I was dreaming that I was in a bathroom, but when I had a moment of self remembrance and strong awareness, I had the intuitive feeling that I was in a dream.
The scene I was in faded away and I was actually in one of the lecture rooms of my university! Definitely not a bathroom…
There were lots of people walking around the room, but they were somewhat distant. I was standing near a table at the front of the room and a man wearing a green vest and a brown jacket was standing beside me.
We made eye contact and decided to introduce ourselves. I introduced my name as Mike and his name was Sean. He then took a seat by the table. I decided to try to have a conversation with him, but it was quite difficult…
He no longer seemed to be aware of my presence. He was looking left and right at things that apparently weren’t there. I could see his lips moving, as though he were talking to people, but no one was there (that I could see).
His eyes had a glazed over appearance, as though he wasn’t really looking at anything, but continued these strange interactions.
It was my opinion that he was a real individual and we happened to speak at a moment of mutual lucidity, but he was then captivated by his own dream images and could no longer see or interact with me…
For the next couple of weeks, I was on the lookout for a man in a green vest and a brown coat named Sean, but that just wasn’t in the cards. It’s highly unlikely he would have remembered the brief encounter, even if it was a legitimate meeting, given how short it was.
But it still made for a nice experience for me and it takes little imagination for me to see myself just like that man when I’m off dreaming, unable to see what’s really there.
Perhaps that’s why zombie movies are just so popular now! People can somehow relate, or somehow know it is the story of our times.
It seemed this experience clearly showed you the ‘drunken’ psychological state that people experience, Mike, valuable to see it so clearly. I’m pretty sure it’s pretty much like that for all of us. Or perhaps in certain dreams we’re clearer, but what about the rest of the ‘dark’ hours of dreamtime, probably spending it like that with very little consciousness of ourselves.
I remember a few years ago when I had been working on my own one night during a holiday festive celebration. That night I had done quite a few practices and when walking back home in the fresh air I felt so crisp and clear. When I turned the corner though I was walking through a street where a whole mob/crowd was also walking. They’d just come from a concert and most if not all were very drunk. I felt like a last survivor walking through a street full of zombies. It was incredibly surreal! Feeling so clear inside I felt completely out of place, it was as if I could see those people, but they couldn’t actually see me. Looking at their faces it was like some ‘spirits’ had taken over. Like walking through some sort of limbo dimension.
At one point one person started loudly singing one line of a song (which I didn’t know) and literally the whole crowd around me repeated. That was quite funny actually.
But It was concerning for me to see people allow themselves to have so little control over themselves…
Anyway your experience reminded me of that occasion. Good incentive to try to be clear inside.
That must have been quite the contrast in inner states: your clarity from practicing awareness and their absorption in the music and alcohol. It does sound kinda surreal and zombie-apocalypse-like.
It is quite interesting to consider the wide range of experiences possible, given the same surroundings, etc., just by variations in our level of awareness.
Oh dear … I always get a kind of sinking feeling when I hear something like this, knowing that this is me most of the time, in the astral and in the physical too. Thanks for sharing though Mike! It’s interesting how this man looks exactly like someone in a day dream, or when you ‘stare into space’ – maybe not moving your lips but none the less hypnotized by thoughts. Most people keep a lid on the internal chatter in the physical, a few mutter to themselves but this results in others giving them a wide berth – little do they know they spend their sleeping hours in the same sorry state!
I’m with you there Ella. Always when I was filming myself for university or whatever or recording longer audio messages and seeing it back it is obvious I’m not as conscious as I think I am! I’m singing songs in my head a lot more than I would estimate, and I think the singing even comes out physically quite often when I’m on my own. Or even some dramatic swoosh movie noises :p
It’s quite ironic, isn’t it, Ella?
I guess keeping the muttering to ourselves is more socially acceptable, but it’s important to understand that just because we aren’t always vocal with our mind chatter, it doesn’t necessarily mean we’re any more “in the moment”. And indeed, it seems the chattering may come out in our dreams anyway.
What a wonderful encounter Mike! It definitely sounds like he could have been “real”, maybe you will meet him at some point later? 🙂
In any way, I also think we can feel when something has a flavor of reality to it in comparison to subjective dream productions. Its also interesting how you got a chance to see him being submerged in his subjective world so clearly. I guess that’s how we must look like there on a regular basis when unaware – talking to ourselves, “seeing” things that aren’t there, etc. The Divine beings must have a really hard time to communicate with us in that state as you have verified.
I bet it is tough to communicate to us when we’re so asleep… and that’s only half the battle: we still have to remember the experience in the morning 🙂