first dream. Mostly in the way how the orb reacted to your attention, while the humans you created weren't on that level yet.
Also, thinking about how the orb had no shape but was unchanging is deep. I like it. Its like saying one form doesn't make up a person. I also am interested by the way you communicated through feelings and symbols. Since it returned in your later dreams I wonder if there is meaning behind it. Like you wanted something full of life before but now that you don't, it appears. Why? Either way the orb sounds cute and now I want to see one too. However, I don't think it would be transcendental in my case. It'd feel like I came up with a fake copy of it.
Looks like Vader has some ideas about what it is too.: D That's actually cool how he dreamed of something similar.
Reading about this part of not being touched again reminds me of a scene I saw in a animated show. Where a Spirit tiger was attacking two people in separate visions. One person killed the tiger and was sent back out the castle and lost the opportunity to uncover hidden secrets. While the other person wanted to gain knowledge about how to gain life, so she was going to give her own by taking the chance of letting the spirit tiger decide. When it lept it went inside of her and she was transported to a place where she learned the secrets to life was with her all along. I know it was just a show but the message I'm getting from it seems almost similar.:uhm:
Ooo some juicy stuff to catch up on.
I was just working on my Advaita Vedanta thread: https://www.dreamviews.com/beyond-dr...roduction.html
You'll know when I've caught up here when I like your posts. In the meantime, I am positively shattered. :P
Awesome! Your warning sign made me second guess whether I should read it though.>.>"Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
Just for the record:
Quote:
Originally Posted by LighrkVader
It was never an orb, even for a moment.Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
I'm not sure why that matters, but it seemed worth mentioning...
Hahah that's a fair response.Quote:
Awesome! Your warning sign made me second guess whether I should read it though.>.>"
My honest opinion is, it is an incredibly positive thing for anyone to do.
But it wouldn't be right if I didn't give a serious warning about the potential side-effects.
I think I'll expand on the warning a bit, because I didn't really explain the side-effects. The biggest kickers are, you start to see more, and sometimes it's things you never wanted to see in the first place. Toxic relationships are revealed, toxic life habits, the problems in the world. Also you can become really sensitive, so if you're surrounded by negative energy, it will sting like a bitch.
But the beauty of Vedanta is that it gives you the ability to free yourself from any problem, easily. Hence it's my favourite form of spiritual awakening.
EDIT: Warning updated.
My mind chose to identify it with the closest thing it could relate it to. Sorry. I was aware it had no real shape though.^^"Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
.
Just saw this.Quote:
Originally Posted by DawnEye11
Well it is now my understanding that the first time was a transcendental event. But after that, it was nothing new so it was no longer transcendental. I did get mentally stronger each time, but still, the first one was the only one to bring anything new into my experience.
Then when I "woke up" with the use of Vedanta, it was a whole new transcendental event, because I came to directly realize some stuff that was previously beyond my scope of knowledge.
Then after that, leaving my body was no longer transcendental, but I did have a few more transcendental events related to Vedanta in which more truths came into my experience.
Then when I experienced my Vedanta practice within a dream, that was a whole new transcendental event.
I did have a few Vedanta dreams, but only the first one was transcendental.
If that makes any sense?
Also, Sageous, I'd love it if you could confirm my understanding here to be correct?
It seems pretty spot on to me!Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112
And as a sort of aside about your account of how you saw your way through fainting without losing consciousness: Are you familiar with sleep yoga, or the Tibetan Book of the Dead (Bardo Thodal)? If your not, you might want to look into them; you might find them interesting, and also find that you might have a leg up in their practices.
Ah nice one, cheers!Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
I heard about the Tibetan Book of the Dead years ago, and I was immediately interested. I think I read a few pages then put it aside. Which was way before I "woke up", so it was mostly just meaningless words to me at the time. I intend on looking at it again, soon. Maybe tonight, now that you mention it!
And sleep/dream yoga is also next on my list, I've been meaning to look properly into it since returning to DV.
I've literally just given up weed so I've only just regained my ability to lucid dream. It's pretty much time to look at it now!
EDIT: Currently reading the Tibetan Book of the Dead. It's fuckin awesome! I actually understand it now!
EDIT 2: For years I've been weirdly interested in the idea of guiding people through death. A ferryman, of sorts.
I think that thought was first sparked by the Tibetan Book of the Dead. But now that I'm reading and understanding it, I fully see the potential that I'll be able to actually do it in the future.
It looks like the biggest gap in my knowledge, however, is how to fully recognize the symptoms of the stages of death.
While I don't think I've encountered anything on quite that level, that does remind me of a couple of instances in LDs where I suspect I encountered “impossible” imagery that seemed to defy waking-life concepts of spatial geometry, leaving me at a bit of a loss upon waking to try to visualize or understand what I had just seen. For example, here's an excerpt from my dream journal:Quote:
Originally Posted by Sageous
I've also often encountered instances of imagery that I suspected was somehow incomplete, despite my impression that it was nonetheless a “complete” image just like I would perceive from my eyes in waking life, yet being unable to place my finger on the source of the apparent paradox during the LD. I tend to liken it to the way the brain effectively “fills in” the hole in the human retina's blind spot; if one pays close attention, it can be noticed how it creates the impression of having a complete, solid image in that area even though it is in fact obviously incomplete at the same time. It felt like what I saw in the dream was sort of like that, only involving the complete “visual field” in the dream, though I can't remember well enough to say whether it was exactly like that or if this is merely the closest waking-life analog (is “metaphor” the correct word here?) I found.Quote:
At one point[…], I found a room with a row of four [light bulbs]. They were in a row in a bar-shaped fixture kind of like our waking-life bathroom, but they seemed to be hung at an angle right in a corner of the room, with the last lamp almost touching the corner. I looked at the lights for a brief instant and then left the room and continued. Right after that, I realized there was something a little odd about the lights. It seemed like each lamp faced an alternating direction, one left, one right, etc. [presumably meaning the sockets would have to somehow be facing different directions despite being mounted in the same plane of the light fixture] I wondered how that could be geometrically possible, so, curious, I immediately went back to the room to get another look.
Again, the lamps appeared as I had seen them. But then when I started studying them in detail to try to remember the arrangement for when I woke up, I noticed that now they suddenly looked normal, with all lamps facing the same direction, installed in sockets facing the same direction. Suddenly, the magic was gone.
I've also had the many experiences of lucid NREM/REM sleep transitions that I suppose might be considered mildly transcendental, at least the first time I experienced them (assuming I understood everything I read in this thread correctly), such as the fact that there can be a smooth, gradual transition between “mind's eye” imagery and “real” (read: full-blown dream) imagery, despite the fact that even today, despite having experienced it enough times, it's still somewhat difficult for my waking-life self to fathom any mental imagery being anything but 100% either/or, with no in-between being possible at all.
And then there are of course the two or three suspected lucid NREM/delta sleep experiences I've had up to this point which definitely seemed to be quite removed from the realm of everyday waking-life experience, but yet are difficult to remember clearly enough to effectively examine and evaluate after the fact.
Yeah, I get it. Thanks for answering my question. ^w^Quote:
Originally Posted by slash112