To my father and Special Thanks to my wife, my family and Willard Gellis, Ph.D without whose help this book would not be in your hands.
You're out of your element. That's what we believe happens in a dream. Part of your soul, spirit, aura, etc. leaves your body (element) while you sleep and interacts with the collective spirit of your environment.
The part that leaves is your weakest part. Therefore, when you see it you've got a good idea of what you should avoid becoming when you wake up. If you can avoid becoming like your weakness, you will be strong. Also, your dream travels ahead in time toward the direction of your momentum. Because of this you have at least 24 hours notice of your own future. The next day you will be in for a close encounter with that future. Remain the way you were in your dream and that encounter will be déja vu.
Now that you know why we recommend you avoid becoming like your dream but instead remain the way you were in your dream, you're ready to read the method used at The Dream Hot-Line. (773-589-2471 PO Box 34934 Chicago, IL 60634). When you've discovered your dream's momentum and you'd prefer to travel your own path instead, I've personally taken to trying the path out to the right or left of my dream's geographical location (from where I dreamt the dream.) For example, if my dream was of a place North of where I slept, I find myself feeling stronger to the East or West. Good déja vu to you and pleasant dreams.
Preface
Easy Dreams may be a revolutionary approach to understanding your dreams. It is not about dream interpretation as much as it is about how to interpret your dreams. It is not a fast read; it is a learning process Anthony Dubetz shows you how to find the middle of your dream, its impression, the message and steps in or- der to act on that dream in your daily life. Stress is a common problem in today's society and distress "from friends, clergy, physicians, psychiatrists, druggists, travel agents, and prayer. Seldom do they seek help from dreams. Yet dreams are the most effective help because they are a part of your totality; they have a personal stake in your well-being and happiness. Then too, your dreams are always available." You have your own answers within, if you will take the time and effort to access them.
Mr. Dubetz talks about the déja vu experience as a a means of transforming one's personality. He doesn't mention precognitive dreaming as such, but I think this is what is implied here. Precognition is the ability to sense something that will happen in the future. It has been determined in spontaneous case studies that ESP material is more frequently obtained through dreams than in the waking state. We can seek out our potential and abilities through such material. In fact, precognitive dreaming is the most commonly reported ESP experience in our society. In other words, at present, we are most comfortable with an unconscious ability displaced into the future. If we practice the techniques described in this booklet, we may be able to verify this experience and bring our precognitive ability to consciousness.
Dr. J.L. Mitchell
Author, Out of Body Experience
1 Introduction
How many times have you fallen from a cliff and survived to tell about it? How many times have you flown without wings? How many times have you been killed and lived to speak of it as if nothing really happened? Never, I'll bet, in this reality. But all of us have experienced these things in the other reality called dreams.
Imagine this is your dream.
You have awakened from the dream but find yourself in a trench just like the one in the dream and the fear of dream is rested. Everything you see before you is what in a trench just like the one in the dream and the fear of suffocation from your dream is still so strong you scream at your fellow soldiers in the trench to get out. You warn them that a bomb is going to explode any second very near the trench and that it will bury you all alive. They think you're crazy and so you give up trying to save their necks and you climb out of the trench as fast as you can. No sooner do you climb out before a huge explosion occurs nearby which covers the trench with the earth it blasted away. All of your comrades are buried alive in the trench. Because of the way you escaped this death, you now think you are divinely chosen for a great purpose. The earth that tried to suffocate you in your dream represents all the inferior peoples of the world. They must be eliminated before they bury the rest of your comrades in the trench. You have interpreted a dream and it is your inspiration. You will never forget it. This dream saved your life and ordained you a knight. Your name is Adolph Hitler and nothing will stop you from your world crusade
2
Anyone can see the power and influence of this dream and the calamity that can come from misread- ing the messages of dreams. Read correctly with me along the way of dreams and your dreams will strengthen your life instead of causing doubt, anxiety, or possibly destruction. Dreams properly read will lead you to your destiny. They will show you where not to tread and which path to avoid on the road to life's fulfillment. You need to know two things about the dream in order to be advised by it. You need to know the middle and the impression of the middle. Read chapters one and two carefully and try the examples along the way with me so you may be adept at find- ing the middle and the dreamer's impression of that middle while he dreamt it. Good luck and lots of money I can't guarantee but comfort in your own well-being I can begin to show you. Look at it this way, the message in your dream is like a flash of light from a lighthouse on a foggy night. A cap- tain knows this light is telling him that rocky shores are ahead; stay clear - you're heading in the wrong direction. An adventurous child who got caught in the fog on a boat he stole for a joy ride might think he was real smart and head straight for the beacon of light. Right straight into the rocks, right straight into the hereafter. Hitler took the course of the child and instead of sailing away from the light of his dream, he headed straight for that light, wrecked his soul and a ship with millions aboard. His childish fears and delusions of grandeur coupled with the power he held was a recipe for disaster. Read this book and learn how to sail away from the lighthouses in your dreams and live to sail on and on and on.
3
I. The Middle
I use the term "middle" to denote the strongest impression you get from your dream and because this strongest impression is usually the middle ground between two different spatial references like up and down or right and left. Between right and left there is a middle ground as there is between up and down. The horizon line is the middle between up and down and the area between your right eye and your left eye is also a middle ground. A borderline between two countries is a middle ground between the two countries. The important thing to remember is the concept of middle. That way you do not have to look in a dream dictionary to find out whether a particular symbol is the middle of a dream. Instead, you decide for yourself which symbol best fits the definition middle as I described it. The middle may be an idea that is the difference between two opinions expressed in a dream, so don't let ideas pass by your scrutiny because they are not seen, heard, felt, or thought, but it must be in the middle. Here's an example of what I mean:
You're dreaming now and creeping up on
your husband while he sleeps in the bedroom.
You're bashing him over the head
with a softball bat. You're bashing him
to death.
Let's find the middle symbol in this dream. There is the husband sleeping, the softball bat, and the husband being beaten. There is you, the dreamer, also but unless you actually see yourself or a part of yourself in the dream, you should eliminate yourself from the search for the middle symbol. I'll go into more detail later about when you might consider yourself as a middle symbol. Getting back to the dream, I mentioned the husband, in two states - the state of sleep and the state of injury. If the symbol changes appearances or mood you have an easy way to find the middle because
4
between the two states of before and before and after there is always a middle state. In this dream the state between sleep for the husband and his deadly state that followed was the state of assault with the softball bat. The softball bat was the middle of this dream be- cause it was between the husband's sleep and death and because it created the strongest impression, an example so strong it can kill. Here's another example:
You're dreaming you're in a parking
lot and you are swinging a long piece
of chain over your head, making the
people near you jump. You like this
and don't stop because it feels so good.
Review the above dream by yourself now and see if you can find the middle symbol. I have been using the word "symbol" because we do not consider the things and people in our dreams to be real. We call them symbols because they are too real to be forgotten and too unreal to be remembered. Symbol is as good a word as any. If you have now reviewed the dream and made your choice for middle symbol, let me show you my choice. There is a parking lot, the chain and the people; the state of standing and the state of jumping. So between these two states there has to be some middle state. The chain swinging dangerously close to them created the difference between the two states. The chain is my choice for the middle symbol. The chain also created a strong impression. Here's another dream.
I dreamed I saw a narrow gulley with
running water. A small dam was in
the gulley and it was in shaky condition.
I was worried it was coming
apart. I awakened.
5
Using the method we used in the first two dreams, see if you can find the middle symbol. What will you choose? Did you choose the dam? The dam was the middle symbol because it created a strong impression of worry and it was the middle ground between the two sides of the gulley. Now we now the middle ground of your dream is between different sides and creates a strong impression. The soft- ball bat created the ground between life and death; the chain created the difference between jumping and standing still, and the dam created the difference between one side of the gulley and the other. Going back a little farther, the dirt that filled the trench in Hitler's dream was the differ- ence between the explosion and the trench he was in and it certainly, along with the other middle symbols we have looked for, created a strong impression.
Here is a dream that might be a little more difficult.
You dream you heard a prowler outside
your unlocked door. You go to the door,
lock it, but it still seems loose and you
feel that the prowler is getting close and
the door won't hold. Now you awaken.
In this dream there are two strong impressions created by a prowler and the door. You might not be sure which of the two symbols, the prowler or the door, best fits the middle symbol's quality of creating two different sides. Is it now the prowler or the door? If you picked the door, you are correct. The door creates the safety on your side and the danger on the outside. The door is therefore, the middle. The middle has the magical quality to hold different things in common as well as creating differences between things or people. Now we know that the middle creates differences and unites or holds these differences in common.
Here's an example of the middle's ability
6
to hold differences in common. You're dreaming again and...
What's the middle symbol in that last bird dream? Did you pick the bird? The bird is the middle symbol because it holds the colors black and white in common and it created a strong impression in the dream. The bird, because it was flying also was the middle ground between where it came from and where it was flying to. Try another dream.
What is the middle symbol? The portrait is the middle symbol because it holds the ability to make different appearances, to be the difference between before and hold both these state together. Although a symbol of the middle is not too often a self-portrait or image of the dreamer himself, it can be the strongest impression you will ever get from a dream.
What is the middle in the following short dream?
There seems to be nothing separating the two men or creating a middle ground between them but there is something that holds them in common and that is that they are both chasing you. The chasing is the middle, and come to think of it, a chase is the middle ground between where the men came from and where they are chasing to. This is a very good example of a dream that has a middle symbol that fits all three qualifications the middle might have. The chase creates a strong impression; the chase holds both men in common,
7
and it also is the ground between where the men were and where they want to be. You should be getting pretty good at finding the middle of dreams, or at least have a pretty good grasp of how to look for the middle. I'm going to give you three dreams in . a row now without telling you what I think the middle is until all three dreams are read. So, you're on your own now for a little while. Don't peek ahead to see if you chose correctly. Wait until you have decided what the middle is in each of the following three dreams
I.
I dreamt I was in a cafeteria and I
was offered a choice of dessert be
tween cherry or banana cream pie.
I immediately chose the banana
cream pie, but on second thought
remembered I had been disciplining
myself not to eat pies at all.
What is the middle?
II.
You are sitting in a majestic throne
in a large cathedral. A man and a
woman of nobility kneel before you
and on your head set the crown of
the realm.
What is the middle?
III.
There was a train station I was sur
prised to be in and a train with a
large light approaching. I was sur
prised when it passed me by without
even stopping.
What is the middle?
You should have the middle symbol of each of these three dreams now figured out. Here are my three choices
8
for the middle symbol. In dream number one, a decision between one pie and another had to be made. The decision was the middle between the two pies. In dream number two, the dreamer is sitting in a cathedral. Two people are kneeling in allegiance to the throne of the land. Between the throne and the two people kneeling is the crown which the dreamer wears. The crown is the middle. In dream number three, there was a train station which was ap proached by a train and passed by the train. Between the approach of the train and its passing was the station. It was the middle symbol. The three middle symbols were a decision, a crown and a station. How do your choices compare with mine? Two out of three isn't bad. Do three in a row again; in fact, let's try four. Write down in the margins of the book your choice for middle symbol this time so you can't hedge on what you chose when we compare.
I.
A man held a paper I had writ
ten and pointed to it. He said he
thought there was too much
expounding in it. I agreed.
II.
You are in Switzerland and
about to leave for home when
you remember you haven't seen
the Alps. Some people told you
if you go to the end of a certain
pier you could see them, the Alps.
You have two hours to spare,
so you decide to take their
suggestion and go out on the pier.
From the pier across the lake
you see the Alps. They are very
pretty and you begin now to
head for the airport and home.
III.
I'm being chased by a crowd of
people but I am confident I know
exactly where I'm running to. I
see a mansion I have never seen
9
or been to before but I feel I
lose my pursuers. I enter and
run with great confidence
through the corridors and al
ways know exactly which turn
to take. I'm out the back door
and the people chasing me are
nowhere in sight.
IV.
You see a large diamond with
a round top and a point on the
bottom. It has a gray sheen over
it but you think this is some
thing unclear in your vision
and not something wrong with
the diamond.
Did you remember to write down in the margin or on a piece of paper your choices for middle symbol? Compare them now with my choices. In the first dream what the man thought about the paper was the middle between the paper and himself. His thoughts were what separated himself from the paper. The thought is the middle. In the second dream the pier was the middle symbol, because it allowed you the time spent between what you thought was the end of your stay in Switzerland and the actual time you had to leave. The two hours between your original thoughts of leaving and when you actually left were spent on the pier seeing the Alps. That is the middle symbol. The third dream in which the dreamer was chased by a crowd of people has a mansion between the dreamer being chased and the dreamer losing his chasers. The mansion is the middle symbol. And, in the fourth dream of a large diamond with a grey sheen, the middle is the grey sheen. That greyness was the difference between the diamond's true clear char acter and how the dreamer actually saw it.
How's your batting average so far? You should give yourself plenty of time and not try to rush your
10
decisions on the middle choice. Remember you are only be ginning and some of these dreams are pretty tricky. Try a few more; take your time, and though I have picked dreams which I'm quite certain about, don't be hesitant to disagree with my choices. Maybe we'll be in more agree ment as the book progresses. Listen to these dreams.
I was walking at night when fly-
ing saucers appeared in the sky.
One of them came down right in
front of me, but I stood my
ground and stared it right in
the eye. The next thing I knew
I was in a hospital room and
two of my friends were asking
my sister how I was doing. She
facial burns from the saucer and
told them I had received severe
I then realized my face was ban-
daged though I could not see it.
Here we have the dreamer walking at night and later bandaged in a hospital room. What happened in between these two settings is the middle of the dream. What was that middle? Do you remember? The saucer, the flying saucer was the middle of the dream. It was the difference between health and hospitalization. Let the next dream's middle symbol be entirely your choice.
She was walking in a valley
when she saw a corral full of
sheep. She walked up to the
corral and opened the gate
and led all the sheep away
up the mountainside. ,
I'm not going to give you my choice for the middle symbol because I'd like you to begin becoming inde pendent in your decisions.
Try this one with only a few hints from me as
11
to where you should not look.
I'm looking out onto an hori-
zon at sea. The sky and the
water are almost exact in
color and hard to distinguish
one from the other. A whale
in technicolor moves now
from left to right across the
horizon grinning and mumb-
ling threats at me. I'm
frightened and run for help.
Make a choice on your own now. Which is the middle symbol? Here is a clue. It's not the sea. This is an easy one that follows, and you can use a dream we did together a little while ago to clue you into the middle.
You see your pet parakeet is
gone from his cage and find
him in the snow outside. He
is not his normal color but is
instead all white in a mudlike
snow that is all black. Despite
the cold temperature the bird
stretches his wings as though
he were in a Florida garden.
I think about his strange color,
all white with black eyes.
The middle here is not the mud or the cold. Check back to a similar dream if you're not sure. This is the last one I will ask you to do on your own for a while. We'll do the rest in this chapter together.
My grandfather and I are sur-
rounded by young women dressed
in matching jogging suits, some
yellow and some red. They were
very threatening. I grabbed my
grandfather's arm and said,
12
"Look, my grandfather and I
have not seen each other
twelve years. We are trying to
get to know each other again.
We don't need people bothering
us." The girls apologized and
went away crying.
Here I immediately seize the term "surrounded." Sur rounded implies a middle. That middle was the dreamer and the grandfather. The dreamer is usually eliminated so that leaves the grandfather surrounded and an easy middle symbol to find. Is that the one you would have chosen?
I dreamed that Bruce had spent
the night at my house and had
gotten up and left before I woke
up. I saw that the house was
a wreck. He had destroyed
everything, broken it all and
strewn it around. Then Bruce
came in and began shouting
and shrieking in that scary,
cynical way Bruce had. He
suspected me of having an af-
fair and was very hurt and it
came out like this. I kept
thinking all he was saying
and doing was not in his
temperament, or was it?
What was the middle symbol in this dream? Here's how I had it figured. There was a before and after con dition in this dream. There was the peace of sleep before and the scene of destruction after. Between these two conditions there was Bruce who caused both the peace and the destruction and who seemed to engender two different personalities. Bruce was the middle symbol because he was dividing a relationship and uniting two different moods.
I think we're beginning to work together well now.
Let's do one final dream before we go on to chapter two.
13
I am visiting some rich people's
house. I go in the bathroom to
take and shower and wash my
hair. A commuter train goes
through the house for the con
venience of the rich people.
Once I get to the bathroom,
every time I start to step into
the shower I'm interrupted by
people coming into the bath
room to talk to me and deliver
my breakfast. I'm naked but
don't really care.
Here is a dream with two middle symbols. I'll do one and you do the other. If you don't mind I'll go first and you do the one that's left. The difference between the dreamer's intention to take a shower and her actually get ting into the shower is the constant stream of interruptions by people wanting to talk with or give her breakfast. These interruptions are a middle symbol. The other middle symbol in this dream comes before the interruptions. When there is more than one middle symbol, which most often is the case with dreams of some length, there is a very close similarity in them. This allows you to cross-check them and make sure you've got the right symbol for the middle. If they match in similarity you know you have chosen correctly.
The similarity is not visual, and in fact, two middle sym bols can look completely different and still be similar. For example, in the dream we have just done together, I picked the people interrupting the dreamer's shower to be one mid dle symbol, and you picked the train that ran through the house to be the other. People and trains don't look alike, so how could they be similar? Here's how. The commuter train was giving the dreamer the impression it ran through the house. The impression it gave was convenience for one side but not necessarily for the rest of the train line. The other middle symbol, the people interrupting the dreamer's shower, gave the dreamer the impression that these people were doing their thing, that is getting their conversations in
14
the dreamer and keeping their breakfast schedule on time, but at the inconvenience of the dreamer. She said she didn't care about the inconvenience. The two middle symbols we chose are similar because they both give the impression that they are convenient. Thus, from two middle symbols we receive one similar im pression, which is convenient. The impression is the step that leads us from the middle symbol to the actual message of the dream. So let us get on to that step called the im pression.
15 II. The Impression
Now that you've got a pretty good idea of what the middle of your dream looks like and you have found that mid dle in a number of examples with my help and on your own, here is step II, the dreamer's impression of the middle. Supposing a symbol of the middle in your dream were a door. A door by definition is a passageway between two areas. But now suppose the door is locked; you can't find your key; there's no one home to let you in and you can hear your phone ringing! You know it's an important call you've been expecting. Look through the window. See your keys there on the floor near the door? Great! You found your keys but they're on the wrong side of the door. You pound the door with your fist as the last telephone ring becomes a memory.
Now that door is a middle symbol because it separates what you want from where you are. It also creates the strongest impression. The door is more than just a passage between two areas. It's an obstacle to an important tele phone communication. The door has become a subjective impression, OBSTACLE. Only by remembering how you felt about it when you dreamt about it can you properly evaluate the impression you will need for step two. What was that impression of the door while you were dreaming it? Do you remember? What a damnable obstacle. That impression is what step two is all about. Once you've a wakened you can be influenced by your surroundings and not the dream. The middle symbol then is like a fish out of water. What you thought about the middle in its own real ity, dream reality, is what's important. That's the impres sion you look for. Example:
I dreamt I felt blood on my hand
and realized I had been shot in
the head. I can't see the gunman
and I feel no pain.
What is the middle symbol? Is it the blood, the
16
gunman, or the shot? What do you choose? The middle symbol is the blood. It holds the gunman and the wound in common and also creates the strongest impression. What now was the dreamer's impression of the blood? The impression, if you choose correctly, is "it's no real pain." It's no real pain; that's what the dreamer thought of the blood when he realized he was bleeding. Try an other example.
I'm watching my father milk a
cow when the farmer whom he
works for and who owns the
cow starts shouting at my
father, telling him his work is
not good enough to keep him
around. You think the work
is fine and can't see any justi-
fication for the farmer's inter-
ference.
Awake.
What is the dreamer's impression of the middle? Think about it. First find the middle. Isn't it the farmer? He hold
the father and the cow in common and creates the strongest impression. What then is the impression the dreamer had
of the middle, the farmer? The impression in then interfering. Are you beginning to catch on? How about this one?
I am standing in the deserted
ruins of a city all alone. The
ruins are all around me end-
lessly in every direction. I
must walk them alone.
To interpret this dream you must find the middle and the dreamer's impression of it. Take your time. How did you do? Did you pick the ruins for the middle? All di- rections were mentioned and what held them in common? It was ruin. The ruin of the place seemed to create the strongest impression for this dreamer. His impression of the ruins of the city was what? Read the dream again. His
17
impression was, "I must walk them alone." The ruins im pressed him, the dreamer, with loneliness. Loneliness is the impression in this dream.
What impression is given about the middle of this dream?
The dreamer is in a field watch-
deer grazing and they look peace-
ful, and this makes the dreamer
feel happy. So he decides to
leave well enough alone, turns
around and walks away. The
deer then show their teeth and
turn on him. They surround and
attack him and tear at his flesh.
The dreamer is confused and
hurt.
This dream seems to be filled with impressions. Which one is the one we are looking for? It's the impression of the middle of the dream of course. We have in this dream a great change of moods from peaceful grazing deer to at- tacking man-eating deer. What happened in the middle of these of these two different moods? Try to remember. The dreamer decided to leave the deer alone, thinking their mood was so good he would certainly not want to stay any long er for he might scare them or distract them. He said leave well enough alone. He turned around, and so did the mood of the dream and the deer in it. This turning around was the middle of the dream. The dreamer turned around thinking well enough should be left alone. That's the impression we want. The impression of well enough was that it should be "left alone." "Left alone" is as crystallized as we can make the impression. Are you beginning to see how we must choose the proper impression of the middle? Keep prac ticing with two in a row now. I'll save my comments till aft- er the second dream has been read. Try it alone for now.
18
a clutching grip on my arm and
wouldn't let go.
II.
I dreamed I saw a brown atta-
ché case open with two com
partments inside. I thought the
case was very nice but nothing special."
What were the two impressions these dreams gave? First choose the middle and then decide what the dream er's impression of the middle was. Did you try to use the dreamer's exact words in describing the middles? That is always the easiest way to describe the middle's im . pression. Use the dreamer's own words. Using the dreamer's own words gets the dreamer more deeply in volved with the interpretation, and after all, it is his or her dream, isn't it?
In dream number one we had a cat with a clutching grip that wouldn't let go. The difference between the cat's arm and the dreamer's arm was the grip. The grip is the middle symbol here and the impression of that grip was that it was clutching and wouldn't let go. "Clutching" is the impression. Is that what you chose?
In dream number two we had an attachÄ case with two compartments inside. The whole case was the middle symbol because it held two different compart ments inside together in common. The dreamer thought that this case was very nice but "nothing special." "No thing special" is the impression. How did you do?
-
I dreamed I was in an adult
education class at a night
school. I had my admittance
card to class. The class was
very crowded and after the
teacher called the names I want-
ed him to know he forgot my
name. I tried to show him my
admittance card but he didn't
seem to pay it any mind. I
thought to myself, "This card
19
should have been good enough."
I won't tell you my choice for impression of the middle in the dream I just related, but I will tell you the middle was the admittance card. You decide what the impres- sion of that card was. Remember, let the dreamer give you the answer.
Here are three dreams in a row. This time, as you did in chapter one, commit your decision as to what the im pressions of these dreams are by actually writing them down either in the book or on a separate paper. Make your choices carefully.
I.
I dreamt I went back to my old
neighborhood to say goodbye
to everyone. I went from place
to place wanting to see the old
gang whom I had good times with.
It was snowing all the while and
it was slowing me down and hin-
dering my going from place to
place.
II.
I dreamt I was turning off the
kitchen light and closing the
door with a key. All of a
sudden I felt something open
the door and I fell to the
kitchen floor. There was no
one in the room. My family
came in and wouldn't believe
what happened. Later on my
sister saw the kitchen door
close and believed me. She
asked me how I was going to
sleep and I told her I didn't
know. "Put on your gear," she
said, and I woke up scared.
20
III.
I dreamt there was a corridor
leading from a street to a
cave. People who entered the
corridor vanished and I knew
they were destroyed.
Were you able to find the impressions of the middle symbols in those three dreams? Did you write them down or are you going to trust your memory? Very well. Here are my choices. Compare yours to see how close we are thinking.
In dream number one, the dreamer was saying goodbye to his old neighborhood going from house to house. From house to house tells me there is a place between these houses. That is where we should look for the middle sym bol. The dreamer said there was something between his trips. Remember the snow? The snow is the middle sym bol. The impression it gave our dreamer was that it slowed him down; it hindered him. The impression of dream num ber one is therefore hindrance. Is that the choice you made?
In dream number two, the dreamer was about to close a door when something opened the door causing the dream er to fall in a faint to the floor. Her family didn't believe the story but when the door closed her sister believed her and told her to get away. The symbol between people be lieving her and not believing her was what opened and closed the door. That symbol is the middle. The impres sion that middle symbol gave was one of fear. The im pression of the middle symbol scared the dreamer into a faint and scared her into awakening. The impression therefore in dream two is, scary. What was your choice?
In the last dream of this series, dream number three, a corridor between a street and a cave should immediately strike you as the middle symbol. Any description of be tweenness is your signal that this is the middle symbol. Now, what did the dreamer get from this corridor? He got the impression that the corridor was destroying people. The impression in dream number three is "de stroying."
The three impressions of these dreams were: I. hindrance, II. scary, and III. destroying. Did your choices for impressions compare with mine in any way?
21
Two out of three isn't bad. If you didn't do as well as you thought you should have, don't be discouraged. There are many more examples we can do together and still some examples you can try on your own. In every dream you dream yourself you should be trying to find the middle and your impression of it. Remember, if you are going to or already have tried this method on a friend's dream, your friend's impression of the middle is what you want, not yours. Every dream is a personal message and only the dreamer's impression of the middle symbol is important. Here's an easy one.
I saw my brother's twin babies
change to grown children before
my very eyes. I was worried
about this.
The change is what is between the babies and the children. The dreamer was worried about this change. The impression is worrisome. Try the following dream all by yourself and I'll give you a clue. It's not the lady in the dream, but something about her.
She was about twenty-two and
plump, not fleshy, not fat, but
merely rounded and not bad look-
ing. She had on only one piece of
clothing. A very long shirt like a
night shirt. It was coarse.
Do you think you figured that one out? Of course it wasn't hard.
This one might be, though.
I saw a snowy desert with a
yellow strip of hardly distinguish-
able road stretched across it and
on this road marched an empty
: pair of boots.
The following dream was dreamt by a boy with a
22
crush on an older woman who unfortunately died in a drowning accident.
I saw her in the earth where
she had been now for years.
Her dress had rotted away.
Shreds of cloth merged with
dry bones while the strand
of hair that used to slip down
over her cheek was stuck fast
to her skull.
We have here an image of a woman, but something on her person is the middle symbol. Can you figure it? Shreds of cloth merged with dry bones. Between the cloth and the bone was a mergin. Between her hair and her skull was a sticking fast. These are the impressions we need to know: merging, sticking. That was a tricky one, wasn't it? The next dream is pretty straight for ward.
I'm in a prison break and me
and my fellow prisoners take
a guard hostage. We got the
son of a bitch but he won't
talk to the police outside to
negotiate a deal. He just
grits his teeth and smiles
smugly.
The hostage is the middle because he is the go-between for the prisoners and the police. The impression he gives is one of smugness. That is what we want, the word smugness. That's the impression.
23 III. The Message
What does it mean? Over and over I've asked and heard this question from others. You have your pain read or your chart cast. You sneak into Madame Beula's reader- adviser shop and ask this question. The experience of dreams that seem somehow more than ordinary are cause to ask "What does it mean?" I became tired of answers to some of these questions or partial answers or no answers. I searched to find some constant in the world of dreams that would answer "What does it mean?" every time, not just part of the time. I found the constant and strangely enough it's us. We make the messages in our dreams. Don't let anyone tell you dreams have no messages or only certain kinds of dreams, lucid or high dreams, have messages. Every single dream has an important message. Moreover, if you don't get the message your dream will make itself more and more evident by recurring or becoming alarm ing. Your dream may even try to frighten you to get your at tention. I can show you how to read these messages and improve your life.
What if you saw perfection? Could you improve and learn from this perfection? What if the per fection was your impression of the middle of your dream? What if that impression of the middle were perfection be cause it was always wrong wrong for you now until your next dream. Wouldn't it be advisable to avoid something perfectly wrong? OUR IMPRESSION OF THE MIDDLE IS SOMETHING WE SHOULD LEARN TO AVOID. That's the lesson in every dream. AVOID BECOMING YOUR IM PRESSION OF THE MIDDLE. That impression of the mid dle is perfectly wrong. Knowing your impression is perfect ly wrong about anything all the time, no exception, is a blow to any person's pride; but you can think of this impres sion of yours as a constant, as a beacon of light shining from a lighthouse on the rocky shores of life. It's always warning you not to endanger your ship. It sends you away but leaves you plenty of other ports to call on. It sends you sailing on and gives you a day's life that is a little less im perfect. Every perfectly wrong thing you can eliminate from your life tends to lead your life closer to the perfectly
24
right. It really works! Trying this method wil be the only way you will know if I am right or wrong. Do you think you are ready? This is the method that will answer "What does it mean?"
I dreamed I saw the Macedon-
ian army all on fire and their
leader, Alexander the Great,
waiting for me clad in the same
clothes as I had worn when I
was a courier to the late king
of Persia. Alexander vanished
out of sight into the temple of
Belus. I awoke.
The middle of this dream is Alexander, first because he made the greatest impression, and secondly because he held the temple and the army in common, and thirdly be- cause he represented the dreamer's self-image because of the clothes he wore. Forgive me for going ahead with the meaning of this dream before I ask you what you think. I want you to see a finished product in your first example. Alexander is the middle. What is the dreamer's impression of the middle? It's "Alexander vanished" from the army to the temple. What does it mean? It means AVOID VANISH ING. Wasn't that easy? Too bad the man who had this dream couldn't understand its meaning. The man was Dari us, King of Persia. He had this dream before his army bat tled Alexander the Great. Darius' army outnumbered Alex ander's so Alexander told his army to hang tight and keep one thought in mind as they engage the Persian army: "Kill Darius." The Greek army held tight and did as Alexander ordered, and instead of trying to defeat every Persian sol dier they instead struck at the position Darius himself held on the battlefield. As they came closer and closer, Darius became more and more afraid. He became so alarmed at this approach that he decided to retreat himself before the battle had yet been decided. He not only retreated, but vanished altogether from the field, and his command ers and men, seeing this, broke ranks in confusion. Alex
25
ander's disciplined army, which he personally led, gained the advantage, won the battle and eventually vanquished all of Persia. Darius was caught by some of his army try ing to vanish from the country after this disaster and was executed by his own guard. For want of a dream? We don't know what would have happened if Darius had listened to his dream's message and avoided vanishing, but it sure makes you wonder, doesn't it?
Try giving the answer to this dream question using an other historical dream. Don't worry, you won't change history for the worse if you get it wrong. Answer the question this Greek general might have asked you when he was trapped between a deep river behind him and an army of Persians before him. He knows this time he won't be able to withstand the Persian offensive and yet re treat across a deep strong river will be too slow. His forces will be cut down by Persian arrows. The general falls asleep pondering the situation and awakens after this dream, asking you the interpreter, "What does it mean?" This is the dream.
I was tied up with thick ropes
so tightly I could not move. Sud-
denly the ropes fell away of their
own accord allowing me to walk
freely unencumbered in any di-
rection.
What does it mean?
Think to yourself, what is the middle? Pause, ask your self what was the dreamer's impression of the middle? You know this impression is what must be avoided. You know this impression is what must be avoided. Remember your life may be at stake in this interpretation. You sweat a bit. You've got it. Tell the general what he should avoid. Identi fy the middle of the dream. Did you pick the ropes for the middle because they created the strongest impression and held the dreamer's bondage and freedom in common? Right on! Now you say the dreamer's impression was that the ropes freed him to let him walk freely in any direction. Your
26
decision is that the general should avoid freeing himself in any direction as the ropes did. A large bag of gold for you, because a messenger brought news during the night some soldiers called to some girls across the river that was thought too deep to cross and after conversation, the girls invited the soldiers to cross at a secret location up the river, not just anywhere, but at a ford where the water was shallow. Only thighhigh was the water all the way across. Congratulate yourself. You told the general to avoid freeing himself in any direction. Now he knows he must walk in a very special direction.
After you've rested and enjoyed that bag of gold, try another dream.
I crossed a bridge. The water
was surging on both sides of
the bridge. The high water
made it very dangerous. The
bridge was very close to the
water but it was a sturdy
bridge and I crossed it safe-
ly. Now I am in a place with
many people. Someone is
telling me about a dream and
suggests that I paint it. I can-
not paint someone else's dream.
I can only paint what is real-
ly mine. Now I see the suggest-
ed dream picture. It is not real
because the image is lying flat.
Now, as I contemplate the scene,
I see the whole thing. The im-
age is lying flat on a circular
island, in the center of a most
beautiful blue lake, surround-
ed by a verdant landscape
of trees and an ethereal sky
It has a mystical duality of
atmosphere in a spherical
depth.But I am distressed
becausethe image is lying flat.
Now as I look and contem-
plate this scene, the image
27
of its own motion is lifted into
a vertical position. I see it clear-
now. It is an oval stone, life-
size, smooth and polished. It
is about one foot in thickness,
and 6, 8, or 10 feet tall, with a
white figure carved in the lapis
lazuli of a ring, only life-sized.
The figure incised in the stone
looked archaic Greek or like an
ancient prophet. What disap-
pointed me was the fact that
the reverse side of the stone
was unknown. It had no figure
on it. Now it is all clear to me.
I see the picture of what I am
supposed to paint.
My editor wanted me to cut this dream in half but don't let its length be misleading. There is a repetitive theme. See if you can find it with me. Look for the middle in each segment. There is the first part of the dream, when the dreamer crosses a bridge; the part when the dreamer sees someone else's dream, and the vision of a large blue stone. Lapis lazuli means blue stone. Read the dream again and try to find the strongest impressions the dreamer received from ththe three segments. (The fourth segment was an- other impression of segment two.)
The first middle symbol was the bridge. It held two shores in common, separated the water into two sides, and gave the dreamer an impression of being close but safe. The second middle symbol is the segment about the many people and the one person who together proposed the dreamer paint a dream. This dream-in-a-dream is set in the middle of a blue lake. It has to be a middle symbol doesn't it? The third middle symbol is the lapis lazuli segment. This stone held two different sides in common: the
28
side with a figure and the side without. We have three mid dle symbols now: the bridge, the dream in a dream, and the stone. Next we must find the impressions these middle symbols gave. The bridge was close and safe. The dream was distressingly flat. The stone's most impressive side was disappointingly figureless. The fourth and final im pression is: Flat is what I'm supposed to paint. Now give the answer to the question, "What does it mean?" The message is avoid becoming close, flat and figureless. This is the dream of a celebrated painter, Irene Pereira. She took the dream to mean she needed more depth in her painting and therefore she changed her whole approach. The technique she used after this dream, making her paintings fuller and more whole, changed her life.
We know from the dream she should have avoided a disappointingly flat image. We used a logical quasi-sci- entific approach to arrive at our conclusion. The artist used an intuitive approach. Unlike Hitler's intuitive in terpretation, Irene Pereira's intuitive interpretation was rightand the world gained beautiful art. Intuition is fine when you're right, but when you're wrong it can be hell for you and everyone around you. That is why a human decision based on both the intuitive dream and the logical brain makes the system you are using in this book both reliable and fail-safe.
Try a short dream now by yourself. You must be getting a little tired.
When I said try a short one by yourself, I wasn't kidding. What's the message of this dream? Before I tell you my
choice, I'd like to recall a dream I gave you in the chapter on impressions.
A large alley cat got hold of
my arm and I couldn't get free.
I called for help but nobody
could hear me. The cat had strong,
tight gripping jaws. I was helpless."
29
We have here jaws, a strong middle symbol, for there is an upper and lower jaw with a gripping, a tight gripping between them. Tight gripping jaws gave this dreamer the impression of helplessness. The message is avoid becom ing like the cat in this dream. Avoid making yourself and others feel helpless. I haven't forgotten to ask you to ana lyze the dream previous to this cat dream. I just wanted to hold off long enough to let you hear the cat dream. Here's why. The last dream was dreamt by the mother of the dreamer who kept losing her teeth. Did you make the teeth dream out to be telling its dreamer to avoid becoming lost? Good. Now try to look at the two dreams together. A mother is being warned to avoid becoming like a cat with a tight grip and her daughter is being warned to avoid be coming lost. Sometimes mothers can be so loving that they lead their children's lives in an attempt to keep the children from pitfalls. This can make the child feel helpless without the guiding hand of the parent. This dependency can make the child a failure when it comes to making her onw life.
Those two last dreams were quite revealing put together, weren't they? You might like to try that when you become more comfortable reading dreams. Remember the message of your last night's dream when you read a dream of some one else's that day. The results may be very startling and useful.
The following dream is the dream of someone who has never known any real success in life.
I dreamed I saw a pile of dead
bones lying in the road. I had a
gun and fired into the heap of
bones. Instantly the bones were
galvanized and assembled them-
selves into the body of a man.
Can you identify the middle symbol of this 30 nightmare? Did you say the gun? The gun that magically transformed bones into a brand new human beig is the middle symbol and also the message, which is: avoid magic transformations. Avoid trying to transform a life--yours or another's-- radically. This dream was told to me by a sick man who had, in his own words, sacrificed everything he possessed to become a poet. He had even sacrificed his own material body and become stricken with a chronic lung condition (an organ that astrologists and psychiatrists say represents ex pression in words.)
The man now informs me that he wants to get bet ter, to stop neglecting his material body. He wants his physicians to give him medications and vitamin that will transform him back again into a man of ordinary good health all at once. Presto-Change-O! He is wil- ling even to sacrifice his calling as a poet if that will mean he can be healthy again. My advice to him was, avoid extreme transformations. Take your time; make gradual changes. Becoming what you want to be is an evolutionary process which may include a working out of a personal karma through a certain amount of suf fering, but that suffering itself is not the goal.
31 IV. Confirmation
You now have a grasp of the first three steps in my ap proach to reading dreams (the middle, the impression, and the message) and may wonder what else is there to the method. If you are not reading this book at one sitting or . in one day, but reading it over a few days or weeks, and if you are remembering your dreams and trying my approach to find their messages, you may have already experienced the fourth step in my approach. That step is an experience more than an action. The experience is "déja vu." We all must have experienced this feeling of being sensually aware of an experience you cannot remember ever actually having. It is a mystery. Almost. I believe déja vu is an awake re experiencing of the middle symbol in your dream. If the middle symbol was not recognizable through an analysis when you awoke, its reappearance in your daily routine can be a déja vu experience.
Suppose you do not remember your dream. Because you do not consciously recall your dream, the middle sym bol would have to be quite near the point of being on the threshhold of your memory to be experienced as déja vu. In fact, the stronger the impression it makes on you in your dream, the more likely the dream symbol will be re-exper- ienced as déja vu. In fact, I believe that déja vu is only a very strong impression of the middle broken out into the awakened state of a dreamer who does not try to remem- ber dreams but may pooh-pooh them or consciously try to forget them. If you can remember every dream, you can ex perience the déja vu that other dreamers only sense rarely. . I will further say, dreamers who do not remember their dreams re-experience their encounters with the middle, but because they have sublimated that memory are not aware of this experience when it recurs except in the cases when the middle impression is too strong to be ignored and for ces itself through the dreamer's self-imposed barriers. Déja vu can be either frightening or pleasurable but it is always a mysterious experience. I believe that if you do not heed the warning of your dream's message,
32
the experience of déja vu will be an unpleasant one. I believe this experience will exercise control over you rather than be perceived as a spectator views an exciting movie. If a horror movie is too terrifying, you can walk out on it. Or you may enjoy the excitement because you know when it is over you can go home the same way you came in. But, if you suddenly became a character in the movie and every attempt you made to extricate yourself from that movie only became the next frame in that film, you certainly would not go home feeling the same way you did when you came in. How do you keep your perspective in the audience and enjoy the movie rather than lose your perspective and be come a puppet in a scenario written and directed by others?
The secret is in whether you heed the dream's warning or not. Heed the dream's warning and the middle symbol's impression will come to you in a way you can control, a way you can handle as you handle the terror of a horror show. Only it will be a lot more exciting than a movie be cause the movie will be your own life. You will direct the most lavish movie ever made: your destiny. If, however, you do not heed the dream's warning, you will be caught up in a no-escape contract to perform what you must and not what you choose. You will become the central figure in a tragedy that you cannot leave with the spilled pop corn and sticky floors of a movie house. Here is an exam ple of what you don't want to do.
There seems to be a deathlike
stillness about me. Then I hear
sobs, as if a number of people
were weeping. I thought I left
my bed and wandered down-
stairs. There the silence was
broken by the same pitiful sob-
bing, but the mourners were in-
visible. I went from room to room.
No living person was in sight but
the same mournful sounds of
distress as I passed along. It
33
was light in all the rooms and
every object was familiar to me.
But where were all the people
who were grieving as if their
hearts would break? I was puz-
zled and alarmed. What could
be the meaning of all this?
Determined to find the cause of
a state of things so mysterious
and so shocking, I kept on until
I arrived at the East Room,
which I entered. There I met
with a sickening surprise. Be-
fore me was a catafalque on
which rested a corpse wrapped
in funeral vestments. Around it
were stationed soldiers who were
acting as guards, and there was
a throng of people, some gazing
mournfully upon the corpse whose
face was covered, others weeping
pitifully. "Who is dead in the
White House?" I demanded of one
of the soldiers. "The President"
was his answer. "He was killed
by an assassin." Then came a
loud burst of grief from the crowd
which awoke me from my dreams.
If you haven't already guessed, the middle of this dream was the corpse of President Lincoln, which is being guarded by soldiers in uniform. It is the most im- pressive part of the dream. Even Lincoln's first words, spoken to his personal aide and to Mrs. Lincoln, were "There seems to be a deathlike stillness about me." Deathlike, death, assassinated, killed - these are all words describing the middle figures in the dream. There is no doubt, even though we are looking at this dream already knowing its consequences, that the mes sage was to avoid death. Avoid being assassinated. Lincoln was continually warned about threats on his life. Upon telling this dream the next day to his wife and
34
aide, who had always been concerned with his lack of se curity and whom we can thank for the recording of this dream, Lincoln noted that the dream did disturb him but even if it were a true omen, he thought there was no way it could be stopped. He thought that it was the will of God and the good Lord knew best about these things. Lincoln's incredible fatalism was a contributing cause of his death. I believe the event of his death could have been avoided had he heeded his dream warning. Instead, he made no extra arrangements for his security, much to the anguish of the aide who recorded this dream.
Will you, having properly read your dream's warning, be able to predict what form your "confirmation" or déja vu will take? Absolutely not. Heed your dream's warning and know only that what you were warned about will come to you in a harmless form. The middle will appear to you as a confirmation, to confirm that your dream reading was correct and worthwhile. Foreknow ledge of the comfirmation scenario will always remain a mystery. Be grateful for little things, like avoiding as sassination or bad paintings, but never be greedy enough to ask why or for what purpose. That is as bad as ig noring the message altogether. When asked when and now your confirmation might come, a great man once said that it would suffice to be prepared. When it shall come or what it shall look like will be of no con sequence, for you will be ready. Let's look at another example of this experience of déja vu following a dream from the chronicles of the famous American frontiersman, Frederic Remington, in his book Frederic Remington's Own West.
An Indian scout, caught in a blizzard on the American plains, retells a dream he had while he took shelter.
A girl what I was use know she
come drop, drop out of de sky,
She had kettle of boil meat,
35
but she was not come right up,
was keep off jus' front of my
pony. I was run after de girl,
but she was float 'long front
of me--I could not catch her.
The scout's dream saved his life in a most unusual way. Unlike Lincoln who decided whatever the dream was could be of no use to him, since such matters were for God to decide the Indian scout heeded his dream. So- called primitive societies like the American Indians put a great deal of credence in signs of nature and spirits. The strongest impression of the scout's dream was the fact that the girl who dropped out of the sky did not drop all the way to the ground but floated just above ground. This floating, besides being the strongest impression, also is the middle ground between the sky from which she came, andthe earth to which she was falling. Floating inbetween these two points is the middle symbol. The kettle of boiling meat she held between the scout's pony and herself has a middle-ground quality about it. If you think about boiling meat you know that it floats. Floating is the middle symbol. The scout chased this middle sym bol. His impression of it was that he could not catch it. The middle symbol was always out of his reach and un catchable. The message ofthis dream is avoid becoming uncatchable, or receptive to safety and comfort. This means do not put yourself in a situation that seems perfectly safe but isn't. This is what complacency is all about. As soon as you think you've got it made and relax in the comfort of your complacency, you have begun to write your own epitaph. The Indian scout did not fall into complacency. Listen to the rest of the story. He awoke from his dream and continued through the blizzard to deliver the important dispatch he was carrying. Along the way he stumbled into a camp where two other scouts had a fire going. They tell him of hostile Indians nearby and then try to persuade him not to go on with the dis patch but to instead remain with them and share the
36
safety of their camp. This reasoning rang loudly in the scout's mind. He had just had a dream where the middle symbol was an enticing kettle of hot food that was un- catchable. Wasn't the camp of his fellow scouts enticing with its warm fire, safely hidden near danger? The impact of this strange coincidence caused a stunning reply that almost spoke itself from the lips of the cold and hungry scout. Here was a man who had just struggled through a blizzard and had a long journey, probably dangerous, ahead of him and he, well let him tell you what he said: "I say, by gar, I am woman; I have got sense. You wan' stay here, you be dead. Den I take my pony un I go 'way een de dark..."
The scout avoided the warm and illusory safety of camp to continue to his destination despite warnings of danger and delivered his dispatch alive and well. His fellow scouts who stayed behind in their warm, safe, uncatchable position were attacked by the Indians they warned the scout about. One was killed; he other bare ly escaped. Lincoln did not take his dream's message and apply it to his life. That was God's job, he said. Lincoln became the dream's middle, a dead man. The Indian scout took his dream's message to heart and left nothing to God or fate that he could not handle himself. He avoided becoming safe. He refused to be complacent. The confirmation of his decision came to him in the form of news that what he avoided was not the illusion of comfort and safety it seemed to be. In fact, its safety was an illusion cloaking death and injury. President Lincoln received his confirmation of the dream's validity in a terrible fashion. He became the news of what should have been avoided.
The confirmation will come. How you want to receive it is your choice. You can take it the easy way in news of others or you can take it the hard way and become the news. Either way, its coming is inevitable. It is written but you can edit it. Here's another example. A man in prison often dreams a dream like this. It is taken from the book The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer.
37
I see demons, they pull in harness
like oxen, a wood creaking tumbrel,
a grey wood tumbrel through the
cobbled streets of my ancient mind.
We have in this dream a cobbled street, a heavy wagon, and demons pulling the wagon. The demons are the strongest impression for they bring to mind oxen which are not in the dream. The other adjectives describe what the dreamer sees. These are objective descriptions like grey, cobblestone, and ancient, to describe the period. But, the word oxen describes the demons not as they appear but how they seem to the dreamer. The demons, because they are a common or middle ground between the wagon and the street, are the middle symbol. The dreamer's impression of these demons is that they are like oxen. The message is then to avoid being oxlike. Oxlike is a term to describe brute strength strong as an ox. This dreamer, convicted of brutal murders, often challenged people to contests of strength and in these acts became the impersonation of an ox. Instead of a- voiding the quality in himself, he tested it daily and claimed to be strong enough to order his own execution. He insisted on that execution immediately rather than go through a possible life sentence of appeals and com mutations of sentence for the capital crimes he commit ted. In a sensational court decision, he was executed as he wished. He was shot dead like a mad dog or animal, like an ox before it is butchered. He took it the hard way because he wasn't strong enough to live.
38
V. Your Bootstraps
Now you know the four steps in my method of reading dreams. You have learned to (1) find the middle, (2) dis cern the dreamer's impression of that middle, and (3) know that the impression is the message detailing what the dream er should avoid in himself. You also know, (4) that if you remember to implement this message of warning or avoid ance, that as confirmation, dÄja vu will come to you. Read ing along with me through the examples in this book may have been quite easy because they were dreams of others or imaginary dreams of your own, but if you have tried this method on a few of your own dreams you know, presuming you found the message in your dream, that remembering to implement this message in your daily routine is far from easy. It takes a tremendous amount of will power just to remember the message, let alone to implement it. I call this implementation your bootstraps.
A pair of good high boots are great protection against the weather but they're a pain in the neck to get on and off, aren't they? You can only have beauty at a cost. The cost of the beautiful experience of dÄja vu will be the tremendous effort you must put forth in remember ing dreams, pleasant and unpleasant, sorting through the distracting and sometimes frightening accompany ing symbols which direct you to the middle, and imple menting the messages to replace your customary routine behavior. You are trying to eradicate a part of your behavior that is imperfect. That behavior is very com fortable not because it is good for you but because it is easy. You have been doing it for a long time. It makes no demands on your creativity.
We have a chance every day to create a better self, but if we do not exercise that freedom the self that is left will stand for a while, but its deterioration in time will make us feel tired, blasÄ, bored, depressed, and even sick. Manyof us have nothing to identify with but the body we live in. It dies a little every day. That is why we must counter death with the creative life of be havioral change. Creation brings new life into the world.
39
a new personality? Your new personality doesn't have to be a whole lot different from the one from yesterday, but if it is a little improved because you avoided an imperfec tion to which you were once susceptible, it is a new person ality. Just as you don't ordinarily die a whole lot every day physically, so too your new personality; it may hardly be perceptible as changed, is a little newer; it has a little more life.
People who experience great physical changes due to ac cident, misfortune, or disease make great changes in their personalities to cope with their different physical selves. It is obvious to them that a change is in order for their per sonality. Whether they consciously make a change for the better and create a new life in the part of themselves they still have whole, or are overwhelmed by the change they have been reluctant to make because of the shock they may have suffered from their sudden physical alteration, change inevitably occurs. These people experience the change or the need for it more deeply than those whose phy sical changes creep over them almost imperceptively day by day. Again, whether you make the inner changes suddenly because of sudden outward changes or put the changes off because the outward changes are not perceptible, the chan ges must be made with your consent or over your objection. The postponing of the creation of a new personality to cope with your different physical body can put unbearable stress on you. This is how people end up seeking help from emotional distress. They seek it from many sources: friends, clergy, physicians, psychiatrists, druggists, travel agents, and prayer. Seldom do they seek help from dreams, yet dreams are the most effective help because they are always receptive to your needs. Because they are a part of your totality, they have a personal stake in your well-being and happiness. Then too, your dreams are always available to you. You must, however, have the will-power
40
to remember the dreams and faith in their message to implement that message. If you can just analyze one dream correctly and implement its message, and exper ience the dÄja vu that confirms your will-power as real ly a true power, you are on your way. You will have picked yourself up by your bootstraps and you will have become a little more alive in the face of the little death we daily die.
When you go to sleep your body falls asleep early while your mind may be still winding down. The time difference between these two events allows your mind to act as a king of time machine. It continues to calcu late and plan your next moves in the great game of life, creating a best case and worst case scenario for your immediate future. How far into the future your mind calculates depends on the gap of time there might be between your body falling asleep and your mind falling asleep. The greater the gap, the greater the future pro jection. The best case scenario created is you yourself, how you acted in your dream. All that is you in the is ahead of you in time. It is ahead of you because it was seen by parts of you that were too overworked to relax with the rest of you. You are seeing the future of your weakest faculties.
If you were to stare at a lightbulb too long, when you closed your eyes you would see a lightbulb. You overworked those receptors in your eye and brain that can receive such information. There are receptors in your brain for every conceivable event. When they are overworked they too will project into the darkness of your closed eyes all they were not able to hold in the vessel of your being. They are evoking an impression of what limped into the future. If you can remember your dream you can remember that future. Your im- pression was excited by those windows to the world to come. How you reacted to what you saw was your best case scenario. It was the strength of your rested self acting on your life's weakness.
When you experience déja vu, you see it all a second time but unlike the person who forgot his
41
dream, you will have a good chance to make sure you're on the right side of destiny. It's a nice trick if you can get it. If you do, you will be a step ahead of everyone else.
Understanding dreams as sore spots that need rest is the first step in using dreams instead of being used by them. Like the chain reaction in mob violence, the plethora of senses we feel in dreams can possess us. Don't let that happen to you. Share the cosmos with them instead.
It's easier than you've ever dreamed.
You can contact Heratheta direct
or contact Heratheta care of ed-core@lists.best.com the Electric Dreams Dream Discussion List.
To join ed-core@lists.best.com send an email:
TO: ed-core-request@lists.best.com
and in the Body of the email put only:
Subscribe your_email_address
You can also contact anthony dubetz
box 34934
Chicago, IL 60634
(773)589-2471
Dubetz, Anthony (1998 May). Easy Dreams: Making Nightmares Pay (Part IV). Electric Dreams 5(5). Retrieved July 8, 2000 from Electric Dreams on the World Wide Web: http://www.dreamgate.com/electric-dreams
The full collection is also held at:
http://www.dreamgate.com/dream/dubetz/ |
