Messages

I've read several books on NDE's and one of them pointed out that NDE researchers often run across people who have had a "Fear-Death-Experience" - one in which they thought they were going to die and consequently left their body, saw a bright light or tunnel, dead-relative, etc.  One experience in particular that I remember being recounted in the book involved and 18-year-old soldier at boot-camp who foolishly removed the pin from what he thought was a live hand-grenade.  He accidentally dropped the grenade and thought he was going to be blown to bits.  He left his body, and had other things associated with a NDE (can't remember the exact description), even though it was in fact a "training grenade" and he was in no physical danger!  

The particular author of this book contended that these cases typically aren't reported to us in most books because the authors don't want to cast doubt on the validity of NDEs.  This author also mentioned that many who have had NDEs recount being met, not by a dead-relative, but by someone who is still alive or by a make-believe character.  Kids often reported being met by the Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, etc.  

But yes, the fear-death-experience is apparently real. : )

My wife, when we were dating, periodically had dreams where she was being chased by bad guys.  Sometimes it was criminals, sometimes the FBI, sometimes one guy, sometimes more.  But she had had a variation of this dream quite often for many years.

I told her that in her dreams, instead of running away, she should confront the bad guys.  Mind you, she doesn't do lucid dreaming or anything like that, but I figure that if in waking life you put an idea in your mind, that in your dreams you will do it.

Sure enough, one time in her dream when she was being chased by one of these guys, instead of running, she turned around and stabbed him in the gut with a butcher knife!  Not only that, after stabbing him she "knew" that that alone wasn't enough to kill him, so she grabbed the knife with both hands and yanked the knife upward.  She said that it was one of the most visceral and realistic dreams she's ever remembered.  And sure enough, - that was the last time she ever had that recurring dream!

I'm sure there are a lot of psychological and spiritual opinions regarding confronting fears in dreams, but my guess is that dreams like these are symbolic representations of issues we need to resolve in our waking life.  And bringing resolution to the symbolic, recurring situation in our dreams coincides with resolving the corresponding issue in our waking life.  But I don't think violence is necessary in the dream.  If my wife had just faced the attacker and told him she wasn't afraid of him anymore, that would have worked just as well.  In fact, if she had struck up a conversation she might even have been able to learn what issue he represented in her waking life!

I learned shorthand in high school (I took two semesters of it because my girlfriend took it).  I don't remember what style it is (Forkner or Gregg rings a bell).  It's actually come in quite useful throughout the years.

Learning shorthand takes practice because the various symbols and abbrieviations have to become second nature.

If you're not concerned about knowing an "official" shorthand, I'd suggest you make up your own and then practice it until it becomes second nature.  Start by identifying the various "sounds", words, phrases, and letter combinations that occur most freqently in your writing such as "ing", "and", "ed", "the", "tion" and then come up with simple notations to substitute in for those.  For example the word "the" becomes a dash, the sound "ing", usually at the end of a word becomes a smile, "out-of-body" becomes oob, etc.  A captial letter can mean one sound (such as "St") whereas a small one doesn't.  Avoid dotting i's or crossing t's.  Use little shortcuts to denote each different vowel sound so you don't have to write out vowels or combinations of them.  Make your shortcuts simple lines and symbols that can be written with one stroke without lifting the pencil.

Start with just a couple shortcuts and keep adding more as you get comfortable and as they become automatic.  Don't forget to go back and re-read your text frequently for practice so that reading your own shorthand becomes automatic also.

A good book on the topic is "The Self-Aware Universe" by Amit Goswami.  

No offense to all of the mystical, spiritual, new age sorts - but what I often dislike about books on this subject is that they often ultimately amount to wild speculation based only on personal experience.  

What I like about this book is that it is written by a PhD Physics Professor at the University of Oregon, which lends it a certain scientific gravitas necessary to be taken seriously by a wider audience then the "new-agey" type approaches to consciousness and spirituality.

The author names his theory "monistic idealism" - the idea that consciousness (or awareness) is the ground of everything - i.e. the physical universe was created by (is an epiphenomina of) consciousness rather than vice versa (rationalism).

It's a fascinating discussion on the topic, well-balanced between scientific and spiritual components.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0874777984/qid=1107815733/sr=2-1/ref=pd_ka_b_2_1/103-8514585-6909455

I've had 6-8 OBEs now, - all RTZ projections, but I notice that I typically don't feel much in they way of vibes.  I tend to wake up with very subtle vibes going on and am able to then get out of my body.  But I've been wondering if I should be trying to get stronger vibes, figuring I might be more lucid once out of my body if I go the vibes going stronger before exiting.  Friday night was better - woke up with vibes in forehead area and they were "mild" which is a step up for me - and I was able to get out.

But then last night I woke up with buzzing sound and stronger vibes in my lower back - but I didn't even recognize the signs!  Not being quite awake I thought there was a bee crawling on my back and I spent several minutes trying to make it go away (so I wouldn't get stung)!  Finally after a few minutes it struck me "hey, - these are vibes!"  and I tried to go with it, but the window of opportunity was lost because the vibes were already fading away.

BTW, do stronger vibes relate to more lucidity once you are are out of your body?  i.e. When I wake up with vibes should I try to make those vibes stronger before attempting to project? []

I'm new to OBEs (3 in last 2 months).  Last night I spent 45 minutes in a mind-awake/body-asleep type of state and experienced a variety of internal sensations and thought for sure that I would OBE, but the vibrations never came, so I let it go.  A few hours later I woke up and decided to try again.

While trying I drifted off to sleep and saw an aluminum extension ladder going from an inner courtyard/entry way up to the second floor of a building.  I was "under" the ladder and I could see three numbers spaced across one of the lower rungs of the ladder. The # on the left was a "5" and I knew that this meant that I could have an OBE by walking up the ladder, but the number on the right was a "2" and because it was lower than the other number this somehow indicated to me that while I *could* OBE the "conditions weren't right". (At the time I knew what the middle number meant, but I can't remember now)  Anyway, I was a bit disappointed but figured that if the conditions weren't right I wouldn't do it.  But then the right hand number morphed into a "6" and I remember thinking, "Okay, - that's good enough for me!".

I went around to the front of the ladder and climbed up. While I climbed I tried to figure out whether I was out of my body and at some point I concluded, "yes, I'm out - it worked".  (In retrospect I think this was a lucid dream and not an OBE since I don't remember seperating from my body). When I reached the top of the ladder I was on a flat surface in total darkness.  I demanded "clarity now!" and "awareness now!" (tip from William Buhlman books) several times until I could see.  I was in what appeared to be a large vacant office space - no partitions.

I saw a woman who looked like an office worker sort of moving towards me, but she was flashing on and off kind of like a strobe light effect - I was a little wary of her since I'm new to this.  I began walking toward the other end of the floor.  At one point a middle-aged woman kind of "got in my face" and I tried asking her who she was and what she represented, but I had a lot of difficulty getting the words out (as if my voice was paralyzed).  When I got to the end of the floor I looked out the windows onto the street below.  There was a secretary type woman at a desk and another woman with a baby came out of a nearby office, apparently casually interested in what I was doing there.

Suddenly I remembered that I had put a playing card in my family room for OBE verification purposes and I got really excited about taking a look at it.  I kind of ran/skipped back to the other end of the floor, passing a middle-aged, balding businessman in a suit on the way.  I came to a bank of elevators and took one down to the ground floor and went out onto the sidewalk.  Never mind that I didn't know where I was or how to get to my family room.  It was kind of wet/drizzly out and in retrospect I think the location was the mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles.  I remember being confident that I was going to find the card and objectively verify the OBE, but was also a little concerned that the experience might not last long enough.  As I started walking down the street I awoke back in my body.

Nothing particular remarkable about the contents of the experience except that I thought the ladder mechanism was an interesting was to obtain lucidity.

Supposedly, yes.  But more likely you will be in what has been termed the "Real Time Zone" (RTZ) which means that you have left your body and are in an energy environment that appears very similar to our real physical world except it is very fluid and dream like.  So for example there may be doors or windows where you don't expect them, or things in your house will be missing or added or different colors, etc.  And your environment may shift very quickly to a dreamlike enviornment or to an "Astral Plane" proper - i.e. you go through a door and you are somewhere entirely different.

The fluid nature of this environment probably has to do with one's ability to focus and maintain a high degree of lucidity.  Some claim that they can wander over to their friends and neighbor's houses etc. and see them eating dinner or whatever, but I've never made it 30 feet before things start shifting drastically.  Then again, I'm a beginner and I'm sure others will have had much different experience with it.

Actually if you read the text of the bill, it doesn't actually give people a choice as to where they serve.  It states that all men and women 18-26 would register and that some would be drafted into the military.  Those who aren't drafted would then serve in a civilian capacity.

Although I would like to believe that the Bush Administration would try to re-enstate the draft (this would kill them off politically because Americans aren't invested enough in Iraq to support it), - it appears not to be true.  Both of the pending bills were introduced by a group of Democratic lawmakers to try to force the war issue into Americans consciousness.  Their point is that if soldiers have to be dying in Iraq then people should have to consider whether they would want their own kids over there.  No Republicans are behind this legislation and the bills are not likely to ever even come to a vote.

Bush Administration officials have repeatedly denied any interest in reviving the draft, and although I hardly believe them on anything else I believe them on this one.

Regarding the reason why the draft boards are seeking to refill 10,000 or so positions, it's because those positions - appointed for 30 year terms in 1970 (or something like that) - expired in 2000.  So they need to be filled.

Regarding the Selective Service's budget being given $28 million dollars to "get ready".  They weren't given an additional $28 million, but rather their total budget is $26 million and that hasn't changed much over the years.

If you research this issue on the web you will find that there doesn't appear to be a Republican plot to re-enstate the draft.

ASMRFruit,

I read the link you posted and it was interesting.  I personally lean toward no reincarnation, but rather some avenue for continued spiritual growth after physical death here.  The article you linked to made a good point about the numbers - there are so many people living today (6 billion) that we couldn't have all had multiple past lives.  In theory one could argue that there are many different planets, dimensions, etc. we could have reincarnated from or to, but that seems like stretching it to cling to a theory.  

I personally have not experienced past lives, but can understand those who have being "convinced" that they had lived before.  However, the article also made mention of the "Holographic Universe" book which (I read it a while ago) was a bit cheesy and unscientific, but did make the point about the possibility of us experiencing other lives/memories stored, holographically in the fabric of the universe.  

Likewise Carl Jung theorizes the "collective unconscious" which is akin to the psychological equivalent of the Akashic records concept.  So in theory, if others' live events are stored somewhere we could access and experience snippets of them and thus come away with the impression that they were actually lives that we had actually lived.

No one seems to have responded to your question about having received any indication during AP that denies reincarnation, but I tend to think astral / psychic experiences are highly subjective and wouldn't typically trust someone elses experience to contain universal truth.  If you read the many accounts out here some affirm Gods, angels, aliens, and everything else which leads me to believe that any type of astral experience, religious vision, etc. is a combination of someone dipping into the cosmic energy of the universe and interpreting it through their own unique lens.

Interesting question, though.  And like I said I'm undecided but lean toward some other explanation.

I think we humans are far too eager to externalize evil to something outside of ourselves, rather than acknowledge our own complicity in acts committed by others.  This is especially symptomatic of western society where our individuality is very strong, and we don't associate as strongly with a larger tribe, per se.

When a gangbanger kills someone it's easy to say, "He's evil.  Execute him and justice will have been serverd."  But it doesn't solve the problem.  I think a healthier approach is to think of our society as a business and each of us as co-owners.  Criminals are defective parts that we churn out and thus a "quality-control" problem.  Rather than dealing with the "blowback" of higher and higher rates of defective products we need to all take ownership, find the underlying causes and address those problems.

On a global level, the same concept applies.  We are all the human race, and at a soul level we all are responsible to some degree for the state of humanity.  Terrorists are a symptom.  As a global society we need to identify the underlying cause and address it.  Just killing the terrorists won't bring about long term peace or stability.

Furthermore, mystics from various religious traditions (in addition to certain schools of thought in psychology and physics) assert that seperateness is an illusion.  We think of ourselves as 6 billion different people, when in fact we are 6 billion individual manifestations of the same creative force.  Like waves in the ocean.  Individual waves don't actually exist - a wave is simply energy passing through the water and temporarily changing it's shape.  All waves are part of the ocean - they aren't individual waves.  Likewise, Hindu scriptures use the example of two islands in a sea.  They appear above the water as two seperate entities, but in fact under the water they are part of the same land formation.

Christ said, "The Father and I are one" and he also said that he wanted for us to be one with him in the same way that he is one with the father.  Traditional Christianity uses the first half of that assertion to support the believe that "Jesus is God" but misses the real meaning - i.e. that Jesus reached enlightenment by entirely subjugating his individual ego to the will of God.  He recognized that he was not seperate from God, but was a manefestation of God. This truth is also why Jesus asserted that "whatever you have done to the least of my children, you have done to me".  He meant that literally, not figuratively.  If we can also come to this realization, not just on a mental level but on a spiritual level then we realize the pointlessness of intolerance and casting moral judgements and the need to do our part, through love of others, in bringing about fundamental spiritual change universally.

The connection between "enlightenment" and ability to project is interesting.  I read a book last year on "Centering Prayer" or "Contemplative Prayer", which is essentially a form of meditation practiced by Catholic monks.  In this particular book ("Open Heart, Open Mind" by Thomas Keating) the author, an old Catholic monk describes how various phenomina such as levitating occur among the monks but they are generally considered distractions on the spiritual path.  He cites the example of one particular monk who kept levitating during certain group activities and had to be asked to leave because it was distracting the group.

Another writer, who also has a background as a Catholic monk (Jim Marion) in his book "Putting on the Mind of Christ" essentially describes the path of spiritual growth as a gradual "rise in consciousnes".  To explain it better he fits the "Christian" path into a model of consciousness levels that was proposed by Ken Wilber.  One of the levels is the "Psychic Level", and Marion explains that when we begin operating at the Psychic Level of consciousness that various things like Astral Projection, healing powers, etc. occur, but that it's very easy to get so enamored with these things that we can get stuck at the Psychic level and fail to progress further toward enlightenment (or what he calls the "Christ Consciousness").

Another interesting piece to for Christians is on the web at www.chrmysticaloutreach.com . It's by a man named LM Richardson and describes his meditative path as a Christian.

Not to denigrate AP, but I get the sense from several writers that psychic phenonmia that accompany spiritual growth are "neat", perhaps but that many progress spiritually without experiencing any of these phenomina and that the presence of these phenomina should not be viewed as evidence of spirituality.

In fact, remember in the Bible when Christ said that in the end times many would come to him and say "Lord, Lord, look at all these great things I did in your name - healings, etc." and he would reply to them something to the effect of "get away from me, I never knew you."  Getting away from the arrogant and closed-minded "we're saved and you're not" mentality of orthodox Christianity, what Christ was referring to here was not people approaching him personally, but rather the attainment of enlightenment or the "Christ" consciousness.  He is saying that no matter what great spiritual things we do, we will not enter into what he referred to as the "Kingdom of Heaven" until we attain enlightenment.

Lest we think those "extremists" are really that different than ourselves I would suggest that if an Arab nation invaded our country and toppled our government under the guise of "liberating" us, we would also be driven to extreme measures.  Given our American pride and our gun culture and our resistence to Islam and a Islam-based government I'd guess that there would be quite a healthy resistance and that our "freedom fighters" - aka "terrorists" would also resort to kidnappings, suicide bombings and the like.

Also, although being kidnapped and executed is surely scary I doubt it's any more painful than the deaths that await most of us.  Nor is it more painful than the deaths experienced by the tens of thousands of civilans that have been killed by both sides in the current conflict in Iraq.  And I'm sure that many of those Iraqis unlucky enough to be interrogated by Americans experienced a lot more pain than those hostages.

I'm not going to agree wholeheartedly that prior to incarnating the hostages and the militants agreed to all of this, but I am going to assert that what is going on with these few hostages in Iraq is no worse than what is going on every day all around the world, and has been going on for thousands or millions of years.  It's human nature playing itself out in gazillions of different ways.  But I've tried to move beyond the "evil" v. "not evil" paradigm because I do believe there is a cosmic "plan" of sorts and I just trust that ultimately it is all bringing about a rise in consciousness.

Hi cat,

Regarding telling the difference between an OBE and a lucid dream: for me it was easy most of the time because with the OBEs I was awake mostly and I consciously had to try to get out of my body.  As I mentioned, once I just sort of woke up to the feeling of being flipped over and I was out.  Other times I've had to roll out or sit up and out.  Once I got stuck half-way out at the waist and experienced pain when I tried to get out beyond that as if the bottom half of me was stuck and I shouldn't try to force it.  I eventually got out all the way.  And then, once out I was there standing in my bedroom thinking "wow! I'm out".

With lucid dreams, mine have typically occurred where I'm dreaming and suddenly something strikes me as "not normal" and I realize (eureka!) I must be dreaming.  For example once I was walking on water and it just struck me - "hey, I can't normally walk on water...wait a minute, this is a dream!!!"

There were a couple of times where I suspected it was an OBE but I didn't specifically remember getting out of my body and I wasn't in my bedroom.  So those are kind of questionable.  

Also, my OBEs haven't been particularly lucid in that after I'm out of my body I seem to make an initial decision or so - i.e. I think I'll go downstairs or I think I'll go outside, etc.  but at some point shortly thereafter my surroundings have morphed dramatically and I'm reacting to events rather than exercising any control over the situation.

All of the experiences that I know were OBEs started out with me getting out of my body.  Then, in some of them I just tromped around my house a bit.  In others I seemed to get to another place in RTZ (Real Time Zone) such as a park that I know or a building.  And in others I tried to project beyond the real time zone and seemed to make it.  For example in one instance, wanting to project beyond the RTZ to the astral plane proper I used a technique recommended by Buhlman (Adventures Beyond the Body, etc.) where I went outside picked a point in the night sky about 45 degrees up and flew toward the stars at that point.  I went through a "warp speed" type of phenomina, like on Star Trek and did indeed end up somewhere that I figured was not RTZ (but without looking at my journal I can't remember much about it now).

In Astral Dynamics, RB mentions projecting directly to an astral plane, as opposed to just stepping out of your body.  I took this to mean that via your intent you project directly beyond the RTZ.  In this case I'm not sure exactly how you would differentiate between that and a lucid dream unless you specifically remembered being pseudo-awake and trying to project.  Keep in mind though, I'm a beginner so those with more experience maybe don't have that problem.

Military commandos undergo extreme physical hardship during their training, including "interrogation" sessions and being dropped in the middle of nowhere without food or water and having to find their way out while eating bugs to survive.  Why do they do this?  Because they know that ultimately they are stronger and better prepared because of it.  And because of that they are better able to be of service to their country.

So, in theory, souls that choose to incarnate physically can be thought of as "spiritual commandos" perhaps.  Accepting physical hardship because of the spiritual growth that it brings and because in doing so they are able to provide service to others.

Or if you think of our little egos as the actors in the grand cosmic play, then souls taking on particular lots in life are like actors taking on particular roles.  Does an actor who portrays Ghandi have a worse role than the one who portrays Bill Gates?

Personally, I'm not convinced of the "we choose all the things that happen to us" assertion.

While people may or may not project while sleeping (I'm still not sure if I buy that), I don't think conscious, remembered projections are exactly "natural". And I believe just as people have different physical aptitudes, I'm guessing people vary widely in their innate ability to learn this particular skill.

I read recently that introverts (i.e. those 25% of the population who officially fall into the psychological classification according to the Myers-Brigg personality test or similar tests) are much more likely to remember their dreams.  I'm guessing (but I may be wrong here) that those most successful at AP are introverts in that their mental energy tends to be more focused on what's going on inside them (emotions, fantasy's, existential questioning, etc.) than what goes on outside of them (career, social life, etc.).  So I tend to think that one's innate psychological makeup affects one's ability in this area.  

I think it's a disservice for various books to say "anyone can do it with these simple exercises".  From the accounts out here, that clearly isn't the case.

When I first tried this I got to the vibrational state within three weeks.  The vibes were so strong it felt like someone driving a semi-truck through my body.  Strangely enough, I've never been able to reproduce vibrations like that since.  Why? Your guess is as good as mine.  Nevertheless I was able to OBE five or six times, but typically there weren't much in the way of vibrations.  I quit for awhile because conditions weren't condusive (young kid climbing in bed with me and my wife each night - hard to focus when sleeping kid is thrashing around  Now the kid is sleeping in her own room and I'm picking up where I left off, so I'll be interested to see if I'm able to get out quickly.

As for why the consistent practice is required, I believe that we humans are composed of spirit, mind and body but we've gotten to a place where the physical body typically calls the shots.  It tells the mind what to do (give me food, give me sex, etc.) and the spirit atrophies.  Through various spiritual practices (and I guess in a loose sense OBE could be called that) we slowly reverse the equation so our spiritual nature is telling the mind what it wants the body to do.  This process can take a lifetime, but I believe success in OBEing is tied to one's ability to be aware with their spiritual component of subtle conditions and processes that go on in the body.  

In baseball, a good hitter (Ichiro) sharpens his skills through decades of practice and ultimately his physical senses are unconsciously harvesting and processing tons of physical cues that he probably isn't even aware of.  Similarly, a skill like this requires sustained practice so that that part of us that isn't physical or mental, is likewise picking up on very subtle (probably non-physical) information and acting on it to successfullly bring about the right conditions for conscious, remembered projections.

How regular are your attempts?  Have you varied the techniques?  Tried combinations of techniques?  Have you got to where you've felt vibrations?  Do you get enough sleep?  Do you tend to remember your dreams?  Do you keep a dream journal?  Do you tend to sleep through the night, or wake up several times?  Are you a light sleeper or heavy sleeper?  Do you typically try to AP at night before sleep or during a meditation session, etc?  Do you have any fears, hangups, or religious concerns that might be holding you back?  Have you tried or been able to produce a lucid dream?  Do you sleep alone or with someone else?  Do you do written or spoken affirmations during the day?

One of the things that I find frustrating is the feeling that the timing of a lucid dream or OBE is out of my control. I can do the same thing night after night and one night I have a lucid dream and another night an OBE and most nights nothing.  Why is that?  Most of my OBEs came after I woke up in the middle of the night, did a technique and drifted back to sleep only to wake up later ready to exit.  One time I woke up to the sensation of being flipped over lengthwise and found myself (astral self) on the floor beside my bed.  So clearly, although my conscious mind is establishing intention and performing the techniques, there is clearly an unconscious process at work that is determining when to actually produce the OBE.  

Anyway, this was a long, rambling response but the bottom line is that I don't think it's an entirely natural thing to do and that a variety of spiritual, psychological and physical traits make it easier for some and harder (hopefully not impossible) for others.

Anyway, - good luck! : )

Once I was dreaming that bees were buzzing all around my head, and as I drifted in and out of sleep I was very annoyed with them and kept trying to shoo them away.  When I finally woke up more I realized those bees were vibrations!!  But by then they had weakened a bit (probably because I'd been shooing them away for several minutes) and I wasn't able to project.

With regard to the Satan and hell of the Bible I agree that they unfortunately are used as implements of fear to keep people in line.  That's part and parcel of the mythic viewpoint where much of the world's population is currently at.

However, if you regard the Biblical Satan as a literary personification of our resistence to spiritual truth, and hell as the spiritual state of souls who are furthest away from spiritual truth much of the Biblical message can be seen as a symbolic representation of the souls incarnation into flesh and subsequent journey back to its source.

In this light, Adam and Eve being thrown out of the Garden of Eden are the soul seperating from *God* and entering duality, having a knowledge of good and evil or the perception that there is something other than *God*.  The death of Christ is the soul dying to the flesh, - i.e. overcoming the perception of duality and submitting itself again to the will of *God* (death of ego or seperate identity) and the resurrection is the new life of the soul - It has been perfected and is once again a manifestation of *God* rather than a seperate entity (thus Christ's assertion that "the Father and I are one").

Given that, I would suggest that when we die we are attracted to spiritual places and entities in the Astral or wherever that fit where we are at spiritually.  And probably much of our surroundings at that point will be of our own manifesting.  So some will manifest for themselves a Christian "heaven", others their version of hell.  And depending on the person that hell could be a fiery cavern managed by the Prince of Darkness himself, or it could be a seeming eternity stuck in an elevator with Pauly Shore and Carrot Top.

Carl Jung, in certain psychological circles is regarded as having written the definitive work on dream interpretation (Man and His Symbols).  A more accessible work however, I've heard is Robert Johnson's "Inner Work".

Jung would also assert that noteworthy dreams are one of the means by which the Self (the Jungian archetype that can be thought of as the Soul) via the unconscious seeks to communicate with the Ego (the conscious self) in order to move us toward Individuation (essentially salvation via re-integrating all of the contents of the unconscious with the conscious).  In that light, the various opponents that you faced could be seen as stages of spiritual development that you have gone through - i.e. accepting and then moving beyond various belief systems.  Or they could symbolize psychological hangups you've confronted or ongoing battles between your Ego and your Shadow self (the Jungian archetype onto which you project all of the negative qualities you don't want to consciously admit that you have).

I've read a bit on Jungian psychology, but haven't gotten around to those books yet, so I won't attempt to interpret your dream further, other than to say that Jung would say that many symbols are highly personal whereas others are universal.  His approach to dream interpretation differs markedly from others, including Freud, who attempt to interpret dreams narrowly by saying this symbol always means that, this one always means that, etc.  

Note that traditional psychology tends to emphasize Jungs more secular concepts (archetypes, complexes, personality types...) into the accepted body of psychology but ignore his esoteric and occult teachings (not respectable enough for Academia).  Nevertheless, Jung only died 40 years ago and I predict that within another 50 years Jungian psychology will have evolved into a quasi-religion.

I'll be interested to see what interpretations others come up with here.

When I was a kid we had those sculpting kits where you buy a hunk of plaster.  Inside there is a figure and as you chip away with a little hammer and chisel all of the excess falls away - and hooray - a five-year-old has just sculpted a work of art.

We are like that.  We are perfect souls, hidden by a lot of excess plaster in the form of guilt, hangups, misunderstandings, etc.  As we progress along the spiritual path we slowly chip away all of that junk until we eventually arrive at what was there all along, but we just couldn't recognize.

Toward this end, if you a Christian please note that the Greek word in the New Testament that is translated as "sin" is the word that Greeks used when an archer missed the target.  It really means missing the mark.  Unfortunately, the concept of sin as a moral affront to God is deeply embedded in the Judeo-Christian psyche so that is how it is preached and how we think of it.

I stronly recommend all Christians, when reading the Bible to replace the concept of "moral failure" with the concept of "a misunderstanding" every time you read the word "sin", - and especially when you discuss or think of "sin".  This alone, over a period of time will chip off a lot of that gunk that is hiding the perfect soul (the Christ or Holy Spirit) inside of you.

When you begin to read the New Testament this way you see other parts of it in much more enlightening ways also.  I would strongly urge you to search for Christian Mysticism on the web and begin reading.  A good book would also be Jim Marion's "Putting on the Mind of Christ".  Warning though - to a traditional Christian it will come across as heresy, but that's the nature of any religious thought that attempts to disrupt the status quo.

Many of these same concepts are present in the major religions, but unfortunately they are more or less ignored and the more dogmatic teachings are the ones that get center stage.

Christian mystics would say that the creation story in the Bible is a symbolic representation of the soul entering into a physical existence characterized by misunderstanding - i.e. duality - i.e. knowledge of good and evil.  Likewise the story of the Jewish nation in the old testament and the life of Christ in the New Testament can be seen as a symbolic representation of the evolution of the soul (both individually and collectively) to where it overcomes the illusion of this physical world and of duality to once again be united with the God, the Ground of all being, the Universe, or whatever you want to call it.

Similar interpretations of Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, etc. arrive at very similar understandings using different terminology.  

Sometimes this process is described as a journey, other times as a purification and internal transformation, other times as shedding one's ego, burning off one's bad Karma, and this same process is described by various religions, philosophies, schools of psychological thought (Jungian, mostly), ritualistic Magik, Alchemy and probably a gazillion other paths I haven't heard of.

Furthermore, each path seems to have different methods by which this transformation occurs.  The Sufi (mystical branch of Islam) mystic and poet, Rumi experienced this transformation by extended periods of time gazing (meditation of sorts) into the eyes of a wandering mystic and teacher (Shams-i-Trabiz).  Carl Jung describes how the process occurs by self-examination engaging and reintegrating the contents of the unconscious via rigorous self-examination.  Buddhist and Christian monks get there via meditation.

And of course, in any particular religion it seems that 99.9% of the adherents have no knowledge of this process at all (which is why Christ described it as the narrow path).

I agree that "answers" are a poor man's spirituality, because language is inherently an unacceptable method for communicating true meaning.  Any time we assign a word like "tree", "rock" - or especially "God" we create an artificial construct that conveys a utilitarian meaning but loses most of the essence of the thing.

Carl Jung asserted that symbols are the method of communication that the unconscious uses, which are visual in nature rather than verbal.  But I'm guessing that as one works their way through whatever spiritual layers of the Universe exist, that communication takes on forms we can't even imagine, being trapped in these rudimentary physical bodies with five measily little senses.  (And I'm guessing that even whatever sensing the most advanced of us use beyond those five are still rudimentary in the grand scheme of things).

As far as "what it all means" no one can say.  Aldous Huxley, Ken Wilber, etc. philosophize on this but ultimately I think we are misguided to look to other people to explain it to us (when we hold some one up as a philosophical or religious guru, Jung would probably say we are projecting onto them, our own divinity that we are unable or unwilling to "own").

(Ordinarily I avoid philosophical discussions with my 7-year-old, but last night while putting her to bed we got on a discussion of death (neighbor in bad shape), during which she said that it has crossed her mind before that life is a big board game and we're the pieces.  Quite a thought for a 7-year-old, I thought - made me laugh!)

Well, Jesus said "the Kingdom of Heaven is within you" so that's a good place to start looking.  If you're coming at this from a Christian viewpoint I'd recommend reading "Putting on the Mind of Christ" by Jim Marion.  It looks at the Christian message from an esoteric/mysterical perspective and is quite illuminating.  Also, if you look on Amazon you will find a variety of books that discuss Christ and his message from a Jungian standpoint, i.e. Christ's life and message were a symbolic representation to us of the internal spiritual path the we must follow (the narrow path that few find) to achieve enlightenment (the Kingdom of Heaven).

We are not just spiritual beings.  We are spiritual beings in biological vessels.  And our sex drive and our sexual orientation stem from our biology - i.e. chemistry, hormones, etc.  If you take spirits out of bodies the question of "sexual orientation" becomes mute, in my opinion.  I find the thought of sexual activity with a woman, desirable and I find the thought of sexual activity with a man repulsive.  That's just my biolgical/psychological make-up - others are different and I don't have a problem with that.  I suspect that when I die and no longer have a biological body I won't have a sex drive at all, or at least if I do have it it will be based on something other than biological cravings.

or Einstein when asked whether WW3 would be atomic/nuclear - he replied, "I don't know with what weapons World War 3 will be fought, but World War 4 will be fought with sticks and stones." []