Dream Recollection II

 As I continue with my dream recollection exercises my dream recollection improves. Whereas in the beginning I could recollect only a few tidbits of information I'm now recollecting much more.

This morning I recorded another dream.

        Episode 1

 

I'm in an area that reminds me of Adams Point in Oakland. It's a hilly area on the west side of Lake Merritt. I used to live there many years ago.

I'm riding an electric bike. It is beige colored. It is low, such as in the low-rider fashion. I believe it is a low-rider bike.

I'm at a location and decide to ride away. Initially I'm riding down hill. I reach a cross street and make a left turn. Now I'm riding up hill. I'm pedaling the bike. Pedal-assist is on and the bike swiftly and effortlessly rolls up hill.

Just in front of me is a guy in a regular bike. He's pedaling his bike up hill. He is effortlessly pedaling up hill.

At the top of the hill is a building into which we both ride our bikes into what appears to be the entrance to the garage area or a lobby area. Towards the left is an elevator. The guy heads in that direction.

I pause in that lobby-like area. 

        Episode 2

 

 I'm still in what I believe to be the Lake Merritt area. Now I'm in the east side of the lake. I'm walking along the sidewalk. I'm observing the beautiful buildings and the lush gardening.

The buildings are tall, about ten stories high, maybe more. They appear to be apartment buildings. They are made of brick walls that give them the appearance of beautiful vintage buildings.

I see a few people outside. Some are sitting outside. I continue to admire the picturesque scene. I decide to take pictures with my phone. 

As I'm taking pictures I see a woman appear to want to hide her face. I say to her that I'm not photographing her.

        Episode 3

Someone is telling me a few things about those apartment buildings and the residents. He says that there are many rooms in those buildings and that the residents dress very well. 

I enter one of those buildings and walk along the halls. I remember that the guy telling me about these buildings and the residents had also said that the rooms were not actually rooms. 

As I walk through one of the hall ways I see what he meant. The living quarters are not actually fully walled in.The living quarters look more like enclosures in museums. They are enclosures built into the walls without any type of wall nor door on the hallway side of living quarter.

 

Each living quarter is made of two spaces. A larger space that serves as the main living quarters and a smaller space that serves as a closet or storage space. Some residents use the smaller space as a display for any collection of items. One resident has a collection of very beautiful and fancy shoes and boots.

I walk along the hallway and observe the main living quarters of another resident. His bed is plainly visible. I continue along the hallway and I reach a vendor. She's an Asian woman who is selling  various figurines. They are figurines of people, animals, etc. They appear to be made of jade but may be glass. They are a pale green color. I ask if they are jade or glass and she says they are glass.

 

They are beautiful none-the-less and decide that I would like to have one. My attention is drawn to one of a squatting boy. He's wearing a brimmed hat. The head of the figurine comes off at the neck. The figurine is actually an ink container for a fountain or quill pen. I believe it's a figurine of Huckleberry Finn. I pick up the figurine and see the price underneath it. The price is $43. I decide it's a bit too much and wish it was more like $23. I decide to not buy it and I put it back down. 

        Episode 4

I want to leave the building so I head towards the stairwell at the end of the hall. As I'm walking down the stairs I encounter another man in the stairwell. I tell him I want to leave the building and if he can show me the way out. He tells me to continue down the stairs and at the bottom is a door. He tells me something about the door handle/knob but I don't remember what he said. For some reason I decide to walk back up the stairs. As I'm walking back up the stairs I notice that the entire inside of the stairway and even the hallways themselves are made of or covered in colorful tile work. Even the hand rails are covered in beautiful and colorful tile work.

 

        Episode 5 

 I'm outside again. I look back at the building(s) I have just exited. I see their outer brick facades and remember the beautiful, colorful tile work on the inside.

I see that at least one, maybe more, of the buildings is cone shaped. The building I'm looking at is a multi-story, conical-shaped building with outer brick walls.

 

        Episode 6

As I'm standing there observing the scene I see many of the locals walking along the sidewalks. Almost all of them are very well dressed in their own ways. They're wearing colorful suits and matching shoes. One guy is dancing along the sidewalk. 

I look up the street but instead of a paved street I see a river. I can see the sidewalks along the banks of the river and the buildings along the sidewalks.

The river is full. The water is running down stream at a very fast rate. I realize that the river flows into Lake Merritt.

 

There are people outside and along the sidewalk. Three guys suddenly jump into the water and let the current carry them away. At first I don't see any danger in them doing so as long as they can stay afloat. The water will simply carry them down stream into Lake Merritt where the waters are tranquil. There they can simply swim out. But then I realize there are large rocks/boulders just under the surface of the water and it dawns on me that the rushing water can hurl a person onto them causing serious or even fatal injuries. 

 

The Protests

 Sitting here in my living room watching a live stream of the protests taking place in Los Angeles. I see a squad of law enforcement in full riot gear advancing forward. A guy holding up a US/Mexican flag is in their path.

The protesters are basically disarmed. Maybe they have some stones in their back packs to throw at the goon squad, but otherwise they are basically disarmed.

As I sit here and watch, the thought comes to mind that here ladies and gentlemen, is why we have the Second Amendment. Imagine if the protesters were armed. There's no doubt in my mind that ICE agents would've concluded that they are not wanted there by the people and they would've promptly left. The goon squad would've did the same thing.

The thought also came to mind, that many of those protesters support the very same politicians that want to take away their right to bear arms.

Tsk, tsk. Such a sad situation. 

There's no doubt in my mind that somewhere in this great country, there are some crackers watching and gloating at the prospect of ICE agents deporting those they deem undesirable.

The reality is that the Second Amendment is multi-faceted. It's there so that we may protect ourselves from would-be predators AND haters, A.K.A., White Supremacists, Fascists, etc.

So as I sit here and watch the protesting taking place in my community, the Latino community, I'm perfectly aware that there are also crackers watching and gloating over what they see.

I also sit here and thank the founding fathers for being mindful, so thoughtful, of including the Second Amendment in our Bill of Rights so that we may defend ourselves not just against a tyrannical government but also against fascist regimes, both political and civilian.

Yeah, so as I sit here and watch the protests going on, I think of all the fascist crackers sitting at home and gloating over what they see. My message to them is, the Second Amendment allows me to protect myself also against them.

See my previous posts:

Mossberg 500, posted July 21, 2019

AR-15, posted August 14, 2019

Glock 19, posted September 10, 2019

Benelli SBE II, posted November 27, 2019    

357 Magnum, posted February 17, 2020

Ruger American, posted August 18, 2020

Henry 45-70, posted July 13, 2023

 

Dream Recollection

 It's been quite a while since I had an astral travel experience. It's actually quite common for me to not have any lucid dreams for prolonged periods and then start having them frequently. I have them more frequently when I practice certain exercises taught in Samael Aun Weor's books.

I also know from experience that when I make attempts to remember my dreams upon waking up my recollection becomes more keen. So last night I went to bed with the intention of remembering my dreams upon waking up. Of course it was a success. It always is. We dream every night, we just don't remember our dreams all of the time. But if we make effort to recollect our dreams immediately upon waking up we will remember more and more of our dreams.

 From last night I remember a couple of dream episodes.

Episode one: I'm riding my electric bike on a hill. I believe I was going downhill but came across some heavy traffic. I didn't want to be stuck in the traffic so I went over the center island and got on the opposite side of the road and began to head back up hill.

That is all I can actually recollect from that episode.

Episode two: I enter a place that appears to be a hotdog spot. It's in the lobby of building. There is a counter towards my right. There are people inside, some are at the counter. The guy making the hotdogs is on the other side of the counter. He is very energetic and enthusiastic about his hotdogs. He makes the best hotdogs. He happily serves his customers. I'm standing at the counter watching him. He says something to me about his hotdogs, about how great they are as he consumes a couple of them himself.

As I watch him I realize he looks like the Iranian guy on this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtDOI8LSn-o 

He's at 3:00, but instead of preparing shish kabobs he is preparing hotdogs.

After a while I turn around and walk out. Outside the hotdog place I find myself in what looks like the lobby of the building. At one corner I see a vintage gambling machine. It's a poker machine. Presumably three people can play against the machine at the same time. There are privacy dividers between to presumably prevent the players from seeing each others' cards. But the dividers have see-through screens which allow the players to cheat and see each others' cards.

The poker machine is not actually used for gambling anymore. It is just a relic of an antique gambling machine. I think there was a sign describing what it was used for and it said that the machine was actually allowed in London.

This is pretty much all I can remember from this episode. 

There was at least one other dream episode but I don't remember much about it.

I've Been Gone for A While

 Yeah, I've been gone from this blogger thing for a while. I simply haven't had any desire to post anything. Much has happened but I simply have no desire to post.

This last January I took a much needed vacation. I went to Mexico for a couple of weeks. My family comes from a small town out in the boonies. I wrote about this in a previous post. See "Off to Mexico, I went", posted January 17, 2020.

In this town festivities take place for an entire week, roughly from January 6 to the 12th. There are fireworks, live music, food, vendors, etc. So that is the main attraction. That is why we return to that small town out in the middle of nowhere every December and January. The rest of the year there is nothing to do there. Literally. There are no bars, no theaters, no museums, no good restaurants, etc. Exactly how people survive in that small town is beyond me.

So, this past January I went back to that town. I lay in bed and went to sleep. I had a dream which turned into a lucid dream. Not much happened. Nothing that I really cared to write about. It was a short astral projection experience and nothing more. Probably triggered by the change in ambience. I was in a distant town in a foreign country.

I returned home and again I had another short astral projection experience. Again, it was mostly insignificant to me. Probably triggered again by the change in ambience; I was back home.

The only thing worth writing about is that in one of those astral projection experiences I found myself in what appeared to be a hill or mountain side. I was walking along a path heading in a downward direction when I became lucid and realized that I was in the dream world.

As I have done in the past I decided to jump and see if I would float. Yes I floated. I actually came back down on my back and landed on a large boulder. Fortunately in the astral the landings are gentle. The laws of gravity in the astral world are much different than in our physical world. In the astral world when we jump we float and come back down gently.

After coming back down from my leap I decided to not jump again. Even though we come down gently I didn't like the idea of coming down on a boulder.

From the hill, or mountain side, I could see out into the distance. It was a beautiful scene. The path I was on was lush and green, covered and surrounded by mosses and various lush green plants.

 This type of scene is very common during my astral travels. I often times find myself in or around lush green forests, parks, hills, mountains, etc. Often but not always. There are times when I find myself in barren scenes. Sometimes I find myself inside of buildings in which the walls are concrete and barren. 

Anyway, I've been gone for a while from this blogger. Not sure how long I'll be away from it again.

Wish You Were Here

 I live alone. I have no problem with that. I really enjoy my solitude. I have the whole house to myself. I can do pretty much anything I want. I can stay up as late as I want. I can play my music whenever I want. Well, you get the idea. Living alone is great.

But sometimes I wish you were here. Today was one of those moments.

Today is the last day of my extended weekend and tomorrow I go back to work. So today I spent the early evening cooking and preparing my meals for the coming work days. After work I have no time to do anything other than eat dinner, shower, and go to sleep. So on the last day of my weekend I devote myself to cooking for the coming work week and having all my meals ready.

For my breakfast I made peanut butter and honey sandwiches. I also sprinkled ground cardamon into them. I got this from Ayurvedic medicine. I also like to add sliced banana to them. But I was out of bananas today.

For snacks I just put together some slices of smoked all-beef salami, New York deli style. I also got a few thick slices of smoked Gouda cheese and Ritz crackers.

 

For dinner I prepared sauteed vegetables and curry chicken. I made saffron rice as a side to go with my curry chicken and vegetables. To this I added some pita bread. I chose pita bread instead of naan simply because naan is not as readily available as pita bread.

 

As I made my dinner I played The Marias. At this moment I'm still listening to them.

Cooking my dinner and listening to The Marias is so dreamy. My kitchen has two large windows that look out onto my yard. It has a small light over the sink that dimly lights up the stove and counter. This dim light ads to the dreaminess of the ambience.

It was this combination that made me wish you were here.

Actually this happens most times when I cook dinner. The view out my kitchen window in the early evening, the dim light above me, and some easy music like The Marias or deep house music sets the tone for a dreamy romantic evening.

Wish you were here.

- - - - -

P.S. I'm a guy addressing a female reader. If you're a guy reading this post keep going, move along, nothing to see here.

Much is Still Happening V

 Yes, much is still happening as I continue to settle into my new home in California's central valley. Far away from Oakland, in the Bay Area where I grew up.

Yes, it certainly looks like I heeded my feeling from a couple of years ago.

Before starting this post I went back and viewed a few of my earlier posts and came across this one:

"I Need to Leave," posted August 3, 2022.

Back when I made that post little did I know that I would follow through with my feelings two years later.

As I wrote in that post, many years earlier I had had the same strong feeling come to me. The feeling to leave. To go somewhere else. But back then I didn't heed my feeling. I stayed and got into a lot of trouble. Then many years later that feeling, that urge, to leave came again and this time I did leave.

Now I'm in the Central Valley and I'm enjoying the quieter, slower, more rural life out here. Instead of spending my weekends going out and partying I spend them working on my various projects around the house. Lately I've been doing a lot of yard work. I have a very nice size yard and have decided to make it into a small park. I have already cleaned out 95% of the weeds. I have trimmed all the rose bushes trees (except one). I have an outdoor kitchen with a picnic table. Recently I added a park bench and two flower beds where I will be growing the California Poppy.

The poppy is native to California and it grows wild in parts of the east bay (my former home). It sprouts out and blooms every spring. I have not seen it here near my new home so I decided to plant it in my yard. It grows well in this zone so in spring I will have a bed of golden poppies.

I also have saffron growing in my yard. It's the world's most expensive spice and I'm growing it. 

 

I'm not certain if my saffron will produce flowers this coming season but it should produce flowers next season.

Market Street

 Last night I went to bed very early. I've been on a very, very long weekend. I have ten days off so I've been doing a lot work on my cars and around the house. Repairs and maintenance.

Since I had not had an astral travel experience I decided to work on one last night. The efforts paid off.

In a sense I can say that I had three experiences but it was just one in which I kept gaining and losing lucidity. I don't even remember the details of my astral experiences because I made no attempt to remember them. But I definitely remember having them.

I went into a dream. At one point I became lucid, I became aware I was in the dream state, I became lucid. A few moments later I lost lucidity and thought I had returned to the vigil state, but almost immediately I became lucid again and realized I was still in the dream state.

A few moments later I lost lucidity again and though I had again returned to the vigil state but again I regained lucidity and realized I was in the astral (the dream state).

This happened a third time before I finally did return the vigil state and I found myself in my bed, in my room, in my house.

I went to sleep again and again entered a dream but this time I did not regain lucidity. It was just an ordinary dream that I remembered the events.

- - - - -

In the dream I was on my way to work. I had taken the BART train to San Francisco. This is just an old memory of my past. Although I do take the BART train to work I no longer work in San Francisco.

I was supposed to get off the train at the Civic station but I missed it and I heard the announcement that we were approaching the 12th Street station. Again this is just an old memory of my past. The Civic station is in San Francisco and the 12th Street station is in Oakland. In the dream world (the astral world) things get murky. Bits and pieces of our past and present get mixed up.

I asked a woman on the train if the 12th Street station came after the Civic station and she answered yes.

I got off the train knowing that I could find my way back to the Civic station. In downtown San Francisco the stations are in order along Market Street. One can exit one station and walk up or down Market Street and reach the next station. But something went wrong. I found myself lost along the streets that are on the north side of Market Street. I knew that if I got back on Market Street I would easily find my way to my destination.

I kept walking up and down the various streets turning left here, right there, up this street, and down that street but for the life of me I could not hit with Market Street.

I asked a woman which direction Market Street was and she pointed and said "down that way."

I went down that way and still didn't hit with Market Street. I then asked a guy which way was Market Street. He also said down that way but then said "get going," and with his thumb pointed in the opposite direction. "He's an asshole," I thought to myself.

 Market Street in San Francisco

- - - - -

This dream had a sudden shift. I was still lost in San Francisco but I had come across a man whom I thought was very helpful. I was nearby when he was assaulted by some crazy man. A third man who was nearby was going to help the first man but stopped and said "I'm not security." Implying he had no obligation nor duty to help the man being assaulted. 

I remembered how the man being assaulted had been helpful to me so I motioned to the bystander to go ahead and jump in and the man being assaulted. He did. I then got into the brawl and while the bystander held the assailant I rushed over and took away the stick he was wielding. The bystander and me were able to subdue and disarm the assailant.

- - - - -

I continued trying to find my way back to Market Street. I pulled out my phone and tried to use Google Maps to pin-point my location and figure out in which direction to go to reach Market Street.

This is where a recurring dream kicks in.

I have had many dreams where my phone appears to have been hacked or in some way a malicious app has been installed and it renders my phone useless. The phone does not go out. It stays on, but I can't load any of the apps that I need to use. I can't make a phone call, I can't use Google Maps, I can't do anything with it. Some malicious app keeps loading itself over and over again not allowing me to use my phone as I want to. This always happens in a time when I'm lost and I desperately need my phone to call for assistance or find my way home or to a specific destination.

 - - - - -

This is a recurring theme in some of my dreams and I have decided to use this as a queue to know when I'm in the astral. People may become lucid when something queues them to the fact that they are dreaming.

Next time I have the recurring dream that I'm lost and my phone has been hacked and has become useless I will attempt to recognize it as a queue that I'm in the astral. I simply need to become lucid to have an astral travel experience.