Susan, whose daughter has recently divorced, contributed this dream.
The Dream: I am in the back garden with James (my daughter's ex-husband). I remember there was a time when I asked him to fix a broken tooth, and he looked into my mouth. This memory leaves me feeling exposed and uncomfortable. We have a conversation, and as it goes on my anger at him lessens. In some way I forgive him for the mess he made of my daughter's marriage. A sort of peace prevails, with a feeling also of sadness and loss.
Carla's thoughts: If this were my dream, the broken tooth would symbolize the broken relationship. My son-in-law's looking into my mouth represents a level of trust that he has betrayed by the way he treated my daughter. I'm now embarrassed that I allowed him into my life and into the close circle of my family. Yet the dream shows me that I will not hang onto these negative feelings. I acknowledge my sadness and the sense of loss that I feel because this relationship failed, and in recognizing these feelings I can begin to get past my anger and forgive him.
I have been trying to articulate what comes to me with this rather unusual dream. I like that it is in a garden setting, a place of relaxation and beauty. A wonderful place to reconcile. And, being that it is around Easter time when this was posted (the day after) I think of the Garden of Gethsemane. James is the name of the one the apostles who slept when Jesus had asked them to be attentive to him. Perhaps a similar feeling evolved in regards to the waking James - he was not attentive to his marriage. The dream doesn't state whether James fixed this broken tooth in the dream, but there is, again, a metaphor for me to Christ's healing. It took me a long time to realized that Christ didn't heal just physically, but also emotionally and spiritually. Somehow the broken tooth is my broken self, the part that is hard and doesn't want to forgive. Yet this is what my dream is showing me is happening to me. My anger lessons, a peace prevails, and I can experience sadness and loss. I've lost the anger and have grown in compassion.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Emily, for pointing out the interesting tie-in to Easter and to spiritual healing and compassion.
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