I dreamt that I was climbing in the mountains behind my home with my 3 year old son. I make a point to look over the edges of all the cliffs before he came close and to warn him of what was just ahead, guiding him in the immediate sense of the trip and in the long term sense of paying attention to such details.

We came to a large stream bed, with shallow rock waterfalls, diving areas, and a swimming hole off to the side. I was swimming there alone at this point, and was just barely aware of the presence of other people enjoying the waters, when I noticed the most striking presence of all: a black bull approaching the small waterfall break about 25 yards in front of us to dip his head for some water. The water came up only to the ankles of his staunch and agile ebony legs, and his horns were copperish brown fading to white at the base, 4 feet wide point to point, and angled diagonally up and forward so there was no mistake of what they were capable of.

The black bull noticed the commotion that his presence caused and it stirred him to anger, a stirring anger that once turned on never backs down until it is dead or its object of opposition is eliminated. He wailed and sauntered forward off the small 1 yard ledge of the little streambed waterfall, the water now coming up to his shiny black knees, and of course, everyone splits in a dozen different directions, everyone but me.

I picture the bull laughing inside at the reaction to his presence and approaching me slowly now, and curiously, wondering why this little one didn’t run. The image of myself in the water was the 7 year old version of myself (the age that I was molested and nearly drowned: I survived because of the water training that I had and the intervention of a passerby who threatened to call the police).

Myself as this little boy, I was comfortable in the water, like a fish, and I somehow dared the bull to come into my domain in the deeper swimming area, although I was scared as hell. The bull walked up to where my eyes barely came above the surface and lowered his wet nose down close enough to the point that I could feel the blowing of his hot breath pushing me backward in the water slightly. I felt the cool of his nose actually touch my head and I squinted my eyes closed in a recoil that woke me up out of sleep.

My dream started out with my friend and I deciding what video game to play. We popped in some boring game and then he pulled out this hellish, demon-slayer-like game, and popped it in with my enthusiasm.

True to the dream, the game begins and I AM the main character, and he my sidekick. The atmosphere is dark, and red, and he shows me how to descend this stair case jumping and flipping about as nimbly as any video game hero.

We enter a pitch black stair case that u-turns into a different hallway and I pause briefly to notice this red and black stained glass circular relief of a face laying on the stair shaft above my eyeline, because it just barely glimmered in a warm light from cracks in the wall from the next room.

My hesitation caused me to fall behind my nimble friend ( I was feeling less and less like a video game hero now ) and I was afraid to go through the next door on my own, so I hurried to catch up to him.

Beyond this next door was a strange sight: a cathedral-like setting all encased in candle and chandelier lit ivory. I explored effectively alone. The nimble friend was gone. I noticed no threats until I noticed the middle of the sanctuary there was an old old man-like thing. His face was pale, ghostly pale, and wrinkled more than a normal person’s would be. His white hair was long, almost down to his shoulders, but straggly. His countenance reminded me of the shadow of a long past Amish man, and in the center of that empty cathedral he stood on a circular raised area surrounded by all manner of catholic symbols equally as ancient as he.

My gaming mind returned and it occurred to me that this might the first enemy to pummel, so I did. I thrashed into him, but soon realized – first that my hands were in fact my only weapons bludgeoning him thusly so – and second that he wasn’t fighting back.

The man’s response to my attack: “I’m sorry but they told me it was alright to come and stay down here. I’ll leave now.”

I was taken aback, “Well you are awfully polite for a ghoul.”

I followed him into the next room, which was most like the pedestrian transit areas of a large train or airport station. He spoke briefly to a HUGE giant of a black woman behind the window. She was gorgeous in a mature, motherly sort of way.

Then the old man went and sat down on a bench across the thoroughfare, blending into the wall as far as the passerbys were concerned.

I went and talked to him. He explained to me his plight: “I was supposed to inherit and retire with $500,000, but my grandparents took it away from me, and wouldn’t let me have it. Now I have nowhere to go. I hope they let me stay here a while.”

I felt pity for the man and got up to go talk to the lady myself. Her energy was very kind yet very strict in a sense. I wanted to be near her, mainly to report and receive guidance, like she was the BOSS running this place, and I didn’t want to get on her bad side at all.

I approached her very respectfully and expressed a deep and sincere gratitude for the place that I am in in my life. She nodded silently in acceptance of my thanks, and said simply, “It is time to go back now.”

And that is the last I remember before waking.

I was walking along the beach on an island. Walking for miles and miles with a friend and I perceived that we were planning on circling the island by foot. Then I noticed some dogs. One at first, then another and another, they were huskies, all spaced about 100 yards apart. I couldn’t decide if they were a pack or not, but were twelve or so altogether. As the first of them approached, I decided I would turn my fear into my knowledge of wolf psychology, and I approached the first dog, looked her square in the eye, and then turned and ran the other way (the way they were going). The dog pack ran with me, the newest member of their group in their minds.

When I reached my destination on the other side of the island, I collapsed, and woke up in the hospital. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a really suncooked kid. One of the doctors commented on helping these “yellow people”.

The yellow people comment was more about our race than our condition. We were Caucasian, but to these islanders and their doctor, we were yellow, and we were dumb for getting sunstroke.

I felt a bit better for being in the hospital, and got to know some of the other patients. There were these two black guys who I recognize as some of my neighbors. They were both conscious but hooked up to a bunch of ICU type of equipment. The guy with dreads, after talking to us for a minute, decided he was going to unhook himself and proceeded to do so, because he was so desperate to get out of being hooked up and immobile. He decided to go ahead and just accept the consequences of death, etc. Just as he unhooked, a nurse walked up and said he could be free of the IV and other lines if he got a couple of shots.

The syringe was deeply orange, like the medicine was fluorescent orange paint. The first injection was directly in the man’s heart. boom. Right through the intercostal muscles of the ribcage. The patient’s face was stunned but he was still standing. The second injection was in the middle of the forehead. boom. Don’t ask me how it got in there. Then I woke up.

I dreamt the other night that I was in india, watching a procession, a parade of sorts, curve along the embankment of a low rolling hill with a rocky peak.

I was standing on one of these peaks and as the parade neared me, what my attention was drawn to was the cart, or float, of a magician.  This magician was tall, with bluish hairless skin.  He was completely bald and had 2 or 3 folds of extra skin on his neck supporting his shiny bluish skullcap.  He wore a long black robe.  This magician had a mirror on his cart that was almost as tall as he was, and he also had these two long, plain-looking, 2×4 like boards that were hollow inside, or at least light enough to lift easily, and they made a hollow clapping sound when he rubbed them together.

This magician put the hollow boards together, repeatedly as was his main trick, and when he pulled them apart, a majestic sword would appear from between them, which he would sell to the crowd for coins and praise of fame.

Impressed, I acquired one of the magician’s swords and went home immediately to brandish my new weapon in the mirror, enjoying the strength and love of my former weapon of choice.

As I watched myself cut and slice the air with my new sword in the mirror, suddenly, my reflection became not my own anymore.  The image in the mirror melted into a watery canopy from which a spirit appeared, moaning and crying like a baby.  “Please please please can I have my sword back??  That magician stole it from me!!!”  Over and over again, the pleas of this spirit with the long face masked by watery essences, rang in my ears and in my heart until I realized the truth and sincerity of his words.

I realized that it in this rare case, it was not the spirit that needed admonishing and guidance, but rather compassion, and my thoughts of admonition turned to the shadowy wizard.  I stepped toward my mirror and dipped the edge of my sword into its watery surface, which rippled like a pebble had been dropped into a pond.  The spirit gently guided the sword back into his realm, and holding its grip once again, cried in gratitude and thanksgiving for retrieving his lost love again.

This dream occurred two and a half years ago now and is still one of the most powerful dreams I’ve ever had. Dreams of this caliber are like maps that lay out the future in symbolic terms and this map lasted a very long time. I celebrate, with gratitude and humility, the love of the divine that has been communed with in this sacred and ancient ritual.

So my dream starts out at a bowling alley.  I am bowling with the most interesting people I have ever met.  Everything is in full color and I feel quite lucid in terms of my decision making abilities.  These people all have the most colorful clothes, stylish hair, and the women, one in particular, just has this striking silver glitter all over her.

Inside I am self-conscious because I never was a good bowler (the last time I bowled in RL I was so happy just to score over 100 and afterwards realized I had thrown my shoulder out.)

As I experience this emotion and memory, a charming and helpful man responds to my emotional state in my dream by handing me this really cool bowling ball wherein there isn’t just three holes to plop your fingers into, the hole is large more like a glove, and the slot for the thumb is as wide as it is long so the thumb can really slide around in there and get some good spins on release.  I was golden from then on.

This enigmatic man, the attractive siver woman, and I then go and play a video game.  She takes the right side of the controls, he the left, and they start to play a ritualistic game that then sucks me into another realm.  His end of the screen is brown and dirtlike, the scenery mostly underground, her end of the screen is bright and heavenly.  I fall into an oblivion and am transported into another realm governed by these two forces.

I ‘wake up’ again in dreamtime and am with the man, only now he is very different.  He looks kind of like the freddy kreuger character played by robert englund, but much more dirty and earthlike.  He is wearing tattered black polyester clothes that is torn to shreds and barely hanging on his perverse earthen scarred body and a polyester black top hat.  When he speaks to me his voice is deep and hypnotic, and I am afraid in his presence as though I have come under the control of his spell…

Yet I cannot resist turning my head and listening to him when he speaks.  The sound of his voice is so resonant.

I wake up from one bout of his spell and regain control of my body.

I am standing on an earthen cavern lit by the moon and gently rising sun.  In front of me is the mouth of the largest and deepest network of caves I probably will ever encounter and am resisting every possible urge to go down there with this one who in the dream I had identified as a demon or devil but in waking consciousness I identify as a mid-ranked being of the mineral kingdoms.

The mineral king is extremely persuasive and wants me to come down to his cave network to help him with something.  Of course he promises that I will be done and out again quickly, yet intuitively I know that if I allow myself beyond a certain threshold that I have to give up something of my self and I may never return again, at least not as a human (I may at best sprout up through the earth again as a carrot or something)!

At a certain gate (like the myth of Inanna in sumerian mythology) my fears are soberingly confirmed:  I cannot pass the gatekeeper without voluntarily discarding something of my self.

My power crystal, my dreaming power objects, and other power objects on my body glimmer at this gate and in order for me to follow the mineral king beyond I have to voluntarily give up something.  This of course wakes me up from his hypnotic vocal control of my will yet again and I manage to turn around and walk back up to level ground.

After a few minutes he realizes that I didn’t cross the threshold with him and he confronts me at ground level again.  He is angry now, and I realize that I need help to overcome his power.

I call an animal to be with me, but the only one who responds to help at first is a little dog, like toto or something from the wizard of oz.  Great, I think to myself when the little dog arrives, how is this little squirt going to help me with the mineral king.

At ground level, in the light of the rising sun, a confrontation ensues, and I sense the gathering presence of other beings to aide me even though their influence is not strong enough yet to directly focus an intervention.

The mineral king is shouting:  “You promised that you’d help me with this project!”  I respond by yelling back at him, “Let my dog help you instead!”  I throw the dog to the man and POOF! every ounce of living dog tissue evaporates in his arms and all that is left is a sticky, plastic like, slimy glue-like web of hide streching from his sticky bewildered fingers.  My fears of never returning from the mineral world are again confirmed by this horrid sight.

I fall into a trance again, then wake up in the middle of the corridor near the first gate again, getting tired and angry at losing control of myself so often.

I make a last desperate please for help from the animal world and this time my call is answered by a formidable creature, one that I truly have never seen before.  It had legs and a spotted body like a giraffe, but it had three heads with catlike features that hissed and spat at the mineral king.  Its aura shone golden down the dark corridor.

I was proud and encouraged and looked back to see the response of the mineral king who in turn responded by changing into another form, some kind of shabby looking elephant to match the size of the three headed cat but he was clearly intimidated and outmatched (reflecting now I realize how appropriate the need for a three-headed creature was to overcome the hypnotic abilities of this mineral king)

Then, to seal the balance of power here in my favor, the silver lady arrives, in a glow and countenance that so greatly exceeded that of the silver glittery woman I was attracted to at the bowling alley.

I want to cry inside as I describe her presence to me at that moment and how much she means to me. On her head was a silvery helm-like head piece tiara that was made of jewel beads. Her neck was adorned with blue precious stones and she rode on a white beast that was so radiant that I could not even perceive its form, only the white velvet back and deep leather saddle upon which she arched her perfect posture.

In her presence I was released from the ritual space, I rode with her on her beast and fought to resist waking up into the confines of my bedroom many times, as I even now long for her presence in my field of awareness.

The other night I had an intense one…

I was hanging out with this guy, kind of the letterman jock testosterone archetype. He was driven and strong and unstoppable, and I thought he was pretty cool, though I guess I didn’t know him that well…

The next thing I know, there is this girl picking up on him. She’s flirting and smiling and on and on. So he says, let’s go on a trip, and opens a waiting yellow school bus climbing into the captains seat.

This young hottie is elated and before she climbs aboard this jock says, “Hey, Oren, bring me the cooler and my knife, this dial is stuck.” I bring him what he asks without a thought or at least just focusing on where on earth are we going for a trip for him and this girl.

Then she boards the bus and is stabbed to death by the man. My mind kind of rubberized the image as though he were mauling a rubber chicked suited mascot shaped like the girl, but the symbolism, the emotions, the shock were all there.

I screamed and ran away to the hills where I was doing research on animal pancreatic hormones. I got to my facility and there were two small white boxes of hormone supplies. They looked like from a different world then the chaos I stepped into.

Just then my former friend pulls up in his pickup. I tried to hide from him but it was too late. He pinned me in my driveway with his truck and I ran in front of his bumper, knowing that he could easily run me over at that moment which he didn’t.

I booked. I ran and my eye caught a nearby payphone.

I tried to call 911 but he was coming too close so I ran again until I reached an apartment building and randomly jumped into a window spiderman style. An old man within was shocked but I explained that I needed to call 911.

Then it hit me. I needed to turn myself in as the only way I’d be safe. Technically I was an accomplice to murder and would be thoroughly interogatted but it was the only way.

I had to turn myself in.

I had to turn myself in.

——————————————————

Update on August 1st 2005

What am I turning myself in to…

perhaps the hospital? We just returned home yesterday.

Checking in…

In waking life the energy of this dream manifested as a 102 degree fever in my 5 week old son Josiah.

We monitored him at home on this day then the next morning the fever broke but we still called the pediatrician who promptly admitted us to the hospital for a 48hour vacation of septic screening.

It was a difficult two days of turning myself in and negotiating with medical staff. I was adamant that no antibiotics be given until the test results were read. They were all negative, thank goodness, so we made out without too much intervention.

Interesting to now have come out from turning myself in and relive this dream on this precious group.

A Golden Light Lands on the Earth

Just after I found out that Steph was pregnant, I dreamt that a giant ball of light a meter wide flew in from the window and planted itself into her womb.

Long Walk on a Short Pier

About 3 months before the birth I dreamt that and I were walking a plank into beautiful shoulder-deep ocean water. She jumped in unexpectedly and I watched her swim to shore. I was afraid and had to work through that fear. In follow ups to this dream I became a bird and flew over her shoulder as she swam to shore. I wasn’t able to go with her into labor, and of course our experiences would be different.

The Space Navy

In the weeks just before the birth, I had so many dreams about the baby. I dreamt that he was a grown man, an astronaut, and I was also one. He was outside of the spaceship hooked to a life line (umbilical chord), I was holding the line and guiding him around the ship. Then someone radioed him and said he had to return to earth immediately as he was fired from the space navy. I consoled him that he did nothing wrong but now had a new mission to fulfill.

This dream reveals much to me about Josiah’s “life before life.”  As I came out of the dream the message from my higher self was, “His destiny would be revealed through the disciplined path of Martial Arts.”

Turtle Totem

Just before the birth I dreamt that three turtles were stacked on top of each other, shaped almost squarelike and ascending like a pagoda in the rocks. They were hidden camoflauged until one moved and then the three slipped apart, descending into a shallow marsh. The baby turtle swam for the protective reeds, on its own as a brand new being in the world.

On the way home from the birth, a real life turtle was crossing our driveway.  With Josiah coming home for the first time, we had to stop and wait for a turtle to cross in front of the car.  It was a clear sign on multiple levels

Josiah, Just Josiah

We were quite perplexed about what to name the baby until a couple of days after the birth when we finally decided. A few days before the birth, a young man’s face came to me so clearly in dreamtime, peaceful, radiant, wise, “Josiah. Just call me Josiah.” The feeling behind this message was something like, “It’s simply Josiah, there’s no need to even think about it. It’s simple. It’s just Josiah.”

SNS-Ville

A week after the birth, I had this weird nightmarish type dream about IVs. The dream started out in a courtroom and this attractive female lawyer was shouting at the judge, “There is no law that says a woman in labor must have an IV in court.” Then Stephanie pulls out this crazy IV from her body herself and someone says, “She’s hyperventilating.” Then Stephanie pulls a similar IV out of the baby and he sits up himself from a supine position, except that I see the silhouette of his head through an opaque screen.  After this last dream it became apparent that we needed help with breastfeeding. One of the remedies that we recently ended up trying was this mechanism called an SNS, which allows the baby to get supplemental formula while still stimulating the mammary glands to make milk. The apparatus looks and acts like an IV that is delivered orally.

I dreamt recently that I was swimming in a large pool with two dolphins and a killer whale.

The dolphins pretty much kept to themselves, but the killer whale kept nudging me as she swam by, so I grabbed on to her tail.

I held onto her tail as she swam. She let the tail so I could breathe, then took me under as she gracefully pushed her way in the water. This was so perfect.

I had such a feeling of happiness just being in the moment of this precious experience and reliving it still…

My dream last night seemed to be answering the question: What would life be like if I totally surrendered my self to God?

The feeling I had inside me throughout the events of the dream was a sense of inner knowingness that ruled my outer experience. (rather than the ordinary experience of circumstance determining if I had a good day, etc.)

A knowingness was all pervasive in my thoughts that I knew who I was and thus I knew who you are. The collective “you” in others, the divinity of humanity. I first spent my time on a college campus, CSUN, and just rode everyday to the campus center to watch and listen to people and finally to talk to them but hardly anyone understood me. But my life was still dedicated to this knowingness so it didn’t matter. Faith was my family, my career, I had no other obligations.

Then I found myself at a lecture by Deepak Chopra. He talked about many things including the ancient land of lemuria and how everyone has an innate power to heal themselves and others. I stayed until everyone left and somehow was able to speak to Deepak one to one.

I spoke to him to ask him if I could offer him “divine light” for ten minutes and if I could come to stay at his spiritual community in San Diego for a while. While I spoke to him a light like the sun shone from behind me and Deepak gazed into it and cried like a baby. He said: “usually at my lectures, people are so moved, that they cry. It is such a huge responsibility on me to have that kind of influence over people. Today’s lecture was so different. Now I am the one crying.”

I dreamt that Josiah’s Mother, Stephanie, and I were first talking to an extremely sweet woman whose voice embodied a feeling of sincere compassion and love.

Then the dream shifted as Stephanie and I walked outside the building we were in to a pier-like bridge stone bridge over the ocean that was made of stone.

This bridge was over the ocean and ran parallel to shore.

I was following Stephanie across the bridge and feeling very out of place and scared.

Then the bridge ended in front of Stephanie and she stopped but I didn’t see the end. Stephanie decided to jump into the ocean and swim to shore. I was getting very scared now. I tried to follow her but I couldn’t jump from the spot where she jumped from. The water where she jumped in was beautifully blue and calm and she easily swam to shore.

Distraught, I didn’t know what to do up on the bridge. I walked back towards the building but was losing sight of Steph so I jumped in the water finally as well, but the ocean for me was muddy, choppy, and difficult to swim through. Somehow I made it to shore and woke up.

Stephanie has less than two months left of her pregnancy with our first child. She thinks perhaps this dream relates to my feelings anticipating the birth–that she jumps into it fully but I can’t go with her. All I can do is my best to stay close to her and try to support her through it.