The Dream of My Dreaming

 

The story continues (sorry for the typos; reading my own material for editing puts me literally to sleep, as I imagine you already know). Suffice it to say that “becoming a hippie” is a metaphor for opening one’s mind to “the unknown” and to discover life “as a strange trip.” I would add, “a most fascinating trip.” I ended up, after another forty years plus of Zen and Krishnamurti, as one who has had an adventurous, interesting story to tell, to remember. Actually, it’s still happening; it is still utterly strange and wonderful and horrendous. Living in a world run rampant with insanity is a challenge to sane people. I don’t believe it possible to “know thyself” since it is clear to me that “self” is a constantly changing, moving, ephemeral thing, if even that. So what I “do” is to see if I can come to terms with whatever it is I am seeing as “myself” in the moment and my “being in the world,” whatever I am seeing what “the world” is in any particular moment. I have become a bit of a reflection of light on an undulating wave upon the surface of a vast, endless ocean. As “a matter of fact,” I had an interesting dream a few months ago:
 
I awaken laying on the bottom of a small coracle (a round Welsh boat) floating upon a great placid sea. I should be uncomfortable but I am actually quite comfortable as I look up at the blue sky and gaze in the distance at the endless glistening waves. I just sit there placidly myself as the day passes. I have no thoughts but simply see what I see, as if I am the blue sky and the endless waves. As the sky darkens and the sun sets, I lay down and fall asleep. Then I dream I am being born as a tiny baby. I grow from baby to childhood to adulthood to old age and then death. And then I wake up in the warm sun as I lay on the bottom of a small coracle. Every day I float upon the sea and every night I fall asleep and dream again that I am born again. Every single night over endless time. And every dream is wonderful in its joy and utter sadness and profound drama. I see that this particular dream of all my dreaming is more than just a metaphor or a jumble of images in my brain.