The 11th Dimension

This is a fascinating video of Michio Kaku as he explains according to string theory, his specialty—his day job, he calls it—there are 11 dimensions. Not 12 or 13, but 11, because after 11 the instability and anomalies that appear make such dimension unfeasible. Probably, for most of us, this all seems quite theoretical and non-practical in human terms. I mean what the hell is the 11th dimension like?

I’m not sure of the answer to that, but when I heard Kaku talking about the 11th dimension, it sort of blew my mind and reminded me—Rob—of an experience I had in 1992 that actually involved the 11th dimension in a strange way. Here’s the story. I may have mentioned here in the past, because it was such a startling experience, but not in this context, which is somewhat of a verification—or a synchronicity, or both!

I had just joined a group of people sitting around a campfire at night in the desert. Carlos Castaneda was running the show, lecturing everyone about dreaming. I thought that was interesting because I’d read all of his books up to that point and he’d never said anything about dreams or dreaming. Trish and I had written a couple of books about dreams and so I’d done quite a bit of research. Something CC said didn’t seem accurate to me and so I offered a different opinion.

He turned, stared at me with a cold look and said: “You’re in 11th dimension kindergarten. Get out!”

With that, I gasped, sat up in bed sweating, and looked around confused. I was sure that I’d just been in the desert with that group, here I was at home in bed and wide awake. After a few seconds, I realized that of course I was home. I hadn’t gone on a trip anywhere. But the experience had been so real that I realized I must’ve been on an out-of-body journey. The story doesn’t quite end there.

About six months later, Trish and I were at the national bookseller’s convention—then known as Bouchercon—in Miami. We were walking down one of the aisles in the convention center, and I looked up to see a poster in front of one of the publisher’s booths. Castaneda had a new book out…The Art of Dreaming.

I’ve always wondered about the comment about the 11th dimension, and now Kaku zeroed in on that very dimension.