{A Dream-Event connection: The Workman's Hammer]}[1st December 1981]

[Redbook2:211-212][19811201:2145a]{A Dream-Event connection: The Workman's Hammer}[1st December 1981]

19811201.2145

Two points arise from this (not very remarkable) possible dream-event connection.

The dream: I was down on the [River Thames] Embankment (Cheyne Walk, gardens, Royal Hospital Road end). A workman high on the bridge* with an exclamation of annoyance, flung down his hammer. It bounced near me. Angry with his disregard of safety, I picked it up. He descended and came over to me, asking for it. I refused to return it. He threatened to take it. I said I would shout for help if he did. He tried to take it. I shouted 'Help, help!'. He desisted. I invited him to walk with me to the Police Station and reclaim it there. He agreed; but as we walked up Flood Street, I was conscious that he might be considering when to try again to remove it from me by force. I was conscious of what one might call his manual belligerence.

The event: I was informed today at work that there was a problem over the final salary and document of a secretary who finished on Friday (when she was ill, having been away since Tuesday). I had posted these, but they had not arrived. Another secretary had phoned her and asked me about this, finishing up with the suggestion that if they didn't arrive soon her husband (who is a builder, self-employed) would be around. He rang up later: he was, exactly, belligerent, and the conversation continued in an unsatisfactory way for some minutes. This left me, for various reasons, a little perturbed.

Some weeks ago, I lost my best hammer when some plumbers, who had done a fair amount of work for us, were working here. I rang them up, was told they would look for it, and heard nothing more.

*[Presumably the Albert Suspension Bridge, although it is the other end of the gardens]

[continues]

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{A Dream of Projection}[23rd October 1981]

[Redbook2:209-210][19811023:2240]{A Dream of Projection}[23rd October 1981]

19811023.2240

When I was at Cambridge I became involved briefly in the experiments of a young scientist/mathematician* who wanted to measure the body of man when {the man was} undergoing astral projection. So far as I am aware I never astrally projected, but it may be as a result of coming across his old instructions sheet that this dream occurred.

In its essentials, I was {being?} measured in body by a device when suddenly my awareness shot upward to a height of what seemed to be some yards, there levelling out to watch the scene below. On returning I was shown the results of measurement, taking the form of a large black area on a white plate.

On a second occasion I was measured – the device was like a kind of hinged bar – when I did not rise, and was shown the result: this time taking the form of a small black area on a white plate: of a similar width, but hardly moving across the plate (i.e. forwards) at all.

I may have reversed these results in memory; but I do not think I have.

I record this dream for the extraordinary intensity of the upwards movement, a kind of sudden release, a rising whoosh (but silent) quite unlike the gentle gliding movement which I have always imagined. Equally sudden was the deceleration and levelling out above; but the scene below as perceived from above, of course, has often been described.

Perhaps this is what an Indian meal does for you! (We had just had one).

*[Currently a Professor of Mathematics and [...] at a Russell Group university]

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{The Itch}[17th October 1981]

[Redbook2:208][19811017:0915]{The Itch}[17^th October 1981]

19811017.0915

I had better set-off the mention and intended implications concerning that spot in my lower forehead, by pointing out that I developed one in the exact (side-to-side) centre of my chin – just under the lip. This caused me some puzzled entertainment; but in the course of time it disintegrated, as they do!

Nevertheless... My forehead just above the continuing spot itched considerably on the way back from work yesterday; and both for that reason and irrationally, I anticipated something of significance. As it happened I met BG, an old school friend whom I had not seen for years, outside his flat, which I have passed unknowing almost daily for over a year.

He brought me up to date on news and phone numbers of others we both knew. I am not sure what, if any, significance attaches to this, although I had considered B[G], F[S] and T[E] several times very recently. But my forehead ceased to itch – perhaps it was the sherry.

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{The School of Economic Science [continued(3)]}[4th October 1981]

[Redbook2:206-207][19811004:1415c]{The School of Economic Science [continued(3)]}[4^th October 1981]

19811004.1415

[continued]

But I wonder slightly whether the recurrent dream* (again last night, but I remembered the others when I was in it) suggests that it is the next stage of this process of formal teaching/learning which is the crucial one. It may also suggest, by implication, further stages. That is if it means anything relevant at all: in last night's version, I was wondering how to re-instate the main staircase between the first and second floors directly above the ground-to-first main staircase; St. Q's only had back stairs up to the second floor (only ever, so far as I know).

*(i.e. referred to above [Redbook2:205][19811004:1415a])

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{The School of Economic Science [continued]}[4th October 1981]

[Redbook2:205-206][19811004:1415b]{The School of Economic Science [continued]}[4^th October 1981]

19811004.1415

[continued]

The method was acceptable – the teacher asks the questions and guides the answers. It is always difficult to prevent one's own education (valid or not) standing in the way of others' teaching. One can, perhaps, rely on direct experience (What, if not that?). On that yardstick some things were said which I feel to be completely wrong. For example, that the imagination cannot encompass creation; that sleep (apparently) and sleep-dreaming have no place in the expansion of the mind's range; that day-dreaming cannot lead to art, only to fantasy; that the more you practise anything, the better you become at it. Of course, I may have misunderstood these; or there may be some sophisticated technique involved. Anything is possible; but my attempt to put these points to the lecturer at the end were met after a few minutes by the suggestion that I go away and practice the technique. This is a relaxation-and-awareness-heightening exercise so basic that the school must have come across people who have done it before, not least those of a creative/artistic bent who may well have arrived at it 'unconsciously'.

One's own ego, as always, is a problem; but I am not impressed. The bookstall minder told me (when politely pressed) that the literary core of the school was the Upanishads and the (Bhagavad) Gita; this fits in with the children learning Sanskrit, I suppose (– if they had been Sufis I suppose it would have been Persian). At this stage, my intention is to stay for argument's sake, if some usefulness seems possible.

[So dreams are responsible (see last previous entry) for the final decision to attend a course one of whose first lessons is not to rely on dreams.... Quite right too, the course was useless. (cf. [Redbook1:84][19690426:2000]{Stichomancer}[26th April 1969])]

[continues]

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{The School of Economic Science}[4th October 1981]

[Redbook2:205][19811004:1415a]{The School of Economic Science}[4^th October 1981]

19811004.1415

I had been 'visited' with dreams* of a return in adult life to St. Q's**, for some kind of new teaching and learning; sometimes the images were identifiably a part of that building, sometimes not so (but still felt like my old school). When I discovered that the School of Economic Science, whose courses [SX] [a colleague at work] had mentioned, occupied 90 Queen's Gate, which I had attended as Wagners***, I decided to go definitely now instead of possibly next year. I was late, the only taxi refused me, I ran, and arrived incoherent and dripping.

*[For example [Redbook2:197][19810823:1250] above]

**[First boarding school, aged 8 to 13]

***(pre-preparatory school – Aged c.6-8.)

[continues]

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{An Epileptic Fit [continued(3)]}[4th October 1981]

[Redbook2:204][19811004:1415]{An Epileptic Fit [continued(3)]}[4^th October 1981]

19811004.1415

– despite something other?

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{An Epileptic Fit [continued]}[14th September 1981]

[Redbook2:203-204][19810914:1900b]{An Epileptic Fit [continued]}[14^th September 1981]

19810914.1900

[continued]

The rest is standard procedure, but I was left extremely perturbed by the epileptic fit. It may, of course, have saved him from collapsing into a printing machine [later] – it seems that he is unlikely to be allowed on the course. It also may have helped me to get on the course, since I was let through, when I refused to give my employer's name and telephone number ('we may have to contact them'), by the very [same] Administrative Officer who had arrived first to help me with the boy.

The first thing that I remember reading on the train back was the religious article in The Times today, whose first paragraph described a Charismatic leader inducing what appeared to be an epileptic type fit.

Before reading this, I had wondered – on the basis of possibilities of connection only – whether I might not have somewhere taken the wrong path, and be creating myself a monster. Later it occurred to me that there are good precedents for the setting off of epileptic-type fits[,] by men of singular goodness, notably in the Gospels; although they tend to cure them, whereas I felt completely impotent in that respect. There may well be a perfectly scientific explanations for the presence of one person setting off fits in another, even though unknown to our science; or this may have been just a co-incidence. W later pointed out that no one knows what goes on inside an epileptic fit: it is not necessarily 'evil' or (my word) 'dark'; and this is possible.

But my first and lasting feeling is that great care is needed. I am not uncorrupt, despite myself – perhaps because of myself.

[continues]

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{An Epileptic Fit}[14th September 1981]

[Redbook2:202-203][19810914:1900a]{An Epileptic Fit}[14^th September 1981]

19810914.1900

[continued]

I queued at London College of Printing [to register for] for my course: talked to a black boy and, rather more, to a white boy on the same course. He seemed chatty but slightly slow. We moved forward. Just before we turned the corner of the stairs, a young Asian man walked past and seemed to stare very hard at my forehead; although, as is often the way with these things, he might well not have been aware of this. I noticed it, however, and considered it for a while.

I do not remember whether I was still considering it, after we turned the corner, when the white boy, facing away from me just after someone had passed, began to shake. The shaking became worse and as he slowly turned to his right I said 'Are you alright?' or something similar. He twisted in towards me and I took hold of him as he collapsed; I was asking for a Doctor, etc.. I lowered him to the floor and kept his head sideways, trying to get someone to watch his tongue as he vomited saliva and bit his lip. He may have cried out – I'm not sure.

[continues]

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{Physical Signs}[14th September 1981]

[Redbook2:201-202][19810914:1900]{Physical Signs}[14^th September 1981]

19810914.1900

I remembered later*, for what it is worth, that just before going to bed I had suffered a momentary headache across (I think) my upper forehead; that in the night I had woken with a ringing within my head (W could not hear it, but I still could under the blankets); and that on the way to work my forehead itched (around and above the white spot just between and above my eyebrows, which has been there for a few months now, attracting it seems to me some curious glances – or am I imagining it?). In the mirror at work I saw a red area just above that spot, touching it; but later the itch ceased and the red faded. Although I thought I had slept well, I was desperately tired, and still am; W thinks she remembers me recounting another dream in the night, but cannot remember what. She says she may have dreamt it.

At lunchtime I walked in the Park**. That curious newness, unfamiliarity, of things presumably seen may times before, was noticeable. I had a strong feeling of being on the point of some breakthrough. My appetite is still almost gone: I eat a few peanuts at lunchtime – can't finish the bag – after a roll at breakfast. I eat supper but do not seem to feel any need for it; if I have a second course I feel grossly overfed, and if I eat out – which is only for fun with W – I usually can't finish, and feel unwell (with stomach pain) afterwards.

*[See last previous entry]

**[Hyde Park]

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{A Dream of Leaving, and the Dark Horseman}[14th September 1981]

[Redbook2:200-201][19810914:0810]{A Dream of Leaving, and the Dark Horseman}[14^th September 1981]

19810914.0810

In my dream I sat in a classroom trying to understand a boring video quiz game. Everyone else played; I could not. The teacher stood by the door. I stood and asked to leave; he refused permission. I went back to my desk but when he was at the front of the class I went anyway, saying that I would fill myself a bad report form; there was nothing for me there.

I ran innocent through the evening of the town on the hill – perhaps naked, I am not sure. Lights were coming on. I took a slightly different route from the one I recognised, and found myself at an edge over which I had to drop without being able to see the bottom in darkness. But the drop turned out to be not heavy.

At some stage, I came to another edge and saw, moving slowly across the evening horizon, the dark cloud shape of a vast horseman*. No one else was around to see it.

It was dark outside. At some stage I saw bright children in a supermarket, and the old argument was rehearsed, this time correctly: These children are qualifying for the good jobs. My answer was not: but I wish for a lesser qualification and a lesser job (as it was last time, waking) but: I wish for no job.

I know that I did reach some sort of destination, but not what was there.

I awoke with, and have (fading) still, that same innocence of mind and body.

*moving Northwards I think – in the same direction as me, anyway.

The image of the dark horseman, in the evening sky beyond the edge, often returns to me. <930116>

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{A Dream of Bicycles and a Collapsing Tower}[8th September 1981]

[Redbook2:198-199][19810908:1800]{A Dream of Bicycles and a Collapsing Tower}[8^th September 1981]

1981.09.08.1800

I suspect that this may be simply the alcohol-induced working of an over-active imagination – I was out with [my cousin] [IMacD] last night; but just in case....

At the 'T' Junction in C I encountered (just after a similar, vaguer incident?) a group on bicycles who had pushed their way straight up from the Nursery and through the wood. I castigated them for taking bicycles where there was in fact no path; they said there was a path*, and it began to look as though a fight might develop; I called back to the others (including [K[O]? Z? S?) and gave the bicyclists (rather arrogantly, I thought) 3 minutes to get off. They left (down the track towards the Manor), threatening revenge.

As I was asking the others whether they thought I had acted wrongly – I think they thought I had – there was the sound of running feet from the wood through which they had come. [EC] ran up, put something in the van [sic], slammed the door and ran back to the wood again. I asked (e.g.) 'Do you need help?' and, receiving no answer but assuming a problem with the bicyclists, followed him. A little way into the wood he stopped just in front of me. Some kind of high structure – an extractor tower (wires ran past us)? – swayed dangerously and crashed to the ground; and the wires running past us along the track all jumped. E said urgently, without looking round: 'Where are you, [Hunter?]'

I do not recall more. I only record it because of the slight possibility of a physical significance in those events, in view of the last. I do not believe there is any mental/symbolic significance.

*[There is now]

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{Sufi-ism – and Gnosticism}[23rd August 1981]*

[Redbook2:198][19810823:0105]{Sufi-ism – and Gnosticism}[23rd August 1981]*

19810823*.0105

The number of resonances found in Rafael's 'The Teachers of Gurdijeff' (which I have finished) and Burke's 'Among the Dervishes' is startling. In particular, the passage quoted from the Apocryphal Act of John – the Dance, and the Cross – is intense.

*[24^th? See last previous entry date & time]

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{A Dream: St. [Q]? (corrupted)}[23rd August 1981]

[Redbook2:197][19810823:1250]{A Dream: St. [Q]? (corrupted)}[23rd August 1981]

19810823.1250

Dreaming yesterday (Saturday) morning, I dreamt I stood in an empty [U] House (St. [Q])*, discussing its conversion as a school for another form of development; transferring to a semi-doze, I became involved with financial details, numbers, length of stay, framework, social organisation, degenerating (perhaps) to plans for a shock encounter initiation to avoid later distraction by sexual curiosity and ambition.... The theme of U House as a Net base is, of course, already part of my plot-structure after '[0]'.

*[First boarding school, aged 8-13]

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{Self-employment?}[22nd August 1981]

[Redbook2:197][19810822:0015]{Self-employment?}[22nd August 1981]

19810822.0015

I have found recently that weekends do not feel as though they are going to end, and that evenings feel like Friday evenings. I have a strong feeling that I shall soon cease to be employed in a strict sense; and relationships at work are in conflict. There are, of course, approved plans to go part time, and personal plans to start a micro computer / word processor / printer bureau. But this may go further than just those things.

[PostedBlogger14022015]

{[8]}[13th August 1981]

[Redbook2:196][19810813:0020]{[8]}[13^th August 1981]

19810813.0020

While I was walking home this evening, considering the presence and significance of the [O], it occurred to me to call the first book '[O]'.

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{An Experience: High Level Conference}[11th August 1981]

[Redbook2:195][19810811:2320]{An Experience: High Level Conference}[11^th August 1981]

19810811.2320

[continued]

But on the same weekend, dozing in daytime with [W], I became strongly aware of a sense that as I waked to this World, I passed out of awareness in another, where discussions were held and plans made for my existence in this World. This may well, of course, be the result of literary suggestion; but it was strong.

I was noticeably more relaxed waking from these various dreams, even on the Monday for 'work'.

[PostedBlogger12-13022015]

{A Dream of the Devil; A Dream of the Soul*; A Dream of the Church}[11th August 1981]

[Redbook2:195][19810811:2320]{A Dream of the Devil; A Dream of the Soul*; A Dream of the Church}[11^th August 1981]

19810811.2320

Fragments of three dreams a few nights ago which I remembered more clearly but now do not – in one the Devil featured, in traditional guise, but was made ridiculous; in another a blonde girl rejected my advances at a party, until too late – was she then persuaded to seek me upstairs because troubled by the devil from the first (and connected?) dream? – ; in the last, I helped prepare a church for a service, and then could not find a way out without disturbing the congregation, who included various elderly female acquaintances. All, but particularly the last, brought a feeling not so much of significance as of familiarity, which is why I have not rushed to record them.

*[?]

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{Higher or Further Education}[9th August 1981]

[Redbook2:194][19810809:0020a]{Higher or Further Education}[9^th August 1981]

19810809.0020

[continued]

Annan's paragraph* about Cambridge becoming just another stage in education described exactly my reactions on arriving there – and on leaving.

*[Noel Annan, Provost of King's College Cambridge 1956-1966, in the Times Literary Supplement of the previous week – see last previous entry.]

[PostedBlogger11for10022015]

{Truth in Art}[9th August 1981]

[Redbook2:193-194][19810809:0020]{Truth in Art}[9^th August 1981]

19810809.0020

While reading on King's [College, Cambridge] and Edith Sitwell in the T[imes] L[iterary] S[upplement] of last week, it occurs to me that talk of 'truth' in art may refer to the part of the mind from or through which the art's expression springs. For example, one may distinguish a political verse and a personal poem: the former may be as technically excellent as the latter, and to its author as true; nevertheless it is largely the product of that rationalisation which structures political thinking (even if it need not inspire it), and therefore the verse as poetry does not “ring true”: it lacks integrity, because the author has not fully integrated himself in its production. The personal poem may be naïve or even, in its implications, extreme; its author may not, on reflection, even agree with it, although his disagreement is unlikely to be violent: if it were, he would probably have lacked the dispassionate ability to write it. But as a work of art (rather than craft) it speaks from a part of his mind which is not structured, and is apolitical (I am too tired and during this last sentence have lost the thread).

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{Science and Magic}[8th August 1981]

[Redbook2:193][19810808:2320a]{Science and Magic}[8^th August 1981]

19810808.2320

[continued]

The difference between Science and magic is the difference between what we do, and what we don't, know that we don't understand.

(Slightly misremembered....).

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{Outer and Inner Decentralisation}[8th August 1981]

[Redbook2:193][19810808:2320]{Outer and Inner Decentralisation}[8^th August 1981]

19810808.2320

[(L)] The move towards decentralisation proceeds at present in parallel within the outer and the inner worlds of human culture.

(L:19810804.1410)

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{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty? [continued(3)]}[4th July 1981]

[Redbook2:191A-192A][19810704:0500d]{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty? [continued(3)]}[4^th July 1981]

1981.07.04.0500

[continued]

I find that the process of writing a record of these dreams often helps my clarification and interpretation of them – correctly, I hope. It seems plain that my creative writing 'symbolism' is coming together more obviously with my 'unconscious'(?) 'symbolism'. These dreams are to some extent, if 'I' am 'right', all basically concerned with the same problem. For example, in the last dream**** the Action aspect within my own mind seems to be encouraging the Revelation aspect within my own mind to act by revealing her information – although one might have expected (probably wrongly!) it to be the other way round. The room often used for visions*** might well be my creative writing, perhaps as an alternative to the 'ghost' overtones of Dream No. 2** – which may owe something to to a comment in 'The Mystic Bible' (which I have been in doubt about) that the psychic faculties are lower than the 'I' consciousness (?). Equally, in the first dream* it may be significant that the crime is to break glass.

****[Dream (3)(b), recorded above at [Redbook2:191A][19810704:0500c]]

***[Dream (3)(a), recorded last but one above at [Redbook2:190A][19810704:0500b]]

**[Dream (2) recorded last but two above at [Redbook2:190A][19810704:0500a]]

*[Dream (1), recorded last but three above at [Redbook2:189A-190A][19810704:0500]]

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{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty? [continued]}[4th July 1981]

[Redbook2:191A][19810704:0500c]{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty? [continued]}[4^th July 1981]

1981.07.04.0500

[continued]

[(3)](b) In the second part [of the dream] in a particular organisation or institute, a girl was refusing to give some film which she had. She was a lovely, tall blonde girl, but slightly scatter-brained. +M (…) was attempting to talk her gently into giving, rather as one might talk a potential suicide down from a high window ledge (indeed, there was some feeling that this was exactly what he was doing. (I think he may have offered her a cup of tea)). She was in great uncertainty. He did not attempt to cajole her, but simply talked her logically through the decision. At the end of this, I distinctly heard him say to her: “Oh(?), [Hunter, Hunter, Hunter, Hunter, Hunter]!” (or was it four times?? – possibly, but probably five) – not with any tone other than (I now realise, remembering the tone) Love. (I think that maybe in the end she did give the film). (That dream was in fact this morning.)

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{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty?}[4th July 1981]

[Redbook2:190A][19810704:0500b]{A Dream of Visions, and the Soul's Uncertainty?}[4^th July 1981]

1981.07.04.0500

[continued]

(3) Two parts of this dream I remember:

(a) One in which I was in a particular room and began to conjure up visions around all the walls; someone warned me against this, but I said it was alright because I often used this room for this purpose.

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{A Dream of the Occult}[4th July 1981]

[Redbook2:190A][19810704:0500a]{A Dream of the Occult}[4^th July 1981]

1981.07.04.0500

[continued]

(2) During the course of a dream, I was (while descending stairs, in company) on the verge of making contact with some form of unseen/spirit world (i.e. world of spirits). This possibility so alarmed me that I hesitated. (On waking from the dream, I immediately resolved not, or at least not precipitately, to enter into this kind of adventure: a reaction which, when I was more fully awake next day, disappointed me a little).

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{A Dream of Forgetfulness}[4th July 1981]

[Redbook2:189A-190A][19810704:0500]{A Dream of Forgetfulness}[4^th July 1981]

(In Germany, I think)*

1981.07.04.0500

Several dreams of apparent significance during the last few days – although (2)** may have been before I left the U.K.. A sudden change of this sort tends to produce these – so is their 'significance' not reliably felt?

Not all of these may have been remembered fully.

(1) I am observer of a deliberate petty crime – the smashing of glass in a street, I think. Others point to the culprit, who seems unconcerned. As they gather round him, suddenly they all seem to forget he is there, and continue on their way. I alone follow the culprit into a shop, but no one else is interested in my explanations. He re-emerges, and during some form of altercation says he can make me quack like a duck (shades of Gurdjieff?). The interesting point is that I find myself quacking like a duck and it seems quite natural (in a way which I do not think I am capable of imagining during waking consciousness). It is only when I cease to quack that I realise how peculiar it was. But I do realise. (In retrospect it seems to me that the difference between me and the others is that they continue under the power of imposed forgetfulness, whereas that power, although exercisable over me, does not continue once its attention or concentration is removed from me.

*[Note added subsequently!]

**[See next entry.]

 

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