He has two eyes. Arms and legs. His outline is that of a human.
His finite facial features are rather vague. His face only has eyes; no mouth, nose, or ears. His eyes are stiff, like the compound eyes of a bug, and I can’t tell where he’s looking. I’m doubtful that they really even are eyes.
He has something resembling hair, but it’s limp, clinging to him like a piece of seaweed. His body is a solid black, with the polish of a mollusk. He’s like a living creature, but I feel no affinity for him. He’s like a lifeform incomprehensible to us, one that evolved somewhere foreign to us, like the deep sea or outer space.
He’s rather like an alien.
That thought likely comes to mind after I realize that I am on a spaceship. My very simple reasoning is that, if this is a spaceship, then he must be an alien.
We’re in a small room. It’s about the same size as the hospital room I was in just a short time ago.
However, the floors, walls, and ceiling are all smooth and white, like the inside of an egg. It’s so sanitized, so robotic. Through what looks like a window, I can see numerous stars. They’re clearly different from the stars one might see in the night sky — they’re too bright, too close.
It’s like we’re actually flying through outer space.
I was in the hospital room receiving treatment for an illness of the mind — when suddenly, an alien paid me a visit and seemingly kidnapped me. I wonder if something so absurd is possible.
It’s an astounding mystery, for if such a calamity were to occur, it would occur in a dream.
This, too, must be a dream.
Speaking of which, Jung, one of the primary researchers of dreams, also had a keen interest in aliens. He presented several papers into which he had put a great deal of work on the subject. Jung was really interested in the occult, and a third of his writing on that was about alchemy. However it’s not like Jung was a swindler like some dubious people claiming to have spiritual powers. Jung tried to illuminate that which was called the occult through his own particular theories and logic.
Like ghosts. Or psychic powers. Or mythology.
Or like aliens and UFOs.
According to Jung, those are things born of and displayed by the collective unconsciousness shared by all humans. No matter where they live or what culture they belong to, everyone has a vision of gods and ghosts. I wonder why that is. The angle he takes is that the reason myths have so many commonalities is because the source of things like gods and ghosts is that collective unconsciousness shared among all humans.
As for gods or aliens, they are visions born of the overarching anxiety of humankind. They give a clear form to fuzzy things like anxiety, and so humans can experience such things in waking dreams. In that case, it’s not necessarily that people saw physical beings, intelligent life that came from outer space, but that they made these “aliens” the symbol of their anxiety. There were a lot of incidences of eyewitness reports of UFO sightings during the World War, as people trembled in anxiety. That’s why aliens came in mass quantities.
Gods and devils, fairies and demons, those kinds of fantastical beings — fear, yearning, human pathos, those kind of emotions are a basis for these symbols. It’s the same as symbols seen in dreams, but we see them while we are awake. Particularly anxious people, or drowsy people, might have a gap in their unconscious mind and begin to see these things in reality.
In most cases, it’s anxiety and fear themselves that make people want to brush off such things. So that’s why everyone laughs the person off, saying things like ghosts don’t exist. However, anyone and everyone has access to those things within the collective unconsciousness. Face them, overcome them, defeat them, and in this way, conquer them.
These kinds of antagonists manifest as general concepts — things like demons or devils that are the realm of the occult. Jung referred to them as “shadows.” We shouldn’t ignore them, instead we should choose to defeat and conquer them. Or accept them, integrate them into ourselves. If we don’t, the shadow part of our hearts will be treated as if it didn’t exist, go missing, be painted over, leaving our hearts and minds incomplete.
If we don’t face them, that is.
So this alien-like thing must be a shadow with some sort of significance to me. Something I’ve sealed away. Something I’m hiding. That part has awakened and is imploring, “Look at me.” Karma is paying me a visit for closing my eyes and pretending not to see.
All the way down into the collective unconscious.
I’ve been lured once again into a dream that should have ended.
No, the scene I saw earlier may not have even been reality to start with. I can’t comprehend it. Having a dream inside a dream, then another dream within that dream — I can’t get a firm sense of where I am within these multilayered dreams. That doctor-like being, the one that seemed to transform into an alien, he’s probably just a character within my dreams. Maybe I’m just monologuing. Like I’m answering my own questions.
I can’t deny the possibility.
There is a sage within my dreams. An intellectual and wise being, like a god. That being guides my lost self. Dialoguing with me, guiding me, and sometimes, exposing me to the truth.
That was something born of the collective unconscious in order to teach and guide me.
That doctor, this alien, they might all be such things.
I am receiving a medical examination from this sage that all humans have in common.
I can’t seem to understand what’s going on anymore.
I don’t get anything.
“......?”
A sound echoes.
It’s not a sound that shocks or surprises me. On the contrary, it’s a sound that has the capacity to calm. It’s the sound of a piano, a very gentle one.
When I look over, Sensei (as I’ve taken to calling him) is playing a piano with his slimy hands. This room, which seems to be inside of the spaceship, has a piano hanging on the wall. A grand piano, the unblemished white of ivory.
Sensei, who I can see as nothing more than an alien, is facing the piano, giving a gentle performance. He seems to be sublimely striking the keys of the keyboard, which also look like those that might operate a computer.
The enumeration of simple sounds that are played. All countries have their own myths and music. A comfortable scale for human ears, with a rhythm. That tune, flowing through. It’s a melody that stays with you, like an elegant lullaby.
I’m squatting in a corner of the room, almost as if I’ve collapsed.
A chair appears out of thin air, and I can sit comfortably in it. Right in front of me is a modest table. I take a seat at that table as white as bed sheets, and stop thinking.
My pulse quiets.
Like when one falls asleep.
Ahh, I’ve gotten so tired, I just want to rest for a bit.