SecretAgentMan wrote:Regarding dreaming raindog (or anyone else interested), you may want to try this trick out. A little over a year ago a lady came in to talk to a meditation group I was a part of. She had been trained by a doctor in France who was using a form of light therapy for things like sleep disorders, memory enhancement, increased focus, and other things like that. She gave a talk, a demonstration, and was of course selling specialized hand-held LED lights for use with their technique. I thought the information was very interesting, but not enough to spend the $ they were asking for the lights. Especially when I was still skeptical about the results they claimed were achievable. Fast forward to that night and the next morning. I woke up having had some of the most vivid dreams I could remember having in a long time. Don't get me wrong, I had been dreaming and could remember my dreams many mornings, but they were fleeting images, fragments, and general impressions of what the theme or experiences were. The vivid dreams that night were more intense and easier to remember. The experience seemed more real and memorable. More impressionable maybe? It is hard to describe. They were not lucid dreams, but just more vivid.
So what was this crazy light demonstration that seemingly led to a night of vivid dreams? Basically it was this. Have you ever had a camera flash go off in your face and you are left with that dot that is temporarily burned into your vision? After a few minutes it slowly dissipates and goes away. Well, they sell lights that are calibrated to a specific intensity and wavelength of light so that it does not damage your eyes and supposedly stimulates the neurons in your brain. You stare into the light for about 30 seconds, close your eyes and focus on the small circle of light that is temporarily imprinted into your vision. With your eyes closed it just looks like a small circle of light against the pitch black backdrop. When you actually focus on it and look at it though, you will notice that it is made up of different colors. Over the course of the next 3 to 5 minutes you just watch as it changes colors and slowly shrinks until you can no longer see it. It is a short meditation exercise basically.
What makes this simple exercise so interesting are the background information that comes along with it. Light is basically just photons. The photon is one of the most basic fundamental elements of matter in the known universe. It is a little packet of energy that behaves like both a particle when observed and a wave when not observed. Double slit experiments have demonstrated this strange behavior of photons. Photons also carry information, as simple and basic as they are. This is why lasers (organized coherent light) can be used to produce holographic images. The light contains the information. Photons demonstrate quantum entanglement with other photons, where information can be transmitted across vast distances of space faster than the known boundary, the speed of light. Ironically this means light can communicate with light, faster than the speed of light...
So those are the properties of light itself, but what about light and us? In the year 1984 Dr. Peter Gariaev was studying DNA and was doing experiments with lasers. When Gariaev put a sample of DNA in a tiny quartz container, zapped it with a mild laser, and then observed it with sensitive equipment that could detect even single photons of light, he found that the DNA acted like a light sponge. Somehow, the DNA molecule absorbed all the photons of light in the area, and actually stored them in a corkscrew-shaped spiral. Dr. Gariaev made many other strange and interesting discoveries working with DNA and light but most relevant to our discussion here is that he found that the DNA molecule captures and stores light. They discovered that DNA of healthy cells captures, stores, and releases light in a regular rhythmic way. Interestingly, the DNA of unhealthy cells either does not store enough light or stores too much light. In the case of cells with cancer, the DNA molecule will capture light and release it at a different scrambled frequency. They actually observed that when someone is stressed their cells start releasing more and more of their stored light. Fascinating stuff to read up on.
Going back to our discussion though, the eye is directly wired to the visual cortex of the brain. Remember that so is the pineal gland or 3rd eye. What is it about looking into an intense light and then focusing on the color show afterwards with your eyes closed that can yield so many unusual benefits? Going back to the research of Dr. Gariaev and the others who followed in his work, it seems that this light may be more a part of our vitality than is currently understood in the mainstream. Along with the presentation and information we received the woman who came to talk to us had also mentioned that the Shaman would spend hours looking into a fire to go on vision quests. It occurred to me that it was not necessary to buy an expensively over-priced LED light for a similar experience. A candle flame was all that was required, provided by nature. I have found that doing this exercise with a simple candle held in your lap or sitting on a table comfortably in front of you is just as effective as the light the lady brought to show our group. A simple household candle flame is also obviously not bright enough to damage your eyes by looking into it. It is perfect for doing this exercise I have found.
If you look into the candle flame for 30~45 seconds and close your eyes you will see the dot of colored light. Observe it and watch it shift and change colors over the next 3 to 5 minutes as it slowly shrinks and goes away. Feel free to repeat if you desire, but just once usually all I need, and it is all that I needed the first time I had the vivid dream experience. All in all this will take you less than 10 minutes. You might think it sounds absolutely ridiculous, but I'd ask you to keep in mind all of the strange weird science surrounding the nature of the photon and how it interacts with us and our DNA. There are so many things we do not know. The results are interesting and positive enough that doctors are developing light therapies based on the phenomenon. Maybe try giving it a shot yourself and see if you don't have a dream experience you can remember. Perhaps it will help with your focus and concentration as well. Who knows. I just thought I would share.
