By a fellow INFJ
How Do You Know Which Step To Take Next?
How Do We Qualify What We Value?
I searched where I least wanted to search. In the depths of my mind- in the darkness. There were many unknown faces waiting for me. Then one by one, they began to scream horribly at me, attempting with all their might to scare me. As one face appeared and screamed, another would suddenly appear and take over, then another, and another. All overlapping and all happening rather rapidly. Their screams lingered and intensified. They succeeded, and I was terrified. They wanted precisely that, to bring me suffering and scare me away. Finally, I began to scream back at them. Screams backed by the lost times I could not scream.
They disappeared.
Suddenly, out from this dense fog appeared an old tree with a single black bird perched on one of its branches. As I walked closer towards the tree, I intuitively knew the bird was waiting for me to get closer, it had a message for me. It felt that I had questions. The blackbird said:
“Hell is below and Heaven above. All you can do is go is right or left, and walk in between them.”
After that, my head moved to look around the tree to see what sort of path I was about to face. The tree and the bird disappeared, all that remained in their place was the fog. So I continued my journey.
Somehow I found myself now walking in a desert. It was on fire. I was resisting the force of winds and sands that were blowing hectically towards me, making it hard for me to see more than a few steps ahead — I felt suffocating nervousness.
The blackbird came back to help me. I could feel the claws from its feet slightly stabbing the skin of my arm as it lifted me away from the sandstorm and fire. It flew me out at such a speed that it was as if I could see the time. It resembled red satin sheets — the softest sheets I had ever seen…it was truly beautiful.
It brings me to the doorstep of an old and abandoned castle, then flies away without any form of instructions.
My curiosity pushed me to open the door of the castle.
I cautiously walk in.
I noticed immediately that it was completely empty, however, it was peculiar in the sense that it was so empty that it didn’t even have accumulations of dust. It was beyond impeccable.
“How interesting”, I thought.
It was entirely dark except for the foyer. It was illuminated by a single light. There was something special about this light — it inspired veneration. At the same time, I noticed the elegant black and white checkered floor.
And just like a chess game, there was a piece (a material) standing right in the middle of this potential chessboard, perfectly situated below the light. A chess piece much taller than me.
I knew it was a move. A single move had been played — a strategy had been implemented, if you will.
What I don’t know is what precise piece was in the middle of the floor or what move it represented.
Subjective Analysis:
After thoughtful consideration of all possible meanings for what I saw and felt during this vision/dream, I keep coming back to one in particular. The general sense I get from it is when the path forward isn’t clear due to not knowing precisely what I want.
We all will have a general idea usually of what we want, or at least we will know for sure what we do not want. Sometimes we will go from there, starting by avoiding what we do not want and that could be a good place to start but eventually we all need to have an actual aim.
We cannot just “wing it” forever and just see what happens because that will never get us what we want. The chances of getting what we truly, really, seriously want are pretty low if we think it will just magically land on our lap without us doing anything to help the process.
It’s truly hard to figure out exactly what we want sometimes.
Not finding something worthwhile to aim at can become demotivating. We don't want to aim at just anything either. Ideally, we want it to align with our values as well as resonate with our gut (intuition).
I mention intuition because that for me is the ultimate confirmation that my aim is a good and noble one.
There is a difference between the decisions I’ve made based on my values only versus decisions made by combining my values and my intuition.
My values are there for me, they are selfish — self-centered.
My intuition will lead me down a path that considers many other variables, such as other people and other perspectives, and stops seeing things from a “me” angle.
As I mentioned previously, it can be quite a challenge to figure out what we want sometimes. If we are lucky, we can perhaps get what we need if we cannot get what we want. Maybe that’s better — because what we want doesn't necessarily mean it will be good for us or the people around us.
Sometimes it’s not easy to accept that we should really be aiming for what we need instead of what we want.
