Thursday, March 25, 2010

Weeds in the Garden


People sometimes ask if a small fragment of a dream is enough to yield an interpretation. And the answer is yes. In my dream group we sometimes spend an hour talking about a two-sentence dream. Since this is a short dream I thought it might be a good one to use to show you the process of interpreting. If you want to play along, you can pretend the dream is yours, and the interpretation you come up with will apply to you (but not necessarily to me).

The Dream: There are two weeds in the garden. I pull them and notice to my chagrin that they are back the next day.

Interpretation Process:
First, let’s look at the weeds. Clearly they represent some things I don’t want in my life. Are these external, such as work problems, or are they my own unpleasant or counterproductive traits? Why are there two of them? Do I have two problems? Two difficult people in my life? Two traits that hold me back? Whatever they are, they’re persistent; I’m having trouble getting rid of them. Is there something in my life I don’t like that keeps cropping up?

The weeds are in my garden, so next I have to ask, “What does a garden mean to me?” Is this a place I go for rest and renewal? Since a garden is a place of cultivation, might this be the place where I create? Or could it be the place where I grow?

I bet you’ve got the idea. If you played along and came up with an interpretation, please feel free to leave it as a comment, or e-mail it to me at CarlaYoung10@gmail.com

2 comments:

  1. I can't help but think that a weed is a weed only in one's definition of it. Some weeds are weeds to some, but beautiful flowers to other. A weed is as natural as any other living entity, and it's we who put the "badness" on it. This reminds me of projection where we project out our own weeds onto others. That is grows in a garden tells me that weeds grow in my internal garden as well. Perhaps I need to tend to the weeds and not try to get rid of them, which is why they keep popping up. "I won't go away until you recognize and honor me us and see we're not as bad as you think we are!". Perhaps I'm just being too hard on myself. Two gets my attention, for from two the rest of life is born.

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  2. Thank you for pointing out an important fact: weeds to some; wild flowers to others. Perhaps I do need to honor the weed!

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