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Buddhism

Buddhist dreams--including dreams of meeting Buddha(s).

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What this site is - Add your dreams! - How to read blurbs - Ratings - Copyright - Downloading - The World Dream Bank has 4000 dreams plus 1000 pages on dreamwork, shamanism, surrealism, fantasy, worldbuilding, creativity and genius. Site © Chris Wayan 2001-2022.


AFTER THE FLOOD & THE PIG-EARED BABY ALLIGATOR: by Skiznot; c.1995, an oracular dream
My hometown floods. I swim after some strange fish and find
a scientific community where a scaled baby tells me who I am...
AIRPLANE DISASTERS: by Jack Kerouac, early Aug? 1954, a helpless-witness nightmare
An indestructible camera relentlessly shows me what passengers feel on every crashing plane...
CAUTION: PAINFUL READING
AMERICAN TANKA: by Wayan; dreamed 1989/7/26, painting-poem-story on 30" disk, 1995.
I dreamed I circumnavigated the entire Buddhist wheel of existence in a single night...
AMIDA: by Lady Sarashina, 1055/10/13, a dream of a salvation-offer
Three years before her husband died and she was left alone, Sarashina dreamt
Amida Buddha stood in her garden and told her "Later I shall return to fetch you"...
ARHATS IN A DREAM: by Guan Xiu, c.891, early dream paintings
Guan Xiu, a painter in the late Tang Dynasty, dreamt that sixteen arhats
or luohans (Buddhist sort-of-saints)asked him to paint their portraits--
not their earthly forms but their (rather peculiar) astral forms. He did...
AT A CALIFORNIA CAMP: by Jack Kerouac, spring 1955, a nuclear testing nightmare
My family and I are prisoners in a camp that will be H-bombed so our remains
can be studied. I write a Buddhist poem preparing for death...
CAUTION: GOVERNMENT ATROCITY
AWKWARD ENLIGHTENMENT: by Wayan; 2010/1/13; a dream of spiritual and practical advice
Anxious about a big party, I dream of being crowded. But
a cat-centaur in the crowd attains sudden enlightenment...
BALANCE?: by Wayan, 1984/10/10, a dream about dreams.
Silky, my sentient starship, gives me a scolding about playing it safe...
THE BOULDER DISSOLVES: by Myoe Shonin; mid Dec. 1230, an old monk's dream of liberation
I was trapped inside a boulder, but as I chanted it melted around me until it resembled a discarded skin...
BRICK AND SKIN: by Wayan; 1988/10/18, a dream of spiritual stretching.
I'm analog myself, but in Tibet, I meet a digital shaman whose body's a sort of ...
THE BRIDGE: by Wayan; a 3-page comic from two linked dreams, 1989/5/28 & 1989/10/1.
The Hunt of the Unicorn (yeah, guess who I am), as I fly through the worlds fighting Reaganism...
CAUTION: MOCKS THE GREAT COMMUNICATOR
BUDDHA BEARS: by Wayan; 1994/12/10. Digital sketch of a dream image I forgot was a dream!
Gosh, I'm speechless. How Zen! Market me at once!
CAUTION: MOCKS RELIGION. OR ADVERTISING. ONE OF THOSE.
CAMERA STRIKE: by Wayan, 1996/10/19, a dream within a dream with a point.
I dream I'm a lemur-girl in an emotional maze.
I wake to find I'm really a satyr cartoonist.
Funny, we have a lot in common! I wake to find...
CAUTION: PHALLIC SATYRE
CELLPHONE HEAVEN: by Alder, 2008/8/28, a dream of practical sainthood
I visit a Tibetan monastery with great cellphone reception from the gods.
But all their calls are messages to pass on to others--none for us...
THE CIRCUS HUMANS' DESERTION: by Wayan; 1988/2/19; an epic holy dream.
I join a circus, but soon all the best carnies sail off to the Blessed Isles. The circus animals pitch in
and carry on--clumsy and lonely. Then a divine herald arrives from the Isles: Donald Duck! He says...
CRONE AND SAGE AT THE MALL: by Wayan; 1991/6/22, a mystical dream-sonnet about malls.
I dream up a shining mall. At a booth selling herbs I meet my mentors, Crone and Sage.
They tease me for building a venue so banal. But I tease right back: "This place shapes you..."
CAUTION: CRITIQUES BUDDHIST PURITY
CROSS THE BLACK RIVER ONE DEATH AT A TIME: by Wayan; 1990? Astral landscape
Buddhism is a 12-step program; it has its pitfalls for those of us who already detach all too easily...
DARUMA DOLLS: by Wayan; late 1994. Nondream digital sketch.
One of Aline Kominsky's comix has her in a bar and a guy asks "Que pasa, muñeca?" and...
CAUTION: CONVERSATIONAL FETUSES
DREAM-DENIERS: by Wayan, 2014/5/31, a dream contemplating the meaning of dreams
In a museum I talk to a stained-glass artist who's a dreamworker like me.
But a meme seems to be spreading that says dreams mean absolutely nothing...
CAUTION: ADVANCED DREAMWORK
A DREAMKU PRIMER: by Roswila; 2007; how-to guide to dream haiku
Distilling a dream to one key image can clarify it. But don't be ruled totally by traditional haiku form...
DREAMKU, JUNE 2006: by Roswila; various dates up to June 2006; thirty dream-haiku
Daily dream-poems in haiku style, nonstop for a month. A flood of animals, revenant ghosts, sex changes...
DRINK THE DOVE: by Myoe Shonin; c.1202/9/11, a pre-Surrealist surreal dream
The sparrow died in the ashes, but the dove in my hands became a blue cloud.
I drank it, thinking "This will benefit us all"...
ELEPHANT WITH A LOTUS: by Queen Maya, 564 BCE? a prophetic Buddhist dream
After 20 years without a child, Maya dreams devas carry her to a holy lake, wash her...
and then an elephant carrying a lotus flower enters her right side. She knows it means...
CAUTION: DREAM OMITS TINY DETAIL--IMMINENT DEATH
FEVER HILL: by Wayan; 1991/4/13, a comic Buddhist nightmare.
My fever-dreams manifest physically and mess up my whole neighborhood. Seismic inspectors arrive...
BUDDHA'S FIVE DREAMS: by Siddartha, soon to be called the Buddha, c.540 BCE?
I'm gigantic, stretching from Ceylon to Tibet. Grass grows from my navel to heaven.
Worms crawl on me. Birds flock to me and change color. I climb a mountain of dung...
CAUTION: PIOUS MISINTERPRETATIONS
FOR THE FIRST TIME: by Jack Kerouac, Nov? 1954, a lucid dream of escaping a rut
I've climbed a cliff and cower on the brink; but for for the first time I need not
fall or retrace my dangerous path down. I know I'm dreaming, and wake...
FORKS AND SAUCERS: by Wayan; 1988/10/18, a dream on when to quit
Tibet, 1910. I find a cult whose ancestors manned a radar station that shot down
flying saucers. But were the aliens really hostile? I'm not so sure...
FURRY TRINITY: by Wayan; 2021/3/1, a dream painting three facets of... me? Or of dreaming?
Three furry people show off their collected art & pets. But then they dissolve into their art & pets!
The room itself dissolves into a river-raft. A unicorn girl in a gauze ritual robe studies a map...
CAUTION: MILD FURRY NUDITY
GABORS: by Jack Kerouac, late Jan. 1954, a dream of celebrity delusion
Starlets Zaza and Eva Gabor grow old shopping, smiling, covering their fears, until...
GRIEF KIVA: by Wayan; 1980/2/16, a lucid psychic dream.
In a Hopi underworld, I find even lucid dreaming can't cure guilt and grief over losses yet to come...
GROUND ZERO: by Al Davison; 2001/9/9, a predictive dream-comic.
Two days before 9/11, I dream I'm a child at ground zero, mourning the devastation--and witnessing rebirth.
HELL CAFE: by Wayan; 2009/10/21, a dream poem w/sketch; Dreamverse #62
A Buddhist scroll shows me Hell Cafe, where diners become entrees. But I read the scroll
backwards! You can escape Hell just by walking out, against the traffic flow...
CAUTION: CANNIBAL SOULS
HIGHER LEVEL: by Wayan; 2011/12/13, an absurd transcendent dream
I paddle through the grim streets of Karachi on my belly, on a skateboard,
with my flipper-hands, until at last I reach the border to a Higher Realm...
HILLMAN ON DAIMONS: by Wayan; 1998/9/7, on Greco-Roman and Jungian ideas of a life-goal
James Hillman and my own experience suggest we enter life with an agenda. But what if our goals are sick?
HIS MINE: by Wayan; 1985/12/2, an epic Wild West dream
I'm a hobbit seeking Henry Fonda's haunted gold mine. And find it. Or is that chocolate?
But then I'm caught in a shamanic showdown in a bar where they serve real spirits...
HOW TO SURVIVE NUCLEAR WAR: by Maxine Kumin; early 1980s, a dream poem.
In Japan, sick in bed, reading a book on radiation sickness, I dream of a restorative ritual for trees...
CAUTION: GRUESOME
HUNT AND PECK: by Patagia; 1997/6/16, a dream on the creative non-struggle.
I’m a brown sparrow scratching in the dirt, looking for bugs. Focused, tireless, I hunt and peck...
I ALSO DREAMED...: by Jack Kerouac, Summer 1958? an early dream of the world as a simulation.
I also dreamed the world was a mathematical abstract, like, by subtracting 740 from 1000
you got 260 which meant 'Egg' more or less, so if you wanted an egg you had the egg...
ID FLOWERS: by Wayan; 1989/10/8, a dream of wish and fear
The villagers warned me not to walk in the alien graveyard; for at night, the Id flowers wake...
THE ILL-FORMED TALE: by Wayan; 160K, 1981/4/7, a wild dream anti-epic.
To reach the Peak of Happiness on the Isle of Dreams, I must pass four Perils--but they're all backwards...
CAUTION: RELIGIOUS NUTS, KNIVES, NUDE ALIENS, BACKWARD PLOT...
IMMOLATION MAZE: by Richard Turner; 1973, a nightmare expanded into both sculpture & story
Saigon, 1973. Lost in a fabric maze. I find, wearing Buddhist robes, the skeleton of a dog.
Years later I write of Buddhist monks burning themselves, and build an ominous maze...
CAUTION: SUICIDES BY FIRE
THE INCIDENCE OF BUDDHAS: by Wayan; 1996/4/24, a dream testing me.
I'm in a mall that enlightened customers alter with a thought. But too many Buddhas spoil the architecture...
JADE JACKPOT, or, A HEAP O' CHANGE: by Wayan; 1990/1/7, a dream of shaking down God.
I'm slipping dimes into a boulder of jade: a vending machine that fills every order wrong. Why feed it? Well...
THE KEYRING OF ATTACHMENTS: by Wayan; 1974/5/31, a dream gone too far.
Swayed by sinister surgeons, I go all Buddhist and give up my attachments, including various organs...
CAUTION: DIVESTABLE GENITALIA
THE LADY LOVES THE HORSE by Wayan, 1990/9/28; a dream mocking fake humility
Richard Russo writes that Westerners cannot dream like tribal people.
So I dream Russo's the Cubist Dictator of Dreams! I prefer the part-equine
Lady Demicorn, and the Fat Meditating Dog, and the Birdiesattva...
CAUTION: NUDE CREATURES
LEARNING SCALES: by Wayan; 1985/6/26, an epic dream of Chinese dragons.
I find myself in astral China. The Empress is banished, the Jester rules. Wisdom is lost.
We need an Imperial Dragon...
LION-MEN: by Wayan; 1995/7/9, an eye-opening dreamlet.
I'm a traveling Zen warrior talking to a circus girl in a barn. Four guys enter--and my life changes forever.
MAGIC SCHOOL: by Wayan; 1982/1/26, a major, political dreamtale.
Phyllis Schlafly, killer of the Equal Rights Amendment, provokes a dream where I'm Captain Kirk trapped in a magic school, with no way out but the graduate exam. Can I learn the lesson of the tree?
CAUTION: POLITICS
THE MAGIC WORDS: by Wayan; 1974/5/29, an early dream on word-magic.
Humanity in the future desperately needs the magic words from the past to free them. But... "pickle?"
MAHAKALA, MOZART, AND THE CRIPPLED BIRD: by Wayan; 1985/4/17, a dream on facing shadows
The Christian God vs Mahakala, Buddhist god of right anger! War in Middle Earth, as Pink Floyd sings...
MEDITATION BLUES: by Wayan, 1983/2/13, nondream sketches of meditative state.
Meditation's hard for me; I expect to turn on instantly, like a lamp plugged into Enlightenment...
MOVING IN THE LANDSCAPES OF MY DREAMS:
by Jenny Badger Sultan; 14 dreams (mostly Jan-Mar 2011) painted on one canvas
A dream urged me to paint a big landscape with cutout movable (magnetic) dream figures
and liftable flaps revealing hidden dream scenes...
MY RITUAL BEHEADING: by Jenny Badger Sultan; 1996/3/24, painting of a nightmare
We stood meekly in line to be beheaded. I tried to accept my fate and commended myself to God...
CAUTION: READ THE TITLE!
MY SINE-FRIEND: by Wayan; 1984/3/6, an emotional dream of time and rebirth.
An animal-girl I know lives like a sine-wave, first forward in time, then backwards, dying at every zero...
NORASINGH: by Wayan; 1987/1/15, a Tantric Frankenstein dream.
I fall in love with my sculpture of a mythical Southeast Asian creature. Then a mad yogi breaks in...
CAUTION: SEX, TANTRA, AND GENERAL WEIRDNESS
ON MOLLY'S FOREHEAD: by Wayan, 1988/11/19, a spiritual sex dream.
A child of radicals goes wild in Rio. When we bail her out, we find she's had a strange enlightenment...
CAUTION: UNSAFE SEX
PEACOCK KINGS: by Myoe Shonin; 1196/8 or 1196/9, an ecstatic dream
I meet two Peacock Kings bigger than human beings, who chant blessings until I wake with tears drenching my pillow...
A PRISONER OF ZEN: by Wayan; 1980/11/9, a dream on isolation.
The Pope spears our Inuit captain and the Mystic, who turns solitary--a prisoner of Zen. Can I free him?
PROPHETIC DREAM OF BUDDHA'S FATHER: by King Suddhodana, c.563 BCE? an uneasy dream
Suddhodana dreams of great upheavals; no courtier can interpret the dream.
An ascetic claims the upheaval will be for the good, then... turns into an owl?!
CAUTION: PERHAPS NOT ENTIRELY ACCURATE
REBORN IMMORTAL: by Reneta Scian; 2010/1/3, a three-stage flying dream
First I try to break the sound barrier like my girlfriend. Nope!
Then I fly slowly to her apartment. Nothing flashy, but I make it.
Last, I zoom back to ancient China, where I find a candle-lit shrine dedicated to... me?
RING OF WHITE WATER: by Wayan; 1983/1/30, an epic astral dream.
I'm a raft guide on a circular river that may just be reincarnation. A girl in my
tour group jumps ship: she dreads the white water of rocky relationships ahead...
CAUTION: METAPHYSICS, SEX, WEAK SOULS...
ROBINSON JEFFERS AS A SHAMAN: by Wayan; 1996/7/28, a life-review, with 2016/10/22 followup
Jeffers, that harsh, visionary, ecological poet, seems drunk on Darwinism, blind to how kindness matters...
CAUTION: SHAMANIC SHOPTALK, BRAIN REQUIRED
SATORI ACCORDING TO GHOST: by Wayan; 1998/4/11, a longterm predictive dream
A Buddhist student, troubled by a corporation marketing a product called
"Satori", summons the ghost of her beloved mentor for advice...
SECRETS OF THE TEETERING STUPA: by Carl Linkhart, 1998 or before; dream poem/painting
The past. Burma. I'm shown a stupa covered in gold leaf, and given a key
to a tunnel where they say a tooth of Buddha is encased in glass...
SERAFINA AND RAM DASS: by Wayan; a 2000/11/6 dream anticipating an 11/9 experience with auras
A Finnish shaman/witch gives me a lesson in night flying; in the waking world
I meet Ram Dass and sense him speak astrally before his body can get the words out...
CAUTION: HIGH MYSTICAL QUOTIENT; IF ALLERGIC, AVOID
SHEEP IN THE SKY: by Myoe Shonin; c.1220/9/20, a dream of strange advice.
A strange transforming thing appeared in the sky--a light, a sheep, a man. It told me to stop burning my head...
SILKY'S WOODCUTS: by Wayan, 2006/12/15, an art-prompt dream with spiritual overtones
I dreamed I'd made a set of woodblock prints showing a scene from varied times & angles:
my anima Silky, part girl part mare, contemplates another set of prints--famous Zen ones...
SOCK PUPPETS OF THE GODS: by Dee and Wayan; 1994/4/14. Parallel shamanic dreams!
I dream I'm suicidal; but I'm saved when I'm shown the flow of human development--the same pattern,
from souls to civilizations! Eddies and knots recur, but the challenges slowly get more spiritual.
NEXT DAY: I learn what my shaman-friend Dee just dreamed. And now I'm unsure whose dream this is...
CAUTION: IDEAS
SOULS IN THE MUD: by Wayan; 1981/1/14, a thoughtful dream.
I'm being hunted in Reincarnation Swamp, as I worry--the human population boom
means experienced souls are scarce. Are most folks you meet really dogs, cats... rats?
CAUTION: MYSTIC ELITISM
SOUL-WORK GOES ON: by Wayan; 1994/11/3, a journal extract on dreamwork.
As I reread decades of dreams, I see Jung was right: even in crisis-times, soul-work goes calmly on...
SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINE? PLEASE, MISTRESS, NO!: by Wayan; 1981/7/18, a meditation on meditation.
A rant on over-disciplined Americans (NOT under; we just think we are) taking up spiritual disciplines...
STRANGE SERVICE: by Gordon B., early 2006, a transcendental dream
The old man sang in the empty church, then looked at me and snapped his fingers. I was filled with voices...
THE STUTTER: by Wayan; 1995/9/7, a religious dreamtale.
Half our religion-founders were just one guy, repeating till he got it right. Practice makes perfect!
SUSHI CIRCUS: by Wayan; 1982/2/17, an illustrated psychic dream.
To avoid being stabbed, I flee the Psychodrama Circus. Wisely--the place explodes!
But it's the filling of the sushi roll that really upsets me...
CAUTION: CANNIBAL MAKI
TAHOE DRAGON: by Wayan; 1980/8/16, a dream of flight and fire
A dragon killed a friend, and threatened worse. I had to fight.
We dueled mid-air, over Lake Tahoe...
TAHOE TAROT: by Wayan; 1988/4/13, a silly mystic flying dream.
My sister and I are playing cards in the air high over Lake Tahoe.
The stakes? The world. But we both cheat...
THREE-EYED WOLF: by Wayan; 1992/12/14. Digital comic of a dream, done movie-poster style
A 'toon liberation dream. I cartooned a new self and slowly she grew realer, until she ran Disney...
CAUTION: FRANK SINATRA SWEARS
THE THREE VEILS BETWEEN MAN AND GOD: by Anna Kingsford, March 1881, a messianic dream.
I was shown what veils the God in us: Blood (violence), Idols (dogmatism), and the Curse of Eve (sexism)...
CAUTION: FUNDAMENTALISTS (OF ANY FAITH) WILL SEE RED
TIBETAN DISASSEMBLY: by Wayan; 2007/7/5, a dream of a desperate ploy
A woman in Tibet disassembles herself! A local god hires her spirit,
but she uses the office equipment to backup her memories and...
CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME
THE TOMBSTONE TEST: by Wayan; 1986/8/18, a deceptive dream.
I walk in a vast graveyard full of history's most famous
people and treasures. But it's all fake, built to test your...

UNICORN TAG: by Wayan; 1986, a linked series of illustrated dreams.
Animal teachers, mostly equine, drag me (as I scream NO!) beyond plain dreamwork into shamanism...
Chapter 1: The Deer Party: by Wayan; 6 illus.
Chapter 2: Ariane's Honeymoon: by Wayan; 8K
Chapter 3: The Everest Marathon: by Wayan; 1 illus.
Chapter 4: Who'll Be My Love?: by Wayan; 100K, 4 illus.
Chapter 5: Dreamrider: by Wayan; 7K, a nondream interlude
Chapter 6: Half Shaman, Half Statesman: by Wayan; 170K, 4 illus.
Chapter 7: Eight To A Horn: by Wayan; 2 illus.
Chapter 8: Black Magic: by Wayan, 7 illus.
Chapter 9: Misfits On Mars: by Wayan; 300K, 7 illus.
WHAT! MORE?: by Wayan; 300 x 500, ink 1985, digital color 2001.
The world needs Zen cards, to balance out the Tarot.
So here's my Zen pack--all one of them. One too many.
"WHAT SHARKS?": by Wayan; 1990/4/22, a dream of multiple viewpoints.
A cowgirl is driving us in circles round the dusty parking lot, fleeing the air-sharks... or is she?
WHO ATE MY LETTUCE?: by Wayan; 1983/1/13, a short dreamfable.
An invisible monster is eating my lettuce patch.
It casts a huge blurry shadow, leaves footprints, but...
THE WORK OF POWER: by Anna Kingsford; Dec. 1880, a wildly uncompromising dream-sermon
A dream telling how to acquire mystic power: raw food, no sex, meat, or booze; just meditate in rural solitude...
CAUTION: EXTREMISM
THE WORLD'S FAIR: by Wayan; 1983/3/18, an illustrated dream fable.
The same night I learn of the Kerouac Tree, a wise old man shows me the world's fair. Not the event...
YEATS: by Wayan; 1990/1/1, a poem wrestling with Yeats's visions.
Our dilemma is, now that we have the power to get what we want... what exactly was it we wanted?
YOU'RE THE EAGLE: by Wayan; 2000/2/8, a dream fable.
A hermit spends his life wrestling with shadows. His only disciple becomes famous. Who was happier?
ZEMMYO: by Myoe Shonin; c.1221/4/20, a spiritual Pygmalion dream.
A doll sent from China breaks into tears over her exile here in Japan. I reassure her and she becomes real...
ZEN INSURANCE: by Anonymous #38, art by Jesse Reklaw; pre-2000; a mystical frustration dream
My Zen master keeps asking me koans. But every riddle is about insurance
forms. I always reply "I am thirsty." He asks another. It goes on forever...


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