[As an introduction to this, have a look at Chris's series of dreams posted below. They are all connected, so you'll need to start reading at the bottom and work your way up to the 'Baby, baby' post below this one. It's a wonderful example of how a dreamer understands a dream, makes an adjustment in life accordingly, then has a dream to reflect the next stage ... and so on until the process is completed.]
In Chris's last dream (Baby, baby) posted while I, in Australia, slept, Chris met a baby with eyes that could see the past, the present and the future.
This made me smile because in one of my dreams last night I did the opposite trick:
I was myself, visiting people a few decades ago. I was mindful of not letting on that I was from the future, taking care not to mention computers, for example, and taking care to do things they way they did them, even though these old ways seemed clumsy and inefficient at times.
In the dream I was walking along talking to a young man. Suddenly I had an overwhelming urge to tell the truth. Would he be able to handle it? "I'm going to tell you something that will blow you away!", I said. He looked worried. "I'm from the year 2,000." (Not 2,001 ..?)
It was a fun dream and a fun revelation.
Of course it was about me, recognising that in some areas of my life I relate according to old ways which may be clumsy and inefficient. It's a wake-up call to be aware of situations in which I might take care to go along with things the 'way they've always been done' instead of doing things differently. Though I believe I'm pretty good at breaking out of the box and finding new ways and solutions, there are always plenty more boxes!
In many dreams we all 'time travel', visiting places we used to live, going back to school, revisiting the past, projecting ahead into the future by dreaming about tomorrow's work or some big event coming up. (Plus precognitive dreaming too.)
However, I think one of the most stunning 'time travel' dreams I've ever had was the following, dreamed about ten years ago:
I dreamed I was back in Africa (I once lived in Nigeria). I was walking along the path when I met my younger self (as I was then, aged mid-twenties) walking towards me! It was incredible as even in the dream I realised that I was meeting myself... that there was a bridging of time.
Has anyone got similar experiences to share here?
As Belinda posted somewhere earlier in reply to Chris,
May the Force be with you ..
;)
Jane Anderson
Lara
16:43 20/01/2001
Did you converse or make contact with yourself in the dream Jane?
Jane Anderson
11:58 21/01/2001
Hi Lara,
I've spent some time this morning looking through my dream journals for that dream to check the details.
I have 43 A5 sized journals to date each with an index of dream titles at the back. I had a vague idea of the year, but couldn't find the dream in the journals I looked through. Maybe the title I gave it was misleading. There's a strong case for having all one's dreams on computer with a personal search engine to keyword search .... (Imagine setting that up!)
From memory, I talked telepathically to my younger self, giving some line of encouragement. Although the younger self was me, I'm pretty sure I experienced the whole dream as the older me. (The older me was the age I was when I had the dream.) I seem to recall the feeling of the dream as one of looking back and knowing, with hindsight, that even when times seem tough (as they certainly were when living in Africa), the path has meaning and direction. I seem to remember then projecting the same feeling forward.
Looking back now, I'd say there are always choices as to which path to travel and how to travel it, but that I feel, in the end, all paths lead to the same place - a place of enlightenment (aka Rome?). It's just that some paths are longer and more winding than others .... and sometimes the quick straight road would seem to be the most attractive ... yet it is the gathering of experiences, the smelling of the roses and the extraction of the thorns that teaches ....and which road best provides that?
Waylaid on my path, just as I was when I started to look though my old dream journals ...finding long lost, way-forgotten dreams ..and so making contact with my past self in yet another way ..
Jane Anderson
(Wandering off into the distance, chatting to myself ..)
Lara
16:13 22/01/2001
Is that wandering forward, or back? And chatting to which self?
I assume you were not recording dreams in such detail at the time when you were physically in Africa? How amazing if you had had a dream about your older self at the time.
Your suggestion about the winding road is timely for me, given my indecision about career paths at the moment. Realisation of the necessity to smell the roses is an important lesson to learn in this age of fast moving traffic. As you say, the sign post that reads 'short road to enlightenment' is a mirage.
I love this idea of keeping a database of dreams. I use a package called 'Endnote' to compile my thesis research and bibliography. It allows you to add in each new set of research notes and then search back through them by date, title or keyword. Transcribing stuff from your written notes would be the hard part though! Apart from the process of typing it all in, what an emotional journey of reflection it would be to reread all those dreams in one hit.
Shalie21
08:49 23/01/2001
I had a dream once where I had gone back to the fourth grade. It was actually a pretty funny dream with lots of puns in it, like in the beginning when I was supposed to catch the bus for school, but it started sliding down the hill, so I litterally had to "catch" the bus lol. But I can't put it all here because I have to find it again to remember exactly what happened in it. There was a lot of sliding going on in it though. But the thing that reminded me of it, is when Jane talked about her dream that showed her the how she was still doing some of the old ways that were not as efficient as the new ways.
In my dream I came to the realization that I didn't belong in the 4th grade. I said to myself in the dream, "Why am I going through the fourth grade? I'm in college. I've already done this. Why am I here?"
I also had a dream in which I met myself. Again I'd have to go back and read the dream to get the details. But I think that I had gone back in time and ended up in a place where they were having some sort of race. I joined the race and had to tight rope walk across a cave opening. Later, after the race, I was talking to a bunch of girls and we looked and saw a bunch of horses coming towards us. Then somebody said, "Oh look, Sarah's coming." I tried to run the other direction because I had heard that if you meet yourself in the past, it could be detrimental perhaps even sap your strength. But somehow I was forced to meet myself. I guess my other self in the dream was about the age of 9 or 10. My other self, another girl, and I began talking. And I wondered, Is this how other people see me? I was a bit critical of my other self, but I did not say anything to her about it.
It was an interesting dream.
Jane Anderson
10:01 23/01/2001
Hi Lara and Shalie21,
("Catching the bus", Shalie21: another lol classic - thank you.)
Shalie21:
I hadn't heard the one about running in the other direction if you meet yourself in a dream. The classic escape from the self I guess.
Lara:
No, I wasn't recording my dreams when I lived in Africa, but I wonder - just suppose I did dream then that I met my older self on the path - would I have recognised my older self? Like everyone else, I look in the mirror and see only myself, not noticing the changes over the years, but really we look quite different from one decade to the next. In meeting an older self (supposing still this was possible), would I think the older self was a relative, a look-alike aunt, or just a comfortably familiar dream stranger perhaps?
And on roses - perhaps living my own metaphor, I'm sitting here wearing a dress patterned in huge pink and red rose blossoms and I have an oil burner on the desk with rose essence wafting towards me. Ahhhhhhh....
Jane Anderson
Chris
23:34 24/01/2001
Meeting oneself?????.....I recall many discussions with a good freind of mine when we were both in our teens regarding this possability.....both in dreams and real life. The discussions were facinating and led to many other meaning of life questions....but I recall that what prompted the discussions was a dream where I met myself when I was a baby........I snuck into the room where I was laying in a crib and quicky looked over and watched myself sleeping....... It was the strangest feeling....It made me feel very safe for some reason. With respect o meeting an older me.......I had a dream once where I was outside a house and I knew that the person in the house was mer.....only, I was in the future. I didn't enter or even look in the window....I just watched tohe house from the distance ........Indeed what would happen if you met your older self......I can't wait to know the answer to this......Keep the posts coming Chris
Shalie21
08:17 27/01/2001
Isn't this interesting. Just right after reading the posts and posting on this thread, my mom and i went to the video store to pick out some videos (We always pick out a bunch of videos and they tend to all be related with a similar theme even though we don't plan it that way). Any way my mom picks out the movie called "The Kid" with Bruce Willis in it. In this movie, Bruce Willis meets himself at 8 years old and has to travel back in time to figure out why his 8-year-old self is there with him. I just thought it was interesting that we would pick that video at that exact moment in time.
