The Cassandra Syndrome by Colin Brookfield, Colin Brookfield (an ebook reader .txt) 📕

so impressed by the gigantic creature that I asked Ron to stop and go back. The moment I stepped away from the vehicle – it disappeared and I was left facing something twice the size of any Shire horse I had ever seen. Then the creature stepped towards me and as the branches slipped away, I saw it had the face of an attractive, smiling young woman. I was quite afraid of this awesome portrayal of equine power. I noticed also, there was no profusion of hair about the fetlocks that one would expect with a Shire. Then the visitation spoke in a normal female voice. 

“Come close,” she said, “and place your back against my front legs.” I did so fearfully but came to no harm. “Reach back and place your hands against my legs.” 

On doing so, I could feel powerful forces coursing through. Later, we walked and talked together. I remember asking her if she had read ‘Laurens van der Post’ or ‘Carl Jung’ but she had not. 

Then the dream switched. I was in a shed facing a shelf with jars of healing unction. Having made my selection, I stepped outside where I noticed an old horse needed attention – so I applied the healing unction. 

Precognition

Ron had been an old friend whom I had volunteered to take to a healer for his illness but he had declined the offer. Several years later, he passed away due to that illness. 

The car in the dream was the one that Ron owned, so perhaps he is now a spirit helper because by taking me to that contact place, an astounding pre-cognitive reality to this occurred the following day and is still ongoing. Also, the animal/human image implies that we are all intimately connected; all creatures have souls.

 

Dream 20

(The collective syndrome) 

This is a message dream. In this dream, a guide is showing me a huge old castle. He led me through a small side door and down a sloping path into a cavern, vastly out of proportion to the structure above. Most of the ground space was taken up by a crater, which was thousands of feet wide and equally deep, then narrowed downwards conically as it descended; its side walls were made in terraced steps, layer by layer downwards. Every terrace at every level was also packed tightly with people’s adjoined little houses. 

Interpretation

The castle represents the power that sits above the collective and, the dark cratered place, represents the lot of the follower. The small side door, symbolises the exit by which those that awaken from the great ‘sleep-walk’, may leave. Strangely, many years later and for the first time, I read of Botticelli’s painting depicting Hell and it described Hell, as a descending conically shaped hole.

 

Dream 21

(My wife’s dream) 

In this symbolic dream that my wife had some years ago, she found herself entering a huge hotel atrium. To her left side was a palatial staircase that she wished to ascend but was stopped. She was directed to a conference hall on her right (as others had been). In the centre of the hall was a large circus ring full of people sitting on benches at tables. It was obvious all of these people had just died because they were all in various states of dress and undress but she refused the ringmaster’s invitation to join them. 

At the back, sitting separately, she saw a man accompanying a half grown Silverback gorilla. Being very fond of animals and people who liked them, she darted forward in that direction. In doing so, the scene suddenly shaded as though a chiffon scarf had floated down in front of her and cleared immediately. When she reached those with whom she felt an affinity, the scene changed abruptly. She found herself ascending the upper steps of the palatial staircase, towards places and people of like-mind with whom she would be comfortable. 

On reaching the top of the oak-panelled staircase, which was wide and beautiful, she entered a long warm, well-lit gallery. There was a lady sitting close-by at a large oak table on which lay a beautiful leather-bound book with a pen. The table was placed at the side of tall oak doors (of which there were many along the gallery) and she was invited to enter. 

Interpretation

The message was, that giving equal standing to other species, indicated a higher level of humanity – hence the stairs. 

It is interesting to note the two-fold meaning of the circus. It is where all roads come together and from which other directions will be taken. Secondly, the circus ring is also the place of the ringmasters and those who perform to their wishes.

 

Dream 22

(The Railway Carriage) 

I was in a railway carriage and it felt wrong. The windows were opaque and there was no feeling of traction. The carriage was empty and I was facing the back end. Its interconnecting door was sealed, apart from a gap at the top through which a person might squeeze through. This is what began to happen as people struggled through from another carriage. At this point I moved forward to help this happen quickly – I wanted the people out of the way so that I could get through and, off the train into the sensible, natural world. 

Interpretation & Analysis

There are physics at work and best understood later, by referring to the two slot experiment in quantum physics which shows that the particle wave duality nature of sub-atomic particles change, when they know they are being watched (this is reality) and that this provides evidence that the conscious mind is intimately associated with that of all physical construct. 

The mechanics of the dream are these: it is concerned with human herd instincts – the follower syndrome (Plato’s Cave). This railway carriage (that’s never going anywhere) is also identical to the other section that people are scrambling out of. The awkward transition from one carriage to another symbolises life’s normal crossing-over death process. 

This carriage duplication arrangement implies that it is the parochial collective expectations of follower people, which primes the sub atomic particles (those, other-worldly building blocks) within the reincarnated place. Thus, such mindsets generate their former comfort zone duplication.

Be careful what you wish for!

 

Dream 23

(The Dark Side) 

In this dream, the figure suddenly moved very close, revealing a composite made up of angry, warring people throughout the ages, with their weapons of destruction right through to modern mankind.

I drew this image at the time and it was never shown to anyone, yet years later, the self same image appeared in a national paper. For that to happen would imply that this image is an archetype of the human collective unconscious. 

 

Out of body experience (OBE)

Before I continue, there was an occasion in 1994 when I had the ultimate astounding experience in alter-reality – an out of body experience. 

In the early hours of the morning, I was awoken by something sitting on the bedside table by my face from which I naturally recoiled. It was an abnormally large black cat. Having woken me, it quietly slunk to the floor as though its mission was complete, then disappeared into the shadows. At this point, I threw the bed covers to one side and placed my feet on the floor. Whilst doing so, I noticed our Siamese cat, Simba, sitting close by. 

Simba had died six months previously and we were still devastated by his passing. I was so astounded that I tried to awaken my wife to share the experience but she could not be woken, even when I shook her. It was then the penny dropped! I realised that something extremely abnormal was happening, except that all my faculties were functioning normally. I could hear my voice and could see everything clearly by the invading light of the street lamp. I checked my tactile sensations; they were completely normal. It was obvious that I was in a separate reality – a duplicate – within which, I could interact on a normal basis with everything inanimate but where animate life could no longer have visual or physical awareness of my presence. That was apparent when I could no longer awaken my wife. 

I turned then, to see Simba disappearing into the shadows as if he had decided to ‘move on’. 

It was obvious I was having an out-of-body experience and felt quite euphoric and privileged about it. Then it shut down and I fell asleep. 

Summation

Being inquisitive, when I awoke next morning, one of the first anomalies that came to mind concerned the bedclothes I had thrown to one side during my OBE. Being a light sleeper, I never move or alter the covers without being consciously aware of doing so. Therefore, having no recall of that activity during the night would imply that all objects of physical nature also have ethereal duplication – their alter-ego ghosts. Whereas, like an OBE person is the duplicate of its physical counterpart, then the bedcovers that were being moved, were also the ethereal counterparts to their own physical component. 

Simba is the key to understanding the message in this OBE it concerns itself with the dangers of carrying excessive emotional baggage to one’s demise. It is a warning, showing the means by which any creature that passes over, might entrap themselves to the source of their obsession (also the background to all haunting). Simba was an example of over-devotion to my wife and me and at his passing, did not leave but, stayed trapped in his alter-world in isolation, unseen and ignored by those who could no longer see him. 

The black (shepherd) cat had come to rescue and guide its own feline kind, out of such entrapment. The lesson applies to all of us to be mindful of what emotional entrapments we are generating for ourselves. Buddhist Monks, from the ‘Book of the Dead’, repeat mantras over the dying to disengage their minds from their emotional chains that could otherwise impede their passage. 

Written at the time:- 

The Black Shepherd Cat

(Psychopomp)

The black shepherd cat flowed out of the dark,

quiet as a shadow; its paws left no mark.

Then it entered the room where somebody slept,

who was quite unaware just how close it had crept.

Then the black shepherd cat took over control

of the person that slept to awaken their soul.

 

The awakening one recoiled with surprise,

away from the black shepherd cat’s gleaming eyes.

But the black shepherd cat was there on a quest;

a mission of care at another’s behest.

Then a movement nearby brought its ward into sight,

so the black shepherd cat flowed back to the night.

 

For a sleek Siamese had appeared on the floor;

a friend who’d been lost from this world months before.

Then gathering, what this was meant to impart,

the awakening one woke up with a start.

It was clear he was now in a parallel life,

for attempts were in vain to awaken his wife.

 

Had this been the lot of his Siamese friend,

an emotional trap awaiting life’s end

alone in this house with no one to care,

nobody knowing that he was still there?

So this was the task in the ‘shepherd cat’s’ mind,

to gather lost souls for return to their kind.

 

But why was a human made privy to this?

A portent perhaps that one shouldn’t dismiss?

For a soul cannot fly at the end of the day

when emotional chains too heavily weigh.

But, to the black shepherd cat (I couldn’t owe more),

for I passed and returned through life’s final door.

 

 Dream 24

(Following the above experience)

I picked up a fishing rod and the line tightened. As I struggled with the catch, the rod broke beneath the strain, nevertheless, I still managed to land the catch. To my surprise, it turned out to be our now deceased Siamese, Simba. I shouted to my wife to call him – which she did – but