I had a number of wild synchronicities bring me here, and I have a hunch that others have too. I would love to hear your stories & will share mine soon.
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Really great question, I am very curious to hear your stories, and other members as well.
I have not shared this with the group and was not planning to, becuase it brings back some unpleasant memories, but I really loved that story of the owl you shared, and I really appreciate you sharing that, and the synchronicity there.
I was hit by a Semi Truck on the highway.
My car was totaled. By the grace of God I survived without a scratch.
Thank God I had someone looking out for me above.
I had never been in an accident before in my entire life, I am a very safe driver. I dont know if the trucker was drunk, or sleep deprived, or on his phone, but it happened right around the time when the economy was starting to really hurt truckers bad, so I am guessing the ones on the road were taking the jobs most other truckers would not.
At the time I had recently found Andrews you tube videos, and a few days after the accident, while watching one of his videos he brought up this community.
I was hugely skeptical, but Andrews intelligence and skills were undeniable, and the advice he gave on youtube was better than any of the other LD expert videos I had viewed, so I decided to try it for a month.
The rest is history.
The more I consumed his works and videos the more I realized the universe had lead me to a Gold Mine.
Andrew doesnt know it, but I consider him my teacher, and words cant express how greatful I am for the knowledge he has given me, as well as this Sangha and its incredible members who have taugh me so much. I am very blessed to have found him, and this community.
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Look forward to hearing them. Cool topic, Iâll jump in. I was an avid lucid dreamer on and off for seven years at that time. I started researching to see if there were any other versions of this phenomenon. I came across dream yoga and began looking for books on it. One of the few books I could find was Andrewâs book, âDream Yogaâ. I tried my best to use it as a guide for some of my lucid dreams. I set goals from the book, and accomplished all but two of them. Then, I looked at Andrewâs other books and discovered âDreams of Lightâ.
I loved the book! Upon reading it, I found rational explanations for what was happening to me in my day-to-day life. The people in my immediate circle could then understand what these events actually meant to me. I used it to rationally explain so many things that happen to me while I was listening to A Course in Miracles. It was such a blessing. Iâm not exactly sure when I joined, but it was around the time of these events.
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I have had a long time interest in Buddhism since the sixties. In 2018, with a history of insomnia, I took a course with Andrew through Tricycle Magazine about Dream Yoga, which I thought might help cure my insomnia. When that finished I attended Andrewâs Sedona retreat and have hung around ever since.
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I will add I had been meditating for about 3/years, and really seen the power ibehind it. I did not have very much training, and I want to learn more.
Andrews work was exactly what I had been looking for for 3 years, but if I had not had the meaniful meditation expeirences from practicing on my own, I dont think I would have been able to really appreciate the deapth and score of everything here.
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A coupla months ago, as part of a publishing course assignment, I was reading the reviews of books on the topic of preparing for death, and came across Andrewâs âPreparing to Die,â the reviews were very intriguing, even the ânegativeâ ones said things like âthis is the weirdest book Iâve ever read,â which drew me in. When I clicked on Andrewâs name to see other books he had written, I was even more intrigued that the same person that wrote about preparing for death also wrote about lucid dreaming. I looked inside one of the dream books and in the first line I read he mentioned co-facilitating a lucid dream retreat at a retreat center in Hawaii in 2012⊠I lived at that retreat center during that time and remembered the lucid dreamers coming through because THIS happened⊠I was telling someone who had lived there for a while that I saw a clock on the wall in my dream which matched the time it was when I woke up, his response was âthe lucid dreamers are here and things like that happen when they come through, you should go talk to them.â So I did, they were so present and enthusiastic and intelligent, they told me that if you talk to people when lucid it can give you hints into your subconscious, which has always stayed with me. It wasnât until 2017 that I dabbled in some lucid dreaming practices through LaBergeâs book (the other co-facilitator at the retreat) based on a recommendation of someone else, not realizing he was one of the facilitators of that retreat until later on.
Right before I came across Andrewâs works, I watched âJacobâs Ladderâ for the first time. For a number of reasons that would take too long to share here, I relate to Jacobâs character quite a bit, and start to wonder if weâre in a bardo right now. The new doctor I see reminds me of the doctor in the film and the interactions Iâd been having (including with medical professionals) that felt like âdevilâs tearing your life awayâ start to feel more like âangelâs freeing your soulâ as referenced in the movie.
I start listening to âDreams of Lightâ and âDream Yogaâ and join the community. Once I learn that lucid dreaming / living can help to prepare you for death and prevent confusion when in a bardo and that this all ties together I reallllly trip out for some realllllly specific reasons that involve the owl and health issues and being with dying, etc. that would make this post too long.
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! Thank you SO much for sharing, and for your kind words about the owl synchronicity. If you donât mind sharing, how long ago was that? And how incredible where some experiences that we never would have wished on ourselves can lead us. Makes me think that some common ideas about manifestation and positivity might be backwards, some very painful experiences have lead me here / informed my life path as well. Iâve been wanting to share my favorite NDE story with this group as it involves incredible tragedy in a car accident mixed with the realizations and wider perspective of the NDE experience, so here it is: https://youtu.be/1FD5lReqe64 Also, I tried to reply to your beautiful story about holding the baby, but there was a limit to my number of replies on that topic, I think since I am new.
@mbready Ooooooooo fun!! Thank you for sharing. If you donât mind, can you share some of those day to day events you refer to?
@_Barry 
! Learning about the practices seemed to immediately change my perspective on sleep problems, I thought that my waking up multiple times during the night or going back to sleep after waking were bad things until I read that theyâre useful techniques. I thought that taking CBG was what helped induce my vivid, sometimes lucid dreams, but now I think itâs just the fact that it would get me back to sleep upon waking in the morning.
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Itâs tough to elaborate completely on this one because it was quite a while ago, and I referenced a lot from âDreams of Lightâ to those around me. It helped with my own integration and helped the people around me gain a better understanding of some of the things I had been experiencing.
But before getting to Andrewâs book and how I ultimately ended up here, it is important to start a couple months back. My stable life became unhinged as I was reading âA Course in Miraclesâ and similar books, like âThe Power of Nowâ etcetera.
While listening to these books everything in waking reality was becoming extremely unreal for me, synchronicities everywhere, profound ones, and on top of that, at the time I was deep diving into my dreams. They were vivid and real. I remember having 4-5 WILDs a night during this time which would feed into the mania that the waking people would see and interact with during the day. This was the beginning of approximately 10 months of intense mania and 3 trips to a psychiatric ward for me. These trips amplified my mania but that is a story unto itself.
Getting back to Andrewâs book, I was skimming through the chapters to find some of the stuff I was sending and found this key section. I remember this being a big deal when I found it because I believe it happen to me. It was like a revelation when I found it. The way Andrew explains this is with finesse too, so when I sent it to my mom and wife they were able to understand it. It was not manic jumbled sentences plastered together.
From âDreams of Lightâ:
âMost people move through the two preliminary phases of hearing and contemplating before they actually wake up to the experience of emptiness but a rare group can directly experience it before they understand it. Emptiness is the discovery of reality, so on one hand itâs not surprising that some people can glimpse it without preparation. But they often donât know what to do with it. They have no choice but to download the ineffable experience into the realm of the effable, into their pre-existing conceptual frameworks and worldview. Without proper understanding, problems often begin. If you donât have a framework to relate to the totally unframed (emptiness), you might come unframed as you try to understand what youâve experienced. The direct experience of emptiness-to put it more bluntly, the truth of your inherent nonexistence-can be frightening to the fully framed ego. Emptiness is the death, or transcendence, of the ego. Emptiness is egolessness. If youâre not properly prepared, instead of opening your mind the experience of emptiness might blow your mind. This is why many âsudden experiencersâ those who arenât prepared, struggle to retrofit the phase of understanding after theyâve had an experiential glimpse of emptiness. On an absolute or transcendental level, they âgot itâ; on a relative or conceptual level they donât get it. Many people are then baffled, wondering, âWhat the heck was that?â or âHow do I relate to that?ââ
-Andrew Holecek
Getting back to before I found his book, after some of the dust settled and I was out of the hospital for the first time, I began going through similar experiences as Andrew explains in the following section:
âAs I grappled with this material I went through a kind of bipolar phase. Part of me was manic. I didnât understand emptiness, but I couldnât get enough. I knew there was something deep here, and I had to get it. It was like stepping into a brand-new world. My mania then bottomed out in despondency. I was irritated, defensive, angry. It felt like my conceptual mind was being checkmated. Years later I realized that what I was feeling was like the five stages of grief, as posited by Elizabeth KĂŒbler-Ross: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and finally acceptance. My old view of reality, my precious view of things, was dying, and I was spiraling through these stages. Denial: these teachings canât be true. Whatâs happening to my world! Anger: the most reconstituting of all emotions. Bargaining: editing the teachings to suit me better. Depression: from the perspective of ego, emptiness the illusory nature of reality is indeed depressing. And finally, acceptance: emptiness really is the nature of things.â
-Andrew Holecek
Flash forward to when I was reading Andrewâs book, finding this was another big deal for me. It helped rationally explain some more of the things I had gone through to my mom and wife. Also, it felt great to know I was not alone in experiencing this type of thing.
Hopefully that covers some of the things, there is so much more I left out because I do not want to attach that many quotes from Andrewâs book. I picked two last examples of the common type of things I would share while reading the book, which aided all of us in our journeys.
From âDreams of Lightâ:
âDaytime lucidity is discovering that waking experience is also a type of dream, that things are not as solid and real as we think. Weâre hacking into what we thought was a fully fully conscious experience, exposing what we thought was real (that weâre really awake, and that the forms we experience in the waking state truly exist) to be an illusion. This insight is what transforms a non-lucid life into a lucid one, a shocking exposĂ© that awaits us in the steamy pages ahead. These domains of consciousness that youâre hacking into are highly classified and secretive because the ego doesnât want you to know the truth, whatâs really going on behind the scenes, or below mere appearance.â
-Andrew Holecek
And
âwithin the dream, we can confront our belief that the dream is real. We are able to recognize that it is just a dream, that itâs not real and once we discover that the dream is just a dream while dreaming it, then it is possible to wake up.â
-Tsoknyi Rinpoche
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Really loved reading your stories and experiences that brought you here. Very glad you shared this.
I am falling asleep now, will have much more time to reply to your posts tomorrow night.
Before I forget though, I really wanted to share this video with you of Robert Moss & Andrew talking. I couldnt find it here on the website, Moss is the one who said âlet the universe be your tarot cardsâ in this interview. He also has died 2 times, or been pronounced dead. He seems to have some really powerful experiences with death:
Really deep, really powerful stuff.
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LOL, you know you wrote a materpiece when even the negative reviews, draw customers interest. I just started the book, and based off the first few pages, I think it may end up being the best of all of Andrews works to date. 
You had a Precognitvie dream, very cool. Its not talked about much in main stream society (although you will see references to it in books and movies), but in Dream circles it is very common. My first precognitive dream while camping is what sent me on the path to dig deaper into dreams and lucid dreaming. It hugely deepened my spiritaulity, and shattered paradigms I had.
Never saw the movie, but really love this quote 
Dreams of light is sooooooooo good! Listening to Andrew read it and give commentary really helped me grasp its depth.
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The accident? It happened Spring of 2022. Why do you ask? I can dig and get more specific dates if you want.
WOW this sychronicity is crazy, great minds think a like. I was going to mention this in my post, but figured I would wait.
While no physical harm came, I was definitely rattled to the core, and very very angry and hurt (at first). I loved that car like a child, she had been with me for years, and kept me safe all that time. I was deeply attached to her to say the least. Was going to max out the milage and then let her spend her retirement as a lawn ornament. We plan, God laughs. 
Looking back, I am greatful for the gift that truck driver gave me. You are absolutely right that sometimes the most painful experiences and tragedies in life, can present the greatest opportunites for growth. âChaos should be regarded as incredibly good newsâ. Andrew has said very negative events can sometimes be viewed as Karma coming to fruition, and thus, leave a furtile field for the future.
Really appreciate the synchronicity and you saying that
I did not check out the NDE link yet, will try to watch it tonight or tomorrow.
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I found Andrew Holecekâs articles online at some place like Tricycle, followed it over to his books, and then came over to this community!
Iâve been working with meditation and Tibetan Buddhism for a while (since 2007 or so). Always loved this story of an Indian Buddhist master on his way to Tibet: to paraphrase, it was something like, âHow will you reach them, you donât even know the language?!â and his response was something like, âIâll teach them in their dreams.â
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Absolutely love this quote and story!
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I was curious how long youâve been in the group, I would have assumed longer!
!!! Quite interesting
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I am part way through your story, from an earlier post! Will comment soon. I would love to discuss more about precognitive dreams and hear more from others here too! Amazing how a dream and/or mystical experience can shatter paradigms / be life-altering .
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Wow when I asked about your experiences I had no idea where it would go, I find this quite incredible. Thank you SO much for sharing. I am glad to hear that your mom and wife understood through Andrewâs words your experience- mania and mental health stuff tends to be terribly misunderstood and stigmatized, and I believe that having validation and understanding from those around us can make all the difference. Over in the animal communication discussion, I was thinking back to times in when I worked in the hospital and was able to connect with some that were experiencing mental health crises and that beyond being calm, there was something about relating and feeling where they were coming from that helped connect (and maybe thats how we can connect with animals and young humans too), and that most healthcare workers were talking down to or belittling them, and they were very sensitive to those energies and were right in my opinion to be pissed and it seemed to exacerbate things.
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Appreciate you saying that.
Me too. I could talk about this topic for hours and hours. It is so fascinating to me, especially because I was a non believer for the vast majority of my life!
This book touched me deeply, Robert Waggoner mentions it in one of his books, I think you might really like it:
(You can buy it used for about $2, plus S&H)
Around page 77-78 is my favorite precognitive dream in the book (the one with the Spaceship), but there are at least 2 dozen other examples of those types of dreams in it.
I think Patricia collected over 1000 dreams in her research for the book. Its an outstanding work, especially if you are interested in the topics of Death and Precognition. I dont think you will be disappointed.
Amen. I think this is Compassion at its best!
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Ahhhhhhhh when I referred to numbers that Greg has communicated through , one of them is 833 and matches the cost of the book in reverse 
. Will check it out now, thank you!!
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I highly recommend it! Andrew mentioned it in one of his audiobooks as well, with a list of other films that have a dreamlike quality including Mullholland Drive, I have been wanting to make note of that list actually but canât find where it was or if it was in âDreams of Lightâ or âDream Yoga.â
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I wonder if hes telling you to read the book starting with the last chapter, and ending with the first?
Awesome, I will add both movies to my list. Appreciate those reccomendations.
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