The dream:

I am a small child carrying a pile of books much too heavy for me. I want to put them down but I cannot find any place to set them. I am in the basement of the house. The lady in charge is upstairs and I am afraid of her, and do not want to anger her by putting the books in the wrong place. I struggle to hold the books and do not know what to do. I see a small table where I would like to set the books, but I am afraid that the lady upstairs will be angry.

Comments:

We know that dreams are multi-faceted. While every element in a dream represents a part of ourselves in our inner drama, dreams also often refer to actual people and situations and our attitudes toward them. This dream is multi-level literally and figuratively: the child is in the basement, the lady in charge in the upper floor, reflecting the inner relationship between a child and authority with power over her. I certainly recognize these sub-personalities -- my intimidated child and dominating "lady in charge" -- and my extreme anxiety and discomfort.

I ask myself, Who is "the lady in charge" in me? I hear the voices of mother and teachers, figures in authority during my early years who had other concerns than a child's feelings and needs. In this dream, the child in me still cannot find her own way, cannot set down her heavy load and free her hands to do what she needs to do in her own life. The books she carries signify to me the weight of intellectualization, of being in my head rather than in my heart. -- a "head trip" laid on the child who was not free to be a child.

Alissa
alissa@dreamgate.com

The online version with graphics of Alissa's work is at
http://www.dreamgate.com/dream/goldring/g97may.htm