Wall

Codes of behaviour, belief systems, attitudes – often unconscious – you live within, or are protected by; the boundaries of behaviour or thought you keep within, are fearful of extending beyond, or are trapped by – thereby what one feels to be barriers or restrictions.

Ones feelings of confidence which protect against anxiety or social ‘knocks’. So fear that keeps you limited in your activities.

The feelings or attitudes you keep people away with – the walls we put up between us to maintain privacy, stop being hurt, or to maintain a role or status. Or a special feeling situation which you have created, such as developing a sense of ones own value.

The ‘reality’ we have accepted as the truth, either given us ready made by our culture, or one we have built personally. This reality is like walls we live within. See: the first example under death in archetypes. The example describes powerfully the breaking open of the ‘walls’ of reality to reveal another sort of reality.

Repairing wall: Considering that the wall suggests either a protective shield or a separation or boundary of some sort, repairing the wall indicates the strengthening of the way you meet the impacts of life or other people, or strengthening the boundaries between you and others.

Wall of prison or trap: Fear; pain; ignorance; prejudice; anger; sense of being an outsider; family attitudes or responsibilities one feels restrained or trapped by.

Idioms: Drive somebody up the wall; go to the wall; writing on the wall; back to the wall; head against a brick wall; fly on the wall. See: fence; wall under house.

Example: ‘I went to the top of the turret and saw all the men getting ready to defend the castle if attacked. They had arrows and a lot of men were standing on little ledges on the outside of the wall, with no protection and I knew they were very brave to face an attack as sooner or later they would have been hit.’ Anna R.

Here the wall is obviously to do with defending the dreamer against attack. Such a wall might be made out of our aggressive feelings, with religious dogma which might defend us against fears and uncertainty, or from tightly controlled behaviour and emotions. See: Fence.