OVERVIEW INTERPRETATION
Hi Patsy,
A sarcophagus is a stone coffin, a memorial to someone who has died, so it represents death but at the same time it immortalises the life that has passed, especially when the form of the person who has died is sculpted onto the lid for all to see.
You mention that you are a sculptor and that you sculpt the female form, so the sarcophagus may have extra meaning for you. Do you work in stone? When you consider a stone or material you wish to sculpture, do you ‘see’ the form hidden in the stone, waiting for you to carve it into life?
Death in dreams usually symbolises the death of something within the dreamer, and this is often a good thing. To welcome change for the better into our lives, we need to let certain attitudes and beliefs die, so that new ones can be born. Sometimes our dreams alert us to premature or inappropriate deaths (of beliefs), but when birth or transformation follows positively in the dream the necessity for death is confirmed.
Your dream includes symbols of birth and transformation: the plain girl was transformed by her apparent death, becoming beautiful and the husband, who “rose again,” was transformed by his “independent discovery of his own path”.
Where, in your life, do things seem to be coming to an end? Your dream has offered you a symbol from your life as a sculptor, reminding you that beauty and life can be ‘born’ from plain, dead stone. In what way can you look at what seems to be ending in your life and “plainly see” (as you said in your dream) an inner beauty about to step forward? When the plain woman submitted to an ending (symbolically, laying on the sarcophagus) she also became naked. Naked, in a dream, often reflects the true self, no hiding behind clothes or cover-ups.
It’s interesting that you could “plainly see” her when she was naked. If you allowed yourself to let go (let die) certain cover-up attitudes and get in touch more with your true self, you would perhaps “plainly see” your own inner beauty more clearly.
You likened her naked and beautiful forms to your sculptures. Do your sculptures express element of your true self more plainly than you do?
The woman “absorbed” the stone. What ending are you absorbing, really taking in, understanding – what is becoming more plainly seen?
In touch with her true self and seeing more clearly, the woman reveals her sadness, perhaps a sadness she had kept covered until now. Have you been covering up a sadness and have you now let that cover-up die, being more prepared to admit your sadness? Are some of your sculptured women sad?
Her sadness is that she would passionately love her husband to fight for her (go to war), perhaps to defend her in some way, or to fight her battles for her, but he refuses. War, in dreams, often represents inner conflict that needs resolving. Have you felt abandoned, conflicted with no-one, not even yourself, to fight your battles for you, to resolve what needs to be resolved, to fight for your rights, to defend your way of being? Which of these war metaphors describes how you have been feeling?
So, the first thing your dream suggests is that you are ready to let go of covering up your disappointment and sadness over an unresolved inner conflict, and you’re ready to stand up (as the woman did: she “stood up”) and declare the fact.
It’s at the point of admitting one’s true feelings to oneself that transformation really begins, and this is shown in your dream. At the point where the woman tells it like it is, her husband submitted to a death of old beliefs and was reborn with a new attitude. Her needs were about to be fulfilled.
You said her husband “rose again’, quite a biblical reference for this death-rebirth transformation. This suggests his transformation may have been more of a rising from the dead, a rediscovery of something he had ended long ago, now being resurrected.
Of course everyone in a dream represents a belief or experience of the dreamer, so the man, in this dream, is you resurrecting a belief or attitude that has been long dead. In the dream the man rose again with an “independent discovery of his own path”. Which is it that you are ready to resurrect – your independence, your long-forgotten path or your readiness to fight for yourself and solve the unresolved for yourself?
The man’s declaration didn’t come from “defeat or submission”. This is another clue: where, in your life, have you tended to respond with defeat and submission? Identify that situation or that relationship: you can transform it through applying the insights you have gained in contemplating this dream.
By combining the reference to resurrection with the symbolism of a sarcophagus as a memorial, somehow immortalising what has died, your dream does seem to be more about resurrecting what has felt dead for a long time. Even so, it’s only by letting more recent attitudes or beliefs die that you can clear that space to resurrect the passion that you had left behind.
You will find it helpful to read ‘Death and murder’ in Dream Alchemy, pages 283-88.
DREAM ALCHEMY PRACTICE
Artwork:
As you are an artist I have suggested an artwork dream alchemy practice. A stone sculpture would take too long, so I suggest planning a sculpture on paper, visualising it, perhaps sculpting it in clay, to resonate with the dream.
The title of your sculpture is ‘My own path’.
Important:
Do your artwork dream alchemy practice alone. This is your contemplation time. Exploring your feelings as you do your artwork is an important part of the alchemy.
How does this work?
By working with dream elements and symbols in art form you are communicating with your unconscious mind in its own language to create change, to explore your feelings or to resolve past issues.
More details on Artwork as a Dream Alchemy Practice in: “Dream Alchemy”, by Jane Teresa Anderson, pages 333-4.
Jane Teresa Anderson
You can consult with Jane Teresa or her Dream Team and receive your interpretation by email within five working days.
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