The Incredible Shrinking Man

 

I feel that pull, and rush to bed at 8:30 p.m., shouting to my wife, “I have to lie down.” As soon as I stretch out on the bed, I see a Blue Lady – a dancing figure of blue light, inside a blue sphere. White lights flash at the top of my head. This no longer alarms me, but I am not wholly prepared for what follows. I am being pulled up into a cone of light. The luminous space is shaped like the inside of a pyramid, with an opening at the top.
    I am drawn into a long, narrow chamber. It is very light, with many tall windows. It is hung with masks and sculpted heads. It has the quality of a museum suspended in space. There is a rounded opening at the other end of the gallery. I approach this opening and am astonished to see an enormous face, the face of a beautiful woman, but of giant proportions. 
     Despite her beauty and welcoming expression, I back away. Then comes another shock. I glimpse the feeler, or part of the leg, of an insect, also blown up to giant size. I’m not happy about confronting a bug or a spider this big. I focus on expanding myself to equally huge proportions. I find the reverse process taking effect. Now I am shrinking incredibly fast. The bug’s leg is now as thick as a tree. As I continue to shrink, I lose track of it. What’s coming next? Dust mites the size of mastodons? My fears dissipate as I continue to shrink. I see planets whirling by, and realize I am traveling in the space between subatomic particles. It is as vast as “outer” space. 
     I see an intense pinpoint of white light. In some way, I become this point of light. I am traveling inconceivably fast, and harnessing immense energy.
     Through swirling cloudbanks, I see another world. Its sun is a great white disc, much closer to the surface of the planet than our sun is to Earth. The planet is screened from its burning rays, to some extent, by dense gaseous clouds. I am looking at a jagged, dramatic range of mountains.
     I am in the presence of a life force. I feel it, but cannot see it clearly. I glimpse fleeting images of something like a grasshopper, or a small humanoid figure with an enormous head. I realize that the life forms of this place are not focused in material reality as humans are on Earth. They can put on shapes as we put on clothes.
     I enter into a long mental dialog with the presence. Its thoughts are deep and heavy as a mountain; they weigh on me before they slip into forms I can hold. I do not hear words. The communication is not in language as we know it. The thoughts are not transmitted in linear form. I can receive them without need of a mediator, but as they become words in my mind, I am aware that I am missing a great deal. I am told:
     “You are an interpreter between worlds.”
     I ask for guidance on my life and work. The response: “You do not need to wait upon Power. Power is always waiting for you.” 
     I ask about love, and receive a surge of communication in one moment point, from which I unfold the statement, “Love brings your world into being.”
     I ask for a name by which I can call on this presence. It is difficult to pick anything up. I suggest that the entity could write its name in lights. I am presented with an impressive display of cosmic fireworks. I see the spiral arms of a galaxy spinning into life. Still no name. But from somewhere, a word that sounds like “Calidon” wells up in me. I ask if this is right.
     My question is received with sublime indifference. My sense is that “Calidon” will serve if I must have a name, but an unclear whether it is the name of the entity, or its world.
    When we part, there is a deep exchange of affection, less personal than human love, but strong and empowering.

For the five hours of this experience, I was in a liminal state of consciousness. I was aware of external noises – a yapping dog, a distant train – and the state of my physical body, while fully engaged in my journey and my interaction with the intelligence of another world. I was also watching over the body on the bed and observing the incredible shrinking man.
     When I got up to record this adventure, and then to walk my dogs in the cool moonlight along the farm road, I carried a sense of awe. I felt I had been given experiential access to a great secret: to go to another galaxy, go within.

Journal drawing: "Traveling" by Robert Moss

Text adapted from The Boy Who Died and Came Back by Robert Moss.Published by New World Library.