John: So in this dream, I am getting information as to why I cannot stay in the subtle aspects of things. It causes me to question: What is there in my nature that keeps jumping out of the subtle? What is there about your nature that keeps you yearning and pulling closer to the subtle? Even that is in there. Of course, both approaches are different parts of me.
In this dream, I am on my way somewhere, and at the last minute I see a product that I had purchased once before. The previous one I purchased was a size medium. I’m thinking that this product is sort of hard to get, so I want to take one even though the available size is a large.
The product is something that you put on or wear. The fabric of the large size seems a little stronger. The price is right – it’s only $14. Even though I would prefer a medium, the ones here are all large – there are a whole bunch of large sizes.
I’m thinking that the large is going to be stronger and I pick it up to take with me, but I feel that I am in a hurry to get somewhere – like I have to catch an airplane or something. I think to myself that I will take it now and have to pay for it later.
As I indicate this intention to pay for it later to a person I am with, I get the sense that it suddenly feels as if I’m taking something – like I’m shoplifting. Part of me does feel justified, though, because I’m in a rush.
The person that I’m with says, “Whatever you want to do.” By their saying that, it causes me to feel that I don’t want to leave that impression, with them wondering about my real intentions – am I going to pay for it or not?
So I begin to wonder: Am I going to be forgetful about coming back to pay? Is this going to cause me to be delinquent in my debt? Ultimately, I put the item back saying, “There are a lot of them here, I can get it later.”
So what this dream is showing is how I’m always acting as if I’m missing out on something. Is that because I’m always hearing the subtlety of something more – that there’s more to get?
I think it works like that. On a very subtle level I sense that there is something more, and my response is to do something defiant in the pursuit of that “more,” even though I may not fully understand what that more is.
Yet in this scenario, I can feel that my pursuit of it will throw me off the course I am on. I can’t feel sure that I am going to do the right thing and come back and pay. In the end I don’t do it – somehow it feels not worth the risk.
In doing that, I prevent myself from being thrown off-course. We can see in the dream that I’m going somewhere – I’m en route. So the image of this product is a detour and a distraction from where I’m heading.
When I allow myself to veer off course like that it discombobulates me. I lose my ability to hold and carry this subtle quality of spaciousness that I had been connected with. By trying to get more, I lose what I have.
It’s like Aesop’s fable of The Dog and its Reflection. The dog is running along with a bone in its mouth and, upon passing a pool of water, sees “another dog” with a bone in its mouth.
The dog feels he has to have that “bone” too, even though it doesn’t really exist – it’s just a reflection. In his attempt to bark at the other dog, the bone he has in his mouth falls out. So in pursuing the more, he ends up with nothing.
