I Used to Fret About My Indecipherable Dreams
Knowing ourselves and having peace of mind do not always require analyzing our dreams.
I used to spend a lot of time noting down and analyzing my dreams, thinking that I would discover hidden things about myself. I was familiar with Jung who gave importance to discovering what lies beneath the surface of our known identities I had notebooks containing these nocturnal stories, as I put down into words those images that surfaced in my dreaming mind.
It required a bit of focus of course. I had to devote time to be introspective, time to sit and listen to the inner self. When you’re young, there is so much to do on the outside world, going within becomes an effort. So I had days of jotting down dreams and days of nothing on paper. Then there were days when the external events grabbed your attention because these were urgent — falling in love, paying rent, raising extra money to buy needed stuff, attending to friendships and relationships that rewarded me with joy and pain and confusion. Life was all these, but not the ones happening in my dreams. The dreamworld seemed distant and nothing of consequence to waking life.
And then as I grew older, I discovered this teaching that says what happens in your inner life, including dreams, is reflected on your external life. Whatever is cooking up in your world of dreams and unconscious mind, given enough energy and unopposed by conflicting beliefs, will manifest in external situations.
It sounds simplistic because, indeed, people just go ahead and consciously dream and plan things that they want to see happen in their lives. But what I’m talking about is when the unconscious is doing the dreaming and plotting.
I can think of this experience I had some 10 years ago when my unconscious mind helped me resolve a problem that I was too unwilling to resolve in my waking world. I got into entangled relationships with people who were my (misguided) spiritual teachers and friends. It got too confusing and oppressive that I wanted out of the situation, but I could not see myself leaving because of some (unknown to me then) attachment issues traced back to childhood. I was frozen to inaction but in my inner world, unaware to me, I was already planning an escape. I retreated to daydream.
Because I did not want to break friendships, it had to be an alter ego that had to do it — and who would it be but my bad or dark or socially unacceptable persona which I tried hard to suppress. So it was also this dark side that daydreamed I guess. I was then surprised when my daydreams turned into something unexpected and hurtful to others in my entangled group.
This shocked all of us and a dramatic confrontation followed. Refusing to move past it, everybody just decided that the friendships and the set-up could not continue anymore. So my problem got solved — I left the emotionally confusing situation and I got the freedom I wanted, and not without emotional pain. My conscious self did not want to give up the benefits of (flawed) friendships and (false) security, but my unconscious knew these were, in fact, detrimental to me.
It seems simple as I look at it now but back then, it was a catastrophe. Thanks to my inner self that did the plotting and the dreaming. At first glance, it was easy to think that I was a victim of circumstances but when I looked closer (after many years of sweeping the incident under the rug to forget), it was in fact me, my hidden self, my unconscious, that resolved my issue.
Sleeping dreams, daydreams, and the unconscious are the same parts of the self that remain hidden but come out in unexpected ways. If you want to understand yourself, maybe studying your dreams can help, but it’s such a hazy thing to do. I gave up studying them because I couldn’t stay in the dream world while the waking world moved on. Sometimes there are dreams that give clear insight to personal problems, but more often you are left on your own to ascertain their meaning.
Nowadays I don’t spend as much time trying to figure what my dreams mean. I do take note of the strong feelings of happiness or disgust or confusion as I wake up in the morning fresh from the this dark world. They give me an inkling as to how I am dealing with things in the waking world.
Just recently, I read something that led me to have a better understanding of all these. I learned that dreams are full of conflicting and impossible thoughts and images because they reflect the ego. The ego is preoccupied with material things and drama and conflict and relationships, which are in the end, things that don’t matter when compared to the lasting truth of unconditional love. Our dream world is merely another of those illusions created by our ego.
The ego is totally of this world as opposed to Spirit which is concerned with eternity and God. Spirit wants us to awaken from this illusion that is this world, and return to the truth of oneness with God. No matter what form they present themselves in our sleep, dreams are but a reflection of our joys, desires, anxieties, fears, and sorrows.
And indeed I now realize that many of my dreams are all various forms of the worry that I won’t be able to make it in this world. I’m aware now that my sense of insecurity - — the uncertainty of a job, a flaky romantic partner, fragile friendships, life and death in the family — all these are all tied to my dreams.
To know that I can deal with such worries as long as I have faith in God or Spirit or whatever the Eternal Source is called in other belief systems, is one thing I don’t need to analyze or to get confused about. So unlike dreams.
In other words, I don’t need to get lost in the conundrum of dream interpreting. All I need to do is to rest in the thought that the security that I’m always striving for can only be found in the certainty of God’s unconditional love. It sounds cliche but it took me a long journey involving heartbreak and unexpected shifts in self-understanding to get to this truth.
Please Donate or Buy me coffee if you feel inspired. Medium/Stripe reward system for writers does not yet work here in the Philippines. Thank you!
