Highway to higher awareness

The Royal Road to Consciousness

"There doesn't seem to be anyone about, and those steps are meant to be going somewhere because of that gateway. "

There was some discussion this weekend about the relevance of dreams. Infact it got a little 'over the top' with the claim of 'soul travel', but the free advice offered didn't exactly point the way to dream control, but more towards further speculation on the meaning of our existence. A bit presumptuous, I thought, since we can't really be sure of what we have at present, let alone higher conscious states. Dreams, we agreed, were a road to higher consciousness, even though, for those of us who dream a lot, it may seem like a step back into fantasy and imagination.

It's an awkward, and not very flattering, fact that our awareness in dreams (a sort of involved fantasy in an unfolding spontaneous play) is the same level as our waking life, and its all reduced to a memory. Such is our time here.

To develop our awareness we could seek-out spiritual guides, read books, do meditations, and experience psychic phenomena, or try a little experiment with our own dreams. Hence the notion of a royal, or important, road to discovery. There are a few 'rules', and the picture above to help you, and there is also the continued use of the hexagrams in The TAO I CHING to intuitively or easily guide you through daytime reality without emotion, involvement/reaction, and expectation (the producers of 'fantasy'). That's what all those hexagrams are for, but no one will tell you that because they are too busy producing more theory and practice to keep you busy. There is an interesting 'extension' to dreaming called "Lucid Dreaming". This is a state of hightened awareness while you are in a dream, only you are not dreaming, but awake. There is enough stuff on the web, and books too, about Lucid Dreaming to guide you in this direction, with tips on 'reality testing', daytime 'affirmations', etc. I've added a few notes of my own to the debate in my other blog www.tomleworthy.blogspt.com. The steps below will start off a process that will take you to where you are going, and a little further.

1. Determine to keep a journal of your dreams as the way to increased awareness.

2. As soon as you wakeup write down on loose sheets of paper everything you can remember in the order you remember it. Write it down verbatum, immediately. To delay this aspect, even for five minutes, will ruin the whole exercise. As you write down the episodes or events make a note of the order they occured in your dream (with linking arrows or numbering). You can put all the episodes in the proper order or sequence later. Do not write "I dreamed ...", but write as though these are real events that you experienced (which you did). How many accounts or dreams you record per week is up to you, so you don't have to do this every night, but it helps if you do.

3. At some later time copy your rough notes neatly into a proper journal or notebook, in the order they occured in your dream (but don't worry too much about this if it's a bit of a jumble). Give your dream an interesting title. All of this may seem a little long-winded, but the time you spend writing in your journal goes straight into your 'psyche' (awareness). Leave plenty of space between accounts of dreams (at least half a page) because you may add comments on them later. If you can illustrate an account with a picture, that may have a tenuous link with your dream, this is a bonus. Look for relevent pictures during the day.

4. At the end of each account write down your conclusions, insight, observation, or anything to further discuss the episode, and also where you could take this exercise next. Write something down, even if it's only a mark out of ten. This starts a debate between you and your subconscious (it'll be the only chance you get, until you hit Lucid Dreaming). Periodically read through your journal to see 'where it's going'. You are going to add these notes after you have completed the 'editing' (5,6,7) below.

5. With a felt tip marker pen strike out any emotion out of your account ! We don't want to know how you felt, or what concerned or worried you, or what guilt or elation you had. This is a statement of FACTS. After a week or so you will get used to, and develop a way to, just record these facts and not the whole 'emotional dream experience'.

6. Anything told to you, or said by you (usually indicated by quotation marks in your rough account) is a message for you. A message from your higher self if you like.

7. In your journal account look out for puns and double meanings, or similar sounding words. These are the hidden messages for you. Often unrelated objects appear, but may have similar sounding names to your topic. It is as if your brain doesn't want you to grasp the message consciously, so gives you a similar 'thing' (which, because you have written it all down, will have all the properties, qualities, and insights, you need on the subject). In your journal you will make a note of any of these findings.
THINGS WILL DEVELOP AT A PACE AND THE NATURE OF YOUR DREAMS WILL CHANGE. IT'S A STRANGE ROAD. JUST FOLLOW THE STEPS.

8. And if you get this far, and with your other daily involvements in the world handled by the hexagrams (or your understanding of a quiet way through the world), you will be ready for the quatum leap of awareness into Lucid Dreams. You see, the more 'involved' you are here in your thoughts and emotions, your past, and your future, the less you'll see and appreciate. Your dreams are full of this imaginative involvement (it's called "dreaming"), which is O.K., but it is 'fantasy'. There is a lot more to see here, and on 'the Otherside'. When you get there the rules change considerably, and also affect your daily perception of 'reality'.