I receive a notice concerning my numerology reading. A woman is giving me an explanation. She says something about timing, the importance of timing. She says something about readings sometimes being a D reading (and/or a)/B reading. I have the impression she is telling me (maybe) that my reading is a D reading. I then have feeling reference to the Divine Feminine/great love. I also have feeling reference that a reading would be to concretize and conceptualize and therefore limit potential and possibility.

I believe this dream results from my conversation in my "Flower Pods of Sameness" dream thread, concerning the Number 5 and the potential meaning of it as experienced in that dream.

B and D? I am not sure. My ego tried to interject in the dream space, and imagined letter grades, as given in school work. While that shows the part of me that "evaluates" (usually over critically) "How I am doing(?)" I feel sure the meaning rests elsewhere.

It feels to be a dream of assurance...assuring me that my journey is guided.

So, I asked, do I have any recent reference to letters of the alphabet in my life? And their meaning? And I do, in the introduction of the runic alphabet by my analyst, last weekend. Could it be indicating this: B: Berkano, and D: Dagaz? I am not sure. Might that be a stretch?

Berkano: (B: Berchta, the birch-goddess.) Birth, general fertility, both mental and physical and personal growth, liberation. Regenerative power and light of spring, renewal, promise of new beginnings, new growth. Arousal of desire. A love affair or new birth. The prospering of an enterprise or venture. Berkano Reversed or Merkstave: Family problems and or domestic troubles. Anxiety about someone close to you. Carelessness, abandon, loss of control. Blurring of consciousness, deceit, sterility, stagnation.

Dagaz: (D: Day or dawn.) Breakthrough, awakening, awareness. Daylight clarity as opposed to nighttime uncertainty. A time to plan or embark upon an enterprise. The power of change directed by your own will, transformation. Hope/happiness, the ideal. Security and certainty. Growth and release. Balance point, the place where opposites meet. Dagaz Merkstave (Dagaz cannot be reversed, but may lie in opposition): A completion, ending, limit, coming full circle. Blindness, hopelessness.

I only feel certain that this dream was assuring me ... after my feeling some afraid of the dark in this past week, which was some amplified when I read your message/encouragement, Jerry, to stay the path and don't be afraid of the dark. I kind of felt "Darth Vader" breathing through me last night! Smiles, here, now.

Or, maybe the play between B and D was simply presenting an "unknown," as if instructing to rest in and trust the unknown, to not allow the mind to get carried away in any imaginings about the dark...

Kristi

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Kristi,
The B and D could be most anything related to your psyche. Since there are so many possibilities I will present one.

Perhaps the D represents death, or decline since dreams do address the opposites. It it is a D reading representing death {or an end} it may limit potential since it leaves so little time. Birth would represent plenty of time since you are at the beginning. If the numerology is associated with the psyche then it may represent your own 'number' of years of life. It may be a inner fear that is the focus. As you progress through mid life you may fear losing the potential to do all you wish to do creatively. Or outward aspects of love, growth in a particular social matter.

Jerry

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Hi Jerry,

Well, it is interesting that it is a "B" and a "D" and not an "A" and a "C" or an "E" and a "G."

One of the other things that was in my contemplation this day was Marion Woodman's saying of Kali that she is death in the service of life (birth).

Also, my analyst and I had talked of the need to live with ambiguity, uncertainty.

Certainly, the things you mentioned are possibilities. I am going through a period of questioning, "What do I know? Who am I? That is not just my history? What matters to me? Individually, Uniquely, Creatively? What is important to me? How do I want to express?? All these things.

I do feel to be going through a death process/phase. Much from my past is raising it's head. In light of this, my analyst and I also talked about the Furies. We could compare these to the emotions, yes? All those emotional pains of the past that I need to be freed from.

Something else, there was something else I wanted to add... Oh, it is how there can be (and is in me) the tendency to not want to go through the hard parts...you know, just pass by the painful death process and go onto the birth. Maybe, the reading was highlighting this...like saying it is "D" time.

Kristi

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Jerry,

I'd like to gain a better psychological understanding of the myths around the Furies. Do you recall if Joseph Campbell speak of them in any of his works?

From what was shared with me by my analyst, I am led to believe that they are symbolic of those experiences in life which were unjust, parts of the shadow formed in our experiences of life where we felt unloved, etc.

Kristi

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Kristi,
I don't recall Campbell ever mentioning the Furies. From the description in the preceding link I get the impression they had features similar to Medusa another Greek mythology.

One thing that caught my attention in researching the Furies was this description:
The Furies punished criminals, especially murderers, and represented conscience.

If we take that metaphorically then it may represent a punishment we put on ourselves, having a conscience.

As for Campbell's mentioning of the Furies. There is a good bet he did somewhere in his 'Masks of God' series of books.

In his four-volume series of books "The Masks of God", Campbell tried to summarize the main spiritual threads of the world, in support of his ideas on the "unity of the race of man"; tied in with this was the idea that most of the belief systems of the world had a common geographic ancestry, starting off on the fertile grasslands of Europe in the Bronze Age and moving to the Levant and the "Fertile Crescent" of Mesopotamia and back to Europe (and the Far East), where it was mixed with the newly emerging Indo-European (Aryan) culture.

This is very deep stuff, detailed and thorough.

Here is a page that may interest and future reference. A list of all of Campbell's works.
Books by Joseph Campbell

Jerry

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Hi Jerry,

Thank you. I've bookmarked the link for Joe's works.

You said: If we take that metaphorically then it may represent a punishment we put on ourselves, having a conscience.

It fits.

I am going to have to ask my analyst for the specific myth/story to which she referred.

There was a masculine character being tormented by the Furies. He pleaded Athene's help. Athena went to the Furies and asked what they needed. "A Name. Give us a name!"

Like the haunting of (being haunted by) our own shadows...and then, acknowledgement of the pain of the plight of judgment/punishment of self, as learned/conditioned.

This conversation arose as a result of my telling, again, of the profound, soulful weeping I have done in my journey, primarily around the abuse of the feminine, feeling like the cries were coming from the bowels of the earth itself, so incredibly deep the pain has felt.

My analyst reminded how it was my early life experience that gave me this gift of profound connection to the feminine. "Gift," I said to her, "I have not always seen it as a gift." She responded, of course, that we never see our burdens so, but... (and she went on), her comments reminding again that the question "why?" never gets answered...

Again, all of this conversation was focused around Kali and other representations of the Dark Feminine.

This morning, I listened to Marion Woodman's interview, "Unleashing the Soul," where she talks again of Kali, and the "Baba Yaga," who assigns the tasks of soul making (to be brief).

I made a list last week of all the archetypal feminine figures that have appeared in my dreams, some of these a few times over:

Sheela (Na-Gig), the first
Black Madonna
Bast
Inanna
Medusa
Ammachi
Baba Yaga
Cailleach

...

I hear Marion this morning telling that one never asks the Baba why, never gets into blame/projection (for it keeps one crippled), never tries to hand back, but must accept responsibility. Listening, I hear echoes...

I don't mind sharing that a part of me has been stuck in the victimization of my early experience, an immature part of me has said/asked over and again, "Why me?" This, under the historical weight of the negative masculine in my family of origin. There has been generations worth of profound disempowerment of the feminine. I need to move past this so that I may find the creative aspect/gifts of my journey.

Kristi

P.S. Now, onto another of Marion's interviews, I hear her reminding that we must tell our stories from the "bone level," not a superficial level (point of view) as we most are apt to do, for we are afraid to be intimate with ourselves (and before others, which is really just a relfection of our inability to be intimate with our own selves too, for what we hide from others we also hide from our own self...so, it is good to see/be aware of where we prefer not to, where we stop, hesitate...for those are the very places we need to go). The "real feeling" is the "bone level." She goes on to say that when we can speak and share of our lives with stark honesty it releases us and those who would hear us into a new maturity. Our stories must be told as honestly as we can possibly tell them, Marion tells. And that the real loving comes in the ability for us to really hear/receive this from one another.

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Kristi,
Once again I must proclaim Marion Woodman a true sage of our times. Every woman, and most men, should 'listen' to what she has to say. Thanfully we have her wonderful audio books and writen books to enlighten us. Here again for those who are looking for resources is a list of most of her books Marion Woodman

And her audio book that is not listed and is essential for a complete education in Jungian psyche Dreams: Language of the Soul.

Jerry

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Jerry,

Her words echo inside of me. I consider her insight and wisdom a grace. When I listen to her, I "know" she is a mentor/role model for me. I have so very much growing yet to do, and it is the likes of she and my own analyst (who is also a very mature woman of wisdom at 80 yo) that bless my life. I am very thankful.

I could not agree more, all would do well to read/listen to her, but especially women, I feel. When I listen to or read her, I hear a woman who speaks with loving and clear authority. One "gets" that she knows precisely because she has taken the journey. There is no doubt. She is clear, crystal. A Guide to Soul. What animus, she has!

I just received a 4 tape set on "Healing the Inner Masculine." But I don't think these were something released nationally, as the labels are marked: "C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco." I feel fortunate to have them.

Kristi

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The response I received from the Marion Woodman Foundation:

> Yes, you are one of many noticing that Marion Woodman's audio tapes
> are now becoming obsolete in this era of CDs and DVDs. The Marion
> Woodman Fdn has engaged in transferring some titles no longer
> available on tape onto CDs. Its a big job as there are many titles and
> transferring to CDs means negotiating arrangements, etc.
>
> One success story is Chrysalis Lectures who has put about 5 titles
> onto CDs. You can contact them at www.chrysalislectures.com. I think
> they still have some available. That's a lead to some titles.
> Otherwise, you are right there is a need for this and I hope that over
> time more titles will become available.

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