Life and Death

Today's sample dream deals with the dreamer's search for her spiritual self.
The Dream: I'm with my husband Clark, and we are going to do some diving near an old-fashioned bridge in search of an answer to a naturalist's question. We are studying a butterfly. We are en route to the venue when Clark stops abruptly near a pond. He jumps out of the car with a butterfly net and catches a couple of very beautiful red and black butterflies, mating. These aren't the butterflies we were meant to study, and while I am thrilled to have an opportunity to see them close up I say, “You know we'll have to return them to the spot where we picked them up?” They will need a very specific habitat to survive. I'm concerned that those who see us will think we are harming the creatures; I want them to understand our higher, scientific purpose.

Interpretation: In this dream, I dive into the Unconscious (the water). The bridge tells me that the dream is dealing with a transitional state, I'm going to a new place. The naturalist and the butterfly are a tip off that this dream is about understanding my physical being (what the naturalist studies) and its relationship to my spiritual being (the butterfly, an ancient symbol of the soul). We have found two of these creatures, and they are mating. Finding two emphasizes the symbol's importance, and mating implies a rebirth or regeneration.

When I find my soul,  it's not the one I expected, and it isn't where I expected it to be. The dream tells me I need to carefully handle this newly discovered part of myself.  (It needs a very specific habitat to survive.) What about my fear of social sanction?  I might want to see what's going on rationally (my scientific purpose), but I doubt that will yield an answer that others will find convincing. I understand that it's imperative for me to return what I've found to its natural habitat. Is that on this earth, I wonder?

The Butterfly and the Spider

Dream image: A beautiful butterfly, wings folded close in and almost wrapped around it like a cocoon, is caught in a spider's web. I am upset and scream for Clark.

Interpretation: Clark spoke to his mother's doctor, who said she is near death. I think of my mother (now deceased) and my mother-in-law (near death) as the beautiful young women they once were and am forced to see the results of Chronos (Time) eating his children. It's hard to accept the selfishness of the Life Force and the ultimate tragedy of we who are enlisted to serve it. It's something like a beautiful butterfly caught in a spider's web.

Guest Dream: Killing Gophers

Today's guest dream has been contributed by Emily, who often adds insightful comments to my dreams.

Emily's Dream: The overall scenario is the need to kill gophers. As I walk, I come across Phil Cooper, a member of my church, who is getting frustrated with trying to kill the gophers. The gophers made perfect circles in the mounds of brown dirt surrounding Phil. He tells me they have made over 300 holes in his yard! One way to kill gophers is to use raw pork with poison in it.. I only see one or two pieces of this raw pork, and I see that Phil has put perfectly circular cuts of poison in the thickest part of the meat. I know he didn't have to use such an expensive cut of meat, but I don't have the heart to tell him this. The size of the gopher holes and the poison pieces in the meat is the same.

Shift: A woodpecker, perhaps an acorn woodpecker, except larger, is eating bugs off a tree or a wooden side of a building which my husband has sprayed with gopher poison. I worry that bird will get traces of poison in his system by eating the bugs off the area sprayed. Suddenly, the bird reaches out and grabs a swallowtail butterfly which happens to fly by. I'm surprised he was able to do this - it was as if he reached out with arms to catch it, although I don't see anything like arms on him. As I look more closely at the bird, I see is he holding the butterfly somehow, perhaps how an insect would grab something with his forelegs to hold it and eat it. I see that this bird is eating the "meaty" or "body" part of the butterfly. Its yellow wings are drooping to the sides of his body.

Carla's thoughts: In reacting to Emily's dream I'll interpret it as if it were one of my own. There are many possible meanings in this (or any) dream. I'm going to write about the one that jumped out at me.

A slang expression for someone who performs tedious, low level tasks is a “gopher.” I am tired of these sorts of tasks, and I need to get them out of my life (kill them). I have some ambivalence about freeing myself from these unwelcome duties, which fill (Phil) my time and coop (Cooper) me up. The church represents the part of me that feels these imposed tasks are the right and good thing to do; the circles represent my being circumscribed, or contained, in a place where I don't want to be. The mounds of brown earth evoke excrement: I'm tired of being in the middle of all this shit! The poison in the middle of the circles of raw (me)at tell me just how strong my feelings about this situation are, and its expensive price tells me how much this is costing me.

When the dream shifts I, in the form of a bird, am pecking at this inflexible (wooden) problem. It's certainly bugging me, to the point that my attempt to solve it (by pecking away at it) endangers me. Even in my own home (the building my husband has sprayed) there's the threat of more “go for” poison. Then the dream shows me the path of my transformation: As a bird I am a winged creature (symbolic of the soul), and I reach out and ingest yet another creature that represents the soul, a butterfly. By swallowing the swallowtail the dream tells me my personal means of transformation (taking in the spiritual) is important, and it reminds me to nurture my soul.

Butterflies

The Dream: The manzinita bush in the back garden is covered with butterfly cocoons and emerging butterflies. I look at them analytically to figure out what kind of butterflies they are. I’m a little worried about the fact that they are so plentiful.

Interpretation: Traditionally butterflies have been a symbol of transformation: the soul emerging from the body as the butterfly emerges from the cocoon. I try to understand this wonder with my intellect (analytically). When I can’t, I become uncomfortable. The unconscious is pointing out that I cannot understand everything using reason and logic.