West

Where the sun sets – death or the end of something, so the mature period of your life. Also the physical life; down to earth self.

The Native Americans saw the West as later adulthood the time of Fall, the time of the setting sun – twilight. The daylight fades and brings a new awareness in this time of gradual change. When the darkness comes, we must look inward to find the light of understanding the makes our path in life clearer and gives courage. To understand what we see in the darkness may be real or only shadows. See: Directions. 

Directions such as East and West are the total opposite, and so are definite things in themselves. Many Westerners see the East as an exotic or mystical place, and so in dreams they use it as such. For the Eastern born, the West may be represented as a materialistic or a place of plenty and riches. A great difference I have noted between Eastern and Western people is the enormous respect Eastern people have for those with real experience – thus leader figures.

Also, for hundreds of years, due to the Christian influence, dreams have been discounted in the West. The masses and their leaders do not realize, however, that there is no substantial difference between calling the world principle male and a father (spirit), as the West does, or female and a mother (matter, kali), as the Communists and Indians do.

In ancient traditions the west indicates, especially in dreams, going to the holy place, the awareness of the inner world and even becoming consciously aware of the death state. So, a state of expanded awareness. See Darkness

For many Westerners there is a profound temptation, when the urgent call of their inner life is first felt, to leave the rational and scientific world entirely. Often they associate with an Eastern religion or guru, or try to drop their entire occidental identity. Fortunately this cannot be done in a satisfying way. The positive elements of ones own culture come knocking on the door of awareness to be included. The rational, questioning, scientific and experimental aspects of our Western identity have a great deal to offer to the unfocused, intuitive, evolutionary drive of the unconscious. Also much of the structure of our inner world is focused around the cultural symbols of Christianity and Western literature art and music. Nevertheless, because the West has entered and in some ways raped the East, it has opened itself to a cultural back flow.