The Thief

The Dream: I see a man entering apartments in an old building that closely resembles an apartment building I once lived in. He has a rectangular device somewhat bigger than a cell phone that he puts up to a locked door, and it opens immediately. I am surprised at how easy this is. I watch him open a couple of apartments this way. Then he comes to the apartment where my friends / family are having a party. As he attempts to enter I grab him, unsure about whether or not I'll be able to overcome him. I yell to the others to “Call 911!” They come to my aid, and we subdue him.

Interpretation: The phrase that came to my mind when I thought about this dream was the “thief of time.” Is the cell phone an “I” phone? Am I unlocking some old doors, and having a difficult time with what I find? The setting is dark and gloomy, the badly lit stairwell and hall of an old tenement something like my mother's Brooklyn apartment and my own apartment on 90th street in Manhattan. The intruder, Time, has gone into these places where family and friends once lived and stolen them, leaving me calling for help. Life goes on; with the help of other friends I subdue this thief, at least for a while.

Boiling Over and Leaking Out

The Dream: I'm in a rectangular studio apartment with two girls. One is my daughter; the other, an odd girl with short dark hair, is her roommate. This girl has an off-putting face and expression; something about her “doesn't get it.” She puts my glass electric kettle onto a gas burner and turns on the flame. Clark notices and rescues the pot before it's ruined. We look again and see that she's done it again. Again Clark rescues it; this time we manage to get through to her, and she finds a traditional kettle.

A ceiling leak has created a puddle on the floor. The odd girl says, “We've told Uncle Nick, but he hasn’t done a thing about it.”

I'm annoyed at her over the kettle, and this idiotic remark ratchets up my ire. I am particularly annoyed at this odd girl's assuming the level of familiarity implied by her calling my brother “uncle.” “Why would you expect Uncle Nick to do anything about it? He lives 3,000 miles away. Have you told Clark?” Then I wonder why he should fix it. “Or the landlord?” Now I feel I have the right answer, so I say it again. “Have you told the landlord?” I feel sure he wouldn't want his building ruined by a leak. The girls assure me that they have informed the landlord.

Interpretation: This odd girl is my shadow. Her closeness to me is clear: she is the roommate of my inner child (my daughter) and feels a connection—as much as I want to deny it--to my brother. While she represents a part of myself that I thoroughly dislike--the oblivious part that wants to do what she wants to do, ignoring the consequences—getting to know her through this dream is helpful. Her insistence on boiling some water tells me I need to find a safe way to let off some steam. While I don't like the demands she makes on others to fix her problems, in the dream I catch myself doing the same when I expect Clark to fix the ceiling leak.

These girls are immature parts of me. The boiling water and leaking roof refer to emotions. After a number of false starts it seems I've finally found the appropriate place to express them. It takes a while to find the right vessel for the water, the place where it can safely boil, but the odd girl ultimately uses the right kettle. The ceiling leak is more problematical. It is not fixed during the course of the dream but, on the bright side, the landlord (consciousness) has been given the heads up.

Up a Tree

The Dream: At the back of a rectangular garden bordering a park a woman is trussed up in a tree in a pose resembling a yoga back bend. The house and garden belong to me, although they have an English feeling. The event takes place on the other side of my fence so it’s not on my property, but there is some confusion about who is responsible for this patch of land adjacent to mine. The “city” claims it is the homeowner. I don’t feel it is, but my original certitude on this point is shaken by the city’s unexpected position. In any event, the girl is rescued and released from her bondage up the tree.

Interpretation: I am in a difficult position, up a tree and bending over backward to please. My Unconscious won’t let me get away with blaming others for this dilemma—it points out that the house and the garden (where I live and where I am) belong to me, even though they may feel foreign (English). The dream ego is at pains to put up a wall (fence) between me and the problem, but my own deeper wisdom (the central authority: the city) insists otherwise. When I start to see its point (I am not so certain that it’s not my responsibility), I am rescued.

Talent in a Limited Sphere

The Dream: My friend Mary and I, and a couple of others, are sitting around in an oblong room. Even though we are few in number, performers come through to entertain us. First to appear is a mixed-aged singing troupe, very young children to adult arranged in order of age, youngest to the left. Two singers catch my eye, one an adorable black boy of about five and the other a middle aged brown-haired white woman. Plain but not homely, she looks like a sweet “mother” type from the 50s. She has a lovely voice, but the group as a whole is amateurish. Other performers cycle through and we realize they hope for some sort of success or recognition, but they have a long way to go, and they aren’t getting much exposure performing for us.

Interpretation: This dream juxtaposes the young, expressive, appealing child who has no skill with the boring, not particularly appealing middle-aged woman with surprising talent. Her talent cannot develop in the limited world she inhabits. Perhaps she is past the point where her talent can develop at all. Her dark blue dress and brown hair evoke my mother: am I looking at her limited achievement in the wider world, which I (and she, no doubt) regretted? Did she want me to be “famous” as her avatar? Is this what drives me?

The presence of my friend Mary is a hint that this dream is linked to the last post  Who’s in the driver seat?

Exposed: Part 2

The Dream: I see what I perceive to be a public monument, although it is only a rectangular concrete box, sitting in a tree. I lean against the box, dislodging it so that it falls out of the tree onto the ground next to a bicycle. I check the bike, and it doesn’t seem to have been damaged. I think I should report this to someone, but instead slink guiltily away not taking the blame for what I’ve done.

Interpretation: My interaction with the public monument tells me that I am ill at ease in the social arena. First of all, I see it as monumental, a synonym for massive and weighty. It’s concrete into the bargain. Oddly, it’s sitting in a tree, a symbol of growth. It falls out of the tree, endangering the bike, a mode of transportation – my means of getting away. By leaning against the tree and dislodging the monument I have sabotaged my means of escape – but wait – the bike is not damaged.  And yet I can’t escape on it; I feel too guilty.

Why the guilt? I don’t want to accept the limitations placed on my life by the society I live in. When I dislodge these (the massive public monument) I am faced with a conundrum which leaves me unable to go forward. If I reject these limitations, I am a traitor: I reject my mother’s life and, by association, my mother.

The Chocolate Mondrian

The Dream: I see a rectangle, on its side, a beautiful chocolate brown color, with a smaller off-center square superimposed in a salmon or reddish color, and some cinnamon-color stripes. Mondrian comes to mind: a geometric sort of art, but with colors very different from his. The image also reminds me of a wrapped present. I think it is very beautiful.

Interpretation: Looking at this image in Jung’s terms, I see the rectangle as what he called the Self: in other words, as the totality of my potential being. The square represents the part of the Self that is conscious. The cinnamon stripes, one of which intrudes into consciousness, are gateways allowing unconscious material to come to consciousness.

The Next Step

I was completely stumped by this dream, but when my friend Beth heard it she knew exactly what it meant.

The Dream: There is a pattern on the floor made of oval-edged shapes. One motif to the right looks like a flower; the others are amorphous. The overall shape is a rectangle. I stand in front of this as if in a Step class and I do a step-like routine. I must place my foot on each of these shapes in a certain sequence. I do it perfectly.
Later I am called upon to do this again, and I find I have completely forgotten the routine. I stare blankly at the pattern on the floor and try to remember it. Someone wants to make a video of the step routine I can’t remember. I’m afraid it will be pornographic.

Interpretation: Beth pointed out that this dream is about performance anxiety. There is a progression of “freezing up,” revealed by my reaction to three different levels of scrutiny:

• Level 1 No Scrutiny: I’m perfect when I’m working on my own, with no one to observe.
• Level 2 Some Scrutiny: Someone asks me to do something and I choke.
• Level 3 Invasive Scrutiny: Someone wants to video my performance, and it feels like pornography.

Animal Instinct

      
When your dreams reward you with an encouraging symbol on one night, you can be pretty sure they’ll throw you a challenge the next.

The Dream: I’m running around a group of buildings at a campground. The buildings form a rectangle surrounded by a covered porch with a wood floor. A tribe of nearby apes seems very human in its social organization and behavior, but nevertheless its proximity is frightening. I am both intrigued by and leery of the apes.

Interpretation: A couple of symbols stand out here. Jung talks about the temenos, which is a contained space in which transformation can take place. In this dream I’m not inside the space, but running around its perimeter. Now that I’ve made peace with my inner child, my next challenge is to integrate my inner ape: my natural, impulsive, and uncivilized inclinations.

This doesn’t mean that these inclinations should lead me or be given free reign—on the contrary. It means I need to be aware that I have these inclinations. I’m probably on my way toward accepting this part of myself, even though I’m frightened, since one of my reactions to the apes (to be intrigued) is not wholly negative.

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.”)

Playing in the Pool

“Father” appears again in this dream, cutting short a playful splash in the unconscious.
The Dream: I’m playing in the pool with some kids. We are all young girls. The setting is the pool of the house I live in. We are playing with the water in such a way that we’ve sent up a spray of water in a rectangular shape. Then we notice that “dad” is spying on us, looking out from the upstairs bedroom window. We’ve made too much noise and awakened him.

Interpretation: Playing in a pool (the unconscious) with some kids. That I’m dealing with children—as opposed to adults—tells me the psychic elements that have been activated are connected to a part of me that’s not fully formed. There’s a playful element: I’m splashing about in this unconscious material, perhaps not taking it as seriously as I should. To create a safe zone these children send up what Jung calls a temenos with their rectangular spray of water. A temenos, often represented by a square, is a sacred place where transformation can occur. This splashing about in the unconscious displeases the “father,” representative of a rigid kind of thinking and morality, who awakens.

Not Ready to Take the Plunge

As you work with your dreams, you might find they comment on the process of working with dreams—in other words, with the process of beginning to understand normally unconscious material.

The Dream: I’m at the gym, but it looks like a hotel room. I’m with my mother, and we have stopped in to have a bath. My mother bathes first, in a small bathroom with a shower curtained tub and a toilet. When I am ready for my turn, I notice she has left many towels rolled up in the tub. I start to remove them, looking for a place to put them. I run out of room and patience when I spot a beige and brown granite tub in the bedroom. It is rectangular in shape and shallow. I wonder if it’s clean. When I am ready to get in, the tub disappears.

Interpretation: This dream is about working out (I’m in the gym) a way to access unconscious material. While the action takes place in the gym it looks like a hotel, a temporary residence, hinting that I’m neither here nor there. We have come to this place to bathe: going into water symbolizes immersion into the unconscious. Even though I thought I was ready for the experience, difficulties show me I’m not.  First, my internalized “mother” places so many obstacles in the tub that I give up trying to remove them. Then I move on to the bedroom, where a font-like tub appears. Would immersion here be a sort of baptism into the realm of the unconscious? I’m not comfortable with this tub, finding it unclean, and it doesn’t trust me either: it disappears at the moment I’ve overcome my resistance to it.