Web

A sticky situation you feel yourself in; feeling caught up in something that might trap you; being trapped by the power of someone else’s emotions or expectations; a web of lies; the symmetry of the Self; the delicate or sometimes imperceptible but real connections linking you with other people, events and the world. This link may be supportive, or threatening as in the example; the circle of life, as with a mandala, the centre suggesting a merging back into the primal energy of life. Through this web-link one may sense what is going on in the world and in relationships. At its most fundamental level this sensing tells us whether what is happening or approaching can be eaten, or whether it will eat us. At its subtler levels we sense our connection with all of life and can find a personal place in the scheme of things. This aspect connects with the symbol of the labyrinth as the difficult journey to self discovery.

But spiders webs, as in a dusty house, show you dealing with something you have not used, or not lived for a long time. Possibly it also suggests a need to spring-clean or deal with old memories or the past.

Sometimes the web made by a spider is a cocoon, and so is protective. Often this relates to very delicate processes of change going on in us, perhaps ones which needs us to be a little withdrawn or protected from the world in order for the process to work out and mature.

Quoting from ‘Women’s Ways Of Knowing’ Basic Books. ‘Webs and nets imply opposing capacities for snaring or entrapment and for rescuing or safety. They also suggest a complexity of relationships and the delicate interrelatedness of all so that tensions and movement in one part of the system will grow to be felt in all parts of the whole. In the complexity of a web, no one position dominates over the rest. Each person – no matter how small – has some potential for power; each is always subject to the actions of others. It is hard to imagine other ways of visioning the world that offer as much potential for protection to the immature and the infirm.’

Example: I am standing in a room full of extremely thick and dusty spiders webs. I am aware these are hiding beautiful wainscot walls. I wish to pass through this room to the ones beyond, but the webs are like a maze, and certainly on the top of the web nearest to me sits a large SOLID spider. If I brush against the web the spider will fall and smother me – since it is every bit as large and solid as I am. Maria M.

This shows how quite subtle old threads of experience or feeling can link us with something that is still powerfully threatening or frightening. This could easily refer to emotions that connect us to memories of childhood trauma or the past.

See: Spider.