Tag: #dreamyoga

Being Watched and Residual Fate

~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

We have two feral cats who live on the compound, Felix who is black and white as you might expect and Gandalf who is grey and now white after the battle with the Balrog. Gandalf is a young, neutered female who is full of beans and Felix is an old warhorse who got her up the duff not long after she arrived here. I captured her and took her to the vets and the local charity paid for her operation for her to be released back here.  

When the wife was recovering from surgery for her breast cancer recently, I fed them both. Gandalf in particular equates me with food. So, I am under constant surveillance wherever I go in the garden. Having a patch of white fur is poor camouflage. Cats think they are clever. I can often feel it when Gandalf is observing me from some random place of hiding / vantage point in our 2 acres. I know. When I turn and look directly at her from say 50 metres, she has on occasion looked surprised and even startled. I have seen her flinch.

I have a kind of sixth sense, which may or may not be reliable.

Of late I have felt some kind of human observation, especially when I am down near the river. It is the wrong time for day for the Korrigans {fairy like beings often associated with water}. The feeling is always of a male, masculine. It has happened a few times in the last few days. But when I have turned to look there has been nobody there that I can see. The line of sight through the gap in the hedge points at a treeline on the hill. It is possible, though unlikely, that someone is watching. What are the crazy Brits up to now? The other day a helicopter flew over our property, stopped directly above, then turned around and headed south. This happened twice in a few minutes. If anybody is watching it must be bloody boring for them. I might set up some trail-cams.

Weird…

Today I have been mulling over if there is any residual fate left for me. The current hypothesis is that I will quietly eke out my days and experience my possibly karmic bad health slowly worsening. I don’t see much left for me to do. I am largely apart from the world. There are cancer and myeloma follow ups for the wife in the next few weeks which include another PET scan. That will advise.

The world is perhaps braced for whatever lunacy might ride forth from Tango man in DC. Maybe he will decree that all Americans must wear tin foil hats on their heads. You might be able to get a special MAGA cap lined with tin foil.

My dreams have pointed at using Tibetan dice for divination. I have made two prototypes from Walnut root. The root is too wet. The ones I made were not fair. It was easy to see that some numbers came up more frequently than others. They were “bent” dice. I have a method of production and nice piece of apple wood for the next iteration.

On the warrior’s path anything is possible. The universe has a bag full of spanners and a playbook full of curve balls. So, you never know for sure. Likelihood is a quiet fade-out to clog popping time.

Fizzling out like a dying sparkler seems quite natural and non-dramatic.

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Sent la pluie comme un été Anglais

Entends les notes d’une chanson lointaine

Sortant de derrière d’un poster

Espérant que la vie ne fut aussi longue

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Electric Blue Heron – Magic – Dream 11-11-2024

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Here is this morning’s dream had after 4.26 AM.

I am in our garden at the corner of the pond closest to the bridge over the river.  Stood on the bank of the pond looking into the pond is a heron.  Our regular visitor often stands here. This however is no ordinary heron. It is a vibrant electric iridescent deep blue. Its plumage is long so that it has a bushy look. I can discern individual feathers which sparkle in the light. I walk toward the heron and it turns to look at me. It does not fly off.

I walk towards the heron and it stays still. I sit down on the bank of the pond. The heron then walks slowly towards me and sits down in my lap as it might a nest. It nuzzles up to me and we start to merge. I incorporate the heron into my being. The blue heron.

I am writing on a clear white postcard with no image on to my brother in law. As I write to tell him about the blue heron the ink vanishes into the paper. I put his name and address in the appropriate place. That ink disappears. I go outside into a UK street and post it in a traditional red round post box knowing that despite the invisibility of the ink it will get there.

I am now at an airport terminal. The woman at the ticket desk reminds me of a New Zealand past colleague of mine P. The ticket desk is very much like an old style railway ticket desk with a movable device for putting money one side and the tickets the other. She ask me what meal I would like on the plane. I say that I would like sandwiches. She asks what filling I say chicken. She says that because of the price of chicken I might have to pay in flight.

She places the ticket in the device and rotates it. The ticket is made out in the name of blue heron and is old style with multiple layers of carbon paper. I board the plane.

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I sit on one side of the aisle. I have a window seat as there is only one seat. To my left are two people sat in modern airplane seats with TV displays. They have their trays down and their lap top computers out. There is a sense they are scientists and techie.

The dream ends.

Heron is a bird of prey, therefore a dreaming symbol of power.

The electric blue is perhaps blue a symbol of humility and understanding.

The Heron is a patience hunter as totem it is about individuality. 

Air travel is awareness with respect to rational ideas and concepts.

The incorporation of the heron feels magical / shamanic – power {the will of the universe} a form of transformation.

There is a sense of old and new butting up against each other.

Inquiry – Inquest – Pow-wow Dream 10-11-2024

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Last night after watching some rugby highlights on YouTube, MasterChef, a bit of the France V Japan game and Strictly Come Dancing we went to bed.

I awoke around 3 AM and then had a relatively short dream in which I was the subject of an inquiry some kind of inquest into what happened and then a knowing and observation that there was/is some kind of ongoing meeting or pow-wow about the findings. Metaphorically the jungle drums are rolling. I had images of several of the people in this inquiry some of whom were known to me ~ two decades ago. There were others who are “famous” or in the public eye.

The contrast between this “dream” and our nighttime entertainment is marked. In no way was I ruminating about this nor have I much. But the dream has brought it to my attention {again}. It is not the first time that I have had dreams about people making inquiries about me.

Nobody {with one exception} has any current knowledge about what I am like, how I behave or how I think. There is nobody I could ask, realistically, to be a referee. Literally nobody has any current knowledge about my abilities and orientation.

If a gang of people gather together to talk about someone when that person is not present is that

  1. Sensible planning and considered responsible behaviour?
  2. A form of conspiracy bordering on bullying?
  3. Rude?
  4. A comforting but relatively pointless exercise? {Look we are doing something about it we are holding an inquiry. We can publish the findings and the matter will be sealed.}

I have pointed out {previously and elsewhere} that I have never appointed nor will I ever appoint a spokesperson or Porte-parole. Anybody claiming to speak on my behalf is therefore a charlatan.

If anyone wants to know what I am thinking, what I want, how I am feeling etc., the answer is obvious. Don’t speculate, guess, suppose or otherwise chew things over.

Ask.

Science and Divination

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My book on Mo the Tibetan System of Divination by the polymath Jamgon Mipham arrived last night and I have had a quick scan through. Like many things Tibetan when something has negative aspect they don’t hold back.

“The Demon of Death – If RA PA – the demon of death – appears, then the symbol is destruction.”

I’ll speculate that if you were to ask most physical scientists if there is any merit in divination techniques, they might say it is a bit of fun but there is no reality to the predictions, divination is a superstition

I have published in Physical Review Letters, Chemical Physics and Faraday Transactions. This is evidence that at least at one time I was able to “do” modern science at a fair level.

In the early nineties I was in a bookshop in Tring and this copy of the I Ching literally fell off the shelf and onto the floor by my feet.

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You could argue that this was purely coincidental or that the universe was telling me something. One could say that the I Ching wanted me, was seeking me out. I have consulted on an off for three decades. I have done consultations for myself and for others. In some cases, people’s faces have gone white with the “accuracy” of how the oracle fits life circumstance. Some of these were scientists! In the late nineties I went on my first “New Age” course with Jay Ramsay a co-author of “I Ching the Shamanic Oracle of Change”. People on the course were suspicious of me because I was a “scientist” from a hardcore science and technology university.

What is safe to say is that a consultation nearly always opens up a new approach, or a new way of thinking about a situation, dilemma or problem. It adds a perspective.

In some cases when approached with the right attitude the fit of the advice to circumstance is uncanny. If you are a dick with the oracle, it can tell you so. Of course, this perceived fit could be my confirmation bias. I am not a premature conclusion sort of person and tend to keep an open mind. I have allowed consultations to alter my actions and orientation. Just like I do with dreams.

There are many that might consider this mumbo-jumbo.

I attended a foundation course in North American Indian shamanism. As a part of that we looked a Scandinavian Runic Shamanism. I carved my own set of runes out of slate. I was accustomed to wear runes around my neck on a cord. I gave lectures on physical chemistry wearing my home made runes. There is a divination system based on runes in which one blind selects the appropriate rune from a bag to advise on a question. The selected rune is compared to a guide book and the intuition invoked to answer the query.

Astrology does not light my candle.

But I do like Tarot and Numerology. I am not drawn to typical Tarot spreads, preferring only to use the major arcana.

Maybe I should go on “Fesshole” and confess to doing Tarot whilst at Imperial College…

In my Tibetan Dice dream I throw One One or Dhi Dhi

“A little later I see two dice. I see that they are carved out of a deep root of a tree and shaped and polished. It is a long process and a labour of love. These are my Tibetan dice. They are perfect cubes with sharp edges and corners. I hold them in my hand and throw the dice, and I see two faces each with a singular dark blue dot. I have thrown two. They are made of root and Tibetan. The workmanship is exquisite. I know the meaning of two and its significance.“

“The Jewelled Banner of Victory

If DHI DHI – the hoisted banner of victory – appears, then you are victorious and excel, like the raising of the banner of victors over every direction.  You are able to accomplish whatever activity you wish to do.”

DHI DHI is increasing and DHI transcendental wisdom, multi-coloured, mind and thoughts.

To dream an auspicious oracle is probably auspicious.

Up in the orchard there is a fallen Walnut tree, taken out by Tempest Ciaran on the first of November last year, the morning I had the dream. Some of the roots are exposed. I could fashion for myself two dice out of the root. Walnut is a very decorative wood.

I have been wondering what to do about the roots of late…

Until I have made the dice, I won’t consult the Mo.

The dream has pointed me at another method to explore…..

And Now the Darkness Spreads

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The politics of division and separation seem to have won in the USA. This means that for four more years it will be difficult to avoid the sound of Trump’s voice. To my ears his voice and tone is unpleasant.  I had enjoyed the relative respite. That is probably not the worst of it.

At around 5:30 AM this morning I had a dream / vision in which the visual field was slowly filling with very dark ink like substance. What light there was became mostly extinguished. And I knew that the darkness was spreading. The effect was like dropping black ink into water.

If he can remember and act on his rhetoric we are in for a sad time, a dangerous time. Nobody, no Western leader, is speaking out meaningfully about the barbarism in the Middle East, to do so is taboo. The political right will feel emboldened. Already the Trump sycophant-fans and mini-me are hailing the victory. Europe is bracing itself for tariffs. China probably does not care. How will Trump manage rocket man now he is cosying up to Putin? Is he jealous?

People do not understand that he has already lost his battle with power. He is spouting very nasty and evil thoughts. If he indeed pardons the mob, it will set a very dangerous precedent. He is in no way a “light” being.

It is difficult to predict how more power will twist and further drive him into the darkness, the unpleasantness. The next four years could be very retrograde. A climate change denier in charge of the USA will not help planetary warming one bit.

It looks like humanity is heading further down the shitter. The odds of a war against Iran have just shortened.

It feels heavy this morning…

Haircut – Script Dream 04-11-2024

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Here are this morning’s dreams. I have put them together as one because although there was a gap there seems a connection.

I am in a hairdressers where people are speaking in French. It is pretty busy. It is my turn and I approach a barber’s chair. A young woman with dark hair approaches and puts a cover all around my neck and over my shoulders. She asks what I want done. In a mixture of French and English I explain that I would like a short back and sides and a scissor cut on top. I say that I used to have #2 clippers in the UK which translates to 6mm here. {Factual account}.

She starts cutting the hair on my right hand side of the head. She shows me some long grey hairs that she has cut off. She comments that they are in very poor condition. She asks if I use conditioner. No.

I know that I only have a single £10 note in my wallet. She says that she could wash and condition my hair. It would cost €17. I say that I could go out into the central square in Guingamp to withdraw money. She says that it would be free this time.

She continues to do my hair and notices a flaky patch of skin with some kind of small growth. She says that she could sort it out. It would take 210 sessions at €17.

There is a pause in the dream. She and her husband are now partially dressed. She is wearing jogging bottoms a small black sports bra. I am out of the chair and kneeling on the floor. She pulls my head to her bare stomach and continues to cut the left hand side of my hair. 

I know in the dream that this is all about my social self-image being tatty and old.

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I am at some big social gathering. We are all sat at round tables with ~8 people per table. It is a wedding of sorts. A representative of the groom comes over to me and asks if I will read the speech for the groom.  He would be honoured. I ask to see the speech before I agree. I look through the document which has emojis. I cannot see my self reading from this script. It comes from a place, a view, which I do not recognise nor could I emulate.

I explain to the representative that because I am cognitively different, I would struggle in trying to convey this script. I would rather that the groom did it. He takes the script back and there is an air of disappointment.

—

Dream ends

The Tendency to Literal Dead Letter Interpretations – Nāga

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In our times there is, allegedly, a lot of fake news. People try to find titbits of “facts” to try and catch people out as proof of lying. It is almost like three year olds trying to get mummy or daddy to tell someone off or punish them. It is what I call sandpit politics. Some believe the bible verbatim and others use this verbatim interpretation to prove that it is not true, that there are errors. The hunt for the resting place of Noah’s Ark continues….

Two thousand years ago they did not have CGI nor for that matter AI. People were largely illiterate and stories had to be crafted in a way that people would remember. There was animistic religion. They had to speak in the parable of the times.

Take a look at the Mucalinda Sutta, – Mucalindavaggo.

Here soon after enlightenment Siddartha is sat deep in thought.

He might have been trying to figure out what to do next. “Ok so what next?”

Mucalindo Nāgarājā notes the incoming poor weather and wraps him in seven coils and protects his head with the hood of a king Cobra risen in threatening manner. They sit for seven days until the weather changes and Mucalinda morphs into a brahmin to praise Buddha the new Bhagavhad.

Naga can also mean Elephant, a semi divine Nāga part snake human who comes from another world Nāga-loka and Buddha is sometimes called Nāga-muni.

Iconography can be easily found with the nascent Buddha protected by a king cobra like Nāga with 1,5 or 7 heads. It is a core piece of iconography. It is core Buddhism.

In occult literature snakes and dragons are words use to hint at wise and sagacious beings, initiates and the like. In the Toltec tradition there are nagal/nagual beings who live in a nagual’s world an alternate assimilation of the one that is commonly held.

Snake is the dreaming symbol for wisdom or need for wisdom.

Rain is the process of life.

Seven is guidance or need for guidance.

Head is intuitive mentality.

Coil or circle is sobriety/ inclusiveness/ unity.

If we interpret this sutta like a dream. Siddartha having awoken as a Buddha had just radically changed his whole view on life the universe and everything. This was mind-blowing. Even for a Buddha. He would need time to assimilate and process things after his ordeal with Mara and the whole shebang. So, he sat in contemplation seeking guidance from his now Buddhic intuition looking at how to apply his Nāga – rājā {very big, king-snake, top notch wisdom} feeling protected by his new found knowledge and had insight, inner guidance, on how to use it to embrace and enlighten all the world.

And he said to himself, perhaps with a chuckle. His intuition had summed it all up for him

Blissful is solitude for one who is content, who has heard the Dhamma, who sees. Blissful is non-affliction with regard for the world, restraint for living beings. Blissful is dispassion with regard for the world, the overcoming of sensuality. But the subduing of the conceit “I am”— That is truly the ultimate bliss.

Wisdom Ripens Sentient Beings – Spooky

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Well, I have just ordered a translation of a book by Jamgön Ju Mipham Gyatso or Mipham the Great a famous Tibetan polymath about divination using Manjushri mantra by dice. Manjushri is the Bodhisattva of wisdom and is depicted with a sword to cut through ignorance and a book for wisdom and learning. {The perfection of Wisdom Sutras}

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For several years Manjushri mantra was a part of my chanting practice.

“Om ah ra pa tsa na dhi”

Wisdom ripens all sentient beings

I have just listened to Tsem Rinpoche on YouTube describe how dice for Mo divination are made from sandalwood…spooky if you look at my dream (previous) in which “my” dice are made from the root of a tree. He further states that divination and or knowledge can come in dreams to “advanced” practitioners.

From Wiki.

“Sandalwood is expensive compared to other types of woods. To maximize profit, sandalwood is harvested by removing the entire tree instead of felling at the trunk near ground level. This way wood from the stump and root, which possesses high levels of sandalwood oil, can also be processed and sold.”

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I have always considered Manjushri as the most neutral of figures, because knowledge and wisdom have no emotional turbulence attached. The feeling of Manjushri is always light.

It looks like I am also back to the Kalachakra Tantra again.

Freaky Friday….

Tibetan Dice Dream 1-11-2024

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This is one of a recent series of “out of the blue” dreams which seems to have little or no relevance to my current life circumstance and events therein.

I am shown a dice/die which is a cube with rounded corners. It has the feel of ivory and looks ancient. I know beyond doubt that it is a Tibetan dice. I know that Tibetan dice are unlike any other dice in the world because of their special properties. I can only see the face of the die with a singular dot to denote one. I know the others are there, but the dream zooms in.

A little later I see two dice. I see that they are carved out of a deep root of a tree and shaped and polished. It is a long process and a labour of love. These are my Tibetan dice. They are perfect cubes with sharp edges and corners. I hold them in my hand and throw the dice, and I see two faces each with a singular dark blue dot. I have thrown two. They are made of root and Tibetan. The workmanship is exquisite. I know the meaning of two and its significance,

Dream ends.

I had not heard of this but when I put Tibetan Dice into Google…

From Wikipedia

Mo (divination)

Mo (Tibetan: མོ་, Wylie: mo), is a form of divination that is part of the culture and religion of Tibet. The Tibetan people consult Mo when making important decisions about health, work or travel. Mo employs dice and there are books written by various lamas on interpretations for the casting of dice. The answers given by the Mo are regarded as coming from Manjushri, the Bodhisattva of wisdom. Mo is considered to represent a blend of Tibetan shaman traditions and Buddhist beliefs.

One Mo prediction manual was composed by Jamgon Ju Mipham Gyatso, a great scholar and saint of the Nyingmapa tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. This Mo prediction manual is based primarily upon the Kalachakra Tantra and supplementary explanations from the ‘Ocean of Dakinis’. To use this Mo divination, one must have a question in mind and roll the dice. The dice’s outcome will indicate an answer in the prediction manual. The answer in the manual should answer your question but may need some interpretation.

The Dalai Lama consults the Mo divination when making important decisions.

Losing Your Mind – Zen

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Some people might think that I am/was a complete nut job for getting out of a contract which would have paid 8000 euros a month tax free, over a decade ago. I must have been out of my mind. Others might think me whacko for a number of my beliefs and that I have lost my mind. Why would a trained scientist not strive for recognition and research funding. Why renounce his job at a world “top ten” university? He must be barking mad and batshit crazy to boot.

I have lost my mind but not in the way people might think.

In general, my mind / head is a very quiet place. There is no continuous chatter of internal dialog. I am not busy with should and ought, nor is comparison mind resident there. My mental default is silence. I can observe, I can experience and absorb. I can hear and see, but there is no mind making endless qualitative thinking. If I want to think I have to actively engage my mind. It does not run off like a horse when the stable door is opened.

I could say that my “mind” differs from most. I know that it has changed markedly over the last two decades. But there is no way that I can explain or illustrate in a meaningful way what my “mind” is like to anyone suffering from internal dialogue or very attached to the common socio-political assimilation of world and society. I once experienced that world first hand as an active participant. I no longer do/am.

I still look much the way I used to but the animating contents of the meaty body are now changed. People might struggle to understand that I am not as I was and interpret me in terms of an old look up table of behaviour and manner. I’ll speculate that many would not get it or me. My assimilation of world is different, I cannot prove this to you or anyone really. It would take sharing a considerable amount of time and circumstance to appreciate and I would have to extrovert my thoughts and thinking in order for people to see just how different. I can still interpret events from a “normal” perspective but I do not share the emotions many are beholden to. I can appear to fit in and comply with the common world views.

In the Zen literature there is a lot of mention of Buddha nature. If I understand Zen at all it is to live fully in the present and at the point before mind knowing that as observer you are also participant and not separate from the arising phenomena. Zen does not like definitions because that is a feature of comparison mind and a definition by definition invites comparison to said definition which is “mind”. People stress over definition and argue the toss. Buddha nature is offered as a way of being, a nebulous ideal which exists when mind is fully quiescent. Most of the Zen koans are devised to show just how much mind trips one up and self-entangles. They point at not using mind the way which it is customary so to do.

In order to be “Zen”, one has to lose one’s mind and yet remain sane.

However, what is considered sane in the common socio-political assimilation of world, is all “mind” and therefore insane. If people like their possessions and acquisitional materialism, to detach from these would be considered lunacy by many. A wide empty path is the road of the lunatic who disavows possession, grabbing and the socio-political accumulation of kudos and social power.

Kudos is illusion in Zen and Buddhism as a whole. Yet many seek it with a passion.

Although people use Zen as an adjective for calm, they are not interested in attaining it because it requires that they forego the common world view. As we all know you cannot have your cake and eat it.

How is my logic?

Do we live in a sane world?

Is there an increasing problem with mental health as measured to the normative socio-political construct?

I have lost my “mind” does that make more or less sane than you?

Are you saner than I?

Discuss….