Awakening Through Dreams Part Two: ELEMENTS of DREAMING |
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by Anita Doyle |
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| In part one of this series, we emphasized the "wholeness-creating" function of dreams. We laid the groundwork for understanding some of the ways in which dreams point to our essential completeness while - at the same time - revealing areas of incomplete resolution in our lives in a way that frees us to make choices for greater integration. People often wonder why dreams are so difficult to understand, why their meaning is seemingly obscured by images and symbols which can sometimes seem bizarre. The primary reason for this is that there are typically multiple layers of relevant meaning in any given image. The dreaming mind is both economical and precise; it sorts for an image that is capable of holding various related associations for the waking mind, simultaneously. There are certain symbolic elements that appear regularly in dreams, and knowing about them can enhance our ability to make sense of our dreams. Let's look at some of the more common, recurring elements: Day Residue. Let's say you had a seconds long transaction with the butcher in the grocery store, and that night you dream about being back in high school art class, and the teacher looks like the butcher. You might be tempted to write the dream off: "I just dreamed that because I saw the butcher earlier in the day." Yet this particular piece of day residue was selected from the thousands upon thousands of bits of experience that could have been extracted from a given day. If we instead develop an attitude of curiosity about that odd tidbit, we may hit upon a really useful insight. Maybe, for example, you've been wondering why, despite the artistic talent that everybody says you have, you lack the confidence to do anything with it. The dream may be addressing itself to that question in you: "How was your confidence in your creative self-expression 'butchered' in high school?" Feeling your way back into early experiences of unskillful, wounding critiques could help to release the creative energy locked up there. A realtor that I know was bored by dreams in which she was selling houses. No rest for the weary! Yet, when she began to ask herself, "How is this house a picture of myself?", she was quite amazed at what her seemingly mundane day residue revealed. A rather ordinary tract house in her dream surprised her by having an earthen floor rather than linoleum and carpets inside, and when she re-entered the image upon awakening, she found that she was exploring the ways in which hides her very real earthy sensuality behind a boringly conventional, socially acceptable facade. Constructive Criticism. Since the purpose of dreams is to promote integrity/integration ("wholeness"), they almost always contain an element of constructive self-criticism, something which sheds light on behaviors or decisions of ours which go against the grain of integrated self-expression. For example: I dream that I have planned a potluck supper with friends. Everyone's beginning to arrive, and the mood is joyful and warm. But I get involved in various details by myself in the kitchen, and by the time I finally make it into the dining room, all the food is gone. The dreamer recognized the relevance to her life: "Sharing and connecting with kindred souls is what 'feeds' me - I thrive on it - but I often let myself get so wrapped up in detailed, solitary work that I miss the opportunities for such nurturing that are available to me." Childhood Experiences. Very often a dream figure or place will be present that is primarily linked to an experience or set of experiences from early life. One's best friend in first grade, for example, or the room that one slept in as a teenager. Such images point to the question: "When did I first feel the way I am feeling now?" It may help to shed light on the unconscious factors at work in the current situation. Visual Metaphors and Word Puns. These are present in nearly every dream. For example, a derailed train... a house on stilts...a phone out of order: these images beg questions like "How am I off-track? ... lacking foundation, or 'above it all'? .... unable to communicate?" Recurring Dreams. The recurrence of a particular dream or dream image seems to be an effort on the part of the dream to draw attention to an aspect of one's life that is creating an imbalance in the psyche, but which is being ignored or overlooked by the dreamer. For example, a woman plagued by severe depression for many years had dreams with a recurrent image: A large, black insect which no one else can see is eating through me. Because no one else can see it, I tell myself it's not really there, and for a while it's gone. But it always comes back. When she worked with this troubling dream, it dawned on her that "insect" and "incest" were very similar words, and this realization opened up floodgates of feeling and memory that had been locked tightly since childhood, and paved the way toward her ultimate healing. Archetypes. These are universal images which connect us with our deepest Self - that self that is both personal and related to the whole of the cosmos. The "big dreams" that we remember for years are often steeped in archetypal images. But even our everyday dreams carry elements of the archetypes, and staying attuned to them can provide us with a developmental overview of our movement toward realized completeness. In Parts 3 and 4 of this series, we'll look at two archetypes that appear routinely in our dreams: "The Persona" and "The Shadow". © Anita Doyle, 1988 [Slightly edited from the original, which appeared in the Winter (Jan.) 1988 issue of Life Scribes.] Other articles in the "Awakening Through Dreams" Series:
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