Exhibit Forty-Nine: 1st August 2002. Photo by Michael Collins
'Lines'
Feeling The Picture
Your feeling reactions to a dream are keys to its interpretation. These are my feelings. If this were a scene in your dream or life, how would you feel about being there?
I feel as if I am seeing something for the first time. Here I have been, knowing only the dark shapes in front of me as I nestle safely inside this sleepy space, yet now the light shines to show the other side of each shape - like faces reflected in a mirror of white light. I feel awakened. I feel a perceptual shift. I feel welcomed into a new world.
The Symbols
Symbols in your dreams often relate to your personal memories and associations, so always consider those first. Then let your mind play with other, more general possibilities. They will not all apply! Just open your mind and notice where the symbol seems to fit and make sense of the rest of your dream.
Ah, but what are these symbols? To look at symbolic meaning you first need to define what YOU see. How would you describe these shapes? Are they chess pieces lined up and facing each other? Are they soldiers emerging from a rainy mist in battle, in peace or in homecoming? Or is this a picket fence sharply shadowed onto a wall? Are they bullets moving along a conveyor belt? Or pottery ornaments lined up in a shop window, strangely evocative of the shape of the wrought iron palings outside?
If you see chess pieces or soldiers in this image then you might like to explore strategies or conflicts as the possible theme of your dream. If you see fences you might like to consider issues of personal barriers, territories or defence.
Perhaps the most obvious things about this image are that it lacks colour and that it evokes a shadowing, mirroring or doubling effect. There is a contrast between the darkness of the foreground and the bright light spilling through from the top left hand corner.
If a dream lacks colour ask yourself what lacks (emotional) colour in your life. Dreams in sharp black and white contrast may symbolise black and white thinking. Shades of grey may symbolise a more encompassing view (blending between the two extremes) or may suggest depression (lack of colour). Dark black may symbolise the unconscious (what is not seen), and light can symbolise the way "light dawns" as you become consciously aware of something previously hidden from you. For example, you may see the light in this image as revealing the faces of the dark shapes in a mirror. Or you may perceive the source of the light as coming from the foreground, throwing shadows and reflected light on the wall in front of the shapes. What shadows are coming to light in your life and what might you learn about yourself from these?
If your dream image remains puzzling, it may simply symbolise "puzzling". As new beliefs and ways of seeing the world emerge they can seem very puzzling at first. We puzzle over our new place in the world, blinking, waiting for full comprehension to shift into definition and recognition.
The Questions
Here are some questions the dreamer of such a dream picture might ask to work towards a complete understanding of the dream.
Try these yourself: just give your 'gut reaction' answers to the questions - your answers will surprise you in the insights they deliver. The key thing to remember is, "Don't THINK about your answers - give quick gut reaction replies". Your unconscious will deliver.
If this process can work powerfully for this image, consider how infinitely more powerful the insights are when the image comes from one of your own dreams - direct from your unconscious!
- Imagine standing in this image. What is the temperature?
- What season is this?
- If you were to walk into this image, starting in the foreground and walking towards the grey shapes, how much further could you walk?
- What is beyond the grey shapes?
- How do you feel as you contemplate this journey?
- Now imagine walking in the other direction, starting in the foreground and walking away from the black shapes. How much further could you walk?
- What is beyond or behind the black shapes?
- How do you feel as you contemplate this journey?
- Look to the left. How far does the line continue?
- Look to the right. How far does the line continue?
- In imagining moving about through and beyond this image, where is the most comfortable place?
- Where is the most uncomfortable place?
- Put yourself in the comfortable place (Q11) and look over at the uncomfortable place (Q12). What do you see and how do you feel about the uncomfortable place from this point of view?
- Now put yourself in the uncomfortable place (Q12) and look over at the comfortable place (Q11). What do you see and how do you feel about the comfortable place from this point of view?
- Look at your answer to Q11. In your waking life, what situation reminds you of this same level of comfort?
- Look at your answer to Q12. In your waking life, what situation reminds you of this same level of discomfort?
- Think about your uncomfortable waking life situation (your answer to Q16). What can you learn from your answer to Q13 about your uncomfortable waking life situation and how to handle it?
- Think about your comfortable waking life situation (your answer to Q15). What can you learn from your answer to Q14 about your comfortable waking life situation and why you enjoy being there?
- Can you see a link between your comfortable and your uncomfortable waking life situations? What is the link?
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