Hello,

A recent dream I had that I'm trying to make sense of, it has significance for me, especially in regards to any life issues. Some background, I had it after working through Jean Houston's meditations in her book, the Passion of Isis and Osiris, and also a recent visit to the actual historical sites where dream incubation/divination and interpretation used to take place. The dream after this was one where I woke up knowing a friend's birthday after making her a birthday present, and she confimed it in real life. I'm not sure if the two dreams are connected, in that the meditation I did is called raising the Djed pillar of Osiris, which awakens feminine and masculine energy in a manner similar to kundalini. Thanks in advance. The dream:

A (destructive ?) boy destroys a man and woman's house.

First, the inhabitants are a woman and her daughter.

A fire perhaps- or flood.

The water rises up from the ground;

melting the already grey, old wooden floorboards.

The only foundation directly under them was earth.

As the water rises, it brings with it tree sap which sticks to the hardwood walls, making the house uninhabitable.

They have to move from Tennessee where they live to Colorado. (Note the direction of the movement.)

They are trying to get the tree sap off their hands. I run my hands on the wall and get tree sap on my hands too.

When it is time to leave the daughter disappears and in her place is a man. The mother and daughter live in this home and part of it functioned as a liquor store.

They have a beat-up car. But when the man and woman leave he drives away in a really nice, black, expensive car.

As I am touching the hardwood walls, I remember my Sufi teacher. As they drive away, I think at least they are no longer serving alcohol, enabling addictions and this is a blessing. After that I go to a dream library that I've been too before and ask for a book that I know is there by its title. It turns out to be something by the poet Shelly, but I only have a moment to read a page about psychology.

I leave and catch a dream shuttle bus, same deja vu feeling, and a man gets on and sits behind me and puts his foot on the back of my seat, its touching my pillow. I have a pillow I'm leaning against. I am writing, what a loss about that house, especially with its pretty peach walls. (My current apartment has hardwood floors, one room with a hardwood ceiling, slanted, and one large area with peach walls, and the rest are not hardwood.)

The boy in the dream was the one who did all this.

End of Dream.

I would so much appreciate an interpretation.

May

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May,
First let me say I believe Jean Houston is simply wonderful. I had the privilege some years back to converse with her personally via e-mail. Not many people know that it was Joseph Campbell who influenced Houston early in her life with his book The Hero With A Thousand Faces'. Others still are not aware of Houston's 'unconventional' relationship with Hillary Clinton {read more about this relationship at AMERICAN REVIEW}. Here is an excellent profile of Houston.

As for your dream. I would think there is a new masculine aspect emerging that is threatening established principles. The threat may be of masculine aspects trying to control certain feminine aspects. It may affect the balance you seek in life.

But there is a saving aspect. Your ground is stronger than any wayward, developing masculine aspect. You are not inhibited {alcohol} by barriers that normally affect lesser minds. The loss is the from accepting this new masculine aspect as a controlling agent in your life. There is conflict about this new development but with spiritual guidance you will overcome the challenge.

Does this touch an aspect in your current life?

Gerard

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Hi Gerard,

You are most fortunate for your correspondences with Jean Houston. One of my hobbies is Ancient Egypt and I frequently visit the historical sites. Jean would concur with me that because of the ancient Egyptian religion of devotedly and consistently invoking and celebrating the dieties for thousands of years, this land is infused with a profound spirit. Of course, we all know that dream interpretation began here, and Jung was wise to learn from the ancients. I believe that Jean Houston is a genuis in her mythic rereading and framing of the ancient myths of this mysterious and blessed land. Of course, we know how Joseph was blessed with the skill of dream interpretation, some say he was really Imhotep, and Moses was trained as a High Priest. In Egypt we have a saying: Egypt is the Mother of Civiliation. This is so true in so many ways. (Think Divine Mother.)

My dream is profound. I could not relate to the masculine energy you mention. I spent several days contemplating it.

I believe I am on a deep healing journey, and as I opened myself up to new ideas about the Divine Mother for example, and the Goddess, I have been experiencing profoundly healing dreams. I believe by shifting my paradigm and leaving 'traditional/orthodox' religions, that I have opened the door to the transpersonal.

As a child, on one of our trips to Egypt, I experienced a serious trauma. I was four and a half and we were here for almost a year. I believe because of my age and the nature of the trauma, that it became a part of my personality. To me, the condition of the floorboards, the foundation of the house (personality) was in terrible condition. I identify this trauma with those floorboards.

I see the water as both a transpersonal element that has deep healing and transforming power, as well as a tide of repressed emotion due to the trauma that are finally given the freedom of release, from the deep unconcious, to clear away the old, grey floorboards, to do away with the trauma and it's unstabily foundation that my personality developed on.

I see the house as being myself, my old self, the one needing healing. I do not mean me, capital S self, just myself. The hardwood walls to me represent death, in that wood is dead trees. I had a sense of a tree underneath the house, related to the water, the tree is also another aspect of the Osirian Djed. That living sap was coming out of the wood is redeeming. I see the wood as dead numb emotions, without life, however, the release of emotion triggered the sap, life. I see the walls and the floorboards of made of the same essence, but in different conditions, wood, non living, numb. Sap comes out of trees when they are injured. I believe in my meditation I contacted very deep collective unconcsious elements, transpersonal, 'gods/goddesses' and the living sap is a healing balm, and signifies the existence of 'The Tree of LIFE' deep within is activating my healing.

I see the boy as a trickster or a newly emerging animus since I believe do to my serious early trauma many aspects of my personality development were serious delayed if not damaged. This trickster boy is actually a positive force for me. He serves as a catalyst for inviting the transpersonal. I don't know enough about the trickster but I think he can function this way. This makes more sense than seeing him as the developing animus. The flood was arising straight up out of the ground and it had the same effect, seem purifying effect as a fire. It was powerful. I see also the floorboards as representing blocks of energy in the lower chakras, and the water as overcoming, or beginning to overcome these chakras.

I see the daughter as a very vulnerable part of me, my delicate femininity that has been through so many challenges and lives in a difficult patriarchial world, also a young part of me that was deeply, deeply hurt at a young age. She makes a token appearance and then leaves...abandonned and abandonning. She is a sad, disowned part. She is really hurting. I don't believe the man, the masculine energy drove her away, she is so weak, she went away by herself because the ego could not cope with the depth of her sense of loneliness, sadness, forlornness. In the dream this young daughter's mother abandonned her, as I feel and felt in real life my own mother, as well as previously, the divine mother abanndon me. She represents the unhealed part of me. She is very sad, so sad she just disappears underground the way persephone disappeared into hades, cyclically....

The mother represents possibly inherited unhealthy values. She owns a liquor store. In real life I do not drink and actually have a hard time metabolizing alcohol. In college I did not realize how much 'social drinking' was damaging and thank God, I found it easier and better to just not drink. I think this part of the dream is a reference to overcoming either having really been an alcoholic, or the fact that I was fortunate enough that my potential for alcoholism didn't rule my life. It also, to my mind,represents any damaging addictions, even ones seemingly harmless as aimlessly searching the internet or spending excessive time reading things like emails, rather than living, working, meditating. Whatever those addictions, the part of me that was driving them...the woman and the man , left.

The beat up car and the new car I thought were my ego condition, before the transformation began, working but 'having taken a beating' and after, new, nice, shiny. I felt the first car was less pretentious and more humble. Perhaps this ego strengh is required to submit so willingly to transpersonal transformational forces that originate deep in the collective unconscious from the lands of the gods/goddesses.

I wondered if the man was representing the dominating masculine energy you mentioned. This is perhaps true. I see his driving away the woman as possible a negative sign in that light. And causing the abandonment of the daughter by her mother.

The demise of the liquor store was a joyous occasion. I was sad that they abandonned the house, yet, this gave me hope. I wanted that 'house of cards' to fall. The underlying trauma that was the foundation of the house has to come down. The woman was actually lifting the floorboards straight of the earth, they were bent and in no condition to hold a house. These are traumas, energy blocks that need to go.

The library shows the value of knowledge and true gnosis in my healing journey. I am actually unfamiliar with Shelly but this is a chance to change that. Perhaps I will discover he was on of the romantics, or very serious about nature, that will give me clues to the process.

The bus is succumbing again to the collective, rather than following my path of individuation.

I lament the loss of the peach walls. I am no longer seeing the world in rose colored glasses. I am facing the painful emotional reality of my inner condition, of my soul condition and doing so is healing but also not peachy. Not cosy, comfortable like the peach walls. I have to die to myself, my old self, like Osiris, and like Christ, in order to be ressurected to true imortal life, the life of the soul.

A man on the bus rudely puts his foot on my pillow. A masculine energy is giving me a rude awakening. My cushioned comfortable life, maybe the lazyness and ignorance of denial and of defense mechanism are being opened. The transpersonal healing, my soul, my transformation will have its way and I can't stop it.

This figure could also be the dominating masculine energy you mentioned. He sits behind me and we do not dialogue and he is part of the loss of the peach walls...

I agree that the ground is stable, regardless of any dominating masculine energy.

The librarian was a relatively neutral figure.

The direction of the dream, from South to West, designates a progress that requires death. This is ressurection. West is the land of the setting sun, of death. For the ancient Egyptians, my beloved ancestors, sleep was but a little death, and west was also a direction of death. Going from South to North west as Colorado seems to be more north of Tenessee, designates progress and in this I see the ressurection theme, that the old dying will give way to new life.

I'd love to hear your take on these ideas, especially related to Jung and to my healing process. I'm also interested in the masculine aspect. I feel actually that in life my masculine energies have abandoned me (like the man driving away) and that I am left to my feminine qualities to cope with things that require a stronger masculine energy. I need to write eloquently and make deadlines, but I have succumbed to a deep revulsion of taking action. I do yoga instead and meditate, and reflect. My feminine energies have taken over, this is what made me wait several days before responding because the idea of a newly developed masculine taking over has not yet resonated with me consciously. Perhaps this is something you well noted that looms over the horizon for me and the dream is asking me to take care.

My three biggest concerns in life are: my healing process, marriage issues, and my studies. They are all interconnected. I see the floorboards in the dream as representing the trauma that is at the root of my personality, soul, life, self, etc, that is also at the root of issues with marriage and study. I want to connect what you said about the masculine dominating better with this so that will help me if you can explain it more.

Also, I love the tenacity of the tree sap. It won't come off easily. Its my resilience in life!!!! :)

Congrats for passing on the torch to your son! Thanks for your reply, I am genuinely touched by your appreciation of Jean Houston, I like her alot too!

I hope you can also explore the ancient Egyptian mythology further, especially as it relates to this dream, my life issues, to ressurection and to the similiarities in the Osiris story to that of Christ......and in relation to Jung and in relation to this website. (The deeper meaning of Dreams as a tool for our ressurection, renewal.)

I am just amazed by how much Jean Houston's book touched my life...I can go on and on...I had several dreams affected by these meditations. And the insights I have received!

Please if you can get her book, its an excellent guide to Ancient Egypt and the Transpersonal realm of the Gods/Goddesses. Its called the Passion of Isis and Osiris. Her reading of the myth is deeper than other Egyptologists and she has taken it to a soul level. She is really a unique individual.

Thanks so much Gerard and I look forward to your interesting comments.

Best,
May

Age & Gender & Location {Required}: 35/ EGYPT

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I forgot also to add that in ancient Egyptian mythology, the raising of the Osiris Djed is connected to the tree of life. There is a lot of mythology relating the diety's resurrection with a tree...Osiris, Jesus, and more. I think the tree energy that I sensed at the core of this was awakened in the meditation, with the beginning of raising the Djed energy, opening up to transpersonal energy. It is a similar process to a Kundalini awakening in Yoga.

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Dear Friends,

Hindsight again:

TWO WEEKS after having this dream I was accepted into a program that 1) was in another country and got me away from the man who I was married to who was abusive for an entire year; allowing me to detach from the relationship, heal myself and get a divorce, 2) exposed me to forums from which I began writing the papers that got published that led to my career improvement 3) exposed me to resources that gave me self confidence and inner strength.

Amazing. Again, I see a theme, inner healing, inner transformation even at an unconscious level by the grace of God, leading to a positive outer manifestation....

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