Sunday, September 11, 2011

Guest Dreamer: Pulling Roots out of my Feet


I can think of no spiritual leader who has not warned of suffering along the path to enlightenment. Emily, who frequently contributes insightful comments to this blog, has given us a poignant dream about the difficulties that must be faced and overcome on a spiritual journey.

The Dream: I walk out of a building (I can't see it behind me, but I know I've left it) onto a wide, cement sidewalk. The tall wall of a building is on my left. I am barefoot. Suddenly I am aware of pain on the bottoms of my feet. I realize I am walking on shards of glass: small, colorful pieces are embedding themselves in the bottom of my feet! I can barely walk it hurts so much. Then, I am inside a room, sitting on a chair. I look at the bottom of my feet, and I see that I have roots, like slender tree roots, growing out from the bottom of my feet. I try to pull one out, and I realize it's deep in my leg, up the calf.  I don't pull it out.  A blonde woman watches me, I think somewhat approving of my actions.

Shift: It rains. Pours. In 2 separate incidents, a man and a woman have left their notebooks/binders in the rain. I rush out into the rain and pick them up and bring them inside as I don't want the rain to ruin them. The man is 30-40ish, tall, and thin. He doesn't appear to be grateful that I rescued his notebook from the rain. His notebook is stuffed with papers and notes. The thought crosses my mind that maybe the rain wouldn't have hurt the notebook after all....end

Carla’s interpretation: I’m leaving my structured way of being (the building) behind. The way ahead is opening up before me (it's wide), but also hard (cement). There’s some sort of unconscious block (the wall to my left). I am vulnerable (barefoot). My foray into this new world outside is risky; I feel pain. There’s something in my path that makes progress difficult and painful; small shards of colorful glass. Apparently I can’t get around my difficulty; I keep walking through this excruciating mess even though my progress is very slow because I am in so much pain. But my persistence is rewarded. I find myself sitting in a room, able to examine my vulnerability (the bare, painful feet).  I have roots. I have the potential to be grounded, to find my ground of being. At first I attempt to reject this possibility, but I realize it is too deeply a part of me to be pulled out. The part of me that is enlightened (woman with blonde hair) approves.

Now the rain can come, like an ancient blessing, over the notebooks of a man and a woman. For Jung, male and female together represent a coniunctio, opposites coming together into wholeness. I have, for many years, created notebooks of my dreams. I fear that all this water (so much unconscious material) pouring into my notebooks could ruin them. My stronger male side lets me know that rescue is not necessary. My unconscious material and the spiritual grounding I’ve accomplished by so carefully recording my dreams, and being brave enough to learn from them, are safe.

20 comments:

  1. Ah, the feet, the feet. That which is our foundation, that which we stand upon, that with which we move forward and make progress. They may have experienced pain on the path but the "cuttings" have taken root! In plants the function of roots is not only to anchor and support but to provide channels of communication allowing water and minerals to be transported up to the leaves where, with sunlight and carbon dioxide, food is manufactured and, in the counter flow, sent back to the roots. Through roots the upper and lower are therefore not just united but in active communication. Openfoot can't help but empathise with this dream - for obvious reasons!

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  2. Openfoot's dream was posted in August 2011. See Guest Dreamer: The Strange Case of the Blood Red Haematite and The Philosophers Stone

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  3. Thank-you Carla and Openfoot for your comments and projections on my dream! So much richer than what I had originally felt about it. Now that over a a month has passed since I had this dream, an update is necessary. For the past 2 or 3 weeks I have been experiencing major heel pain when I first walk in the morning. When I asked my husband what could be causing it (as I had NO idea), he thought "plantar fasciitas", which affects the heel and can affect the Achilles Tendon. Aha! For in the dream, more of the pain of the shards of glass were in the heel area, and that one root I couldn't remove could represent the tendon. We can look at this dream as a prodromal dream, a dream which expresses a medical condition before it is medically diagnosed. So, now I am using this image meditatively to "heal the heel". I can't help but be in awe of the creativity of our dreams; why, instead of one message per dream, our dream maker gives us 3, 4 or more levels of meaning as evidenced by how you both have expanded upon this one? It all fits! Thanks again - Emily

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  4. Waking on the shards reminds me of that famous ritual of walking over hot coals to show a readiness to overcome obstacles.

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  5. I had a similar dream about plants growing out of the bottom of my feet but in my dream, I pulled the roots out from the bottom of my feet. It did not hurt but I could feel the sensation of the skin pulling apart. no blood or anything. I don't remember what preceded the event. Any thoughts on this?

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  6. Dear Anonymous, Your particular version of this dream strikes me as signaling that you are ready to move on; in other words, you are ready for a new stage in your life's journey. You are removing your roots--or getting rid of the things that used to ground you, but perhaps also kept you "stuck."

    You will know whether or not the idea that I'm giving you is right for you and your situation: if it is, take a little time to think about what is changing in your life.

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  7. I dreamt of a few strands of black hair growing out of my right toe ( outer edge), also the nail of my right toe appeared very small and dark. What does it signify?

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  8. Shagun: No one can tell you what an image in your dream means because your own mind made it up and it pertains to your life. Some people interpret hair in dreams as representing thoughts, because both hair and thoughts come out of our heads. The fact that these hairs are black and that your toenail is dark might indicate an unhappy or a dark thought. On the other hand, these images could mean something completely different for you--so write down the images and under them list what they make you think of. That would be the best way to come up with what the dream images mean in your case. Read the blog's welcome post for advice on looking at and understanding your dreams.

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  9. I dreamt that an old friend was growing roots from her leg and arms and she was blaming me she showed me the roots and pulled one out easily and continued to tell me it was my fault she was like this

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  10. I dreamt that an old friend was growing roots from her arms and legs and kept blaming me for it saying that I’m the reason this is happening to her as she showed me her pulling a root out ofher leg easily what does that mean?

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  11. If it were my dream, I'd look at two aspects of the dream to start. First I'd think about the old friend. Is this an actual person? What is your relationship to her? How do you feel about her? How would you describe her to someone else? Second, I'd look at the dream's word-play. You say she is an "old" friend, so is she somehow connected to your ethnic or cultural roots? Or is she an old part of you that is "rooted" in your past, perhaps making it difficult for you to move forward in waking life?

    As the dreamer, you are the only one who can know what your dream means. This site has lots of information on how you can go about deciphering your dream's meaning--read "Welcome to the Daily Dreamer" to get started. http://youngandjung.blogspot.com/2017/01/welcome-to-daily-dreamer.html.

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  12. Hi, few weeks back I had a dream which really got stuck on my mind. I kept thinking about it for days. And today it popped up to my head again and "bothered" me so much that decided to search the internet. So here I am. The dream, I was sitting in some empty space and the ground was some kind of hard, rocky material. I looked at my (bare)feet and there were roots growing out. I pulled them out but it didn't really hurt. Then this part, that really creeps me out, in my dream there were also a blonde woman, (who actually in real-life is friend of mine. At younger age we used to be super close but sadly time separated us.) watching and somehow approving what I was doing. Wonder what this might mean. And I almost skipped a beat when I found your post and red all the comments.

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  13. In my dream I pulled a toe nail with roots that looked like branches of a tree and felt such a relief. I was happy that finally the nail came off .

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  14. Incredible how strangers can have the same weird dreams. I had exactly the same dream as Anonymous, I had sprouting tiny clover plants all over my bare foot and I remember that I was surprised and started pulling them out, they came out easily with no pain but I was able to feel it. I had this dream 2 times in the same week. That was confusing.

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    1. As you can see, Eyra, many have had, or can relate to, the dream you had. I hope yours means that everything's coming up clover for you!

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  15. If it were my dream I'd ask myself if there is something in my background that I'd like to be free of.

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  16. I had a short dream that when I looked down to my right ankle each side lush hemp leaves were growing out unfolding. weird dream but felt nice.

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  17. I was napping and dreamt I was pulling flowers out the heel of my feet... it didn't hurt but they just kept coming out all the way to the bulb

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  18. I dreamt that I noticed a green plant coming out of the bottom of my foot. It turned out to be an onion plant and my cousin had to stretch my foot skin and scoop out an onion the size of a softball from my foot. It didn’t hurt and there was no blood.

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