Hi LonelyWarrior – You are not taking up my time be sending me a good description of you dream. It helps, and adds another dream to my collection.
What I see in your dream is that you have stimulated processes in you that have put you in a powerful flow of energy – Shiva and Nandi. This has brought you to Shiva’s attention - he is watching you. The worship you have been practising has brought you this far and you must ask for a sign as to what is needed of you now. If you continue it will become obvious, you will have an experience, an initiation that will show you the way. There is an old saying that when the disciple is ready the Master will appear. But the master may take many forms.
It can be is a dream where you are told what is needed of you at the moment. At example of such a dream is as follows:
"I was walking across open moorland, followed by a crowd of people. I was their leader, and was supposed to be leading them to ‘Salvation/God’. The only thing was, I had no idea in which direction salvation lay. We came to a barbed-wire fence and stopped. I was considering the best place to cross, when I noticed a rabbit beyond the fence. My dog was with me, and leapt on the rabbit to kill it as in previous dreams, but this time the rabbit fought back and bit his foot, and he stood back respectfully, as he would if a cat clawed him. I now saw that the rabbit had turned into a huge and powerful hare, with four pink furry babies. Then the hare spoke to me, saying, “Where are you going?”
"I told him we were looking for salvation. He listened and then quietly said, “Turn back. Go back to whence you came.” At this I became irritable and said, who was he to tell us what to do. There were so many so-called authorities telling people how to discover truth, and yet most of them either disagreed or hadn’t found it themselves.
"The hare looked at me and suddenly disappeared. Then, in a few moments it reappeared. This impressed me tremendously. I felt it was a sign of complete self-mastery, and knew the hare was the master. He then said again, “Go back, and carry on with your accustomed tasks. Do not wildly seek the Kingdom of Heaven, for you already have what you seek within you. Your seeking only hides it.” Then we all turned around and went back to our village, and carried on our usual tasks, knowing that in time, we would realise our heaven – find Self through meeting life’s trials and growing."
It can come through a voice or spirit talking to you. Through someone who has achieved that awareness simply looking at you, or by a casual touch. It can come in a vision that moves you. But when it comes you will know and it will be followed by other such meetings – for once you have met the master you will never be left unless you yourself desert. Here is another such meeting.
"I was going through a fairly cynical phase, and in the dream my wife told me she had met a Master. I said such people were fictional characters, but went to see for myself anyway. The man worked opposite where I lived in London, in a small printing factory on the corner of Duke Street - the factory is still there. Apparently the man used to come out onto a raised loading bay at lunch time and talk with the few people who gathered to listen to him. So I waited in the street around the loading bay with the others. Then there was a whisper that HE was coming down the stairs from the first floor of the factory. As I caught sight of him I didn't think much of him. He was medium height, about late twenties or early thirties, slim but not skinny, perhaps athletic build. He had sandy, slightly red hair, going prematurely bald.
"He was not a flamboyant man at all, but very quiet and unassuming. He stood on the loading bay and began to talk about the spiritual life. It was very simple, and I thought to myself that I had heard or read it all before in the spiritual classics and the bible, and he was simply repeating it. He didn't speak for long though and he came down to meet us all. About five of us walked along the street with him slowly, talking. In those days there was no traffic rushing past. Near the end of the street, before it joined Euston Road he stopped and slowly looked at the people to my right. They seemed to get something from this. Then he turned his eyes on me. Suddenly I was pierced through with the most intense love I had ever felt. He knew me through and through, every part of my life, and he bathed me in love. I fell forward into his arms, crying, and he held me for a while then gently parted. I knew I had met a master."
As for not worshipping the Lingam, everything is in you and you can call it out of you through worship. And being a girl doesn’t matter as far as the spiritual life is concerned. Sri Anandamayi Ma was a wonderful guru and started young. Also there is Amma, another living example. But often we are called to be less famous and yet a part of the holy fire.
Tony