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Pillars of light

Hi all,

I dreamt I am walking deep into a green, deep, lush, vibrant forest.

On either side of me are two large pillars of clear white light. Each pillar has four square sides, and the height is rather tall, and they walk with me where ever I go, one on either side.

Somewhere between waking and dreaming I go the sense that these pillars of light could represent my parents protective love, but I am sure this is only one meaning.

I'd love your ideas......

May

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Re: Pillars of light

I think it's to let you know that 'although life seems wild and untamed you do have highly organized and civilized angels with you.

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Re: Pillars of light

May,

Overall the dream may describe a basic component in the formation of a new concept from the first stage of initiation through subsequent events ultimately leading to dispersion of old concept(s). Could equate to what Campbell describes as Crossing the First Threshold stage in the Heroes Journey.

From Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction on Joseph Campell’s The Heroes Journey

The Crossing of the First Threshold

This is the point where the person actually crosses into the field of adventure, leaving the known limits of his or her world and venturing into an unknown and dangerous realm where the rules and limits are not known.

pithy quote: "With the personifications of his destiny to guide and aid him, the hero goes forward in his adventure until he comes to the "threshold guardian" at the entrance to the zone of magnified power. Such custodians bound the world in four directions - also up and down - standing for the limits of the hero's present sphere, or life horizon. Beyond them is darkness, the unknown and danger; just as beyond the parental watch is danger to the infant and beyond the protection of his society danger to the members of the tribe. The usual person is more than content, he is even proud, to remain within the indicated bounds, and popular belief gives him every reason to fear so much as the first step into the unexplored"
-- (Campbell)
"The adventure is always and everywhere a passage beyond the veil of the known into the unknown; the powers that watch at the boundary are dangerous; to deal with them is risky; yet for anyone with competence and courage the danger fades"
-- (Campbell)

Kind Regards,
Kathy

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Re: Pillars of light

WEll personally I see a major link between dreams and the day before. Dreams symbolise recent thought processes and capture conceptual feelings HOT OFF THE PRESS. So when you look at the dream symbols then try to establish links with what has just happened to you, what you have just been thinking and the oparanoias and fantasies that have dominated your thinking. A pillar of lightcould be your pareents. weree you thinking about them the day before? Have you just started to realise their importance to you? What other sources of wisdom and guidance are there that the dream could represent? think particularly back to the day before.

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Re: Pillars of light

I think you feel that your parents influence is with you and your learning from them is keeping you safe where ever you go.

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Re: Pillars of light

unclesirbobby,
The MDS Forum succeeds and the majority of dreamers respond, with a number staying long term to engage Self work, because interpretations based on Jungian psychology connect to the dreamer, it makes sense of a dream to the dreamer…not the interpreter. Many middle agers, me for example, are on the Forum in a personal psychological journey to wholeness, individually and collectively. The Forum is a psychological support network for individuals, for each other, offering and asking for insights, sharing knowledge, and encouragement when the path gets rocky.

Simple personal level dream interpretations do apply more so to younger people than mid life and older age due to lack of accumulated life event history and experience. And often looking at the days preceding a dream for clues to meaning are helpful. However, a psychological complex is often evidenced in repeating patterns, where the source didn’t occur today or yesterday. Resolution of a complex by integration does not occur until the source of the complex is discovered, properly addressed then integration through practice, practice, more practice and…more practice. So the purpose of dream interpretation is not only to identify a possible current disturbance, but to assist a dreamer in their identification of the causative so permanent resolution and integration can come about through successive and progressive stages.

And this may stretch Jungian discipline a bit, but many times I sense a deeper meaning in dreams of younger people. They, too often to ignore, are compelled to seek deeper meaning in their dreams.


From Jung Dreams General Aspects of Dream Psychology:

“What is our justification for attributing to dreams any other significance than the unsatisfying fragmentary meaning suggested by the manifest dream-content? One especially cogent argument in this respect is the fact that Freud discovered the hidden meaning of dreams empirically and not deductively. A further argument in favour of a possible hidden meaning is obtained by comparing dream-fantasies with other fantasies of the waking state in one and the same individual. It is not difficult to see that waking fantasies have not merely a superficial, concretistic meaning but also a deeper psychological meaning.

But by far the best argument for the existence of a hidden meaning in dreams is obtained by conscientiously applying the technical procedure for breaking down the manifest dream-content.”

Food for thought…

Kind regards,
Kathy

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Re: Pillars of light

Hi Doug, Unclesirbobby, Carlos and Kathy,

Thank you all very much for all of your insightful replies. Certainly, there is truth in all of that you said.

Kathy, I agree completely with what you have offered as an interpretation of my dream and would like to explore this further. I read the info you posted and it definitely resonates. Can you tell me more...what is the next step...what do I need to prepare myself.

I am almost positive that that type of new journey is exactly what I'm on. I'm breaking new ground

May

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Re: Pillars of light

Kathy :

Sometimes I tend to overemphasize the importance of recent events in dreams. Dreams do linked to events but they also link to very personal and complex thoughts. But what's I try to emphasize is the trigger of a dream. Yes dreams can link to very personal and psychological issues but there is always something in particular which triggers any dream. The roots of the dream may be in some fantasy that we had the day before. The roots may also be linked to some very important events coming up. Or the trigger of a dream may be linked to something that happened that made us think the day before. Dreams may also be very general and deal with how we are coping with any particular problem in general. Yes a dream that may link to something involving confidence and that may be a common theme within someone's personality. But there is always a particular trigger for any dream. There would always be some particular reason for some longtime theme. I think we should approach dreams in a different way. Instead of linking a dream to some longtime tendency within our personality we should word it differently. Think of the following two sentences

"I have always tended to lack confidence"

"yesterday I lacked confidence. I really have got to be a more assertive with my mother"

To me dreams are really in the here and now. It's just really a slight difference of emphasis.

I realise what you say that dreams do occur with no obvious trigger from the previous day. I think that the mind uses something called neural networks,. We do not change our decision making with one piece of evidence. Sometimes its the absence of info that causes us to shift thinking. Say that we notice a change in someones pattern of behavior. That they used to spend the afternoons gardening everyday. Then they suddenly stop. It takes us a few days or weeks to suddenly realise that this is a chnage. After all we do not see them eevry day and it will only dawn on us that things have changed after a while.

Dream dictionary

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Re: Pillars of light

Hi May,
Congratulations on entering the forest! The path you are on is your individual path. Not to cop out on your questions but it relates to your personal journey...as {Yoda} puts it so well...that is for you to discover.

Campbell's The Heroes Journey is an excellent guide book. The web site Steve recommended is also great: MCLI – The Heroes Journey

MCLI info is a quick succint reference of Campbell's book. I'd still read Campbell's book as it offers deep shades and nuance of meaning not available at MCLI. I can email to you the MCLI info as a Word doc if you like.

Kind regards,
Kathy

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Re: Pillars of light

unclesirbobby,

Thank you for responding. A really excellent definition, and point of stimulus as both presence and absence. I do apologize for being unclear on the point of stimulus occurring in the days preceding a dream. For a Jungian there are several meanings in most dreams. A personal level pertains to current waking life, addresses the dreamers current life. I fully agree the stimulus for a dream occurs in the days preceding a dream and the dream addresses that agent. Ona deeper level the reason this particular and specific presence or absence acts to stimulate dream content lies in the unconscious, at an unconscious level. Why engage in a particular fantasy? What is it about an upcoming event that one perceives it to be important? Why think of what happened the day before? In essence, each of these events has it's own trigger. The trigger rests with cognition - the psychological result of perception and learning and reasoning. Purpose being to address psychological disposition concurrently with past, present and future.

Cognition results in an unknown and unpredictable phenomenon that causes a psychic (of the Psyche) event to result one way rather than another. From Jung Man and His Symbols “…even what we retain in our conscious mind and can reproduce at will has acquired an unconscious undertone that will color he idea each time it is recalled. Our conscious impressions, in fact, quickly assume an element of unconscious meaning that is physically significant for us, though we are not consciously aware of the existence of this subliminal meaning or of the way in which it both extends and confuses the conventional meaning.”

Agreed, change does not hinge on a single point but rather occurs through successive and progressive, and even repetitive, steps determinate of various and/or numerous agents. This would correlate to dream content as successive and progressive to incorporate those various and/or numerous psychic agents.

If I understand the theory of neural networks correctly this is the coordinated pathway by which repetition creates an imprint or pattern so becomes usual and customary. When this encounters a stimulus a new pattern develops over time to become the accepted and customary pattern. (Please feel free to correct or expound...) How does this explain the origination of change? What factor identifies and drives change, and determines what to change to?

Psychological patterns are developed through exaction of parents, influential others and society, and personal experience and congnition of experiences. Sometimes we develop patterns yet they are not our own patterns, hence persona masquerading as/masking Self. The stimulus to change psychological pattern imprints originates with Psyche, which encompasses the neural network. In this deeper level the neural network symbolizes capacity and ability for change, and the necessary tools to carry out change, but does not itself originate change nor determine what to change to.

Again, thank you for responding with your thoughts and knowledge, and participating in the Forum. A great conversation and refreshing exchange.

Kind regards,
Kathy

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Re: Pillars of light

Nietszche wrote, and campbell reiterated that a story befitting of this event.

Man is first like a camel drinking from the water fountains of knowledge and life at an oasis.
The camel is getting ready for a long journey intot he desert. At the end of this journey he comes upon a dragon. The dragon has a "thou shalt do this!" , and a "thou shalt not do that!" addressing every known aspect your life on each and every scale.
At this point the camel becomes a dragon and slays the dragon. Upon the lion achieving this victory, it becomes a new born baby.

you are at the point where you are ready to embark on this journey: probably not the first time for you.

You are going to address old established beliefs, habits, idiosyncrasies, and overcome them and be born anew.

Are you going through a period of reflection? Has some new environment forced you to address yourself as a person? are you undergoing a challenge of this type?

That would be the forest that you are approaching. In the forest you will come upon life, death and renewal of aspects of yourself. forest are naturally recycling lands. Some of the perpetually recycling areas of the forests will be long held beliefs or learned behaviors that are running free and wild within you. Sometimes you have to deal with guardians of the forest (the protectors of these recycling events); or behaviors you will not easily overcome. sometimes seemingly beautiful parts of the forest will suddenly become thorny. sometimes thing will be as they are. These are all urges, learned behaviors that keep reoccuring that you are ready to address and outgrown. some will attempt to scare you into submission. thus you take your previous learning with you, your shell of security: the pillars of light - the maternal learning and the paternal as well).

hope this helps.

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Re: Pillars of light

KATHY

The biggest mistake people make with dreams is to assume that they are some guiding light. They wake up from a dream and try to seek some deeper message from it. They feel that a dream somehow has some hidden meaning. That if we seek this wisdom then we shall suddenly transform our lives.

I think that most dreams actually link to the brain and to thought processes that we have. But many of our thought processes are based on insufficient data. We learn how to use a new camera by trial and error. We trust someone but for no strong reason other than a gut feeling. We sense that someone is acting strangely and that there maybe some hidden reason behind their new and different behavior. All of these involve judgement. We must move forward all the time. Yet often we have no reason to form one opinion rather than another.
I believe that sometimes that we may dream about the same subject twice in the same night. That one dream provides one opinion whilst the subsequent dream takes the opposite view. We do not have enough information to base a reasoned and intelligent opinion. Yet we must form a view. Should we trust someone? Is someone acting arrogantly or are they just expressing their knowledge? A single mother may ask if her new boyfriends relationship has in any way spoilt her relationship with her child.

All such questions do not have easy answers. I think that most of our dreams are about these such dilemmas. That far from providing clear guidance they represent our best guess.


Your exactly right about neural networks. Sorry for not defining them.

-------------------
DREAM DICTIONARY

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Re: Pillars of light

Hi Carlos,

Thank you so much for that brilliant illumination of what the forest might be. It definitely applies.

I'm in the forest of self-transformation.

Putting the image of the forest, with what you described about the forest being the place of relearning and recycling helped my dream image make a lot more sense.

All the best,
May

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Re: Pillars of light/ The meaning is now revealed

Dear Friends,

I now understand the profound meaning of this dream.

As I walked, the pillars on either side of me moved at exactly the same time....in fact, what I did not 'realise' before but what I (Self-)'realise' now, is that happened because there was light through me....

I am the light.


In the Kabbalah, there are references to the tree of life and how we are 'in God' when we are self-realised.

This dream is showing me my true mystical state. To make it very simple, I realised my inner-Christ Self and it is light.... I am part of the 'I am'....

philosophically, mystical union with the divine...Christ-consciousness, Krishna-consciousness, self actualisation..... God is light and the dream was showing me that I was in the light and that I am light.

We all are, it is our journey to recognise to 'realise' it. ...

The forest is just the background.

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