"Um, picka color." "Blue." "B-L-U-E." "Pick a number." " Eight." " 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8." "Pick one more number." " Fifteen." " 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15." "Pick another number." " Six." " Okay." "" Dream is destiny."" "¢Ü¢Ü [Violins Scratching]" "¢Ü¢Ü" "[ Laughing ]" "[Man ] Rock out." "Rock and roll." "Go, strings." "Begin." "Sara, will you try that, the thing you asked me about ?" " Yeah." " Will you try it a little more subdued ?" " Okay." " Vibrato." "J ust try it and see what you think." "[Woman Laughs ]" " But what I want" "I mean, I want it to sound rich and maybe almost a little wavy... due to being slightly out oftune." " Doyou want it, um" " I think itshouldbe slightly detached." "That's what I was wondering." "¢Ü¢Ü" "Yeah,yeah,you got it." "Snazzy." "Okay, pick up to 20, please." " Erik, this is a pickup to 20." " Okay." "1, 2, 3." "¢Ü¢Ü" "[ Brakes Squealing ]" "Hey, man, it's me." "Um, I just got back into town." "I thought maybe I could bum a ride offyou or something, but that's cool." "I could probablyjust take a cab, something like that." "Um" "Yeah, I guess I'll hang out with you later, something like that." "Ahoy there, matey !" "You in for the long haul ?" "You needa little hitch inyourget-along, a little lift on down the line ?" "Oh, um, yeah, actually, I was waiting for a cab or something, but ifyou want to" "All right." "Don't miss the boat." " Hey, thanks." " Not a problem." "Anchors aweigh !" "So what doyou think ofmylittle vessel ?" "She's what we call "see-worthy." S-E-E." "See with your eyes." "I feel like my transport should be an extension of my personality." "Voila." "And this ?" "This is like my little window to the world, and every minute, it's a different show." "Now, I may not understand it." "I may not even necessarily agree with it." "But I'll tell you what, I accept it and just sort of glide along." "You want to keep things on an even keel I guess is what I'm saying." "You want to go with the flow." "The sea refuses no river." "The idea is to remain in a state of constant departure while always arriving." "Saves on introductions and good-byes." "The ride does not require an explanation." "Just occupants." "That's whereyou guys come in." "It's likeyou come onto this planet with a crayon box." "Now, you may get the 8-pack, you may get the 1 6-pack." "But it's all in what you do with the crayons, the colors that you're given." "Don't worry about drawing within the lines or coloring outside the lines." "I say color outside the lines." "Color right offthe page." "Don't box me in." "We're in motion to the ocean." "We are not landlocked, I'll tell ya that." "So where doyou want out ?" "Uh, who, me ?" "Am I first ?" "Um, I don't know." "Really, anywhere is fine." "Well,just--just give me an address or something, okay ?" "Tell you what, go up three more streets, take a right, go two more blocks, drop this guy off on the next corner." " Where's that ?" " I don't know either, but it's somewhere, and it's gonna determine the course ofthe rest ofyour life." "All ashore that's going ashore." "[ Laughing ] Toot toot !" "[Man] The reason why I refuse to take existentialism... asjust another French fashion or historical curiosity... is that I think it has something very important to offer us for the new century." "I 'm afraid we're losi ng the real vi rtues of I iving life passionately, the sense of taking responsibility forwho you are, the ability to make something of yourselfand feeling good about life." "Existentialism is often discussed as ifit's a philosophy ofdespair." "But I think the truth is just the opposite." "Sartre once interviewed said he never really felt a day of despair in his life." "But one thing that comes out from reading these guys... is not a sense of anguish about life so much as... a real kind of exuberance offeeling on top ofit." "It's likeyour life is yours to create." "I've read the post modernists with some interest, even admiration." "But when I read them, I always have this awful nagging feeling... that something absolutely essential is getting left out." "The more thatyou talk about a person as a social construction... or as a confluence offorces... or as fragmented or marginalized, whatyou do is you open up a whole new world of excuses." "And when Sartre talks about responsibility, he's not talking about something abstract." "He's not talking about the kind of self or soul that theologians would argue about." "It's something very concrete." "It's you and me talking." "Making decisions." "Doing things and taking the consequences." "It might be true that there are six billion people in theworld and counting." "Nevertheless, whatyou do makes a difference." "It makes a difference, first ofall, in material terms." "Makes a difference to other people and it sets an example." "In short, I think the message here is... that we should never simply write ourselves off... andsee ourselves as the victim ofvarious forces." "It's always our decision who we are." "[ Barking ]" "Creation seems to come out ofimperfection." "I t seems to come out of a strivi ng and a frustration." "And this is where I think language came from." "I mean, it came from our desire to transcend our isolation... and have some sort of connection with one another." "Andit hadto be easy when it wasjustsimple survival." "Like, you know, "water." We came up with a sound for that." "Or, "Saber-toothed tiger right behind you." We came up with a sound for that." "But when it gets really interesting, I think, is when we use that same system of symbols to communicate... all the abstract and intangible things that we're experiencing." "What is, like, frustration ?" "Orwhat is anger or love ?" "When I say "love,"" "the sound comes out of my mouth... and it hits the other person's ear, travels through this Byzantine conduit in their brain, you know, through their memories oflove or lack oflove, and they registerwhat I'm saying and sayyes, they understand." "But how do I know they understand ?" "Because words are inert." "They're just symbols." "They're dead, you know ?" "And so much of our experience is intangible." "So much ofwhat we perceive cannot be expressed." "It's unspeakable." "And yet, you know, when we communicate with one another, and we-- we feel that we have connected, and we think that we're understood," "I thinkwe have a feeling of almost spiritual communion." "And that feeling might be transient, but I think it's whatwe live for." "Ifwe're looking at the highlights ofhuman development, you have to look at the evolution of the organism... and then at the development of its interaction with the environment." "Evolution ofthe organism will begin with the evolution oflife... perceived through the hominid... coming to the evolution ofmankind." "Neanderthal, Cro-Magnon man." "Now, interestingly, whatyou're looking at here are three strings:" "biological, anthropological-- development ofthe cities, cultures-- and cultural, which is human expression." "Now, whatyou've seen here is the evolution of populations, not so much the evolution ofindividuals." "And in addition, ifyou look at the time scales that's involved here-- two billion years for life, six million years forthe hominid," "1 00,000 years for mankind as we know it-- you're beginning to see the telescoping nature ofthe evolutionary paradigm." "And then when you get to agricultural, when you get to scientific revolution and industrial revolution, you're looking at 1 0,000 years, 400 years, 1 50 years." "You're seeing a further telescoping ofthis evolutionary time." "What that means is that as we go through the new evolution, it's gonna telescope to the point we should be able to see it manifest itself... within our lifetime, within this generation." "The new evolution stems from information, anditstems from two types of information: digital and analog." "The digital is artificial intelligence." "The analog results from molecular biology, the cloning ofthe organism." "And you knit the two together with neurobiology." "Before on the old evolutionary paradigm, one would die and the other would grow and dominate." "But under the new paradigm, theywould exist... as a mutually supportive, noncompetitive grouping." "Okay, independent from the external." "And what is interesting here is that evolution now becomes an individually centered process, emanating from the needs and the desires ofthe individual, and not an external process, a passive process... where the i ndividual is just at the whim of the collective." "So, you produce a neo-human with a new individuality and a new consciousness." "But that's only the beginning ofthe evolutionary cycle... because as the next cycle proceeds, the input is now this new intelligence." "As intelligence piles on intelligence, as ability piles on ability, the speed changes." "Until what ?" "Until you reach a crescendo in a way... could be imagined as an enormous instantaneous fulfillment ofhuman, human and neo-human potential." "It could be something totally different." "It could be the amplification ofthe individual, the multiplication ofindividual existences." "Parallel existences now with the individual no longer restricted bytime and space." "And the manifestations ofthis neo-human-type evolution, manifestations could be dramatically counter-intuitive." "That's the interesting part." "The old evolution is cold." "It's sterile." "It's efficient, okay ?" "And its manifestations are those social adaptations." "You're talking about parasitism, dominance, morality, okay ?" "Uh, war, predation, these would be subject to de-emphasis." "These would be subject to de-evolution." "The new evolutionary paradigm will give us the human traits oftruth, ofloyalty, ofjustice, offreedom." "These will be the manifestations ofthe new evolution." "That is what we would hope to see from this." "That would be nice." "A self-destructive man feels completely alienated, utterly alone." "He's an outsider to the human community." "He thinks to himself, "I must be insane."" "What he fails to realize is that society has,just as he does, a vested interest in considerable losses and catastrophes." "These wars, famines, floods and quakes meet well-defined needs." "Man wants chaos." "In fact, he's gotta have it." "Depression, strife, riots, murder, all this dread." "We're irresistibly drawn to that almost orgiastic state... created out of death and destruction." "It's in all of us." "We revel in it." "Sure, the media tries to put a sad face on these things, painting them up as great human tragedies." "But we all know the function ofthe media has never been... to eliminate the evils ofthe world, no." "Theirjob is to persuade us to accept those evils and get used to living with them." "The powers that be want us to be passive observers." "Hey, you got a match ?" "And they haven't given us any other options... outside the occasional, purely symbolic, participatory act ofvoting." "You want the puppet on the right or the puppet on the left ?" "I feel that the time has come toproject my own... inadequacies and dissatisfactions... into the sociopolitical and scientific schemes, let my own lack of a voice be heard." "I keep thinking about something you said." " Something I said ?" " Yeah." "About howyou often feel like you're observing your life... from the perspective of an old woman about to die." " You remember that ?" " Yeah." "I still feel that way sometimes." "Like I'm looking back on my life." "Like mywaking life is her memories." "Exactly." "I heard that Tim Leary said as he was dying... that he was looking forward to the moment... when his bodywas dead, but his brain was still alive." "They say that there's still 6 to 1 2 minutes ofbrain activity after everything is shut down." "And a second of dream consciousness, right, well, that's infinitely longer than a waking second." " You know what I'm saying ?" " Oh, yeah, definitely." "For example, I wake up and it's 1 0:1 2, and then I go back to sleep and I have those long, intricate, beautiful dreams that seem to last for hours, and then I wake up and it's... 1 0:1 3." "Exactly." "So then 6 to 1 2 minutes ofbrain activity," "I mean, that could be yourwhole life." "I mean, you are that woman looking back over everything." "Okay, so what ifI am ?" "Then what would you be in all that ?" "Whatever I am right now." "I mean, yeah, maybe I only exist in your mind." "I'm still just as real as anything else." "Yeah." " I've been thinking also about something you said." " What's that ?" "Just about reincarnation and where all the new souls come from over time." "Everybody always say that they've been the reincarnation... ofCleopatra or Alexander the Great." "I always want to tell them theywere probably some dumb fuck like everybody else." "I mean, it's impossible." "Think about it." "The world population has doubled in the past 40 years, right ?" " So ifyou really believe in that ego thing of one eternal soul," " Mm-hmm." "then you only have a 50% chance ofyour soul being over 40." "And for it to be over 1 50 years old, then it's only one out ofsix." "So what areyou saying then ?" "Reincarnation doesn't exist... or that we're all young souls like where half of us are first-round humans ?" "No, no." "What I'm trying to say is that somehow I believe... reincarnation is just a-- a poetic expression ofwhat collective memory really is." "There was this article by this biochemist that I read not long ago, and he was talking about how when a member ofa species is born, it has a billion years of memory to draw on." "And this is where we inherit our instincts." "I like that." "It's like there's, um, this whole telepathic thing going on thatwe're all a part of, whetherwe're conscious ofit or not." "Thatwould explain why there's all these, you know, seemingly spontaneous, worldwide, innovative leaps in science, in the arts." "You know, like the same results poppin' up everywhere independent of each other." "Some guy on a computer, he figures something out, and then almost simultaneously, a bunch of other people all over the world..." " figure out the same thing." " Mm-hmm." "They did this study." "They isolated a group of people over time, and they monitored their abilities at crossword puzzles... in relation to the general population." "And then they secretly gave them a day-old crossword, one that had already been answered by thousands of other people." "Their scores went up dramatically, like 20 percent." "So it's like once the answers are out there, you know, people can pick up on 'em." "It's like we're all telepathically sharing our experiences." "[Man ] I'll getyou motherfuckers ifit's the last thing I do." "Oh,you're gonna pay for whatyou did to me." "For every second I spend in this hellhole," "I 'll see you spend a year in living hell !" "Oh, you fucks are gonna beg me to let you die." "No, no, not yet." "I want you cocksuckers to suffer." "Oh, I'll fixyour fuckin' asses, all right." "Maybe a long needle in your eardrum." "A hot cigar in your eye." "Nothin' fancy." "Some molten lead up the ass." "Ooh !" "Or better still, some ofthat old Apache shit." "Cutyour eyelids off." "Yeah." "I'll just listen toyou fucks screamin'." "Oh, what sweet music that'll be." "Yeah." "We'll do it in the hospital." "With doctors and nurses soyou pricks don't die on me too quick." "You know the best part ?" "The best part is you dick-smokin' faggots will haveyour eyelids cut off, soyou'll have to watch me do it toyou, yeah." "You'll see me bring that cigar closer and closer... toyourwide-open eyeball... till you're almost out ofyour mind." "But not quite... 'cause I want it to last a long, long time." "I wantyou to know that it's me, that I'm the one that's doin' it toyou." "Me !" "And that sissy psychiatrist ?" "What unmitigated ignorance !" "That old drunken fart ofa judge !" "What a pompous ass !" "Judge not lestye be judged !" "All ofyou pukes are gonna die the day I get out ofthis shithole !" "I guaranteeyou'll regret the dayyou met me !" "[Man ] In a way, in our contemporary world view," "It's easy to think that science has come to take the place ofGod." "But some philosophical problems remain as troubling as ever." "T ake the problem of free wi I I." "This problem's been around for a long time, since before Aristotle in 3 50 B.C." "St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, these guys all worried about how we can be free... ifGod already knows in advance everything you're gonna do." "Nowadays we know that the world operates according to some fundamental physical laws, and these laws govern the behavior of every object in the world." "Now, these laws, because they're so trustworthy, they enable incredible technological achievements." "But look at yourself." "We're just physical systems too." "We're just complex arrangements of carbon molecules." "We're mostlywater, and our behavior isn't gonna be an exception to basic physical laws." "So it starts to look like whether it's God setting things up in advance... and knowing everything you're gonna do... orwhether it's these basic physical laws governing everything." "There's not a lot of room left for freedom." "So now you might be tempted to just ignore the question, ignore the mystery offree will." "Say, "Oh, well, it's just an historical anecdote." "It's sophomoric." "It's a question with no answer." "Just forget about it."" "But the question keeps staring you right in the face." "You think about individuality, for example, whoyou are." "Whoyou are is mostly a matter ofthe free choices thatyou make." "Or take responsibility." "You can only be held responsible, you can only be found guilty or admired or respected... for things you did ofyour own free will." "The question keeps coming back, and we don't really have a solution to it." "It starts to look like all your decisions are reallyjust a charade." "Think about how it happens." "There's some electrical activity in your brain." "Your neurons fire." "They send a signal down intoyour nervous system." "It passes along down intoyour muscle fibers." "They twitch." "You might, say, reach outyour arm." "Looks like it's a free action on your part, but every one ofthose-- every part ofthat process... is actually governed by physical law:" "chemical laws, electrical laws and so on." "So now it just looks like the Big Bang set up the initial conditions, and the whole rest of our history, the whole rest ofhuman history and even before, is reallyjust sort ofthe playing out ofsubatomic particles... according to these basic fundamental physical laws." "We thinkwe're special." "We thinkwe have some kind ofspecial dignity, but that now comes underthreat." "I mean, that's really challenged bythis picture." "Soyou might be saying, "Well, wait a minute." "What about quantum mechanics ?" ""I know enough contemporary physical theoryto know it's not really like that." ""It's really a probabilistic theory." "There's room." "It's loose." "It's not deterministic."" "And that's gonna enable us to understand free will." "But ifyou look at the details, it's not really gonna help... because what happens is you have some very small quantum particles, and their behavior is apparently a bit random." "They swerve." "Their behavior is absurd in the sense that it's unpredictable... and we can't understand it based on anything that came before." "It just does something out ofthe blue, according to a probabilistic framework." "But is that gonna help with freedom ?" "Should our freedom just be a matter of probabilities, just some random swerving in a chaotic system ?" "That just seems like it's worse." "I'd rather be a gear... in a big deterministic, physical machine... than just some random swerving." "So we can't just ignore the problem." "We have to find room in our contemporaryworld view for persons, with all that that it entails;" "not just bodies, but persons." "And that means trying to solve the problem offreedom, finding room for choice and responsibility... and trying to understand individuality." "[Man Over Loudspeaker] You can't fight cityhall, death and taxes." "Don't talk about politics or religion." "This is all the equivalent of enemy propaganda rolling across the picket line." "" Lay down, G.I. Lay down, G.I."" "We saw it all through the 20th Century." "And now in the 21 st Century, it's time to stand up and realize... that we should not allow ourselves to be crammed into this rat maze." "We should not submit to dehumanization." "I don't know aboutyou, but I'm concerned with what's happening in this world." "I'm concerned with the structure." "I'm concerned with the systems of control, those that control my life and those that seek to control it even more !" "I want freedom !" "That's what I want !" "And that's what you should want !" "It's up to each and every one of us to turn loose and just shovel the greed, the hatred, the envy and, yes, the insecurities... because that is the central mode of control-- make us feel pathetic, small... so we'll willingly give up our sovereignty, our liberty, our destiny." "We have got to realize that we're being conditioned on a mass scale." "Start challenging this corporate slave state !" "The 21 st Century is gonna be a new century, not the century ofslavery, not the century oflies and issues of no significance... and classism and statism and all the rest ofthe modes of control !" "It's gonna be the age ofhumankind... standing up for something pure and something right !" "What a bunch of garbage-- liberal Democrat, conservative Republican." "It's all there to control you." "Two sides ofthe same coin." "Two management teams bidding for control !" "The C.E.O.job of Slavery, Incorporated !" "The truth is out there in front ofyou, but they lay out this buffet oflies !" "I'm sick ofit, and I'm not gonna take a bite out ofit !" "Doyou got me ?" "Resistance is not futile." "We're gonna win this thing." "Humankind is too good !" "We're not a bunch ofunderachievers !" "We're gonna stand up and we're gonna be human beings !" "We're gonna get fired up about the real things, the things that matter:" "creativity and the dynamic human spirit that refuses to submit !" "Well, that's it !" "That's all I got to say !" "It's in your court." "[Man] The quest is to be liberatedfrom the negative, which is really our own will to nothingness." "And once having said yes to the instant, the affirmation is contagious." "It bursts into a chain of affirmations that knows no limit." "To sayyes to one instant... is to sayyes to all of existence." "The main character is whatyou might call "the mind."" "It's mastery, it's capacity to represent." "Throughout history, attempts have been made... to contain those experiences which happen at the edge of the limit... where the mind is vulnerable." "But I thinkwe are in a very significant moment in history." "Those moments, thosewhat you might call liminal, limit, frontier, edge zone experiences... are actually now becoming the norm." "These multiplicities and distinctions and differences... that have given great difficulty to the old mind... are actually through entering into theirvery essence, tasting and feeling their uniqueness." "One might make a breakthrough to that common something... that holds them together." "And so the main character is, to this new mind, greater, greater mind." "A mind thatyet is to be." "And when we are obviously entered into that mode, you can see a radical subjectivity, radical attunement to individuality, uniqueness to that which the mind is, opens itself to a vast objectivity." "So the story is the story ofthe cosmos now." "The moment is not just a passing, empty nothing yet." "And this is in the way in which these secret passages happen." "Yes, it's empty with such fullness... that the great moment, the great life ofthe universe... is pulsating in it." "And each one, each object, each place, each act... leaves a mark." "And thatstoryis singular." "But, in fact, it's story after story." "[ Woman ] Timejust dissolves into quick-moving particles that are swirling away." "Either I'm moving fast or time is." "Never both simultaneously." "I t's such a strange paradox." "I mean, whi le, technically," "I 'm closer to the end of my life than I've ever been," "I actually feel more than ever that I have all the time in the world." "When I was younger, there was a desperation, a desire for certainty, like there was an end to the path, and I had to get there." "I know whatyou mean because I can remember thinking," ""Oh, someday, like in my mid-thirties maybe, everything's going to just somehow jell and settle, just end."" "It was like there was this plateau, and it was waiting for me, and I was climbing up it, and when I got to the top, all growth and change would stop." "Even exhilaration." "But that hasn't happened like that, thank goodness." "I think that what we don't take into account when we'reyoung is our endless curiosity." "That's what's so great about being human." " You know that thing Benedict Anderson says about identity ?" " No." "Well, he's talking about like, say, a baby picture." "Soyou pick up this picture, this two-dimensional image, and you say, "That's me."" "Well, to connect this baby in this weird little image... with yourselfliving and breathing in the present, you have to make up a story like, "This was mewhen I was a year old," ""and later I had long hair, and then we moved to Riverdale, and now here I am."" "So it takes a story that's actually a fiction... to makeyou and the baby in the picture identical to createyour identity." "And the funny thing is, our cells are completely regenerating every seven years." "We've already become completely different people several times over, and yet we always remain quintessentially ourselves." "Hmm." "Our critique began as all critiques begin:" "with doubt." "Doubt became ournarrative." "Ours was a quest for a newstory, our own." "And we grasp toward this new history driven by the suspicion... that ordinary language couldn't tell it." "Our past appeared frozen in the distance, and our every gesture and accent... signified the negation ofthe old world and the reach for a new one." "The way we lived created a new situation, one of exuberance and friendship, that of a subversive m icrosociety... i n the heart of a society which ignored it." "Art was not the goal but the occasion and the method... for locating our specific rhythm... and buried possibilities of our time." "The discovery ofa true communication was what it was about, or at least the quest for such a communication." "The adventure offinding it and losing it." "We the unappeased, the unaccepti ng continued looking, filling in the silences with our own wishes, fears and fantasies." "Driven forwardby the fact that no matterhow empty the worldseemed, no matter how degraded and used up the world appeared to us, we knew that anything was still possible." "And, given the right circumstances, a new world was just as I i kely as an old one." "[ Man ] There are two kinds ofsufferers in this world:" "those who suffer from a lack oflife... and those who suffer from an overabundance oflife." "I 've always found myself i n the second category." "When you come to think of it, almost all human behavior and activity... is not essentially any different from animal behavior." "The most advanced technologies and craftsmanship... bring us, at best, up to the super-chimpanzee level." "Actually, the gap between, say, Plato or Nietzsche and the average human... is greater than the gap between that chimpanzee and the average human." "The realm ofthe real spirit, the true artist, the saint, the philosopher, is rarely achieved." "Why so few ?" "Why is world history and evolution not stories of progress... but rather this endless and futile addition ofzeroes ?" "No greatervalues have developed." "Hell, the Greeks 3,000 years ago were just as advanced as we are." "So what are these barriers that keep people... from reaching anywhere near their real potential ?" "The answer to that can be found in another question, and that's this:" "Which is the most universal human characteristic-- fear or laziness ?" "What areyou writing ?" "A novel." "What's the story ?" "[ Chuckles ] There's no story." "It's just... people, gestures, moments, bits of rapture, fleeting emotions." "In short, the greatest stories ever told." "Areyou in the story ?" "I don't think so." "But then I'm kind of reading it and then writing it." "[Man] It was in the middle of the desert, in the middle ofnowhere, but on the way to Vegas, so, you know, every once in a while a car would pull in, get gas." "It was the last gas stop before Vegas." "Office had the chair, had a cash register, and that was all the room there was in that office." "I was asleep, and I heard a noise." "You know, just like in my mind." "So I got up, and I walked out, and I stood on the curb of where the gas station ends, you know, the driveway there." "I'm rubbing the sand out of my eyes, trying to see what's going on, and way down at the very end ofthe gas station... they had tire racks." "Chains around them, you know." "And I see there's an Econoline van down there." "And there's a guy with his T-shirt off, and he's packing his Econoline van..." " [ Laughing ] - with all ofthese tires." "He's got the last two tires in his hands, pushes them into the thing, and then I, of course, I go, " Hey, you !"" "This guyturns around, he's got no shirt on, he's sweating, he's built like a brick shithouse, pulls out a knife, it's 1 2 inches long, and then starts running at me as fast as he can, going," " [ Screaming ] -[Laughing]" "I'm still" ""This is wrong." I walked in, stuck my hand behind the cash register where the owner kept a.41 revolver, pull it out, cocked the trigger, and just as I turned around, he was comin' through the door." "And I could see his eyes." "I'll never forget this guy's eyes." "And he just had bad thoughts about me in his eyes." "[ Chuckling ]" "And I fired a round, and it hit him." "Boom." "Right in the chest." "Bang." "He went-- as fast as he was coming in the door, he went out the door." "Went right up between the two pumps, ethyl and regular." "And he must've been on drugs, on speed or something, you know, because he stood up... andhe still had the knife, and the blood wasjust all over his chest, and he stood up and he went like that, just moved a little like that." "And I was pretty much in shock, so I just held the trigger back and fanned the hammer." "It's one ofthose old-time-- Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom !" "And I blew him out ofthe gas station." "And ever since then," " I always carry this." " [ Clicks ]" "I hear that." "A well-armed populace is the best defense against tyranny." "I'll drink to that." "And you know," "I haven't fired this in such a long time, I don't even know ifit'll work." "Why don'tyou pull the trigger and find out ?" "[Faucet Squeaks ]" "[ Beeping ]" "[ Line Ringing ]" "[ Ringing Continues ]" " [ Man ] I'm not here." "Leave a message." " [ Beeps ]" "Hey, man." "I guess you already took off or something." "But, uh, remind me to tell you about this dream I had last night... 'cause there's some really funny stuffing it." "All right, man." "Uh, I guess I'll catch you later." "Okay." "[Man On TV] Bareback riding." "Copenhagen William... and his horse Same Deal." "[ Woman ]...for a hat band." "Sew it into the inside ofthe" "I do not await the future, anticipating salvation, absolution, not even enlightenment through process." "I subscribe to the premise that this flawed perfection is sufficient and complete... in every single, ineffable moment." "[Announcer] The Blonde Bee, the Firefly, Praying Mantis-- ...lunatic macaroni munchkin with my googat" "¢Ü¢Ü [ Classical] ...venerable tradition of sorcerers, shamans and othervisionaries... who have developed and perfected the art of dream travel, the so-called lucid dream state... where, by consciously controlling your dreams," "you're able to discover things... beyond your capacity to apprehend in your awake state." "¢Ü¢Ü [Brass Band]" " Winning back-to-back" " Tell us what Felix is doing" "A single ego is an absurdly narrow vantage from which to view this-- this experience." "And where most consider their individual relationship to the universe," "I contemplate relationships... of myvarious selves to one another." "[Announcer] While most people with mobilityproblems... are having trouble just getting around, at age 92,Joy Cullison's out seeing the world." "[ Woman ] ¢Ü Now I'm free to see the world¢Ü¢Ü" "Hey, how's it goi ng ?" "They say that dreams are real only as long as they last." "Can't you say the same thing about life ?" "A lot of us out there are mapping that mind/body relationship of dreams." "We're called the oneironauts." "We're explorers ofthe dreamworld." "Really, it's just about the two opposing states of consciousness... which don't really oppose at all." "See, in the waking world, the neuro-system inhibits the activation ofthe vividness of memories." "This makes evolutionary sense." "It'd be maladapted for the perceptual image ofa predator... to be mistaken for the memory of one and vice-versa." "Ifthe memory of a predator conjured up a perceptual image, we'd be running offto the bathroom every time we had a scary thought." "Soyou have these serotonic neurons... that inhibit hallucinations... that they themselves are inhibited during REM sleep." "This allows dreams to appear real... while preventing competition from other perceptual processes." "This is why dreams are mistaken for reality." "To the functional system of neural activity that creates ourworld, there is no difference between dreaming a perception and an action... and actually the waking perception and action." "I had a friend once who told me... that the worst mistake thatyou could make... is to think thatyou are alive... when reallyyou're asleep in life's waiting room." "The trick is to combine... yourwaking rational abilities... with the infinite possibilities ofyour dreams." "'Cause ifyou can do that, you can do anything." "Did you ever have a job that you hated and worked real hard at ?" "A long, hard day ofwork." "Finallyyou get to go home, get in bed, closeyour eyes." "And immediately you wake up and realize... that the whole day at work had been a dream." "It's bad enough thatyou sell your waking life for-- for minimum wage, but now they get your dreams for free." "Hey, man, what areyou doing here ?" "I fancy myselfthe social lubricator ofthe dreamworld, helping people become lucid a little easier." "Cut out all that fear and anxiety stuffand just rock and roll." "By becoming lucid, you mean just knowing thatyou're dreaming, right ?" "Yeah." "Andthen you can control it." "They're more realistic and less bizarre than non-lucid dreams." "You know, I just woke from a dream." "It wasn't like a typical dream." "It seemed more like I'd walked into an alternate universe." "Yeah, it's real." "I mean, technically, it's a phenomenon ofsleep, butyou can have so much damn fun in your dreams." "And, of course, everyone knows fun rules." " Yeah." "So what was going on inyour dream ?" "Oh." "A lot of people." "A lot oftalking." "Some of it was kind of absurdist, like from a strange movie or something." "Mostly, it was just people going off about whatever, really intensely." "I woke up wondering, where did all this stuff come from ?" " You can control that." " Do you have these dreams all the time ?" "Hell, yeah." "I'm always gonna make the best of it." "But the trick is, you got to realize that you're dreaming in the first place." "You got to be able to recognize it." "You got to be able to askyourself, " Hey, man, is this a dream ?"" "Most people never ask themselves that... when they're awake or especially when they're asleep." "Seems like everyone's sleepwalking through their waking state... or wakewalking through their dreams." "Eitherway they're not gonna get much out ofit." "The thing that snapped me into realizing I was dreaming was, uh-- was my digital clock." "I couldn't really read it." "Itwas like the circuitry was all screwed up or something." "Yeah, that's real common." "Andsmall printedmaterial is pretty tough too." "Very unstable." "Another good tip-off is trying to adjust light levels." "You can't really do that." "Ifyou see a light switch nearby, turn it on and off and see if it works." "That's one of the few things you can't do in a lucid dream." "What the hell." "I can fly around, have an interesting conversation with Albert Schweitzer." "I can explore all these new dimensions of reality, not to mention I can have any kind of sex I want, which is way cool." "So I can't adjust light levels." "So what ?" "But that's one ofthe things you do to test ifyou're dreaming or not, right ?" "Yeah, like I said, you can totally train yourselfto recognize it." "I mean,just hit a light switch every now and then." "Ifthe lights are on and you can't turn them off, then most likelyyou're dreaming." "Andthenyou can get down to business." "Andbelieve me, it's unlimited." " Hey, you know what I've been working on lately ?" " What's that ?" "Oh, man, it's way ambitious, but I'm getting better at it." "You're gonna dig this." "Three-sixtyvision, man." "I can see in all directions." "Pretty cool, huh ?" "Yeah." "Wow." "Well, I got to go, man." "Okay, later, man." "Super perfundo on the early eve ofyour day." " What's that mean ?" " Well,you know, I never figuredit out." "Maybe you can." "This guy always whispers into my ear." "Louis." "He's a recurring dream character." "[Man ] Cinema, in its essence, is about reproduction ofreality, which is that, like, reality is actually reproduced." "And for him, it might sound like a storytelling medium, really." "And he feels like, um-- like film-- like-- like literature is betterfortelling a story." "And ifyou tell a story or even like a joke" ""This guywalks into a bar and sees a dwarf."" "That works reallywell becauseyou're imagining this guy and this dwarfing this bar." "And it's an imaginative aspect to it." "In film, you don't have that becauseyou actually are filming a specific guy... in a specific bar with a specific dwarf..." " ofaspecific height who looks a certain way, right ?" " Mm-hmm." "So like, um, for Bazin, what the ontology of film has to deal-- it has to deal with, you know, with" " Photography also has an ontology," " Right." "except that it adds this dimension oftime to it... and this greater realism." "And so, it's about that guy... at that moment in that space." "And, you know, Bazin is, like, a Christian, so he, like, believes that, you know-- in God, obviously, and everything." "For him, reality and God are the same." "You know, like" "And so what film is actually capturing is, like, God incarnate, creating." "You know, like this very moment, God is manifesting as this." "And what the film would capture ifitwas filming us right now... would be, like, God as this table, and God is you and God is me and God looking thewaywe look right now... and saying and thinking whatwe're thinking right now..." " becausewe're all God manifest in that sense." " Mm-hmm." "So film is like a record ofGod or the face ofGod... or ofthe ever-changing face ofGod." "You have a mosquito." "You want me to get it foryou ?" " You got it." "Yeah." " I got it ?" "And the whole Hollywood thing has taken film... and tried to make it this storytelling medium... where you take these books or stories... and then you, like, you know-- you get the script and then try to find somebodywho fits the thing." "But it's ridiculous." "It shouldn't be based on the script." "It should be based on the person, the thing." "And, um-- And in that sense, they're almost right to have this whole star system..." " because then it's about that person instead ofthe story." " Right." "Truffaut always said the best films aren't made" "The best scripts don't make the best films... because they have that kind ofliterary, narrative thing thatyou're sort of a slave to." "The best films are the ones that aren't tied to that slavishly." "So, um-- So" " I don't know" "The whole narrative thing seems to me like" "Obviously, there's narrativity to cinema 'cause it's in time, just the way there's narrativity to music." "You don't first think ofthe story ofthe song, then make the song." "It has to come out ofthe moment." "That's what film has." "It's just that moment, which is holy." "You know, like this moment, it's holy." "But we walk around like it's not holy." "We walk around like there's some holy moments and there are all the other moments..." " that are not holy, but this moment is holy." " Right." "Right." "And film can let us see that." "We can frame it so that we see, like, "Ah, this moment." "Holy."" "Like "holy, holy, holy" moment by moment." "But who can live that way ?" "Who can go, "Wow, holy" ?" "Because ifI were to look atyou and letyou be holy" "I don't know." "I would, like, stop talking." "[ Chuckles ] Well, you'd be in the moment." "The moment is holy, right ?" "Yeah, but I'd be open." "I'd look in your eyes and I'd cry... and I'd feel all this stuff and that's not polite." "It would makeyou uncomfortable." "You could laugh too." "Whywould you cry ?" "Well, 'cause-- I don't know." "For me, I just tend to cry." "Uh-huh." "Well" "Well, let's do it right now." "Let's have a holy moment." " Everything is layers, isn't it ?" " Yeah." "There's the holy moment and then there's the awareness... oftrying to have the holy moment... in the same way that the film is the actual moment really happening, but then the character pretending to be in a different reality." "It's all these layers." "And, uh, I was in and out ofthe holy moment, looking atyou." "Can be in a holy-- You're unique that way, Caveh." "That's one ofthe reasons I enjoyyou." "You can..." "bring me into that." "Ifthe world that we are forced to accept is false and nothing is true, then everything is possible." "On the way to discovering what we love, we will find everything we hate, everything that blocks our path to what we desire." "The comfort will never be comfortable for those who seek what is not on the market." "A systematic questioning ofthe idea ofhappiness." "We'll cut the vocal chords of every empowered speaker." "We'll yank the social symbols through the looking glass." "We'll devalue society's currency." "To confront the familiar." "Society is a fraud so complete and venal... that it demands to be destroyed beyond the power of memory to recall its existence." "Where there's fire, we will carry gasoline." "Interrupt the continuum of everyday experience... and all the normal expectations that go with it." "To live as if something actually depended on one's actions." "To rupture the spell ofthe ideology ofthe commodified consumer society... so that our oppressed desires of a more authentic nature can come forward." "To demonstrate the contrast between what life presently is and what it could be." "To immerse ourselves in the oblivion of actions and know we're making it happen." "There will be an intensity never before known in everyday life... to exchange love and hate, life and death, terror and redemption, repulsions and attractions." "An affirmation offreedom so reckless and unqualified, that it amounts to a total denial of every kind of restraint and limitation." " Hey, old man, whatyou doing up there ?" " I'm not sure." "You need any help getting down, sir ?" "No, I don't think so." "Stupid bastard." "No worse than us." "He's all action and no theory." "We're all theory and no actions." "Why so glum, Mr. Deborg ?" "What was missing was felt irretrievable." "The extreme uncertainties... of subsisting without working... made excesses necessary... and breaks definitive." "To quote Stevenson:" ""Suicide carried off many." "" Drink and the devil... took care ofthe rest."" " Hey." " Hey." "You a dreamer ?" "Yeah." "I haven't seen too many ofyou around lately." "Things have been tough lately for dreamers." "They say dreaming's dead, that no one does it anymore." "It's not dead." "It's just that it's been forgotten." "Removed from our language." "Nobody teaches it, so no one knows it exists." "The dreamer is banished to obscurity." "I'm trying to change all that, and I hopeyou are too." "By dreaming every day." "Dreaming with our hands and dreaming with our minds." "Our planet is facing the greatest problems it's everfaced." "Ever." "So whateveryou do, don't be bored." "This is absolutely the most exciting time we could have possibly hoped to be alive." "And things are just starting." "A thousand years is but an instant." "There's nothing new, nothing different." "The same pattern over and over." "The same clouds, the same music, the same insight felt an hour or an eternity ago." "There's nothing here for me now, nothing at all." "Now I remember." "This happened to me before." "This is why I left." "You have begun to find your answers." "Although it will seem difficult, the rewards will be great." "Exerciseyour human mind as thoroughly as possible, knowing it is only an exercise." "Build beautiful artifacts, solve problems, explore the secrets ofthe physical universe." "Savor the input from all the senses." "Feel the joy and sorrow, the laughter, the empathy, compassion... and tote the emotional memory in your travel bag." "I rememberwhere I came from and how I became a human." "Why I hung around." "And now my final departure is scheduled." "This way out." "Escaping velocity." "Not just eternity, but infinity." " Excuse me." " Excuse me." "Hey." "Could we do that again ?" "I know we haven't met, but I don't want to be an ant." "You know ?" "I mean, it's like we go through life... with our antennas bouncing off one other, continuously on ant autopilot, with nothing really human required of us." "Stop." "Go." "Walk here." "Drive there." "All action basically for survival." "All communication simplyto keep this ant colony buzzing along... in an efficient, polite manner." "" Here's your change." " Paper or plastic ?" "Credit or debit ?"" ""You want ketchup with that ?"" "I don't want a straw." "I want real human moments." "I want to seeyou." "I want you to see me." "I don't want to give that up." "I don't want to be an ant, you know ?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I know." "I don't want to be an ant, either." "Yeah, thanks for kind of, like,jostling me there." "I've been kind of on zombie autopilot lately." "I don't feel like an ant in my head, but I guess I probably look like one." "It's kind oflike D.H. Lawrence had this idea oftwo people meeting on a road..." "And instead ofjust passing and glancing away, they decided to accept what he calls "the confrontation between their souls."" "It's like, um-- like freeing the brave reckless gods within us all." "Then it's like we have met." "I'm doing this project." "I'm hoping you'll be interested in doing it." "It's a soap opera, and, so, the characters are the fantasy lives." "They're the alter egos of the performers who are in it." "Soyou pretty much just figure out something thatyou've always wanted to do... or the lifeyou've wanted to lead or occupation or something like that." "And we write that in, and then we also haveyour life intersect... with other people's in the soap opera in some typical soap opera fashion." "Then I also want to showit in a live venue... and have the actors present so that once the episode is screened, then the audience can direct... the actors forsubsequent episodes with menus orsomething." "So it has a lot to do with choices and honoring people's ability... to say what it is that they want to see... and also consumerism and art and commodity." "And ifyou don't I i ke what you got, then you can send it back... oryou get whatyou pay for, orjust participating, just really making choices." " So, you wanna do it ?" " Uh, yeah." "Yeah, that sounds really cool." "I'd love to be in it, but, um" "Uh, I kinda gotta askyou a question first though." "I don't really know how to say it, but, um-- uh, what's it like to be a character in a dream ?" "'Cause, uh, I'm not awake right now." "And I haven't even worn a watch since, like, fourth grade." "I think this is the same watch too." "Um" " Uh, yeah." "I don't even know ifyou're able to answer that question." "But I'm just trying to get like a sense ofwhere I am and what's going on." "So, what aboutyou ?" "What's your name ?" "What's your address ?" "What areyou doing ?" "[ Chuckles ] I" " I" " You know, I can't really remember right now." "I can't really-- I can't really recall that." "But that's beside the point... whether or not I can dredge up this information... about, you know, my address or, you know, my mom's maiden name orwhatnot." "I've got the benefit in this reality, ifyou wanna call that, of a consistent perspective." "What is your consistent perspective ?" "It's mostlyjust me dealing with a lot of people... who are... exposing me to information and ideas... that... seem vaguely familiar, but, at the same time, it's all very alien to me." "I'm not in an objective, rational world." "Like, I've been, like, flying around." "Uh-- [ Clears Throat]" "I don't know." "It's weird, too, because it's not like a fixed state." "It's more like this whole spectrum of awareness." "Like the luciditywavers." "Like, right now I know that I'm dreaming, right ?" "We're, like, even talking about it." "This is the most in myselfand in mythoughts that I've been so far." "I'm talking about being in a dream." "But I'm beginning to think... that it's something that I don't really have any precedent for." "It's" " It's totally unique." "The" " The quality of-- ofthe environment... and the information that I'm receiving." "Likeyour soap opera, for example." "That's a really cool idea." "I didn't come up with that." "It's like something outside of myself." "It's like something transmitted to me externally." "I don't know what this is." "Weseem to think we're so limitedby the world... and-- and the confines, but we're reallyjust creating them." "And you keep trying to figure it out, but it seems like now that you know that whatyou're doing is dreaming, you can do whateveryou want to." "You're, uh, dreaming, butyou're awake." "You have, um, so many options, and that's what life is about." "I understand whatyou're saying." "It's up to me." "I'm the dreamer." "It's weird." "Like, so much ofthe information... that-- that these people have been imparting to me" "I don't know." "It's got this, like, really heavy connotation to it." " Well, how doyou feel ?" " Well," "Well, sometimes I feel kind ofisolated, but most ofthe time, I feel really connected, really, like, engaged in this active process." "Which is kind ofweird because most ofthe time," "I've just been really passive and not really responding, except for now, I guess." "I'm just kind ofletting the information wash over me." "It's not necessarily passive to not respond verbally." "We're communicating on so many levels simultaneously." "Perhaps you're-- you're perceiving directly." "Most ofthe people that I've been encountering... and most ofthe things that I would wanna say, it's like they kind of say it for me and almost at my cue." "It's, like, complete unto itself." "It's not like I'm having a bad dream." "It's a great dream." "But... it's so unlike any other dream I've ever had before." "It's like the dream." "It's like I'm being prepared for something." ""On this bridge," Lorca warns," ""life is not a dream." "" Beware and beware and... beware."" "And so many think because "then" happens," "" now" isn't." "But didn't I mention the ongoing "wow" is happening right now ?" "We are all coauthors ofthis dancing exuberance... where even our inabilities are having a roast." "We are the authors of ourselves, coauthoring a gigantic Dostoyevsky novel starring clowns." "This entire thing we're involved with called the world... is an opportunity to exhibit how exciting alienation can be." "Life is a matter ofa miracle that is collected over time... by moments flabbergasted to be in each other's presence." "The world is an exam to see ifwe can rise into the direct experiences." "Our eyesight is here as a test to see ifwe can see beyond it." "Matter is here as a test for our curiosity." "Doubt is here as an exam for ourvitality." "Thomas Mann wrote that he would rather participate in life... than write a hundred stories." "Giacometti was once run down by a car, and he recalled falling into a lucid faint, a sudden exhiliration, as he realized at last something was happening to him." "An assumption develops that you cannot understand life and live life simultaneously." "I do not agree entirely." "Which is to say I do not exactly disagree." "I would say that life understood is life lived." "But the paradoxes bug me, and I can learn to love and make love... to the paradoxes that bug me." "And on really romantic evenings of self," "I go salsa dancing with my confusion." "Beforeyou drift off, don't forget." "Which is to say, remember." "Because remembering is so much more a psychotic activity than forgetting." "Lorca in that same poem said... that the iguana will bite those who do not dream." "Andas one realizes... that one is a dream figure... in another person's dream, that is self-awareness." "You haven't met yourselfyet." "But the advantage to meeting others in the meantime... is that one ofthem may presentyou toyourself." "Examine the nature... of everything you observe." "For instance, you might find yourself walking through... a dream parking lot." "And, yes, those are dream feet inside ofyour dream shoes." "Part ofyour dream self." "And so, the person you appear to be in the dream... cannot be whoyou really are." "This is an image, a mental model." "Doyou remember me ?" "No." "No, I don't think so." "At the station ?" "You were on the pay phone and you looked at me... a few times." "I remember that, but I don't remember that being you." "Areyou sure ?" "Well, maybe not." "I was sitting down... and you were looking at me." "My little friend, dream no more." "It's really here." "It's called Efferdent Plus." "In hell, you sink to the level ofyour lack oflove." "In heaven, you rise to the level ofyour fullness oflove." "Hurry up !" "Come on !" "Get in the car !" "Let's go." "Allegedly, the story goes like this." "BillyWilder runs into Louis Malle." "This was in the late '50s, early '60s." "And Louis Malle had just made his most expensive film, which had cost 2 1/2 million dollars." "And BillyWilder asks him what the film is about." "And Louis Malle says, "It's sort ofa dream within a dream."" "And BillyWilder says, "You just lost 2 1 /2 million dollars."" "I feel a little more apprehensive about this one than I did" "[Man Speaking, Indistinct]" "Down through the centuries, the notion that life is wrapped in a dream... has been a pervasive theme of philosophers and poets." "So doesn't it make sense that death, too, would be wrapped in dream ?" "That, after death, your conscious life would continue... in what might be called, "a dream body" ?" "It would be the same dream bodyyou experience in your everyday dream life." "Except that in the post-mortal state, you could never again wake up, never again return to your physical body." "As the pattern gets more intricate and subtle, being swept along is no longer enough." "What's the word, turd ?" "Hey, doyou also drive a boat car ?" " A what ?" " You gave me a ride in a car that was also a boat." "No, man, I don't have a boat car." "I don't know whatyou're talking about." "Man, this must be, like, parallel universe night." "You know that cat that was just in here, whojust ran out the door ?" "Well, he comes up to the counter, and I say, "What's the word, turd ? "" "And he lays down this burrito and he kind of looks at me, kind of stares at me and says," "" I have but recently returned from the valley of the shadow of death." "" I'm rapturously breathing in all the odors and essences oflife." ""I've been to the brink oftotal oblivion." "I remember and ferment the desire to remember everything."" "So, what did you say to that ?" "Well, I mean, what could I say ?" "I said, "Ifyou're gonna microwave that burrito," ""I wantyou to poke holes in the plastic wrapping because they explode." "And I'm tired of cleaning upyour little burrito doings." "You dig me ?"" "'Cause thejalapenos dryup." "They're like little wheels." "When it was over, all I could think about... was how this entire notion of oneself, what we are, isjust... this logical structure, a place to momentarily house all the abstractions." "It was a time to become conscious, to give form and coherence to the mystery." "And I had been a part ofthat." "It was a gift." "Life was raging all around me, and everymoment was magical." "I loved all the people, dealing with all the contradictory impulses." "That's what I loved the most-- connecting with the people." "Looking back, that's all that really mattered." "Kierkegaard's last words were, "Sweep me up."" " Hey, man." " Hey." "Weren'tyou in the boat car ?" "You know, the guy-- the guywith the hat." "He gave me a ride in his car or boat thing, andyou were in the back seat with me." "I'm not saying you don't know what you're talking about, but I don't know what you're talking about." "No, see, you guys let me off at this really specific spot... thatyou gave him directions to let me off at." "I get out and ended up getting hit by a car." "But then I just woke up because I was dreaming, and later, I found out that I was still dreaming, dreaming that I'd woken up." "Those are called "false awakenings." I used to have those all the time." "But I'm still in it now." "I can't get out ofit." "It's been going on forever." "I keep waking up, but I'm just waking up into another dream." "I'm starting to get creeped out too, like I'm talking to dead people." "This woman on TV's telling me about how death is this dream time... that exists outside oflife." "I mean, I'm starting to think that I'm dead." "I'm gonna tell you about a dream I once had." "I know thatwhen someone says that, usuallyyou're in for a very boring next few minutes, and you might be." "But it sounds like-- What else areyou gonna do, right ?" "Anyway, I read this essay by Philip K. Dick." "What, you read it in your dream ?" "No, no." "I read it before the dream." "It was the preamble to the dream." "It was about that book, Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said." " You know that one ?" " Yeah, yeah." "He won an award for that one." "Right." "That's the one he wrote really fast." "It just, like, flowed right out of him." "He felt he was sort of channeling it or something." "But anyway, about fouryears after it was published, he was at this party and he met this woman... who had the same name as the woman character in the book." "And she had a boyfriend with the same name as the boyfriend character in the book." "and she was having an affair with this guy, the chief of police." "And he had the same name as the chief of police in his book." "So she's telling him all this stufffrom her life, and everything she's saying is right out ofhis book." "So that's really freaking him out, but what can he do ?" "And shortly after that, he was going to mail a letter, and he saw this kind of, um, dangerous, shady-looking guy standing by his car." "But instead of avoiding him, which he said he usuallywould have done, he walked right up to him and said, "Can I helpyou ?"" "And the guy said, "Yeah." "I ran out of gas."" "He pulls out his wallet and he hands him some money, which he says he neverwould have done." "Andthen he gets home and he thinks, "Wait a second." "This guy can't get to a gas station." "He's out of gas."" "So he gets back in his car." "He finds the guy, takes him to the gas station." "And as he's pulling up to the gas station, he realizes, " Hey, this is in my book too." "This exactstation." "This exact guy." "Everything. "" "So this whole episode is kind of creepy, right ?" "And he's telling his priest about it, describing how he wrote this book, and fouryears later, all these things happened to him." "And as he's telling it to him, the priest says, "That's the Book ofActs." "You're describing the Book ofActs."" "He's like, "I've never read the Book of Acts."" "So he goes home and reads the Book of Acts, and it's, like, you know, uncanny." "Even the characters' names are the same as in the Bible." "And the Book of Acts takes place in 50 A.D., when it was written, supposedly." "So Philip K. Dick had this theory... that time was an illusion and that we were all actually in 50 A.D." "And the reason that he had written this book... was that he had somehow momentarily punctured through this illusion, this veil oftime." "And what he had seen was what was going on in the Book ofActs." "Andhe was really into Gnosticism." "and this idea that this demiurge, or demon, had created this illusion oftime to make us forget... that Christ was about to return... and the kingdom ofGod was about to arrive... and that we're all in 50 A.D. and there's someone trying to make us forget," "you know, that--you know, that God is imminent." "And that's what time is." "That's what all ofhistory is, this kind of continuous, you know, daydream or distraction." "Andso I readthat, and I was like, "Well, that's weird. "" "And then that night, I had a dream, and there was this guy in the dream who was supposed to be a psychic." "But I was skeptical." "I was like, " He's not really a psychic."" "I was just thinking to myself." "And then suddenly, I start floating, like levitating up to the ceiling." "And as I almost go through the roof, I'm like," "" Mr. Psychic, I believeyou." "You're a psychic." "Put me down, please."" "And I float down, and as my feet touch the ground, the psychic turns into this woman in a green dress." "And this woman is Lady Gregory." "Now, Lady Gregorywas Yeats' patron, this, you know, Irish person." "And though I'd never seen her image," "I was just sure that this was the face of Lady Gregory." "So we're walking along, and Lady Gregory turns to me and says," "" Let me explain toyou the nature ofthe universe." "" Now, Philip K. Dick is right about time, but he's wrong that it's 50 A.D." ""Actually, there's only one instant, and it's right now." ""And it's eternity." ""And it's an instant in which God is posing a question." ""And that question is, basically, 'Doyou want to, you know," ""'be one with eternity ?" "" Doyou want to be in heaven ?"" ""And we're all saying, 'No, thankyou." "Not justyet.'"" "Andso time is actuallyjust this constantsaying no... to God's invitation." "That's what time is." "It's no more 50 A.D. than it's 2001, you know ?" "There's just this one instant, and that's what we're always in." "And then she tells me that actuallythis is the narrative of everyone's life." "That behind the phenomenal difference, there is but one story, and that's the story of moving from the "no" to the "yes."" "All oflife is, " No, thankyou." "No, thankyou."" "Then ultimately it's, "Yes, I give in." "Yes, I accept." "Yes, I embrace."" "I mean, that's the journey." " Everyone gets to the "yes" in the end, right ?" " Right." "So we continue walking, and my dog runs over to me." "So I'm petting him." "I'm really happy to see him." "He's been dead foryears." "So I'm petting him and then I realize... there's this kind of gross oozing stuff coming out ofhis stomach." "And I look over at Lady Gregory, and she sort of coughs." "She's like-- [ Coughing ] "Oh, excuse me."" "And there's vomit dribbling down her chin, and it smells really bad." "And I think, "Wait a second." ""That's notjust the smell ofvomit, which doesn't smell very good." ""That's the smell of dead person vomit." "You know, it's, like, doubly foul."" "And then I realize I'm actually in, you know, the land ofthe dead." "Andeveryone aroundme was dead." "My dog hadbeen dead over tenyears." "Lady Gregory had been longer than that." "When I finally woke up, I was like, "Whoa." "That wasn't a dream."" "That was a visitation to this real place, the land of the dead."" " So what happened ?" "How did you finally get out ofit ?" " Oh, man." "It was just like one ofthose, like, life-altering experiences." "I could never really look at the world the same way again after that." "Yeah, but how did you finally get out ofthe dream ?" "See, that's my problem." "I'm trapped." "I keep" " I keep thinking that I'm waking up, but I'm still in a dream." "It seems like it's going on forever." "I can't get out ofit." "I wanna wake up for real." "How doyou reallywake up ?" "I don't know." "I'm not very good at that anymore." "But, um, ifthat's whatyou're thinking," "I mean, you probably should." "Ifyou can wake up, youshould... because someday you won't be able to." "Sojust, um-- But it's easy." "J ust--J ust..." "[ Whispering ] wake up!" "."