Alien Encounter of the Fourth Kind
In this dream, I see a drawing of a one-eyed alien with my body, dancing in a nightclub. Carl Jung associates the symbol of the alien to the unconscious.
Since the unconscious gives us the feeling that it is something alien, a non-ego, it is quite natural that is should be symbolized by an alien figure. (Jung, 2014).
The one-eyed alien head on top of my body is significant. It represents the integration of the unconscious (Self/ true nature) with the individual self. This experience is where the Essence (Self/ true nature) knows itself through an individual consciousness (me!). Padmasambhava, a teacher of Dzogchen, says:
Being without any distraction, it is the luminous clarity of the Essence itself (Reynolds, 1989, p.18).
The Essence knowing itself, can be experienced as a glimpse or peak insight (as compared to permanent realization), and is what Almaas’s calls primary awakening. In Alchemy of Freedom Spirit Rock Book Talk 2017 (starts at 1:04:16) Almaas playfully describes primary awakening as an alien encounter of the fourth kind.
Necessary awakening is a close encounter of the third kind. Primary awakening is a close encounter of the fourth kind. You are not just meeting the alien and shaking hand with them – it’s knowing how they’re feeling inside, how they’re experiencing things inside, you know how true nature experiences itself. I’m using the alien as a metaphor for true nature. It’s an alien because it’s different […]. You discover what you are, what your nature is and it turns out to be the nature of everybody, the nature of the universe, and which is part of what we discover when we have that kind of access.
Having this kind of access requires what the Shaikh calls an “eye of the world beyond”. (Corbin, 1977, p. 81) This organ of perception is what allows this realization to be possible, and is depicted in this dream by the huge and unmissable single eye.
The dancing unifies both the dynamic world-creative force of Sophia (Soul of the World) with her individual manifestation (me!).
Her [Sophia] essence, may be said to be something like the dancing sparkle of life-she is the principle of life itself. She is joyful, creative manifestation of all possible expressions of living forms, and she is the knowledge of them all. As the principle of life, she is the center of all souls and all souls belong to her.’ (Raff, 2003, p. 96).
…the dance of Sophia linking divinity, humanity and the Earth.’ (Habel & Balabanski, 2002, p. 85).
