Status (Quo?)

The Dream: A dream that featured one of  my mother's relatives, her brother's son. In some way I felt I had to prove myself, that I was seen as inferior.

Interpretation: At first I thought this dream was about an envy rooted in an old family rivalry that has refused to die. The older relative in the dream is wealthy and accomplished. My ridiculous and unworthy feeling, considering the ill health he has endured, springs from the poisonous soil of my youth and my poor mother's resentment that her husband was not as successful as this fellow. In the dream I feel inferior to his son who has screwed up in just about every way, and that's interesting because I don't—who could?

When I looked at the image I drew to illustrate the dream, I realized it gave me a different answer. The exotic flowers had their own kind of life force and beauty. The caption asked, “What grows from the poisoned soil?” and answered, “Everything.” The rivalries we have push us forward, compel us to do better, to be more, than we otherwise might. The confusion of our own worthy and unworthy feelings, if we can look at them honestly, makes us more empathetic. Our dark side gives us depth. So what springs from the poisonous soil of our earthly life? The things that make us human, for better and for worse.

Dueling Pools

While our dreams often reflect the current events in our lives, they can show us that our reactions to these events are linked by a long chain to events and opinions we picked up long ago. Sometimes these dreams are little gifts, because they enable us to realize we don’t have to hang on to ineffective ways of thinking and feeling.

The Dream: My cousin Judy and I embrace. She feels small and delicate, and I feel tenderness toward her. We have a desire for closeness, for an end to the suspicion and rivalry that we inherited from our parents. I invite her to visit. I think she doesn’t know what a beautiful, resort-like place we have here in California, so I say, “You can swim in the pool.” Then I see the plans she and her husband have made for their back garden. The plantings are marked on the plan, as is a rectangular, heated swimming pool. I feel one-upped, but I say to myself, as if just realizing it, “My pool is heated, too.”

Interpretation: Here I am dealing with feelings of inadequacy left over from childhood. The dream tells me that the reason for my uncomfortable competitive streak is still living in the unconscious (the pool). According to Jung, a square represents wholeness and balance. The rectangular shape of the pool in the dream indicates I’m not seeing the whole picture: one dimension is askew. In the dream I begin to see my cousin as a human being, rather than a competitor; despite her apparent superiority, she needs care and careful handling. By bringing my unacknowledged envy to consciousness I can realize that what I have is just fine. (“My pool is heated, too.”)