Thanks for the kind words Gerard. Intuition is as you guessed an important part of how I try to analyze a dream. As Marie Louise von Franz said:

“Interpreting a dream is not something one can do by rational effort alone…I always feel when I interpret dreams to people that, if the unconscious doesn’t give me the right hunch, I am lost. I can stammer forever, but the unconscious, thank God, is very interested in the understanding of dreams and generally helps one to hit the mark. But it is really an act of grace that falls from heaven”

She also wrote:

“[dreams] contain something essentially unknown which emerges creatively from the unconscious background and which must be examined anew, experimentally and objectively, in each individual case, as far as possible without preconceptions”.

That’s why it would be much better if those posting their dreams would provide more background information, but I know that this isn’t likely to happen.

Your site is a kind of lifeboat on the Net, one where a person is more likely to get a reasonable interpretation of a dream than anywhere else. The world needs the approach to dreams and the unconscious as developed by Jung, but sadly, it just hasn’t taken a hold as yet on a big enough scale among the general population to help change the tide of events.

Thanks for your efforts in keeping such a varied site up and running!

Thank you very much CBS, Justin and Gerard on your feedback to my dream. I really appreciate it. Actually, I think it subconsciously triggered a few things that helped direct me to a few 'revelations' in recent days.
A few updates on memories from the dream: The vanilla used to wash the sheets wasn't vanilla scent, it was actual vanilla extract (that you use in baking) which crystallized and THAT was what attracted the bugs....I remember being really disgusted that I had those two nasty things under my bedsheets.
The other thing that hit me was that I kept asking other people how to get rid of them, but nobody knew. It seems fairly obvious now, but it didn't sink in until later that perhaps this meant that in real life as well, no one could tell me how to get rid of my problems except me.
So, I guess I could give some relevant background info now. The dream undoubtedly connects to how I have suffered from an addiction of sorts for about six years, which is now fading. And yet there are still things at the back of my mind which haven't quite been addressed yet, but I don't know what they are. I feel like something is missing.
Interestingly enough, I had a funny experience the other day where I realized that I had wiped out the memories of a good portion of my life from high school and before. I would remember them if somebody reminded me of them, but without stimulation there is no way I would have accessed those memories. It was triggered by listening to an old favourite CD from my junior/high school days.
The only way I can describe it is that it was as if I had erased my history...as if it never were. REALLY strange sensation let me tell you. But as soon as I remembered that I had forgotten those things, something LITERALLY connected in my brain. I could feel it.
Anyway, that fits in nicely with the whole Princess in the Pea theory, doesn't it?
Thanks!

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It’s great that we’ve been able to stimulate your mind to bring up additional personal things for you to think about and hopefully this will lead to “what’s missing”. Generally, if you turn toward your unconscious mind through looking at dreams or doing some writing/painting etc., it’s very eager to help you and will reward your interest with even more interesting dreams or creative ideas.

It’s still a little difficult to pin down what the crystallized vanilla extract may represent but it may be related in some way to an attempt to “blend in” with everybody else and not be too “flavorful” or self-promoting. This could result in nagging doubts and feelings (the bugs) because certain aspects of yourself are being denied development too much.

A similar idea might be related to the bugs and the fact that in reality you had suppressed all sorts of memories about your life so far, not allowing them into consciousness. This again could result in irritating emotions and thoughts etc., but hopefully your listening to the CD has opened up the channels once more to this “you” inside and there’s a chance to build up the Princess.

You may like the book “Addiction to Perfection” by Marion Woodman. It covers why girls and women often tend to end up feeling too alienated in an overly “masculine” world, and this may have contributed to your addiction. Congratulations on having tamed it!

Thanks CBS,

Funny you should mention that book, but I've already read Marion Woodman's "Addiction to Perfection. Actually, I found her "The Pregnant Virgin" to be more helpful. I think it delved a little more deeply than Perfection did. It resonated more.
Good one to recommend!

Lindsay

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You’re right, “The Pregnant Virgin” is the more substantial book. A few years after it was published, I was chatting with Marion Woodman at a local Jung Foundation get-together. I said how much I admired her books and how I believed that “The Pregnant Virgin” was a minor classic. Exactly why I said “minor”, I don’t know, but probably because that’s how I had evaluated it at the time and didn’t have the sense to be a little more polite.

She didn’t seem irritated at the comment, but continued to show a similar attitude that apparently Carl and Emma Jung often displayed, namely, the complete acceptance of a person along with a certain “disinterest”. I believe that the underlying idea is to avoid any attempt at power or domination over another person.

Anyway, maybe it’s time for me to reread “The Pregnant Virgin”!