“Was not their mistake once more bred of the life of slavery that they had been living?—a life which was always looking upon everything, except mankind, animate and inanimate—‘nature,’ as people used to call it—as one thing, and mankind as another, it was natural to people thinking in this way, that they should try to make ‘nature’ their slave, since they thought ‘nature’ was something outside them” — William Morris


Friday, December 2, 2011

Psychedelic Death

After you Die, You See This...

When I awoke this morning it was to the telltale rushing sound that indicates that part of my CPAP machine that pushes air into my lungs was disconnected. The new tube is a little loose at one end.

Then I remembered my dream. It was the beginning of an after-death phowa (ejection of consciousness) dream: another telltale sign I wasn't breathing right. (I have sleep apnea and if you search for apnea in the search bar you'll find my posts about that.)

In my dream I was eating pieces of huge magic mushrooms (!) and was repurchasing copies of Dungeons and Dragons books: the Monster Manual, Deities and Demigods, and Player's Handbook (see above). Yes, glowing demonic faces with horns, riiighht....

At the time I recall thinking: I'm not tripping hard enough to be completely absorbed in the trip—should I eat more or just leave it? This coincides, I think, with having just enough air to remain breathing (semi-breathing), rather than the full on out-of-body dreams I was having every night at one point a couple of years ago.

I mean every few minutes my brain would dump its DMT and I would go into a world of pulsing colors and strange alien beings. According to the brain scan I had I was only in REM for 2 minutes a night for over 15 years—yet those few moments a night felt like thousands of years. Sometimes on waking the pulsations would continue in my visual field, I mean, really vivid: animated Yukultji Napangati (search for her name in the bar). In the dreams I would meet my Buddhist teacher and he would explain that I had just died, and how to meditate in the after death state (bardo). Every night. It was relentless!

I almost miss them...but being alive is quite nice : )

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