lack of consciousness

i open my eyes into the dark - to a noise i did not recognize in a space i did not know. the bed i lie in is soft and warm. i can smell clean linens and i feel the sweat starting to prickle on my neck as i swelter underneath the down comforter.

i have no idea where i am.

this has happened before.

this has happened a lot recently. i'd forgotten this part of not having a home.

once i got my wits to me and came to a realization of where i was (thanks to the mansion folks for letting me stay!) i sunk back into the bed and proceeded to flatten my mind back out for sleep. it was then that it came to me. the answer. not some kind of intense revelation. not THE WAY or HOW or WHAT'S NEXT. just simply the answer to what had stumped me last night. i knew how to start the cover letter i was working on.

this has happened before.

sitting in the kitchen this morning i chatted a bit with my friends about that moment. not the moment last night that led me to get another job application done, but THAT MOMENT when i wake from my sleep to some kind of realization. when i open my eyes into the dark and just know.

funny thing is that i did not start the conversation. my friend jason did. he came to the kitchen with a tale of realizing in the middle of the night that he needs to spend time centering again (centering in the middle - literal metaphor). he wondered aloud what it was that led him to this late-night revelation. he told me this was not uncommon for him.

this has happened before.

i often do my best thinking when i am not thinking. i come to conclusions when i sleep, when i am focused on intense exercise, when i talk, when i have sex. in the moments when i am outside of my mind i find that it works the best. the puzzle pieces pull themselves together seemingly on their own and i suddenly...just...know.

for me i live in my head most of the time. my heart and body and spirit have to catch up on a regular basis. i wonder if that is what is happening. i step out for a bit and the rest all come home. there is a scientist who focuses his research on measuring levels of consciousness and developing a meter that can read it as easily as temperature. thinking about this article, my recent accidental foray into jungian psychology, and spending time with therapists who tap into the nether-realms i wonder if that is actually possible.

i do love those moments of realization where the things i need surface from my unconscious mind and i come back to my brain to find them there. it is a moment of intense clarity where my unconscious is tapped into my conscious mind. i think about personal integration and centering and drawing together the pieces of my being and i wonder if i could harness that mindfully.

or perhaps the unconscious is not something we can own.