Dream Snapshots of Tomorrow

In my writings I have claimed that I see tomorrow in my dreams. I see the most significant aspects of the next day. This does not mean that I see the most significant events occurring around the world. However, if some national or world event occurs that my subconscious thinks I should know about, it will be shown in a dream. What I should know about is based on many factors, not the least of which is my conscious focus in my everyday life. Sometimes my subconscious will bring to my attention future events that may be a threat that allows me to take appropriate action to avoid disaster. At other times such as in a recent dream, it reveals my reaction to something in the news.

 

I have long known that my dreams often tune into tomorrow’s activities. If I watch a movie, even though the day of the dream I had no thoughts of watching that movie the next day, scenes from that movie may be incorporated into a dream. Two nights ago, I dreamed about being with a man who took me to a speech he was going to make that involved tennis in some way. A young female tennis player was nearby and seemed to be the focus. Last evening, I watched the PBS news that had a segment about the fiftieth anniversary celebration during the US Open tournament of equal prize money in tennis for men and women. This is the theme of this year’s US Open and is a major event. Billy Jean King, who was instrumental in gaining equal pay for women, was interviewed along with a young female tennis player. Now in the dream, a man made the speech, but the man (relative) in the dream had a certain aggressiveness, physical appearance, and personality like that of Billy Jean King.

 

I was aware that the US Open tournament was underway but had no thoughts about it when I watched the news and did not expect to see it in the news or know the US Open was celebrating fifty years of equal prize money for men and women. Yet my dream picked up on that moment, perhaps because I am familiar with the history and remember the battle Bill Jean fought to get equal prize money for men and women tennis players. Now if this were a single occurrence one might say it was a coincidence, but a daily pattern makes it hard to justify on that basis.

 

The subconscious mind is not limited by space or time. The rules for its operation are different from the ones we experience in the conscious world in which we live. A study of your dreams will reveal this to you with relatively little effort. Problems that seem unsolvable to your conscious mind have their solution in the depths of the subconscious. But to find the solution, you must be paying attention to the messages the subconscious is sending you each night in your dreams. You must be alert and open to the guidance you receive. If you have decided that the answer to a problem must happen a certain way, you may never see the real answer because you have limited yourself to a small subspace of acceptable options. And you will not even be aware of what may be the best solution.

 

Your dreams are about you. In my example of the tennis dream, I had certain strong associations with the man in the dream. This allowed me to see the connection to Billy Jean King. He was a representative for her. Someone else would probably not make the same connection. This is why you should not turn to someone else to interpret your dreams. Even if they are skilled at interpreting their own dreams, they do not have the reservoir of memories and associations that are used by your subconscious to construct the dream. The dream is not just a random collection of characters, scenes, and actions. Each item in the dream was chosen for a specific reason—because they could tell the story or deliver the message better than another one could.

Dreams of Death, Dying, and the Departed

In a recent post on Facebook, my niece expressed sadness over the death of her best friend. This caused me to reflect on death and consider doing a post about dreams and death. The past few years we have all seen more deaths than normal because of Covid-19, so I thought such a post would be relevant to many. I have posted about death in the past, but often only the most recent posts are noticed so I am posting about it again in relation to dreams. A physical death is something we must all face, and I believe the fear that many people have of death is misplaced. I hope this post helps alleviate that fear.

 

Dreams of death are common, but they usually do not mean a physical death will occur. They are symbolic of a death of something else such as a habit, belief, or behavior. However, dreams that foreshadow a physical death of yourself or someone else do occur, although the dream may appear to be about something else entirely.

 

What if you dream about your death or the death of a family member, close friend, or just someone in the news? You don’t need to panic because the dream is probably not about a physical death. As an example, I once dreamed that I was by a graveside watching the casket of my mother being lowered into a grave. My mother did not die. In fact, she lived another twenty years. At that point in my life, I had been indulging in pastries and other sweets, but had recently completely changed my diet and given up all desserts. My mother was a cook and among the family members well known for her pies and cakes, which I strongly associated with her. The death of my mother in the dream symbolized the death of something I associated with her, which was the presence of pastries in my life.

 

If a dream about the death of someone is not literal, then how is an actual death shown in a dream. There are many ways, and I have experienced several common ones. Once I dreamed that I saw a family member and a large clock. The minute hand moved a short distance and stopped. I instantly knew that the person was not going to live much longer. Within a few months after the dream, they were diagnosed with terminal cancer and did not live much longer.

 

Another time I dreamed that I saw an old woman dressed in black. She asked me something that was family related, which I answered as best I could. She then floated upwards into the sky. Several days later I learned that she had died the day of my dream.

 

In still another variation, I found myself on a train. The train car was empty except for two men, one of whom I knew from work as a coworker and friend. They did not seem to be aware of my presence. The coworker had been ill for some time, and I learned the next day that he had died. In the dream the other man asked him for his birth date, which he gave. Then the other man related his birth date. They both seemed aware that they were going off to a new unknown destination.

 

Many years ago, I had an office off a main walkway. A man who was a supervisor in manufacturing would often pass by, and sometimes he would stop to chat. One day he stopped to tell me about a dream he had the previous night. He was not aware of my interest in dreams; I think he just felt the need to tell someone. He had been experiencing some health issues for several months and was having trouble getting a medical diagnosis. In the dream, he was walking up a spiral staircase to a higher level. He asked me what I thought it meant. I did not give him an interpretation but felt that he knew. Within a few months he passed away.

 

I am reminded of a story that Hugh Lynn Cayce, the son of Edgar Cayce, told at a lecture he gave that included a discussion of dreams. He said that when he was a teenager he had a friend with a car that they used to cruise around the area where they lived. One evening his friend wanted to drive around, but Hugh Lynn said he was tired and decided to go home and turn in for the night. In the middle of the night, he was awakened by a dream in which his friend’s hand came down from a cloud reaching for him. His friend wanted Hugh Lynn to join him, and said it is great where he was. Of course, Hugh Lynn said he was in bed and wasn’t going anywhere. The next day Hugh Lynn learned that his friend had been killed in an auto accident after he left him and went home.

 

Many people wonder if life after our physical death exists. Although I cannot give you proof that scientists will accept, I believe you can answer that question for yourself to your satisfaction through dreams. You must be careful though in your interpretation of dreams. Just because you dream of an encounter with someone who has died does not mean you are meeting that person in your dream. In fact, most likely you are not. That person my be used by the dream to symbolize what that person represented to you while alive. In your daily life, you may soon encounter, or have recently encountered, someone who you associate with the departed person. As an example, you may unexpectedly receive a call from someone you have not heard from in a long time. The previous night you may have had a dream in which you received a telephone call from someone who has died who reminds you of the person who called.

 

However, I do believe there are certain times when you will encounter the spirit of the person who has passed over. As described in my examples, you may encounter that person right after they pass over. If you have a close bond with someone, you may encounter them in a dream. I have met my mother a few times in dreams that I thought represented actual encounters. Once was shortly after her death and over the years a few times in her current environment. Others, such as my father who died when I was a young child, I have never encountered. I have two brothers who have passed. One I observed in a dream soon after his death as he was making the transition to a new existence. The other one has never appeared in my dreams.

 

As a final comment, I want to point out that there is no evidence to suggest that people suddenly become wise and all knowing after death. New age literature suggests the opposite: people continue to learn and evolve. Psychics who claim contact with the departed report that many of them are confused about their state and are no wiser than when they were alive. They may have a different view from the one they had on Earth, but their struggles and mental problems do not suddenly vanish.

 

I make many journeys in my dreams. Sometimes I have encountered people from my past who have passed over, but the encounter is very brief. There is an acknowledgement of meeting on both our parts, and I move on. Again, the encounters are more common when someone has just passed. And often I am not aware of their passing when I have the dream. It is later that I learn of their death.

Dream of Warning about the US Dollar

I don’t often write about my dreams concerning the stock market or finances. It isn’t because I don’t have such dreams; it is because I fear that people would only focus on these dreams and lose sight of the real purpose of dreams. Also, the conditions reflected in the dream might not materialize and people would forget that I stated it was a probable future or symbolic of something else and might not occur as shown. Then I would be blamed for any financial loss they may experience if they invested based on my dream.

 

One example of such a dream occurred several months ago. In the dream, I was talking with a man who told me he was enthusiastically buying call options (a bet that the underlying security or securities would increase in price) on the semiconductor index. One such index is SOX, which has enjoyed a sharp rise the past few months. One key stock, Nvidia, has gained over 50% in a few months and in a year 100%. I did not take any action on the dream. Of course, this is no guarantee of what will happen in the future.

 

Earlier in 2023 I dreamed that I man told me I should purchase shares in a fund holding investments in food sources. He may have mentioned a specific fund, but I don’t recall. I believe that eventually severe droughts resulting from climate change will drive food prices much higher. I do own some shares in an agricultural commodity fund.

 

Dreams like the two just described happen from time to time. They are simply part of what the subconscious picks up that it believes will be of interest or value to me. I don’t control the nature or timing of their occurrence. They happen in response to the subconscious’ evaluation of current and future conditions, which is influenced by my conscious desires and intentions.

 

Last night I dreamed that I was talking with a man who was a broker in an investment firm. The firm had taken a position in the US dollar that they believed was solid and without risk. I disagreed with him, but he blew off my concerns. Later, something happened that suddenly caused a gigantic move in the dollar. I believe it was a drop in the dollar, but it could have been the opposite. In any case, the firm had huge losses, and this individual was now bemoaning not listening to me. Although most economists think a crash in the US dollar is highly unlikely, it is not impossible. Some of the things that can trigger a dollar crash are out-of-control inflation, political instability, and high debt levels that are unsustainable. And a stronger dollar could happen if interest rates keep rising.

 

Of course, this dream may be symbolic of something else entirely and have nothing to do with the US currency. But it could, as is often the case, be a warning about an impending condition that will blindside the investment community. I believe the answer will become apparent in a short time. I can think of at least one situation in my life involving another person that may relate to the dream. In this case, the US dollar would just be symbolic of a financial loss, or a spiritual collapse since money sometimes symbolizes spiritual value. The dream does not seem to fit anything in my personal life, which is the first place I look when deciphering the meaning of a dream.

 

In my book The Inner Guru, I give examples of all kinds of dreams from advice dreams, warning dreams, feedback dreams, spiritual dreams, health dreams, and psychic dreams to name a few. My advice to you is the following. While a specific dream may be important, your focus should be on your dream patterns. They give you a picture of the condition of your life: physical, mental, and spiritual. Dreams of particular importance are those that recur because they deliver a message you are not understanding or heeding. As an example, you may often dream that you are being chased by someone or something. Until you understand the dream and deal with the cause, it is likely to recur in various forms.

 

If you intend to examine your dreams just to make money or gain power, you are missing the point of dreams and are likely to become disappointed and think they are not worth the effort needed to record and understand them. If you heed their advice and are on a positive, life affirming path, practical help from dreams will occur when needed. You will begin to tap into the enormous power that lies just below the surface of conscious thought.

Personal Experiences with Climate Change, Political Comments, and a Dream Vision of Now

Climate change is now affecting the broader population in the United States and around the world, and I have experienced it directly recently in my own life. I have lived in Florida for almost fifteen years in a villa/condo community with units attached in buildings of four or five units. They are all one story and I have a small area in the front and back where I have various plants. A large, beautiful Hibiscus has been a source of joy, but the record heat this summer and lack of rain is too much for the plant. The buds are wilting from the heat before they can open, and the plants normally lush green leaves are shriveled. Pictures have appeared in the news of even the cactus plants in Arizona dying from the extreme heat.

 

The heat is made worse by the lack of rain, although this week we are finally getting some. Normally, we would have an abundance of rain in August, but until today almost none. Unusual patterns like this are playing out across the country. My home state is Vermont where I was raised and attended college in Burlington. Last month Vermont was in the news because of a once every hundred years rain event. The downtown of Montpelier, the state capitol, was flooded after an intense rainstorm. This never happened before in my lifetime.

 

I have a niece who lives alone in Montpelier who is retired and doesn’t have family close by. After I saw the news, I tried to contact her without success. Cell phone reception is not good because of the mountains and her home phone wasn’t working. I left a message, and she called me two days later. Her power had been out, and the road was washed out a few houses down a hill from her place, so she couldn’t get out. Fortunately, a neighbor checked on her to make sure she was OK.

 

There are many areas considered at risk from flooding, but I didn’t think Montpelier was one of them. We have now seen much of Lahaina in Hawaii destroyed by a fast-moving wildfire. No place is completely shielded from the effects of weather and Earth changes. Before moving to Florida, I lived in Dayton, Ohio. Shortly after I retired, a windstorm moved through the Miami Valley with strong winds blowing all night. The next morning the area was a disaster with trees and power lines down everywhere. I knew people who were without power for nearly a month. The damage was worse than what I witnessed in my community in Florida after hurricane Irma.

 

During my lifetime I have experienced a blizzard, an earthquake, a tornado, and a hurricane. They are different in their nature but can all result in catastrophic losses. With blizzards and hurricanes there is some warning, but little warning for tornadoes and often none for earthquakes. It is hard to identify a part of the country that is safe from all four, and also safe from wildfires and forest fires.

 

Some areas will be affected more than others by severe weather events. But if you are going to move, make sure you understand the risks in the area you are moving to. Right now, Americans are moving to the Southwest and Florida in large numbers. They may come to regret it, especially if the warming trend continues. Excessive heat affects your quality of life, and it also affects the cost of your utilities. My electric bill is way up because the air conditioner is running almost continuously.

 

Insurance losses are skyrocketing, and I believe the worse is yet to come. Insurers have been leaving Florida, which is pushing up the cost of insurance, especially in the high flood-risk zones by the coastal areas. They are leaving California because of forest fires. The stock market has been strong, but it is now starting to drop because of higher rates and other bad news. Families and companies are feeling the effects of higher interest rates. Delinquencies are increasing and credit card debt has now exceeded one trillion dollars for the first time. The cost of climate change has not been adequately accounted for in business and government budget forecasts. Financial markets could continue strong for a time, but when a major downturn occurs you may have little or no warning.

 

Stories now coming out of Hawaii describe problems with the local government response to the fire that swept through Lahaina. And there are reports of looting and robberies. Many of the residents are desperate for basic help such as food and water. I am reminded of hurricane Katrina that hit New Orleans in 2005 and the criticism of the FEMA response. It is easy to criticize, but I do think these situations are indicative of a broader problem, which is the lack of understanding of the situations that response agencies may face because of climate change and unexpected weather patterns.

 

The unexpected is now becoming common and emergency response agencies will now have to face the reality that events previously considered not a real threat are occurring more frequently. The scope of planning for potential disasters needs to consider potential disasters that may occur from climate change with little or no warning. Living in Florida, I am aware of the necessity to prepare for emergencies, especially during the hurricane season. If power goes out and the streets are flooded, I may be on my own for an extended period. I suggest everyone pay close attention to the events in Hawaii because we are all vulnerable and what you see there could take place in your community, although the type of disaster may be different.

 

I am not an apocalyptic. I do not think we are in the End Times; I believe the Earth will continue long after I am gone. However, I do think we are coming to the end of an age. And when that happens, there can be great turmoil and pain before the new age is established. Based on my dreams, I see this age completing around the end of this decade. Scientific discoveries and new technology will help establish the next age, which can be a marvelous time. But for a beneficial time to replace the current period, humans must evolve spiritually as well as technically. So far that has not happened.

 

I believe this decade will provide the wakeup call for humanity. Many, though, will be unable to adjust and this will undoubtedly result in great turmoil as climatic conditions worsen. People will be called upon to choose how they respond to the challenges that confront humanity as a whole and them personally. Those who know how to reach that quiet sacred place within will be fine, but those who only turn to outside sources for their salvation may feel completely lost as governments struggle to even provide basic services. Those who turn to weapons to take what they need from others will be lost souls.

 

In this country, we seem to have lost our way. People can no longer agree on basic values, and an increasing number of people consider morality irrelevant. Lying and cheating has become a way of life for many. We now have a past president with four different lawsuits involving multiple indictments against him including the most serious of charges. What I find particularly disturbing is the response of some who previously voted for him who say that he may be guilty, but they will vote for him again anyway. Morality is not a factor in their decision. It is based only on what they think is best for them regardless of the consequences for our democracy.

 

Trump supporters say that they like his policies. I must remind them that when the COVID-19 pandemic reached the United States he compared it to the flu, and even after the seriousness of it became apparent, he continued to have rallies without his use of a mask or recommended mask use by those in attendance. He said that climate change was an invention of the Democrats, and he proceeded to pull the US out of the Paris Agreement and decimated the environmental protection agency. Are these the policies his supporters are referring to?

 

I do not belong to a political party. I consider myself an Independent and vote for candidates who support policies that I believe are best for the country. But I can recognize an attack on democracy when it occurs, and I can recognize when the good of the country becomes subservient to the desires of an individual. Donald Trump lost the last election, and he knows it. Even many top Republicans acknowledge that fact. However, Trump knows how to effectively use the media and recognizes the power he has over his base. He knows they will believe whatever he tells them as facts, regardless of the truth. For him and them, the truth is what he says it is.

 

I believe some want to see our democracy destroyed. They should examine other countries where this has happened to see if that is really what they want. After Hitler took control of the government in Germany, their democracy was gone in six months. And we all know what happened as a result. Great divisions in Spain in the 1930s resulted in a civil war followed by the Franco dictatorship for the next forty years. Although economic gains were made in the 1960s, there was great repression of various groups and individuals during the Franco regime. After Franco’s death Spain returned to a democracy. The people of North Korea are living in poverty in a giant prison with widespread malnutrition and starvation while their dictator enjoys the best of everything material.

 

In my book The Man Who Sees Tomorrow in His Dreams, I describe a dramatic dream that I had in my early teens. The dream woke me out of a sound sleep and left me very scared. The dream was a preview of the life I would lead, not in detail concerning job choices or marriage, but as a moving theme of my relationship to God during various stages of my life. During the later years of my life, which is now, I was shown a world in chaos with climate out of control, volcanic eruptions, and earthquakes. There was mass panic on Earth. In the dream, I was trying to get people to turn to God for help.

 

Now even at the time of the dream when I was thirteen or fourteen, I felt that it was showing me the course of my future life. Now looking back on the dream, I realize that the themes it depicted were dead on. My life occurred exactly as shown. Since I am in the later years of my life, I must wonder if I am at or near the final part of that dream.

 

Dreams often exaggerate conditions, perhaps to get our attention or drive home points. But sometimes they show conditions as they will exist. If the latter is the case, things are going to get much worse and life as we know it will no longer exist. Some volcanic eruptions are already occurring such as with Mount Etna in Sicily, but this is not unusual. If they begin to occur around the world in frequency and magnitude and we see an increase in earthquakes, we may have reached the point of the greater changes shown in my dream.

The State of Affairs

Recently I have seen an uptick in my older posts concerning climate change. These posts had been the least viewed. This increase in views is probably because of the realization that climate is really changing with unprecedented heat and storms. Perhaps this new interest in these posts should not be a surprise. People focus on immediate concerns and for most people climate change seemed to be something far off with little relevance to their lives. Now all of that is changing. More people are searching for safe places to live, although the main movement is still from colder regions in the North to the South and Southwest, which are areas that are or will be negatively affected by climate change.

I wish I could say that the current situation is a blip that will soon pass. However, my dreams have shown that weather will only get worse for several more years (see my August 2015 post titled A Dream About Edgar Cayce and Climate Change), something also now projected to be the case by scientists. Maybe by the end of the decade new technologies will bring about more stable conditions. There are many encouraging new developments that should substantially reduce greenhouse gases during the latter half of this decade. But for now, we must live with the results of past inaction with things still getting worse.

 

How bad will it get? I don’t know the answer, but for many people disaster has already struck. Some parts of the world such as Africa are seeing unprecedented drought conditions. Somalia is hard hit with thousands dying of starvation. International aid organizations are desperately seeking donations to avert a catastrophe. In the United States, we are seeing record heat in cities such as Phoenix that is resulting in deaths. So far, crops are largely surviving, although that could change very quickly. It will not take much of a further increase in temperatures to push at risk areas into a crisis with people and crops unable to endure the heat.

 

In addition to climate change, the world is now facing a war in Europe that could envelope all nations. In the United States I am seeing a division among people that I have never before witnessed in my lifetime. Instead of working together to solve this nation’s problems, groups are working against each other. The polarization may have multiple causes, but the division that even pits family members against each other is quite shocking. We are facing a seminal moment in history and many politicians nurse petty grievances and look for ways to punish their political enemies instead of solving critical problems.

 

In my earlier post titled Seeing the Future, I wrote about the limitations that we experience as humans. I pointed out the nature of our mental world as an individual creation that is based on very limited information. Even the physical world we think we know is a creation of our brains that depends on sense information that is far from comprehensive. And our mental world is based on beliefs, thoughts, and feelings that may bear little relation to reality. Even the rational, levelheaded person is unable to peer into the mind of another person and see all their thoughts; they must reach conclusions and make judgements about the person based on limited information captured by the senses.

 

Fortunately, there is an answer. Help exists in the way of communications from our subconscious mind, which is not as limited as the conscious mind. We can see the connection between ourselves and other people. At deep levels of the unconscious, the mind experiences a unity that is beyond conscious awareness, except during enlightened periods. However, through our dreams we are shown a connection with others that goes far beyond what our conscious awareness sees. We are also shown our own limitations and misconceptions about ourselves and other people. We soon realize that things we were certain were true may not be true; they are only our beliefs about what is true.

 

When I was employed by a corporation, I managed a technical group responsible for software applications. Late in my career, I moved to a new position that was more directly related to sales and customer support. One day I recall having a conversation with the person who replaced me as manager of the applications group. He said he had previously wondered why I had done certain things, which he admitted he regarded as questionable. But now that he was in my former position, he said he understood my earlier actions.

 

Education helps us understand other people, even those from foreign cultures. I am somewhat distressed by the emphasis on going to college just to get a better, higher paying job. Improving one’s occupational opportunities is important, but equally important is the enhancement of understanding of the arts, other cultures, and society. As we explore other cultures, we find that people everywhere have the same basic concerns and desires that we have. If humanity is to endure and prosper, it will not be because of technology; it will be because we have turned to the spiritual to guide our actions and recognized that at a deep level, we are all one.

 

Recently, I was talking with a neighbor about climate change. He asked me who I thought was responsible. I said we all are. As early as four decades ago, scientists and others began warning about the negative impact humans were having on the Earth. But most ignored the warnings, including the US Congress. A few voices cried out about the urgency of acting, but most thought actions were unnecessary. Al Gore warned us thirty years ago. (See https://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/meetthepressblog/mtp-flashback-1993-al-gore-warned-climate-change-us-temperatures-soare-rcna40221.) 

In his second inaugural address Barack Obama highlighted the threat of climate change and the need for immediate action. That was over ten years ago. Still Congress did not act. Finally, President Biden was able to get a bill passed in Congress that supplied critically needed funding to address climate change. But we are late in addressing the problem. Innovations from this funding will not change what is currently happening. We are going to have to live with the lack of action during earlier decades. When I say all of us are responsible, I am referring to our lifestyles and choice of representatives to Congress with little vision who disavowed any real threats from climate change.

 

As I stated above, I don’t know how bad things will get but past dreams indicate it will get worse, maybe even catastrophic for some areas in the United States and other parts of the world. My dream about California is certainly shocking (see post on 6/25/2021 titled Warning Dream about Seismic Activity in California). The acceleration of the melting of the glacier ice caps, heat waves, and forest fires is very worrisome. People are dying from the heat, and some have no place to go for relief. We need to work together, both in the US and in the United Nations, to address this urgent problem. This is a critical moment for humanity. If we cannot come together and focus all our combined energy and resources on the problem, many people will not survive. We need a plan on the national level about how to help people who live in areas that may suddenly become uninhabitable. How will people be fed, clothed, and housed? How will health care be provided?

 

A couple of years ago, I expressed concerns in a post about the effects of climate change on the economic environment and financial markets. At that time, there was little concern expressed in the financial news, but now I am starting to see articles expressing alarm about the financial impact of climate change. As a society we are not very proactive; thinking is very short term and great sweeps of change are often ignored or not seen at all. It isn’t until we are feeling the direct effects of threats that we are able to galvanize into action. My belief is that when the full effects of climate change are realized, panic will set in. For now, the stock market is moving higher, and analysts are making future stock predictions with no thought of the effects of climate change. That could all change in an instant because of a critical event affecting our food sources, physical health, or the sustainability of certain geographic areas. We saw how quickly Covid-19 changed everything. A new disease for which we are unprepared could appear overnight.

 

Pray for guidance and turn to your dreams for answers. They will provide help, and a single dream could help prevent a loss to you and your family. The certainty of help will strengthen your faith and help you keep a positive attitude during trying times. Even if you are not directly affected, many others are and need your help. Over the years, my dreams have saved me from serious grief. Yours can as well, but you must be willing to take the time to understand this critical aspect of your being.

 

In this country, people place great emphasis on material things. The belief in God is a at a low point; technology is the new God. But technology has not and will not solve the basic problems we face that bring about hunger, disease, and war. Human nature has not learned from history as current problems around the world show. More and better technology will be exploited for war just as past developments have been. The only hope for humanity is an understanding of and reverence for all life. A growth in awareness must occur or the destructive use of technology will end us.

 

The new movie Oppenheimer raises serious questions, but it is sad that the scientists involved in the development of the atomic bomb did not fully realize where it would lead. The situation we have today was predictable once the first bomb exploded. But they and the country’s leaders did not see the probable future that was already contained in their present. A group of scientists did try to urge the government to not use the bomb once it was developed, but I think they were being naïve. Oppenheimer apparently went into a depression when he began to see the results of the detonation over Hiroshima. I wonder what he thought was going to happen.

 

In a future post, I am going to share a few of my thoughts about AI. This is a very important topic that I believe will further test the moral fiber of humanity. Technical developments are occurring at a pace that may well be outstripping humanity’s ability to understand and control the outcomes of those developments. We are creating ever more powerful systems, tools, and weapons without an increase in our wisdom. 

It was not just Oppenheimer who had great misgivings about what he had done in developing the atomic bomb and who later opposed the development of the hydrogen bomb. John Von Neumann, the great twentieth century polymath, played an integral part in its development and use as well. Some ten years later, he wrote an article that appeared in the Fortune magazine in 1955 titled “Can We Survive Technology?”  He was considered by some colleagues to be the smartest person alive at that time, and he was very worried about technology outstripping humanity’s ability to manage and even survive it. (See https://www.thenation.com/article/society/john-von-neumann/ and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_singularity.) Is humanity now at that singularity suggested by Von Neumann? 

Seeing the Future

Can we really see the Future? Or is it an undetermined unknown that does not exist until we reach that future point in time? We think we know the present, and the past is something that once occurred that we could reflect upon. But most people think the future is not yet written and does not exist. To further explore this train of thought I think it will be helpful to consider what it means to see the present.

 

Do we really see the present? Are we aware of the world around us, both the physical and mental environment? First, consider the physical environment. We think we see the world as it is. Our vision shows us a multitude of objects with a broad spectrum of colors. Wide agreement exists among humans about these objects and the details of their structure and appearance. However, people exist who have a different view of the physical world from the one the majority of us see. But they are considered exceptions with a physical abnormality. In addition to conditions such as color blindness, there is a condition called synesthesia in which wiring in the brain appears to be crossed: sights may appear as sounds and colors as taste. The stimulation of one sense crosses over to another sense, and sometimes both senses are triggered.

 

Ignoring these exceptions, what about most humans? Do we see the world as it exists? Let’s examine the process of seeing. Light emitted or reflected from objects in the form of electromagnetic radiation impinges on the retina of our eyes. Photoreceptors in the retina generate electrical signals that are sent to the brain via the optic nerve for processing by the visual center. The brain generates, based on these signals and other sense information, what we call a visual image. The image or what we “see” is a construct of the brain. The colors we see are a result of three types of receptors in the retina that are sensitive to red, green, and blue light. The light or electromagnetic radiation we see consists of energy at specific wavelengths. The electromagnetic radiation doesn’t have color. The R, G, B sensors in the retina find the proportion of red, green, and blue wavelengths received and the brain constructs the image based on that information.

 

The visual spectrum that the photoreceptors in the retina are sensitive to is only a tiny part of the entire electromagnetic spectrum that includes high energy gamma radiation, x-rays, ultraviolet waves, the visible spectrum, the infrared, and radio waves. A quick Google search (e.g., see https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Electromagnetic-Spectrum.svg) retrieves several sites with images showing the wavelength and frequencies of the electromagnetic waves for each part of the spectrum. Every day we are bombarded with radio waves, tv signals. Infrared radiation, visible light, and ultraviolet (UV) rays from the sun. We see only a fraction of the energy that surrounds us, and which supplies information about our world. If the person who is unnecessarily out in the hot sun in the summer during midday could see the UV, they might schedule their activities differently.

 

Among the mammals, humans’ vision is quite good with a large range of color perception (theoretically millions, see https://www.aao.org/eye-health/tips-prevention/how-humans-see-in-color). As a comparison, dogs have two color receptors instead of three. They are missing the red and see primarily in the blue and yellow. And no, bulls cannot see red either. To dogs and bulls, red would just appear as a dark or gray shading. But some animals can see better than humans do. Bullfrogs and salmon can “see” in the infrared, and bees and butterflies “see” in the ultraviolet. Butterflies and mantis shrimp have more color receptors than humans and are believed to have the broadest visual range. Our visual resolution is decent, but hawks and eagles have a far superior ability to see details at a great distance. (For references see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_vision, https://askabiologist.asu.edu/colors-animals-see, and https://www.colormatters.com/color-matters-for-kids/how-animals-see-color.)

 

What about the other senses? We know from experience that many animals such as dogs can hear better than we can (especially higher frequencies, see https://ncraoa.com/dogs-hearing-range/), and dogs experience a different world through their heightened sense of smell as well as hearing. If you are in bear country, do not leave food out or in your car. Bears can smell food miles away (https://hikingandfishing.com/bears-sense-of-smell/). Some animals have night vision far superior to a human’s vision. The retina has rods and cones for photo receptors. The cones manage daylight vison and colors, and the rods are more sensitive to light levels and give us our vision in the dark. Familiar animals such as cats have a much greater density of rods giving them superior night vision (https://excitedcats.com/cat-vision-vs-human-vision/).

 

At this point you may wonder why I am presenting this information when the title of my post is Seeing the Future. My purpose is to make clear the limitations in our ability to see the physical world as it exists. Our brains construct a picture based on data from the photoreceptors in our eyes. What the brain constructs is limited by the information these receptors can capture. We do not see the world; we see the brain’s interpretation of the world based on what our physical sensors can capture. It has been good enough for humans to survive and prosper, but we have had to turn to technology to supplement what our eyes cannot show us. When you leave your house and look upon the world around you, you are only perceiving a limited version of that world. You are seeing the brain’s interpretation of reality. What actually exists is electromagnetic radiation with certain wavelengths transmitted or reflected from objects.

 

If we only see a limited subjective version of the physical world, what about our awareness and understanding of other humans: family members, friends, coworkers? Do we “see” the mental world: our thoughts, emotions, and social interactions correctly? Or maybe I should ask what the limitations are in this area. Now we are dealing with the world of thoughts: our thoughts and the thoughts of everyone else who makes up our world. Every day we make judgements about ourselves and those we meet. Based on our beliefs, beliefs they espouse, comments they make, how they dress, the friends they have, their occupation, politics, all lead us to form our opinions about them. Of course, we are limited by what we see, hear, smell, taste, and touch; the physical senses supply the information that our thoughts use to reach their conclusions. And we do not know other people’s thoughts—only what they tell us. But is that the whole story, the entire picture? For the physical picture of the world, we clearly are limited by our senses, which are enhanced to some degree by technology. Is our mental world also limited in any way other than our lack of ability to know another person’s thoughts?

 

Here we must differentiate between two major aspects of mind: the conscious and unconscious (often referred to as the subconscious, although they are not identical). Our daily conscious activity is based on the information from the senses that feeds into the conscious mind. The subconscious mind is the great reservoir of power that makes our physical movements seamless and manages automatic functions such as blood flow, cell reproduction, digestion, and breathing. But it does much more than that. Paranormal research has made it clear that communications can occur between individuals beyond the normal senses. Many still doubt the psychic, but at this point I believe the evidence is overwhelming that it exists. I do not want to debate this here. I have gone into this in detail in my dream books, with dreams my own primary source of communication on a psychic level.

 

The subconscious is the receiver and generator of communications on a vast level that for the most part is not perceived by the conscious mind. These communications can be seen in dreams and during meditation or other altered states. Our dreams filter most of what inundates us and focus on what is important for us to know in the conscious state to help our lives.

 

You can think of the subconscious as being bombarded with an uncountable number of signals (the form is unknown). The subconscious filters out all but information that may be of interest or benefit to us. What is related in dreams is strongly influenced by our conscious motives, ideas, and interests.

 

Unfortunately, the vast amount of helpful information supplied nightly in our dreams is ignored by almost all people. Most are unaware of the nature and purpose of their dreams and make no effort to remember them. As a physical analogy, it would be like shutting off one, or more, of our senses and pretending it doesn’t exist. Our dreams show us a present that greatly expands on the present we see and know from our conscious awareness, which only shows us a a physical world limited by our senses and a mental world that is probably much more distorted and limited than the physical because of a lack of direct contact with other people’s minds and our own subconscious mind.

 

Earlier I commented on seeing colors and specific human limitations. The objects we see appear to us to be solid. However, science has shown that they are anything but solid. They are formed of molecules and atoms with a great amount of space between them. But our vision cannot show us that level of detail. To us most objects appear solid. If we want to see what objects are made of, we must turn to technology to extend our visual perception.

 

Hypersensitive individuals exist who claim to see auras or color patterns around other people. They may see layered energy bodies enshrouding the person. Sometimes psychic healers claim to perceive physical health issues from the appearance of grays or dark colors in the person’s aura. In New Age literature various energy bodies are described, which appear to owe their origin to Hinduism and other Eastern religions. Most scientists refute those psychics’ claims, but since even a normal image is a construct of the brain, I question how they can say a psychic is not seeing what they claim. However, they might argue that the construct is totally within the individual and is not because of any emanations from the person whose aura they claim to see. I do not believe that this is the case as my own psychic feelings have shown.

 

Clearly, we do not see things in any complete sense, even if you reject psychic perception. We build our personal world based on imperfect feelings of the world we inhabit. Both the physical world we see and the mental world we inhabit are created by our brains and conscious minds. Certainly, there is considerable agreement among people about the nature of the physical world because we all have the same kind of sense apparatus. There is much less agreement in our mental worlds, partially because of the exclusion of the subconscious mind as a source of enlightenment and the fact that our mental worlds are personal, individually created.

 

If you want to see the future, then begin to really see the present. Pay attention to your surroundings and the details in your life. Wake up to the body language and moods of those around you; they are conveying nonverbal messages that may be more important than what they say. Examine your own feelings and try to understand what generated them. Become aware of yourself: your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs.

 

Begin to record and study your dreams. Learn the language of your subconscious and you will find an entirely new level of perception and understanding. The world you see will be greatly enhanced and you will wonder why you didn’t see that world before. You will begin to see the future and discover it is contained within the present. You will understand that you create the future. In a real sense it already exists, and if you want to change it, you must begin with the present. Your future is not unknown; it just may be unknown to you. Your mental world is completely your creation and is unique to you. You can continue to live in the one you created or create a new one that removes barriers and opens new channels and opportunities.

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Tragedy is Looming

In the past two decades, we have seen a limited desire on the part of humans to make the necessary efforts to prevent cataclysmic changes to the Earth and its climate. The changes Edgar Cayce, Gordon-Michael, Lori Toye, and others have warned us about have been delayed, but increasingly chaotic weather and UN warnings suggest that many of the predictions may yet happen. Last year I had a dream about California and posted it on my blog (helpfromdreams.blogspot.com) on 6/25/2021. The dream indicated that in California everything would turn to sand in four years or by 2025. Now given the current drought situation in California and future predictions about its continuance, my dream is not farfetched in saying that there will be no relief in California and it could become a desert. See the recent BBC news post titled Drought-stricken US warned of looming ‘dead pool.’ It describes the situation in the western states and California in particular quite well.

 

Recent trends in population movement indicate an explosion of growth in Phoenix, Las Vegas, and Houston. And people are grabbing up beach property in Florida at hugely inflated prices. Despite all of the warnings from government agencies and the United Nations, many people believe climate change will not affect them. They are ignoring drought conditions in the West and the risk of coastal flooding in Texas and Florida. I think they are in denial and are living in a delusion. Climate change is not something that will happen in twenty years or ten years; climate change is happening now. If you think food prices are high now, then wait a few years and the prices today might look cheap. California alone produces a third of our vegetables and most of our fruit.

 

My previous posts on climate change have largely been ignored with few views. People may be tired of hearing about it, but that doesn’t mean it will go away. Almost forty million people live in California, which is nearly the entire population of Ukraine. If my dream comes true, what will happen to all of the agriculture in California and what will be the cost of water to the inhabitants of California?

 

Another of my dreams (posted on August 18, 2015 and titled A Dream About Edgar Cayce and Climate Change) indicated that weather would continue to get worse for most of this decade, and we are only in the early part of the decade. The signs of what is happening are now everywhere, and my dream is saying it will only get worse. In some parts of the world, we are already seeing high temperatures that are threatening life and drought that is causing mass starvation.

 

I have not posted items for almost a year. However, I have decided to make another effort to reach people with a message that hopefully will resonate with some because we are truly out of time. We must elect candidates this year in the midterms who understand the situation and are prepared to address it. This may be our last chance. People claim their number one concern is inflation. Well, unless we elect people who are willing to address climate change, inflation in the near future may be even worse.