So here's where this dream has been leading me...
I took into consideration the comment about 'negative karma'. Last week, I experienced a lucid dream where I was unable to fly beyond the planet's atmosphere and out into the cosmos due to intense pain in my breasts.
I pondered more about karma...read some information that suggested the way to transform karma is to identify more deeply as "god" (which I think of as a verb) -
which lead to a discussion with a Buddhist friend, who introduced me to the practice of Chöd, which lead me to read about "Feeding Your Demons", which is a process for dialoguing with unwanted aspects of self and transforming them. Rather than fighting them, the idea is to learn what those aspects really want and need, and to become the nectar of it and feed it to them, then ask for an ally (sometimes they transform into allies). Which is, of course, a variant of dialoguing with dream characters
In reading about the practice of Chöd I was delighted to read a teacher's experience that was very similar to my dream - in seeing the 'demons' in his meditation, he did the same thing I did - he prayed, chanted, and called on his gods. Then finaly recognized the demons as manifestations of his own mind and invited them to tea, so to speak.
I plan on playing with this over the weekend, I have noticed that my emotional overeating has kicked up a notch, I pushed away my friend at work and am noticing that all of the loving feelings that opened up in me seemed to have frightened me and kicked in the need to control.
The voice in my head is telling me over and over that it's time to leave my job but I don't know where to go or what to do next so...scary unknown ahead! Last night I dreamed of an inner woman friend who told me she would help me clean up and redecorate my inner house, and she said she would stand by my in my waking hours as well. More and more I'm noticing inner friends and dialogue rather than jumbled images, conflict and feeling isolated, as if I am a mere observer in the dream scape. This seems like a major victory to me, and I am so grateful that life has given me the drive and the ability to somehow, if even a bit, become something other than a perpetuation of the violence and pain of the past.