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.