Tag: journey back to god

Clearing Space for the Future

~ d2k ~ Leave a comment

John:  As my dream starts off, I’m in an area where I see a lot of trails cut through after a snowstorm. It took a lot of work to do this – it’s a monumental feat.

I’m in a campus area and there are a few buildings and then a huge open area in the middle. There are sidewalks that go this way and that under the snow, leading to the various buildings.

Everyone is basically asleep or unaware of what has happened in the night. These trails had to be opened up because come morning people have to move about. The shoveling has already been done, so most people don’t pay any attention to it; they take it for granted.

In looking at this, I’m impressed. They trails may be narrow, just a shovel pushed along the sidewalk and a pathway opened up, but it’s enough to walk on. It’s not like the whole sidewalk is exposed. So there’s still a need to widen and groom the pathways.

Henry is the man who got up early and did all this. Now Henry’s attention has switched to doing something that’s very time consuming: he’s clearing the open area in the center, which will add a more comfortable feel and people can actually hang out. It adds a spatial ambiance, a type of light, to the place so it’s not just cut up into trails.

To do this is very time consuming, and it’s not readily appreciated because the immediate need is to go from one place to another, quickly.

I notice a number of women in the courtyard, and I see them criticizing how the job’s been done. They’re critical of Henry because they don’t see him doing much, but they seem to appreciate my service as I’m further grooming the trails, clearing the snow all the way to the edges. This makes it easier for people to pass back and forth, but not necessarily to hang out in an overall ambiance.

People weren’t up and around to see what Henry did – they were asleep – so what they see him doing now seems a waste of time. They ignore him and invite me to join them for tea.

Before I do, I have a responsibility to quickly finish grooming the sidewalk. But I’m a little confused about joining them because they’re critical of Henry who did the initial trailblazing.

They have their opinion of what needs to be, and because they’re in a position of authority, they may even want to fire Henry. I find myself caught in the overwhelming energy projected by these women, collectively, in which they’re dismissing what Henry has done. And they can’t appreciate what he’s trying to do right now because it’s slow, time consuming, and it doesn’t fall within the immediate needs.

Did you figure out the meaning of this?

Jeane: No, I never figure it out!

John: The uneasiness I feel, and I’m beating myself up about it, arises when I try to sort out the value of the big picture. In other words, that’s what Henry was working on, creating an ambience where all the trails come together.

That wouldn’t be possible if there hadn’t been the necessary trailblazing at the beginning. So the trailblazing is done, and what’s currently needed is the grooming, which I’m doing. So the trailblazing is a thing of the past, the grooming is what’s occurring now, but, what about the bigger picture?

No one wants to pay attention to the bigger picture. It’s as if, when you deal with the bigger picture, you disappear.

I was focused on grooming the trails to be more serviceable, and that’s what’s noticed and appreciated, because that’s the short-term need. Yet I recognize and value the process of trailblazing, and also can appreciate the aspect of focusing on the overall.

Those in power don’t recognize the need to accommodate the overall, and I may not have the sight to know where Henry’s process is leading. It’s not like I can try to say anything, because deep down I’m not sure what’s the best use of Henry’s time.

It’s such a different level of need when you’re dealing with the overall, how do you know? What’s required isn’t as readily apparent.

The reason for the dream is that I’m sorting out, within, how to take on the need in all its aspects. I can see that the first step has been done, and that’s the trailblazing.

Then comes the part that’s now at hand, which is the grooming of the trail and I’m involved in that. But Henry has moved on to the bigger picture – he’s moved on from everyone else. A huge gap seems to exist in the collective consciousness, and I noticed that Henry became more invisible, in terms of the whole, with his focus on the bigger picture and its overall ambience.

In other words, he’s becoming more and more isolated, by carrying that sense of the overall from a depth inside him, which is becoming subtler and subtler in terms of whether others can appreciate it.

In a way, this dream captures the arc of spiritual history. The great writings and teachings exist from those who have done the trailblazing in human history. What is called for at present is a refining and an updating of those understandings in the way we live our lives. But at the same time, the overall must be considered, and the future must be considered, and incorporated. Yet there is resistance from the “powers that be” who only have a short-term view.

Said another way, we must let go of the past, act in the present (awaken), and be open to the future. It’s a process of integrating ourselves with everything. And it’s what’s required of the human, as a response, in these times.

Where the Future Lies

~ d2k ~ Leave a comment

John: Picking up from where we left off yesterday (see Holding It Together), my dream shows how easily we can get lost in some pattern from the past that has no current meaning or usefulness for us.

In the dream, I’m returning to high school.

I’m apparently an older student, but I’ve decided that I don’t necessarily want to return like I’m an old fogey, or someone who acts like they’ve got it all figured out, because there’s something stale or stagnant about that. I know that every time I return to school after being away for a while, it’s going to have a different sense about it. There’s going to be a shift.

So what I do is go through the introductory part of the orientation, to get the feel of how this will affect me or how things have changed. Time has gone by and it might be slightly different in terms of how I take it in.

After doing that I go back through the door to where the new class of freshmen are. Of course, they’ve never been to high school before so they are full of anticipation as to how it’s going to be. There’s a certain excitement in the expectation and, as a consequence, there’s nothing that limits the potential – and I find that refreshing.

In fact, it doesn’t have any parameters around it, where it’s taken for granted in some sense because everything has already been figured out and put in its place. It’s a pleasure to be with something that exudes like this.

To help things along, because I do have a little understanding, I go through the door first as if I’m kind of clearing the way. On the other side I see the upperclassmen that I know, and I’ve known them a lot longer than I’ve known the freshmen.

I hear their voices and recognize people, but I’m holding back so that I don’t get pulled in to talk with them because my whole sense is that they feel stale and reserved and are just going through the motions in their return.

In other words, it doesn’t have the same level of excitement. It’s kind of a lackluster state, so I hang back and wait for the freshmen who are right behind me to come through because they’re more exciting and alive to be with and joyful and so on.

As I’m there, I’m pondering if it’s going to make sense to introduce the freshmen to the upperclassmen, or will the older guys be too stuck up to respect the exuberance and excitement of the freshmen?

What happens is that I wake up noting that I’m hanging back, waiting. I don’t want to be seen or recognized or pulled into the realm of the upperclassmen. I’m waiting for the freshmen to come through, and pondering if I can integrate their enthusiasm into an atmosphere to enliven it, or will the blandness of the familiar that the upperclassmen carry repress the fresh and eager anticipation of embracing life?

I’m familiar with the ways of the heart, with its euphoria for life, but also the way that other things can just go along with a process, putting in time in a lackluster way. So I look to that which is now and alive as if this is where the future lies.

The reason for this dream is to get me to shift from a way of life I know too well, I’m too familiar with, and is too predictable and, therefore, shut off from an aliveness that’s quickened, innocent, and teeming with excitement. Such freshness is actually infectious if I’m able to catch it and it’s able to make a difference with its euphoria in ways that I find interesting and touching.

This way of being has not yet been beaten up by life and needs to be guided in such a way that it doesn’t lose its flair. My concern is that this wonderful quality will get worn down into a pattern that is again lifeless. That would be sad.

In the past this sort of thing has been inevitable; can it be different this time?

Not Taking the Bait

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Jeane: In my dream it feels like I’ve had someone imprisoned in a hospital for something they did. I’m pretty sure it’s a woman, but sometimes I seem to think about them as a man, so I’m not positive on that part.

Some time has passed, and now another man and I are going to the hospital; we’re going to smuggle this person out and break them free. This will probably be as much a surprise to the person in the hospital as it would be if the hospital staff discovered that we’re the ones doing it.

So we have to distract the staff and smuggle the person out. I get them in my car and then I have to decide whether to have them hide, or maybe cut their hair short, so if it’s a woman she can now be disguised as a man until we can get past any roadblocks.

I’m trying to go through different scenarios of how best to keep hidden. Then we drive off.

I have the impression that one of the reasons I can break this person free now is that my children have all grown up. So it feels safe to let this person out or to break them out. There’s also some kind of intense dialogue I seem to have with them now.

John: The theme of the dreaming last night has to do with having to hold onto some sort of overall inner balance, in relationship to being confronted with things that are overwhelming, in terms of the use of energy, in the outer.

What you did was start with a general, overall vibration in terms of how you felt things. Then you took and added to that. There’s a certain overallness to an energy from within, which you hold inside. You’re in a physical body and you’re able to direct that energy in particular ways, and when you do direct it in some specific way you can, when coming from the center, have a lot of energy . And you can do it in a free way – providing you hold onto the understanding that it comes from.

The energy you’re working with is an energy that’s at the essence of your being, or is from the inner, so when you’re having this dream, in terms of you taking and now applying this energy in some specific outer way, what you’re doing is weighing the degree to which this foray takes something away from how you feel yourself connected in an overall context.

And you find you’re able to do that because something about you has grown up (the children), or has gotten to the point where you can sustain the energy that you feel within, without losing it. Ordinarily when you take energy and cycle it and funnel it into some outer capacity, it faces a lot of resistance from you, in the form of personal or psychological indulgences. So the degree to which you personally indulge, is the degree to which you do harm to yourself in terms of maintaining this inner space.

You have this dream in which you’re trying to see if you truly are free, if you truly have let go. In other words, can you deal with a huge challenge, from an outer context point-of-view, that you’ve decided to take on, to see if you can effect a change in it or break something free?

And, can you do this without contaminating yourself, or without contaminating the inner space? A part of you is saying yes you can, because something has grown up. However, you’re not sure, so what’s facing you is presented as a dream, with the potential to be caught, or not break free.

So what you’re doing when you have a dream like this is you’re weighing the forces inside you that are personal versus impersonal, or that are totally free or in a nothingness or an emptiness, versus still having some sort of involvement in an outer capacity, reflective way.

In doing this you’re recognizing the degree to which that kind of lack of independence, in terms of letting go, will actually distort or hurt you.

An example of what that’s like is when the American Idol judge Steven Tyler commented to one of the participants that her biggest challenge was in accepting herself. He felt that this comes with time and that eventually she would get to the point where she could just think, “I don’t give a shit.”

Using that language, and many other mannerisms, is Steven Tyler’s way of showing that he’s beyond what other people think; he’s not limited by what other people project on him, or how they try to define him. So he stays true to his core. He said to the participant that she may not have that quality and freedom now, but she’ll get that. Eventually it will come to her.

That’s kind of how this dream is. You have this huge energetic opening up – can you process it in a way that doesn’t compromise it, or inject some limiting personal, self-image problem, in relation to what you’re experiencing inside and what you’re dealing with on the outside?

The dream is a testing ground, presenting a situation to see if you can take and truly bring inner into outer. Because if you just take the bait of whatever life throws at you, feeling that you have to confront it and deal with it in some separate capacity, then you really haven’t found, using the words of Steven Tyler, the spiritual version of that “I-don’t-give-a-shit” mannerism inside you. That place that’s totally free, empty, and in a nothingness.