Theatre and Dreams experience...

It's the last week of classes this week. Technically Finals Week.

I took Theatre and Dreams, History of the American Music Theatre, Development of Theatre, and worked in the costume shop.

In my Theatre and Dreams class last week, Professor Kubiak took us through a kind of meditation most common in other countries. It was prompted by an orchestra of maracas (they had actual names, but I can’t remember what they were actually called) operated by various students in the class and led by Kubiak at the head of the room. The lights were all out and the shades pulled so as to make it as relaxing and calming as possible. In fact, the way he pitched the exercise was that finals week is coming up and he knew everyone was probably tired (which we had told him), so he asked what kind of energy we would like: calm or upbeat energy.

The maraca exercise was nice, but then we took a quick bathroom break and did the same exercise with a drum operated by Kubiak. My experience was powerful and I had to write it down. So here is my account of that experience. It may not make sense, or it may, but it is what I went through and what I felt on the journey.

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I envisioned the meadow from my Jesus Walk and was slowly walking through the tall knee-length brush, running my hands through it for a minute or so. The surrounding landscape was snowy mountains. It was cold and my usual meadow but I knew it was winter and the forest and mountains were covered in snow, but as soon as I started walking, it was spring again, and warm.

Then I saw the immediate start of the forest of tall trees. Forest creatures, forest plants, ferns, lizards, butterflies. As I walked, I started picking up the pace and a masked, caped man-ish thing rushed by in front of me. I kept going until I reached the cave and stood in front of it even though the path continued to the left. I almost decided to visit my creek first, but I stopped and wanted to focus on what was around the cave and it was incredibly dark inside but appeared more like a giant wreath surrounding the mouth. Squiggly dried leaf-like material all around it.

I decided to go in and the mouth was long it seemed because it was simply and utterly dark. Walking through the mouth of the cave, I could see the pulse of the drum’s beat and tried to see the color but accepted I couldn’t, so I just saw the pulsing, pulsing, pulsing.

As I walked through the dark cave, I reached a kind of shelf in the wall on my left that had water in it and a big fish (I think it was a gold fish) that was swimming in circles or figure eights until he saw me and came to the surface of the water and popped his head halfway out to look at me as if to talk with me but he just stared. I continued walking and saw something else on my right ( I don’t remember what) I continued and on my left again were to sets of legs (human) bound and hanging form the ceiling of the cave. They were dead; sacrificed for something, although I don’t know for what.

As I envisioned, I could feel my sitting body swaying with the sound of the drum.

I continued and there was a monk on my left, kneeling in prayer and directly in front of me, another monk standing stark in front of me with his hands high above his head in a funnel-like shape, gazing at the ceiling, but there was an enormous, bright light shining on him and his turned-up head and tightly-shut eyes.

I felt tearful at the sacrificed people… I felt for them.

I felt the drum pace speed and looked up and knew it was Jesus and as I ascended, the drum came closer and was right in front of me and the light became so bright, it turned into a dark blue, purple, fuchsia, gorgeous colors with the pulse of the beat. And because I know it was Jesus saying He is the reason and He is powerful that I wanted to weep and could feel my eyes tearing up. I stayed with Jesus, surrounded by His elegantly brilliant colours floating and flowing before me in every shade of purple from blue to fuchsia. Even as the drum moved, the colors changed.

I got really excited because I don’t think I’ve really ever seen consistent color in visions or dream without putting pressure on my actual eyes to encourage color. Usually any colors I “see” are only because I “know” them to be the certain color, but this time I literally SAW the colors.

I didn’t want it to end and almost considered staying there long after the drum stopped (which would signal the end of the exercise).

It was then time to go back, and the beat stopped suddenly and quickly picked up a rapid pace to let us know it was time to head back out the cave, to the field and back to the classroom. I was suddenly ripped from the light, and as I was pulled backwards, I saw the monks, the sacrificially hanged people, the fish, still watching me, the pulses from the mouth of the cave, the wreath of the cave, ferns, butterflies, trees, the edge of the forest, and finally the meadow and long, tall grass. I felt my eyelids pulsing with the drum beat as I was pulled back.

And as I was pulled back to my initial spot, my arms brushed past the grainy brush and I stopped about five beats before the drum stopped.

At the end I really felt such a poignant feeling that I wanted to just weep nonstop. Never to stop.