Spirit Guide Group: Dreams, Volume Two

This is the second thread specifically for those who have experienced what may be contact with a guide while dreaming. Although Zorya will close the previous thread, there is nothing to stop anyone from continuing on with the discussion of dream material posted in Volume One. This is also a good opportunity for those who have not been involved so far to join us. Don't be shy!

The Journey Continues

Last Sunday morning, the dream was of a long distance hike on the 100 km road from Port Alberni to my home in Ucluelet. But shortly after I started my journey, which would involve an overnight stay by the road, I understood that I needed to visit my father before continuing. Just to the right of the base of a major mountain climb, his home was up a long and poorly kept logging road, and I wondered why he hadn't bothered to come and pick me up. He seemed to be running a drop-in centre for troubled youths, but rather unsuccessfully, and was chatting idly and self-centeredly about his plans. I felt that he had really wasted my time and energy, for I knew that the trip was a finely calculated journey to the edge of my strength, endurance and timing. Then a woman who was a leader in the local church asked me to do a lot of paper busywork, further delaying my start. At last I started back down his road to begin the journey in earnest. The dream ended.

Well there is a lot of physical reality in this dream. Last year I was in training to do this walk, one that has been accomplished by very people walking - perhaps no one without a vehicle escort - although some have travelled by bicycle. There is literally nothing but trees, lakes, rivers and mountains between Port Alberni - which is actually up a very long and sheltered inlet - and the actual open Pacific coast at Ucluelet. My intention was to walk in the other direction, from here to Port Alberni, to travel east, which is the typical destination of my metaphysical journey. But in the last training walk prior to the trip I badly blistered my feet and then the Fall rains came before I recovered. This year just did not seem right for retrying this vision quest, instead there has been the Tarot Holiday and the upcoming retreat. Perhaps next year...

In any event, the interlude with my father was actually fairly typical, but I felt that he represented more than just my actual father. Together with the woman of the church, he represented stagnating convention, that which saps your creative and assertive energy, holding you within the linear box of social conformity. As you can well imagine, I was very reluctant to go to church that morning, but I did go.

But on the following morning I had a complimentary dream. With a male accomplice I hijacked a train. There was no physical violence involved, we simply persuaded the conductor that we were taking over. The train was running north within Mexico, but instead of stopping at the border we were going to have it continue right through to New York. Two mexican women on the train, an older and a younger, figured out what we were doing. But they were strangely in support of our efforts and calmed the passengers so that they did not worry. For some reason, without the direction of the conductor, the train engineer seemed to have no choice but to continue without stopping. A man from First Class, the only person in that carriage, was also strongly in support of our coup, and said that he would delay the police when we arrived so that we could get away safely. The dream ended.

In this dream the opposite effect occurs. Instead of being limited by convention, we are able to channel the energy of the libido into a breakaway. I believe that the association with New York was a symbol of Purple Goddess's recent journey there for the transformation of a Landmark weekend. But in this journey the various members of the psyche, the two Beloveds in second class, the High Self in first class, the active masculine duality of Sun self and Aragorn(? or Inu?) conspire to ignore the egoic consciousness of conductor and engineer so that the soul proceeds inexorably towards enlightenment.

Finally, in a dream on Wednesday I had become a mystical healer. As healers often are, I was severely persecuted. Yet within the dream, the real blessing of the dream which made it numinous and unforgetable, I was dwelling within the eternal consciousness. I was perfectly at peace, yet completely active and present - this was not just theoretical but real. Although I seemed to be on trial before a kangaroo court I had that quiet and grounded charisma and authority which Gandhi had when he appeared before the British courts in the Gandhi movie. The dream ended without resolution.

The moment I woke up, I heard the ego voice saying, "I don't want to be a healer, the cost is too high." What will be will be. Within the last year I have on four occasions dwelt in what I called Eirian consciousness, the first within a dream in which I was Eirian, the second in a meditation on the Tarot Moon. In these cases the consciousness partially broke free of the egoic, extending within space in perfect interconnectedness. Earlier this year there were two separate periods of several hours during normal daily activity in which I was within what I then called extended Eirian consciousness, not only independent of place but of time - standing apart from yet at once within all time, seeing both time and space as convenient illusions within a greater reality.

Noting that my current motto is "He's making it up as he goes along" - a convenient reminder of humility from Monty Python's The Life of Brian - I now see that what I called extended Eirian consciousness, the domain of the Creative Beloved or Empress, has been called by Cynthia Bourgeault "unitive consciousness" and by mystics throughout the ages, enlightenment.

When my train will arrive is anyone's guess. My one and most important role is not to desire it, for egoic desire is the quickest and surest way to derail its progress. There is in fact some risk in stating these dreams, but I believe that this too is a necessary part of the process - to face egoic temptation head-on and yet continue...

Truth is Eternal - David

David - your dream clarifies a lot for me.

I had a visit from the dream master last night - I was beginning to think he had left me for good!

I was flying - I'll quickly explain how I become lucid in dreams and what I think the flying is a metaphor for. I was in my house and I came out of the bathroom to see a full grown tiger on the landing. I wasn't scared, just apprehensive. The logical part of my mind must have been awake at this point, because I thought to myself - "this can't happen, I must be dreaming". I always get to this point in my lucid dreams. I then perform a little test just to see if I am dreaming - I try and hover above the ground. So I did my tests and I could float, and then suddenly I am soaring in the sky. I now think the flying represents a departure from what I call "mundane" dreaming into a more significant dream.

So, I am flying and I look around for the UFO's - but there are none. I breathe a sigh of relief. I had made up my mind to face them if I dreamed of them again, so I am happy they are not there.

I land on a kind of island. There is a little man there - looks a but like one of the seven dwarves - and he tells me to look in the water. I look and I see beautiful patterns on the seabed - vivid blues and greens in the shapes of dolphins and whales. Then some boats pull up, chock a block with people. "You have to go on the boat". I sense this is not pleasant and say "I don't want to". The dwarf says "you must, however unpleasant it is". So I resign myself to do it.

The dream then re-sets and I am in a kind of lagoon waiting to get on my boat. I am standing at the bottom of a wooden staircase. A woman comes down to give me a little knapsack for my journey. She also says to me "chose a role model" - and shows me pictures of people from my past life. Several men are in the album - I say "I never picked the right man" and she says "it all happened for a reason".

I get into the boat (without chosing a picture) and she is the tiller. She says "we are going to hell. It will be tough, but you will get through it".

At this point, I begin to wake up. I see a black figure sitting in the chair in me bedroom (I am still dreaming). It's horrible and it's laughing at me. I am afraid but I think "I won't let you stop me". Then I wake up.

This reminded me of the Fools journey - with the knapsack. The woman I feel could be my higher self. The dwarf maybe my sub-conscious. My journey will be hard going at times but I need to do it. It seems I have already resolved to continue. The woman tilling the boat reminded me of the 8 swords. One side of the river choppy, on side calm. I need to sail through both waters.

The role model bit I thought could be a mentor - the bit about the men, I am not sure about.

The black figure I feel could be my ego (David I need you here!) - maybe mocking and trying to hold me back?

It was a very vivid dream so must be significant - it had that "other world" quality to it that ordinary dreams don't have.

originally posted by sophie-david
In any event, the interlude with my father was actually fairly typical, but I felt that he represented more than just my actual father. Together with the woman of the church, he represented stagnating convention, that which saps your creative and assertive energy, holding you within the linear box of social conformity.

Click to expand...

Perhaps too this dream was a revelation a lá The Devil...recognizing the ways in which we trap ourselves into negative thought patterns or beliefs (about ourselves and others) that keep us from moving forward. In this dream you seemed quite cognizant of the fact that how your father and the churchwoman acted was not in line with who you are as a person and it was time to let go of these outmoded ways of seeing things.

The reason this comes to mind is when you state in your post

He seemed to be running a drop-in centre for troubled youths, but rather unsuccessfully, and was chatting idly and self-centeredly about his plans.

Click to expand...

We all have tapes in our heads/hearts of things we grew up hearing and believing about ourselves as well as our parents. Here you seemed to realize that regardless of what your tapes have told you again and again the reality of the situation was the outcome of a self-centered person who wanted to help but was unable to let go of the ego long enough to effectively create change.

I loved the train hijacking dream!! As I read through it, I was cheering you on big-time!! LOL And it was amazing to me how resourceful your subconscious mind is in creating change...last train dream, you had come to the end of the line and needed more track in order to proceed. This time, instead of waiting for something 'other' to lay track, you simply decide to take on another train heading in the direction you need to go! Well done!

The dream ended without resolution.

Click to expand...

This made me laugh out loud. In regard to being/becoming a healer...there is no resolution as once the Magician's tools are picked up and handled successfully there is no turning back...you can no longer play 'the fool'...but must move forward on the journey.
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Sue, in regards to your experience...congratulations on resolving to confront the ufo's! How apprapo that once you made this resolution they no longer appeared to hold you back! I hope this will break the spell their presence has held over you. And if they do return, you know now that you can confront them without harm coming to you.

I think it is wonderful that you did not pick a 'role model' from those in your past...this free's you to be who you are without the baggage of other's personalities. The part about not choosing the 'right man' seems to be saying that you have become the independent strong person you are through your experiences and thus it was "right", but they were not the right people for you to become tied to.

The black figure is a bit perplexing to me as well...when I experience something like this in a dream state, I ask myself what feelings did this evoke in me? This is a tricky question to answer because sometimes upon awakening we "assign" feelings based upon our waking mind set (i.e. I should feel afraid of this, I should feel angry, etc). When you ask yourself what your feelings were, try to put yourself directly back in that moment when you returned in the dream and saw the dark figure sitting there. In that exact moment, what did you feel? This may help you to discover what this figure represents to you.

Dreaming Outside the Box

Wildchilde - thank you so much for another insightful analysis! I woke up this morning realizing that the three dreams form a triad of past-present-future. Now, I realize that it is not quite as simple as that, for one thing time itself is pretty illusory, especially when dealing with the archetypal.

Yet there was certainly a temporal aspect to these dreams - the setting of the first dream was last year's planned walk and the greater struggles against convention that occured then; the second dream provided a continuation of the train dreams of this year, with a greater internal acceptance of living and dreaming outside the box (I wonder if the railroad goes underground when it reaches New York? What a fascinating thought!); the third dream clearly implied a future life of unitive consciousness although each of its elements have been experienced to some extent already, including the costs of healing.

Yes, the negative conventions are certainly like the negative devil, in fact when I was writing up the dream I thought about mentioning the Bluebeard connection again. When I was training for this walk I was using a full size loaded pack. I usually walk an hour each day anyway - its a half-hour each way to and from work. Then I was doing progressively longer walks out and back from the village. You can imagine that in a place this size this activity was widely noticed.

So I would be asked over and over again what I was doing. When I explained my plans there was generally a mixed response of incredulity, admiration and mild criticism (i.e. it must be a Fool's journey). It seemed so obvious a challenge to me, a spiritual and physical journey of reconnection, but it was so out-of-the-box for the locals. In fact the only people I have heard of who have ever made this quest have been small groups of First Nations people, basically for similar spiritual reasons, but this has been very rare. But their journeys have been quite a bit easier, supported by vehicle escort so that the walkers do not have to carry their own supplies. In any event, its a journey quite a few people could do, but no one wants to do. Since it is along a road, I see it as a relatively safe method of conducting a vision quest - I certainly would not go out by myself into the wilderness with no chance of rescue.

Well, I took a bit of a divergence here, but you can see why the setting of this dream presented a very definite outside the box experience.

The Hero's Journey

Hello Sue

Like Wildchilde, I was also very impressed by your courage, wisdom and determination in this very rich dream. I'll deliberately try to focus on different things so as not to duplicate Wildchilde's analysis.

psychic sue said:

I was in my house and I came out of the bathroom to see a full grown tiger on the landing. I wasn't scared, just apprehensive.

Click to expand...

I also felt the beauty and numinous quality of the tiger here. I know you love cats too, Sue, and this is an encounter with a very powerful embodiment of feline energy: their grace, sensitivity, adaptability and intuition. This tiger is like the gatekeeper of your hero's journey, and clearly you have passed the first test.

psychic sue said:

So, I am flying and I look around for the UFO's - but there are none. I breathe a sigh of relief. I had made up my mind to face them if I dreamed of them again, so I am happy they are not there.

Click to expand...

And here you pass the second test - as Wildchilde implies, whether or not you actually meet the UFOs, it would seem that they are defeated.

psychic sue said:

I land on a kind of island. There is a little man there - looks a but like one of the seven dwarves - and he tells me to look in the water. I look and I see beautiful patterns on the seabed - vivid blues and greens in the shapes of dolphins and whales.

Click to expand...

This dwarf seems to be an initiator into underground energy - dwarves are creatures of the earth, seekers of buried treasure from within the depths. But this dwarf starts first by connecting you to the imaginal energy of water, your element of power. Hmm, now I can see a definite connection with the chart work I was unexpectedly doing for you earlier, Sue: from Water, through Water, to Earth. I'm beginning to see why I was led to do it...

psychic sue said:

Then some boats pull up, chock a block with people. "You have to go on the boat". I sense this is not pleasant and say "I don't want to". The dwarf says "you must, however unpleasant it is". So I resign myself to do it.

Click to expand...

My apologies to other readers, but I cannot fully explain this context in order to protect Sue's privacy - but Sue, here we see a connection to the collective unconscious in water, this group of fellow journeyers whose destination across the water is the seemingly unpleasant underground.

psychic sue said:

The dream then re-sets and I am in a kind of lagoon waiting to get on my boat. I am standing at the bottom of a wooden staircase. A woman comes down to give me a little knapsack for my journey. She also says to me "chose a role model" - and shows me pictures of people from my past life. Several men are in the album - I say "I never picked the right man" and she says "it all happened for a reason".

I get into the boat (without chosing a picture) and she is the tiller. She says "we are going to hell. It will be tough, but you will get through it".

Click to expand...

I much admired you at this point for not conforming to the past - I'm not sure I would have chosen so well in the same situation. It is interesting that Charon the boatman has become feminine.

psychic sue said:

At this point, I begin to wake up. I see a black figure sitting in the chair in me bedroom (I am still dreaming). It's horrible and it's laughing at me. I am afraid but I think "I won't let you stop me". Then I wake up.

This reminded me of the Fools journey - with the knapsack. The woman I feel could be my higher self. The dwarf maybe my sub-conscious. My journey will be hard going at times but I need to do it. It seems I have already resolved to continue. The woman tilling the boat reminded me of the 8 swords. One side of the river choppy, on side calm. I need to sail through both waters.

The role model bit I thought could be a mentor - the bit about the men, I am not sure about.

The black figure I feel could be my ego (David I need you here!) - maybe mocking and trying to hold me back?

It was a very vivid dream so must be significant - it had that "other world" quality to it that ordinary dreams don't have.

Click to expand...

Yes, indeed, this one is literally a blockbuster! I agree with Wildechilde that it is worth some care in perceiving who this black character actually is. But frankly, I do not sense that this is the ego - if anything the ego tries to lull us into false security and apathy, not wake us up with horror. The ego would sooner believe that these monsters of the dark do not even exist: her power lies sustaining comforting delusions. Whoever this is, he would seem to be another gate keeper - if you have reached the end of your boat ride, perhaps it is he who guards the gates of hell.

The boat woman certainly seems to be a source of inner feminine wisdom, but a guide who is also active in propelling the boat.

This was quite the dream, combining many of the themes in your previous ones! It would seem you are on a most encouraging and powerful journey...

Deep Blessings - David

Mistaken Identities!

Sophie-David said:

A man from First Class, the only person in that carriage, was also strongly in support of our coup, and said that he would delay the police when we arrived so that we could get away safely. The dream ended....But in this journey the various members of the psyche, the two Beloveds in second class, the High Self in first class, the active masculine duality of Sun self and Aragorn(? or Inu?) conspire to ignore the egoic consciousness of conductor and engineer so that the soul proceeds inexorably towards enlightenment.

Click to expand...

Well, I woke up with a correction here. I have jumped to conclusions before on this, and each internal entity would naturally like you to believe that they are in charge. The man in first class was NOT the High Self. I don't think I've ever seen the High Self, but the closest I've come to being the High Self is as the Wild White Stallion. I suspect the High Self would be a very numinous figure indeed, glowing like the Sun or an angel. I think that the projection of the High Self image onto the man in first class was an egoic response. I now remember at the time of analysis a part of me trying to correct this...

Sorry to be misleading in this. It was quite clear to me this morning that this man in first class was my Hermit guide, James of Chiron. Naturally a hermit would be very uncomfortable in the crowding of a Mexican second class carriage and would pay a premium for some solitude . James is the wise old man figure in the psyche, the complement of the crone.

Through his strength of character James might well succeed in throwing off "the police", perhaps a bit like the Obi Wan Kenobi in the first Star Wars. The police in this story are very likely the internal protectors of rules and convention, representatives of good old Saturn in fact. As an Aquarian Hermit, James would be a fitting match for them.

And again, the companion train hijacker to the dream ego was most certainly Inu, the internal expression of the Mercury-Magician archetype, the communicator and initiator. He was not the more numinous Aragorn, reflecting my Mars in Sagittarius. This was a significant enough dream without adding these fish story "enchancements".

The deceptive ways of the ego can be quite subtle and convincing! In this case the image of a train ride - which would in fact be an ego extending and therefore ego frightening growth of consciousness - was attempted to be misdirected by inflation. This is a good illustration of Wildchilde's caution at the end of her analysis.

Namate - David

Thank you both for your thoughts and comments. Most helpful.

I dreamed I was a kind of zoo-keeper last night. I had all these wild birds and petting animals (like hamsters etc) in cages. I didn't like the cages, they were too small, so I was looking around for bigger ones. I had some hamsters in a cage and one had given birth. I could see the babies all pink and fur-less. I scooped them up and put them in a new clean cage. The mother hamster ran away before I could get her in the cage and I thought "they will die now".

Trying dream interpretation

I would like to have a chance to have a stab at this. I have a friend, who is actually a member of this forum who has all these bizzare dreams and he sends me his dreams for me to interpet. Today, I thought, hey, I am not to bad at this. I bought some dream interpretation books today, so I will give it a go with the aid of my newly acquired books.

psychic sue said:

Thank you both for your thoughts and comments. Most helpful.

I dreamed I was a kind of zoo-keeper last night. I had all these wild birds and petting animals (like hamsters etc) in cages. I didn't like the cages, they were too small, so I was looking around for bigger ones. I had some hamsters in a cage and one had given birth. I could see the babies all pink and fur-less. I scooped them up and put them in a new clean cage. The mother hamster ran away before I could get her in the cage and I thought "they will die now".

Click to expand...

The cages would indicate a sense of claustrophobia in a way, especially since they are too small. You are wanting to explore more of your natural and insinctual aspects of your own nature, but due to outside influences you are somehow feeling restricted in doing so.

The baby hamsters could indicate that you have had new ideas about something, that needs to be nutured. But as in the dream, the mother has fled, they will not be nutured. You said "they will die now" meaning that whatever new ideas you may have had you were unable to nuture them, so that these new ideas will not amount to anything. I would have the tendency that this would be in relation to the fact that the cages were too small, and in a way that your outside environment is restrictive to you developing these new ideas you have, possibly because of too many responsibilities and not enough time for you to do something for yourself. I would tend to say here, that you are in a situation where you think that you are not being nutured by yourself, as in the sense that you have lost contact with your inner child, maybe????

The fact that the birds are caged indicate that you are frustrated, unhappy. You have a desire for expansion and release.

I hope this is OK?? I'm still finding my way with this, so please excuse my rather negative view of my interpretation!

Bec

Hi Bec - I think you are right and I think this dream relates to my job, which is getting more and more frustrating day by day.

I've got quite a bit of equity in my house, so I am thinking about selling up and moving to a much smaller place, somewhere near the sea. I wouldn't have a mortgage and I would be free to pursue a job that I actually like.

Thanks for your input,

Sue x