12/6 - 12/9: Personality Crisis

A-ha! I'm back from the realms of sleepy-time and I've concluded that I'm having some sort of identity and/or personality crisis on SO MANY LEVELS IT ISN'T FUNNY!!!!

Actually, it kind of is...but no laughing about it now! The dream, please!

***

From what I can remember, there were three different styles, but it was all generally the same. I would always begin laying in bed when I would feel two cold hands wrap around my chest from underneath my mattress. Terrified, I look down to see that they're almost completely covered in swirling shadows and that they're coming up from through the mattress instead of underneath like I thought. With a force I've yet to see replicated by even the strongest of strongmen, I was pulled through my mattress by these shadowed hands and began to fall as shadows and large glowing indigo crystals flew past me.

Nice to see you're back...a voice that I could have sworn I've heard in the past called out from the nothing below and above me. Frantically looking around to see what the hell was going on, I could see nothing but two glowing red spots that were coming from above me and rapidly getting closer. When I looked closer at these dots, I saw that they were in fact red eyes attached to a human-shaped mass of shadow that seemed to be enjoying this impromptu skydiving session (or shadow-diving, depending on how you look at it). She (don't ask me how I know, I just do!) looked at me as she passed and flashed something of a malicious smile before continuing to rocket down toward the abyss below.

I had no idea where the hell I landed, or how hard I hit the ground. All remember is when I regained consciousness to find the same shadowed girl looking over me. Except instead of having blood-red eyes she now had piercing blue ones. You're OK! That's a good sign! I wasn't sure exactly when you'd wake up...she exclaimed as I picked myself up and began to rub my head. "What happened to the other one?" I asked as I looked over this new girl.

Other one...? she cocked her head to the side and looked at me in a somewhat-confused manner. I have no idea who you're talking about...and with that, she looked like she was about cry. I had no idea what she was crying over, but I thought that I would try and get out of there as soon as possible...

Where the hell do you think you're going? I heard the first voice call out once again. I looked back to where the blue-eyed girl had been sitting to find that she had now become the red-eyed one from earlier. She began to run after me and out of nowhere she materialized a blade made of some crystalline substance that crackled with red bolts of lightning. She swung wildly at me, but I somehow managed to dodge all the blows. Yet she still somehow got a hand on me and lifted me up by the neck. Who the hell are you!? she screamed at me. Who the hell am I!?

Now at this point, it splits off into three different particular styles. Three nights ago, I replied that I was me and no one else. As to the girl that was now determined to choke me, that was still left to be explained. She let me go and sank to her knees. She placed her head in her hands and screamed before smashing the ground with an ethereal fist. When she looked back up, blue-eyes had come back. I was hoping you had the answer for me...

Two nights ago, I replied that I had no idea who I was, but I knew that she was part of some unconscious collective of thoughts. She let me go and sank to her knees. So I'm nothing more than a thought then...she breathed. It seemed as if she had been frozen in shock from the realization of what just she just realized. I began to back away slowly, but she made no moves to stop me. I'm nothing...a fragment of aether and shadow...nothing...

However, last night was the most interesting. I replied that I had no idea who she was, nor did I have a clue about myself. She threw me to the ground and lowered the tip of her blade to my throat. Do you honestly expect me to believe that load of bullshit? she asked maliciously as I felt the heat and energy of the blade against my flesh. You have no idea who you are? That's almost laughable...She lifted the blade above her head when I rolled out of the way. "Look! You don't know who you are, and I don't know who I am, so why do you have to kill me!?" I asked. She looked at me and dropped her blade in surprise. When it would have hit the ground it dissipated into the aether around us. The girl looked back at me and I watched as the eyes turned from red to blue.

You're right...I'm never going to find out who I am if you're dead, right? I mean, you're the only one that's ever been here before...she was off in some kind of stupor. I tentatively put my hand on her shoulder and looked her in the eyes. "Goddammit, we don't even know where the hell we are! How can we figure out who we are if we don't know where we are and how we're involved with all of this place!?" I asked. Blue-eyes just smiled mysteriously and looked off to the distance. I guess we're going to find out, aren't we? she replied as she began to walk off into the distance...

***

So yeah...interesting stuff...I still have no idea who I am, and I wonder if she ever found out who she was...

Yowza! I mean, good gravy! Now this is a good ol' fashioned crazy dream post! 'Bout time, too.

If I were to venture an extremely wary guess I would say that you, sir, are in direct contact with your "higher self", or as you called it before, your "anima". Of course, I would hope that one's higher self would have a better sense of identity than what is presented here; but perhaps they can be in some confusion over the matter themselves.

All that is to say, Yaz, is that you seem to have the spirit of a woman (as far as these things can have a sex), and a bipolar one at that.

So... this makes things a little... different.

Just in case you're interested, I enjoy long walks on the beach and drinking red wine under the light of the moon.

Goddammit, I knew that there'd be some sort of joke against my subconscious representing itself as a female...

Although in Freudian/Jungian psychology the anima is the embodiment of all the unconscious female psychological qualities that the males possess, and the animus is the male qualities of the female. There's one for both senses and genders.

According to the Wikipedia article on anima and animus, Jung gives some cautions regarding what he called "anima possession", and that the anima exists to only serve as the intermediary between the ego and the subconscious. As well, an over-awareness of the unconscious anima/us could cause the intermediary to try and usurp "the self, with which the patient's animus identifies. This identification is a regular occurrence when the shadow, the dark side, has not been sufficiently realized".

The more I think about it, the more I'm confused...and enough with the damn jokes already! This is serious business, dammit! Besides, isn't that what the woman in the relationship would much rather do, Rhaps?

I could lend you a shoulder to cry on, if that helps my dear.
*SNORT*
I'll stop.

So Jung said that it would try to take you over, huh? That reminds me of a Richard Matheson short story I read, about a guy who gets a mental phone call from his subconscious. It essentially tells him that it thinks he's been doing a crap job, and proceeds to take over his mind in a very creepy manner. Is this what you think is happening? Be warned: when it comes to that part of your mind, the things you fear the most will have the most strength and will almost always come to pass; the more you think about them the greater prominence they gain within your psyche.

All that is to say, that your thoughts will dictate the future course between you and this (sometimes) sweet lady who's just as confused as you are. Next time you go to sleep think about giving her a big ol' hug, and her warmly responding to it. Maybe when you see her the two of you can have a nice chat over a cup of tea about philosophy and the meaning of life; work some of those worries out, eh?

Or, she could completely take over your mind and leave you trapped withing the dark recesses of your own unconscious, leaving you to watch helplessly as she turns your body into an engine of hate and destruction that hurts all of the people you love. If so, make sure to let her know that we'd appreciate her participation on this board; the more, the merrier!

Rhapsode wrote:

All that is to say, that your thoughts will dictate the future course between you and this (sometimes) sweet lady who's just as confused as you are. Next time you go to sleep think about giving her a big ol' hug, and her warmly responding to it. Maybe when you see her the two of you can have a nice chat over a cup of tea about philosophy and the meaning of life; work some of those worries out, eh?

Here's the problem with this whole thing...I think she's (yes, I think I can definitively call the embodiment of my subconscious a "she" now) developing a personality of her own...and not just one but two distinctly different ones--as in polar opposite--so you could imagine something going terribly wrong in some weird sense. It seems like I have no control over what she is able to do, no matter how lucidly I think I'm dreaming that night; she reacted differently every single night when I responded to her questions, not just because I answered differently each time (whether I realized it or not) but because I think she's becoming her own...person...? It seems to me that she's becoming more and more aware of herself...which may be a good thing, or could be a terrible one...

Rhapsode wrote:

Or, she could completely take over your mind and leave you trapped withing the dark recesses of your own unconscious, leaving you to watch helplessly as she turns your body into an engine of hate and destruction that hurts all of the people you love. If so, make sure to let her know that we'd appreciate her participation on this board; the more, the merrier!

Nice to see you have that much faith in me, Rhaps. I'll keep that in mind when Red-eyes is coming after me with some ethereal sword.

Just remember this, young one: if you believe that this emanation is truly terrible, and is gaining independence within your brain, then it will be so; that's just how the mind works. It's like The Secret - except it ain't bullshit.

Dammit, Rhaps! I don't want to die! I'm a fledgling author, not a subconscious-psychopathic killer who's got bipolar disorder!

*ahem* Sorry about that...

But anyway, something interesting last night in the dream!

***

The whole thing plays out until the part where she asks Who am I!? I respond that I don't know who either of us happen to be, and she put me down on the ground and threatened to kill me. I once again talk her out of it and she sort of reverts back to her calmer blue-eyed self. I got up and dusted myself off and figured that this was as good of a time as any other to ask the question...

So I get up and I ask her, "What the hell?" She looks at me, extremely confused and somewhat worried. What do you mean, what the hell? she asks me. "Aren't you supposed to, you know, try and take over my body now or something?"

What do you mean?

And so I explained to her the whole explanation I gave on the forum on the Jungian psychology and the concept of anima/animus and the shadow and all of that good stuff. When I finished, she sat down on the ground, somewhat stupefied at what I told her.

And you believe that I'm supposed to take over your body somehow?

"Not supposed to, but it's possible for you to somehow or another become ingrained into my consciousness..."

...Why would I want to do that?

And it was at that point I realized that she (at least Blue) had no intention of trying to take over my consciousness...although I was still extremely wary of her somewhat-unstable emotional states. "You're not trying to do it?" Again, why would I want to? I don't even know who you are! I had no idea if she was trying to be funny or not, but I chuckled once.

Well, shall we find out then?

"Find out what?"

Who you are! Then I think I'll find out who exactly I am too! She then proceeded to run off towards the horizon as if she and I were playing some sort of large-scale game of tag. I couldn't run after her, but she eventually slowed down and waited for me to catch up with her...

***

So yeah...not 100% sure about Red, but Blue's now cool in my book, I guess...

So wots.. uh.. the deal? How's this whole thing playing out? Still got ol' Blue on your side?

Sadly, this is really as far as anything got...I mean, I haven't really been dreaming of much as of late, considering I've got finals this week and all. However, I'll try and evoke this dream sequence again sometime in the near future when German isn't all that's on my mind (like, say, Thursday night or something?).