Earthquake

Usually involves feeling of fear or insecurity. The loss of confidence in things that have always been stable or dependable in the past – this includes things such as a relationship, your personality structure, health, etc; so the breakdown of opinions, attitudes or relationships which seemed so dependable and you have taken for granted.

An earthquake, like a tsunami, are the result of deep natural processes taking place in the earth. But as human beings, most of us live as if we are somehow not a part of nature or the earth.  Yet we are products of natural processes and our conscious self if a tiny little bit of consciousness largely cut off from its deeps.

These deeps are shown in dreams are often depict earthquakes, floods, huge waves and floods that take place in our own nature as creatures of the earth. They depict huge changes that are taking place within us, for each of us are immersed in a ‘river’ of constant change. If you think about it you have been carried, pushed, impelled by this current as you were moved through babyhood, childhood, teenage and adulthood, and there are more stages of growth beyond adulthood. And as we passed through these changes we died to our old self in order to change to the new. It is the current of Life. This current then carries us on through old age and through the gates of death. All the time we are faced by decisions, and each decision directs us on a different path, helping to create our future. And this is a force of growth and change.

So it may also show great inner change and growth that makes you feel uncertain of your ‘ground’. The growth from youth to puberty may be felt as an earthquake, as also maturity to middle or old age. Because earthquakes can destroy our house, a whole town, it can represent the attempt of our inner being to shake and destroy what we have built and hold onto as our reality. Often we have become so unmoving and solid in our thinking and beliefs that a  dream earthquake is needed to destroy the old to allow a new or more flexible you to emerge. In such cases the dream indicate great changes in your life.  See: Earth.

If you told me you had dreamt of an earthquake I would therefore want to ask you about your marriage or other domestic relationships and about your work situation. I would ask about any changes happening in your life – especially those caused by deep down tensions that are starting to release to bring in a new life for you.

Occasionally, but not often, you have a dream that warns you of a coming earthquake.

Example: At two in the morning on the night of the Los Angeles earthquake, Claire Douglas, a British born psychologist who now lives in Malibu, woke up having had a most alarming dream.  ‘In the dream,’ she said, ‘I am outside when suddenly the earth starts to shake.  It starts slipping away and I slide down this hill with a terrible sickening feeling, but I realise I can get to the side and get back up again.

‘I look up the hill and feel terribly worried that something worse is going to happen. What I see is a great bank of earth with a tree in it. Some of the earth around it has slid away, leaving a few roots exposed. but most of the roots are very firm and it’ll hold. I see the terrible damage, but I’m all right.

‘I wondered what the dream meant, especially when my cat Sophie crawled under the covers with me for the first time ever. Am I getting ill, I thought?

‘But at 4.30, when the real earthquake struck, it helped me so much. Even though these books – which I only just managed to clear up before you came – were being thrown all over the place and the crockery in the kitchen was being smashed, I thought this is not the end of the world. “The dream had come to show me I was going to survive. I haven’t the foggiest idea how it happens, but there are pre-visions.’

Example: The dream of a few days ago where I was putting posts in to start a new building wonderfully typifies this process going on in me .  The building is set upon a moving surface, yet built in a way that can stand earthquakes.  It doesn’t have to be built on a rock, because actually rocks get shifted around in an earthquake.  So, it is built on moving base making it in a way that it can move and yet maintain its own structure.  And that is how I see my life today, it needs to be built in the middle of such enormous change.  We need a structure, but we need one that will shift with a change.

Example: Just after the four days of meditation I dreamt the following – I was standing or walking in a landscape that was uncultivated, rocky, and with many trees but not a forest or wood. The land sloped away to my right. As I looked to my right though I could see a great river of boulders and earth flowing downhill till it went out of sight behind me. I knew that great earth changes were going on, with earthquakes as part of them. The wide river of huge rocks was a part of these earth changes. I did not feel frightened, but I did feel it was necessary to keep watch on what was going on around one.

In exploring this dream I realised I am the landscape as ‘changes that are part of natural events’. I clarified that the ‘power’ was myself. I am life. I am the creator. I am what created my personality. I created the attitudes and structures of this personality that are now breaking up because they are not mobile enough. I can create other forms. I created this body and will break it down again like all forms. I am facing great personal change.

Useful Questions and Hints:

What are the signs in my present situation of great coming changes?

Am I feeling signs of coming change or the shifting of dependable people or situations?

How can I prepare myself for change?

See – Life Changes – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Features on Site