The Helper In The Dream

I’ve thought of the ‘ghost’ aspect with these types of dreams and others. But if that is the case, then what I’ve noticed is that in the helper dreams/OBEs it seemed I was perceived in a more ‘substantial’ way compared to how we in this reality regard a ghost as an apparition, shadow, spectral, etc.

Now, it could be that it’s a different degree of being a ‘ghost’. In the dream I related, the young man looked at me for a moment or so until I could tell by his expression and slight smile that he had ‘figured it out’, that he understood ‘what’ I was. That kind of exchange is not something you normally hear when people recount ghost stories, they’re usually just fleeting sightings. Maybe the old woman perceived me differently considering her reaction but there again her reaction could also apply to the presence of a stranger, ghostly or not.

What all of that tells me is, again, that in the ‘helper’ dreams I seemed to have more of an ‘embodiment’, something that could be addressed more directly than a fleeting, ghostly encounter. Another possibility is that I was occupying someone else’s body, that’s also been considered in dream/OBE literature and has its own implications on different levels.

In short, it seems that in some of those realities ‘visited’ there are individuals there who recognize those ‘travelers’ just as easily as one would regard another person. It’s like if someone from another country came up to you on the street and they asked you for directions and you knew immediately that English was not their primary language. They would be ‘different’, yet you would still help them because it’s another human being. Maybe in some other realities awareness and helping is expanded to many kinds of beings.

Now, if some tourist, humanoid-like being with four eyes and wearing a fanny pack suddenly came up to me on the street and in the most basic English asked me for directions to ‘The Strip’ where the casinos are, yeah, I’d be freaking out a little. :slight_smile:

There is a vast difference between the two types. The four eyed tourist and the one who pegged as simply from another country.

However the ghost resides in between these two types, plus if he is seasoned then he knows allusion from illusion. He becomes variable, and as soon as. a focus tries to come close to determening his identity he morphes into the highly variable come uncertain roles that evade identification .

The other, trying to identify, compresses the two architypical covers and again expands them , and wholla! A ghost is born.

The next stage is anomalous character of shadow and ghost, here the hunted may become the hunter.

This also may progress into a less idiomatic creature of helped/helper.

These are merely appaririona in a nighttime tableau, &/or a real time horror scene. The true haunt can or even MUST fulfill both requirements or else!

Meno

I need to clarify a few things for myself re your reply before proceeding further.

Are you shifting into the ‘ghost’ premise as explanation for the ‘helper’ premise as I’ve described it, or as an explanation for the ghost premise by itself?

The reason I ask is because you posit the ghost as a third party: “However the ghost resides in between these two types…” That makes for an elaboration of the scenario that I related. For example, was the young man and the old woman real and I the ghost or vice versa? Were we all ghosts thus making the scenario I described a kind of ghostly rendezvous?

I think you can see why I want to define which premise we’re dealing with. The ghost premise seems to explain the ‘helper’ premise as more ‘nighttime tableau’ than ‘alternate reality’. Granted, they may be one and the same but then the recurrence of the particular element as I described in the OP would have to be explained as a non-variable aspect, i.e, the many dreams/OBEs had different situations, scenarios, etc., but upon assessment of them the ‘helper’ aspect was constant and thus of particular focus.

Just noted what you call ‘m elaboration’. The symbolism is rich, therefore it’s expected that different interpretations will come off it. I must defer any comment until a few hours from now, since it will take that long to digest and formulate at least an inceptional comment.

Are you shifting into the ‘ghost’ premise as explanation for the ‘helper’ premise as I’ve described it, or as an explanation for the ghost premise by itself?

I think both.Depending where the focus is coming from. Simultainity is impossible, and the ‘ghost’ can be used a literal or a metaphoric experience . Lack of content, visualization of the fleeting moment can be experienced both: in dreams and in waking
This bybqay of describing the experience , whereas dreamlike content cam be experienced during waking, and the opposite, - ‘real’ similitude during unconsciousness of dreams.

This type of hybrid is again, variable , as above described, depending on the type of manifested symbolism. as more closed, (with less space to define it, therefore within more general parameters), with less articularization and embellishment.

Whichever with less space, needs a minimum of declinated adjectives, minimal to the point, gleaning off the surface.

That is where the ghostly apparition induces a feeling of being haunted, hunted down, as in the old lady’s cryptic presence indicates.

The helper comes along defensively, but his intentions are not early known, so where and for what purpose does he appear? A mechanism perhaps , literal for structure and continuity perhaps, or, maybe for deeper psychological reasons, for which much more space is required, terming it’s contradictory logic into play, in presentation, not mere representation , a contradiction not only on terms , in description, in order to configure, wjat really is going on, in the dream, vis. and what it is trying to say.

Whether the theme can actually rise to the level of paradox, and become a model for subsequent and future action, depends on the foreshadowing , the present circumstance, and the thematic expectations, by a well integrated memory.

If such does in fact occur, the. perhaps only a divine oracle would do justice to it. Examples abound in Hamlet, Ibsen’s Ghost, and some other notables.
At that point, it can be said of the question of difference, an uncertainty between them, and indeed such confusion does not relegate to Hamlet’s madness, for life may indeed be merely a dream.

Simultaneity is impossible or possible? You start out saying you think it’s both but then you say it’s, ‘impossible’. Or is that the automatic speller? Also, is ‘bybqay’, byway?

Yes, in the interpretation of dreams much has been written as to the symbolism in them and what it represents. In the case of the dream (or OBE but that puts it in a different category) that I related, the dome in the distance, the pedestal my hand was on, the old woman, her reaction, the young man, etc., all can have a symbolic meaning that refers to something else in my ‘awake’ life. I’ve had many dreams when in the aftermath (awake) I thought about the different elements and with some I was able to see how they represented something that referred to my awake state.

If such was the case that this particular dream represented something, it was some time ago when I had it but then as now I do not remember it referring to anything that was going on in my life at the time. Sure, I could make generalizations of some sort, the old woman is age, young man is youth, maybe he is an aspect of me, the ramshackle shacks a condition of some sort, and so on. But the distinguishing feature of that dream above any of the possible symbolisms, was the ‘helper’ aspect. This has been the case, the ‘constant’, in these ‘helper’ dreams. It was so apparent that as you can see I posted this topic not to relate about the dream’s symbolic material but instead about something that seemed independent of the dream and that such has recurred in dreams that I’ve had through the years.

Again I refer to what I noted in the OP about the usher. The movie is the dream, I’m watching it, involved in it. Suddenly the usher appears and tells me something that for whatever reason makes me leave my seat and follow him. At that point the movie is of little, if any, consideration.

Now, there have been dreams where the ‘helper’ appears in the middle of a dream. For example, some time back I had a dream and in the middle of it I found myself in a large hallway like you see in office buildings. It had lots of doors and I ‘knew’ that I had to find the one that would lead me out of there. As I’m walking around I see an open doorway and walking up to it I see a girl, she was maybe 10-12 years of age. Along with her in the room was a woman, maybe in her late 20s, early 30s. The girl saw me first, there was no reaction on her face of me being someone dangerous or whatever but she left through a door, I guess to another room. The woman walked over to me. No extreme reaction from her either, she just nodded with an expression of acknowledgment and waiting for whatever I had to say. I told her that I was looking for a door that would lead me outside. She motioned with her hand up the hall. I started walking and she was behind me. We got to a point and then she motioned again to large double doors. I turned and thanked her, she nodded, turned and walked back to the room. I walked through the doors and the dream continued.

In that type of ‘helper’ instance there was nothing evident that would make me search subconscious symbolism for an explanation. So, that was a mild instance of the ‘helper’. But what made think afterward about it and brought it round to be considered a ‘helper’ incident is that when I first saw the girl and she saw me she didn’t freak out or anything as I said but I could tell in just those couple of seconds or so that for whatever reason she knew I was something or someone ‘different’. When the woman approached me I could sense the same in her, she was dealing with me, and pleasantly so, but I could tell that there was a mild caution to her facial and body expression. That indicator is what reminded me of the same in other ‘helper’ dreams.

Is there a symbolism to the ‘helper’ aspect? I don’t know. Maybe a safeguard of some type employed by the subconscious in the dream narrative? Again, I don’t know. What I do know, at least from having experienced various ‘helper’ scenarios, is that it seems to run in a parallel narrative to the narrative of the dream. Such as in the example of the usher in the theater. His narrative runs parallel to the movie/dream I’m watching. But he is not the movie/dream, he is something other. He recognizes the difference between the movie and me the watcher of the movie. And of course, I’ve come to realize that he recognizes that.

If you haven’t already done so, check out some of Robert Monroe’s books whom I mentioned in the OP. His story is a fascinating one and those who ‘helped’ him in his OBE experiences takes the ‘helper’ concept to a whole other level. The Wikiwand on him gives a lot of background info from others but the books speak for themselves.

So thus far, the feeling I get as I’ve said before is that ‘somewhere’ there are beings who recognize me, and probably many others like me, as not being a ‘local’. That unlike us, or at least the majority of us, they communicate with the ‘travelers’. Do we appear as ‘ghosts’ to them? Maybe. I don’t know. But whichever the case, they seem to have a better handle on such ‘tourism’ than we do. :slight_smile:

Yes lack of sleep , automatic speller.

But here. I think the redux, the simplification and minimilization between entropy and redundancy must lead to an intermingling clarification. (Of the helper and its role and substance
)

Otherwise the problem of the unconscious, the dream, will coil around it like - looking beneath it, like for an original search for the temptor, the woman in the picture who plucks off the apple.

I always like to look for subterfuge, like Your searching for am exit, and the young girl, may be it. Who is she? Another helper, so the multiplicity and the deacription of helpers are variable.
Who the helper is is not the central matter, of is the role they play.

Did the dome look similar to something like this? An more details of the scenery, buildings and what not? Did it look like Africa?

alamy.com/stock-photo-dome- … 63205.html

No, it was wider and smoother like the image from the movie I linked.

But your mention of Africa is interesting. Apart from the hill which was obscuring part of the dome building, the terrain did have the look of a savanna.

It could have been a remote viewing or some form of non discretion/differentiation of and between time while dreaming or in a lucid subconscious state. A conscious viewing of some of the imagery that is the subconscious string attached to our conscious awareness. Seems very lucid and I don’t think dreams that lucid are just made up by the mind, the mind needs information that is in a proper sequence before it can do such a thing, that’s how it may show up as imagery, by it being a sequence of information through and creating of imagery. It also didn’t sound as though it was dictated by fear or emotional attachment either.

Similar to how when awake, there is a sequence of information of which is the reason why we view blue as it is and can’t describe it other than providing the specific experience/information.

Yes, that connection is a possibility.

Or an OBE. But as I mentioned previously there are differeing opinions on this, some to the point that they regard OBEs happening more from a waking state than a sleeping state. Personally, I would have to disagree on that assessment, I’ve had experiences in sleep where it was more, shall we say, a passport than a postcard. Very intense, where even after waking the feelings and atmosphere of the experience lingered regardless the scenario had changed.

Now, if as you have noted that it’s the subconscious connecting to the conscious, then that brings up questions. One of the many being if the connection is merely for ‘psychological entertainment’ purposes, i.e., a mind movie, or if it effects a conduit of sorts to actual though remote, sometimes very remote, ‘locales’.

Here’s an illustration using a previously mentioned experience that can be examined both as possibilities of a conduit and as a mind movie (a ‘representational’ display).

In the experience with the woman who helped me find the double doors, and which I stated that the dream continued, once I went through the doors there was a very vivid scene before me.

Now, if you’ve ever passed a theatre on the street you may have seen the doors open, maybe no function going on, airing it out, whatever, and seen the interior of the theatre, the seats, how big the interior is, and so on.

When I went through the double doors I saw those other, opened doors what seemed to be an area for a large group of people but I wasn’t on the sidewalk next to the doors, I was more like across the street from them. The ‘street’ was more like a concourse of some sort, there were people walking back and forth.

Inside the doors there were hundreds of people or even a thousand or more. There was a golden light that suffused the interior and the people. The people were dressed in varying colors of red, green, gold, (there could have neem more colors but those were the prominet ones) and sparkling elements on the clothes and the architectural features.

The people were grouped together according to the colors and they all moved in a kind of dancing procession. The closest I can describe this is like if you’ve ever seen Shaker dancing. Here is a video of it. Go from the 4 minute mark to around the 5 and half minute mark.

youtube.com/watch?v=fcoAkNU24Vw

You see that slight procession and then backward motion? Now instead of just a line of people doing it as shown in the video, imagine groups of people, hundreds, wearing the same color I mentioned doing that in formation. Then imagine that the red-dressed people moved in one direction passing the green-dressed people who were moving in the opposite direction, then the gold dressed people in another direction, and so on. In other words, if you could see all of that from above, from the ceiling of the place, you would see color swirls of the differently dressed people. Remember, the swirls are independent from each other yet side by side. Add to all of that the choral aspects such as you hear in the video but multiply to a thousand voices. I hope all of that gives you an idea of what it looked and sounded like.

I stood there transfixed by this scene. The feelings that were emanating from it were of a JOY that was absolutely irrefutable. At one point I heard myself saying emphatically in the dream, “Now, THAT! is a Christmas celebration!”. :smiley:

When did I have that dream? Around a week or so before Easter (Google Christmas-Easter connections). But here’s the thing: I haven’t gone to church in decades, since I was boy of around 12. And the extent of religion since then has been mostly in discussing it as philosophy, politically, etc. ‘Spirituality’ would more descriptive of what I’ve pondered and even at that not in a routine or particular form of it.

A part of me wanted to get nearer, join in with those people in their celebration. But as you may know from your own dreams, sometimes the itinerary, for whatever reason, is not in your control. I smiled at the scene, enjoyed the wonderful feeling from it and walked away. Shortly thereafter the dream stopped.

Now, in what you previously stated, that would be a rich field for examination in the sense of what the ‘connections’ might be. Did the subconscious/unconscious delight me with a fantastic mind movie since, hey, it’s that time of the season? Or was I fortunate enough in some trans-dimensional way to “be” at the actual location of this event? Whichever one, even the most hard-bitten nihilist would have had the biggest, goofiest and most joyful smile on his or her face. The scene and feelings were, IRREFUTABLY AWESOME. :slight_smile:

If emotion is attached to your experience it can be blinding to and hard tocseparate the message of the dream or communication from subconscious to conscious mind, it could be a beckoning to invest time into studying religious texts, I’d meditate or concentrate on it, the first organic thoughts or intuitive feeling of description you get from the idea separate from an exaggeration of emotions are usually pretty accurate.

Emotion was the message of that dream. I say that because with dreams I usually do review, as many people do, and meditate on them afterward to see which elements compare, contrast, and refer to what is occurring in the awake state. In this dream that emotion, elation, joy, was the purest message and it didn’t take too much reviewing to see how that related to my present experiences.

I agree with you that emotion could interfere with an assessment. But I’m sure you also know from your own such examinations that dream material is of a highly fluid character, ‘separations’ are not so defined. It’s like examining water on a slide under a microscope compared to examining water in situ such as a stream, a shore, the rain, etc. The former can give you some details but the latter examples can show a larger dynamic and context. In this particular dream related, emotion was front and center.

Nonetheless, I do intend to meditate on it and see where the details lead especially because of its wonderful import. Nothing wrong with reverse engineering, as long as the ‘quality’ of what is being examined is not compromised.

Can the sub-conscious be attributed in a dream(2 doors) within the sub conscious?

My experience with an auditory dream with no visuals, indicate 2 mental processes going on at the same time? Like the auditory , one with no or little content, and one with it?
And the key to the helper in two forms( old lady, young man), be indicative about some need to describing both forms? Or something like this?

An example is one mentioned, as the Polanyi dream, strictly auditory, linear and may be interpretive of a kind of Oracle, as mentioned above.

Or another, with a question to the oracle: as also mentioned, about a game being played in the unconscious, a prisoner’s dilemma occuring within the unconscious , the dream. Can the two helpers or even guardians facilitate recognition of metaphoric content?

In that event a deothness to the roles can be discerned to arise, as a third man solution to the dilemma.

Solution: at the level of contradiction, the metaphor has to include, not exclude the middle .

This requirement, is necessary for proper dream interpretation as a transcendentalky full content.
Can I thus, incorporate the Polanyi example , and give substance to the question of whether there really is a way, an exit out of one dimensionality, and pricerde from the seeming existential nothingness into the content of full being.

If I can shed light here, it may support proof positive for elevating the question worthy to ask, the oracle.

The thing is, the man in the middle in a transcendental/transactional situation, relies on the flow of suggested dream-scales, where the two tries to diminish the difference between types of helpers , I f not, they can switch roles , and become hunters.

The two drives the hunter, there by becoming hunted. by becoming non distinguishable, and that is a difficult middle position.

Oracle not accessible there, and leads either to repression - turning into dreams. Or strike out, the third. , excluding the middle, who is desperately trying to stay within.

Meno

I’m sure that when you write your observations and questions there is a rhyme and reason. But I find that trying to make the connections of what you say is at times like playing pick-up sticks. So with that in mind let’s clarify a couple or so questions at a time.

“Can the sub-conscious be attributed in a dream(2 doors) within the sub conscious?”

Are you asking if the dream of the double doors can be attributable to the subconscious? ‘Within’ it as opposed to an external location such as an OBE would imply?

“My experience with an auditory dream with no visuals…”

To my recollection, I do not remember ever having an auditory dream with no visuals. The nearest analogy that I can think of would be listening to a piece of music ‘as itself’. But even there the music would provoke some imagery.

What do you mean by, “Oracle”? And your statement of, “…worthy to ask, the oracle” ?

Let’s start with those.

This start maybe a beginning or end, depending Your appreciation of the general framework of the connective impulse leading to an intentional motive, as is traditionally viewed philosophically and psychologically. Mind You, this is uncharted territory, especially from my point of view, and it’s more inclined to concern with Jung than with a Freudian look into dreams.

I will answer that with my take on the character of symbolism as it applies to the particular dream related in this topic. I do this partly because I think that it’s the pivot of your observations and partly because I still find it tricky to interpret the manner in which you relate on said observations. There’s nothing wrong with such manner, it’s the ‘voice’ of the writer. But at times, said voice might employ free association modes that makes the sequence of interpretation by the reader a kind of patchwork.

Symbolism, by it’s very definition is of a ‘representational’ character. Thus it is not the, ‘thing-in-itself’. What that means re the dream related is that we are left with the task of discerning whether it is wholly generated by the subconscious’ apparatus, or if it’s of supraconscious or even super-physical import (remote viewing being one example of super-physical). In other words, the ‘helpers’ are either representational mirages, or they are actual entities albeit in a distant ‘locale’ that the perceiver witnesses. At this point things are fairly neat and simple, it’s either-or.

I figure you know of the Hermetic Principles. The first one, the Principle of Mentalism, states that, 'The All is Mind; the Universe is Mental". That at a foundational level all phenomena of life share a connection in the fact that they exist within the mind of ‘The All’. If such a context holds, then symbolism would be relegated to the status of, say, a photograph. It can be a good photograph, depicts things clearly and sharply, and as such still qualifies as an effective representational device. But it would no longer be considered a principle ‘generator’ of phenomena, it would only generate ‘reiterations’ of itself. Just from this we could radiate out in different considerations but here I just want to focus on the aspect of the ‘helpers’.

If the premise of ‘All is Mind’ holds, then the ‘helpers’, and for that matter all other phenomena in dreams/OBEs, are actualities, they’re ‘real’, not merely symbolic products. It would echo what you noted in an earlier post: “… for life may indeed be merely a dream.” I would only differ with you on the ‘merely’. :slight_smile:

Symbolism is not without merit, we rely on it for many things in our existence. Language itself, perhaps the premier stream of symbolism, is what we use every day and right now in this discussion. Yet, as philosophers have pointed out and what every person has noted without necessarily being a philosopher, language is a representation. It’s been said that, ‘The map is not the territory’. At least with that we have ‘territory’ as the focus. With symbolism it could be that, ‘The symbols are not the map’. And if we regard language in that manner, well, then it could very well be, ‘Language is . . . . .’ (and you fill in whatever is appropriate for you).

So, in the ‘All is Mind’ premise, the ‘helpers’, the ‘ghost’ aspects, and yes, the Oracle, could all be real. They only seem unreal because our station in existence is maybe not equipped to perceive them. Thus, perhaps, our reliance on an ethos of representation in so many of our endeavors.

Does any of that mean that I am now free to ignore all symbols? No, if when I’m driving I see a stop sign, I will stop. I don’t think ‘All is Mind’ will regard me lesser for it. :slight_smile:

Sure the representation within the absolute mind is merely a map. And that is a conscious interpretation within the symbolic content of the dream.

However that interpretation coincides with the Freudian totem , and levels down it is less figurative, more substantial, in terms of the sensible , qua, sensation , less figurative, and that is the source of major oracles, it’s source has been filtered through the muraids of time, before that, and before even that, into a downward spiral infinity, whose totem is really the beginning of phallic inference.

If your were to along Freud’s line. But Jung extends this into more dimensions and ends up with reality within epochs which bear definition within their own subsequent perimeters. Their flowing into each other is based more on metaphor then actual succession of images and ideas spliced together, mostly their gaps consist of situational variable fillers, because all representation. Is acquired after exposure, a posteriori.

It appears as flow, and my free flow only factually submerges such flow into the lower realms of increasingly excluded temporal space.

At the limit, the unfathomable looks backward at the identified essence who asks the oracle. This absolute can be accessed, but only subliminally, from beyond where limits no longer assail with scepticism and doubt. It is through the veils of doubt that certainty comes to emit a generated energy packet of quantum uncertainty, made explicit by the power of the will to communion.
The helpers need to appear to alley the uncertainty, because at the level of the inquiry , the inquirer would be thrown into apotheosis of incredible negative power, most certainly destroyed by such energy.
The helpers may be a defensive shield to the dream’s downward lunge into the unfathomable .
Nietzsche was a pioneer, he has become a helper. For me, it’s Polanyi.

I’m not sure about that segue. By, “within the symbolic content…” do you actually mean “of the symbolic content…” ? There is a difference, or maybe I’m reading it wrong. Could you please rephrase that?

I can see the totemic aspect re this discussion because of the ‘representational’ element. But what does the Freudian totem with its connotations have to do with the context of the ‘helper’ dreams? Are the ‘helpers’ of sexual significance or were you using that totem as merely an example discharged of its particular characteristics?

Interesting that you bring up Jung. He once said that God spoke through dreams and visions. That would seem to make a case for the first Hermetic principle. By the way, you didn’t say if you considered the principle a valid one.

I gather you mean, ‘allay’?

Yes, as I noted in an earlier post there may be safeguards employed. Whether by the inquirer or an ‘other’, I’m not sure.

If that is so - or more accurately, the potential for that - it implies an ‘agent’ independent of the inquirer (assuming you mean by ‘inquirer’ the person having the dream experience) who is aware of a peril that the inquirer is unaware of. Following along that line, would the frequency of ‘helper’ dreams be an indicator as to proximity to destructive regions? Similar to, let’s say, a spaceship registering the outermost traction of a black hole?

Or, upward? Though in the omnidirectional display of direction such as implied by, ‘All is Mind’, then up, down, left right, etc., may be irrelevant.

By the way, I understand how you use ‘apotheosis’, but it’s a tricky word to use in some contexts because one of its roots is, ‘the act of making someone into a god’. Then again, maybe you are of the opinion that dreams/OBEs, especially high-risk ones, are possibly preparatory for such. :slight_smile: