Posts Tagged ‘dream analysis’

Grey – Gray

This sometimes indicate feelings of living an unhappy or colourless dull existence, a daily round without excitement or stimulus, or morbid or serious thoughts. Sometimes it suggests officiousness or officialdom.

Grey is the mid point between black and white, so in that sense depicts balance or calmness, but it can also indicate lack of clarity, indecision or blurring of distinctions. Like fog, it suggests not being able to see clearly. The grey could mean not judging myself, as in the past you might have got caught up in black and white thinking about yourself.  It could also mean invisibility or a way of protecting yourself.

Artemidorus wrote that, “.. a sky that is gray, gloomy or full of clouds, signifies failures and afflictions. In fact grey or gray is often used in language to indicate such feelings, as in the following sentence, taken from Castle’s Dreaming Mind. “If a dreamer needs to be sensitised to how gray, confining, or confusing his or her outlook is toward life, dreams may be cast in sombre,  prison-gray  tones  or the dreamer may wander around in a fog.” These states of mind can lead to ill health or at least a lowering of excitation and energy in life. An extreme example of how grey indicates difficult feelings is seen in the following dream.

Example: I have had a series of dreams which feature grey people standing beside my bed, and each time I have woken myself up by screaming, with my heart pounding, my being unable to move. JS

With grey hair it has several possibilities depending on the tone of the dream. It can link with maturity, wisdom or gathered experience. But it can also point to ageing, the loss of faculties with increasing years, and the path to death along the avenue of diminished interest or sparkle in life.

Grey clothes suggest neutrality or lack of ‘colour’, or in some dreams officialdom. But as with the grey colours worn by puritans, it can also suggest a moral stance, an avoidance of extremes or vivid passion. Such a stance might be one of avoiding full relationship or involvement in life. It might also suggest lacking anything more than a ‘bread and milk’ diet sort of life.

But some dreams describe grey in a powerful and exciting or enjoyable way. One dream includes a ‘beautiful, grey, old time car’. Another has a grey carpet that reminds the dreamer of home and comfort. Silver grey is sometimes felt to have these positive and life giving qualities.

Idioms: A grey world; a grey area; grey matter (brain); grey power.

Useful questions:

Is the dream environment I am in a grey one, and if so what aspect of my life does it reflect?

Does my life lack colour at the moment, and if so in what way?

Is this grey in the dream depicting my own feelings, or is it how I see the environment I exist in?

See: Colour – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Questions – Processing Dreams

Grotto

See: Cave.

Ground

See: Earth.

Group

This shows how you feel about being one of a crowd, and what sort of strategies you use for dealing with a group – whether a follower, a leader, a quiet introvert, or an extrovert.

Grove

Similar to Garden, but being trees, specifies the growth or area of your ideas and habitual emotions.

Guard

We guard our language, our thoughts, our actions. The guard can symbolise the morals, social pressures, fears, used in this way. It may also represent a fear of losing something, such as respect, love, social standing, virginity. Can symbolise protection also, such as in the form of a guardian. See: police.

Guide

The principles that guide your direction in life. They may be a worthy or unworthy guide, depending on the principles or desires by which you are directed. The guide may also be an animal, in which case see it under its heading. Or it may be an intuitive guidance.

Example: I am sitting in a chair.  Across from me are a woman to the left and a man to the right sitting on a sofa.  They have black skin, hair and clothes.  On my right a tall man sitting…white skin hair and clothes.  I know he is a spiritual advisor, counsellor or guide.

The guide says to me “would you even say that this is a therapeutic depression?”

I am unsure as to what he means by the word “therapeutic”…but feel a little jolted, maybe insulted, for lack of a better word…maybe insulted at his implication that it was necessary for healing…and reply “No” to his question.

Many people look to their dreams as a sure guide to what to do and believe in ther life. But of course we may be influence by our fears or beliefs, and dreams cannot guide us while we take them literally, for dreams are from the world beyond rationale thought, and so thinking about their meaning is of no help. The following example may explain this.

Example: Last night, I again asked my guides to show me through my dreams whether our relationship was good for my best self. This was my dream:

I am living in a large old house with P (my husband) and I ask him about a girl that I recently discovered online who is an adult film star and frequents the same cafe that he occasionally works at. When I ask him if he knows her, he admits to me that he has known for a while and recently had oral sex with her. He apologizes, but says he is somewhat interested in her and intends to pursue her. I get very upset and verbally attack him and pull his hair and have a bit of a tantrum. When I am calm, I feel better, but still completely betrayed and saddened.

In the first place it is very seldom that any dream states things straight out as in everyday life – even in waking life things are usually not that clear. To get at the real meaning of a dream you have to enter into each character and object in the dream, and be them. Because dream come from a very ancient part of us that uses ‘felt’ things as a language of dreams. So you have to feel the quality of your dream people and objects. Try being the girl – the adult film star.

I am not you, but the first thing I have to say when I imagine myself as the film star is, “I am not a real person, only an imagined one who is about sex.” She is an imagined one because she does not actually appear in your dream, but is a raging feeling in you. As such she becomes a target to believe in. So the dream is a magic mirror reflecting you, your feelings and fears – so you see your husband in the light of a person with no integrity. Such feelings grow because you cannot ‘find him out’ and so your feeling, which you project onto him, grows, ruining the relationship, until he maybe actually finds another woman.

If I am right, instead of projecting your feelings onto your husband, try seeing where they come from in you – usually parents or a previous relationship in which you were actually left for another woman so fear it will happen again. Try Acting on your dream

So the unconscious can be seen a kind of intelligence that attempts to guide and otherwise assist the conscious self. The language of the unconscious is, however, indirect and symbolic, and requires, not interpretation, but efforts made to explore the enormous emotions and feeling hidden in the images of dreams.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Have you tested your guide to give you information that can be checked?

Have you simple thought about your dream or actually explored it?

What is it that guides you in life or dreams – define it if you can?

Is my guide an expression on my own wishful thinking or desires?

See Using Your Intuition – Being the Person or Thing – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams – Edgar Cayce

Guillotine

Losing ones head, or threat of it; killing out ones ability to think and reason – so perhaps becoming irrational. See: Body; Head.

It could be a way of meeting the fear of death. It can also be a graphic way of saying that your head is cut off from your feelings.

Example: I felt I could really die, not just as an illusion, not just in the drama of other people but my own life would have a very normal end. I know now I never wanted to face this but realise there is such a thing as really living. When I felt this, it did not take long to discover that if there is such a thing that could lift one up and this can only be the life I am leading. With this horror of death realised, I started to experience a most fantastic happiness with the realisation that after all I do not have to die now. I felt I was no longer with my neck under the guillotine. This was the very feeling I have been living under all my life. Right from my childhood, and without my knowing it. I did not know that all the time I was living it was as if a rope was round my neck or my head was on the guillotine. But now I had this unique opportunity to experience what it felt like to die. It has revolutionised my life.

Example: I dreamt I was in a line of young women like myself, and as I looked ahead to where we were going I saw that as each came to the head of the line they were decapitated by a guillotine. Without any fear I remained in the line, presumably quite willing to submit to the same treatment when my turn came.

Working with Carl Jung he explained to her that this meant she was ready to give up the habit of “living in her head”; she must learn to free her body to discover its natural sexual response and the fulfilment of its biological role in motherhood. The dream expressed this as the need to make a drastic change.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Where you witnessing the guillotine or on it?

What did you feel during the dream?

Were there feelings about dying?

See Near Death Experiences – Dreaming of Death – Secrets of Power Dreaming – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

Guitar

See: Fiddle.

Gulf

Is there something separating you from a person, or a situation? The gulf might even be a feeling of some kind that caused a rift between you and an individual or a situation. If the gulf is huge, see Abyss.

Gull

See: Birds.

Gum

See: Glue.

Gun

This could be a sign of urges to hurt someone. It may also signify fear of being attacked and hurt by others, or a sense of inadequacy when facing aggression. For some people the gun relates to a sense of power and strength to meet the world. It is a confidence based on an exterior object. The gun can also represent aggressive or frightening sexuality.

Gunpowder

See: Dynamite.

Guru – Dalai Lama – Sensei

Represents your connection with the whole of life, with collective wisdom, or the collective unconscious, as it relates to your life. Beside a guru, the dream figure can be any person you feel is in contact with the mystery of Life, so is not concerned with physical welfare, but is very linked to the realisation of your eternal nature and life as it connects with the whole. Thus the guru in dreams will usually guide you towards greater self understanding, deeper relationships with him/her/self, and instruct you in any necessary disciplines of mind and body.

There will be an unfolding to you of the inner meanings, where necessary, of ancient scriptures. The guru really represents your own awareness in the wider awareness beyond the physical senses. Thus, as a dream series develops, if you reach the stage of illumination, you will wake up as the guru, or merge into her/him, or be absorbed in his/her consciousness. This may be frightening, due to fear of losing individuality or ego. But in fact, the guru is your own self. See: Yoga and Dreams – God; Goddess – archetype of the self

Example: ‘Dreamt that J.A.’s Guru was coming to see me. I was waiting in some kind of reception hall. Suddenly he came with his followers. He gave the impression of being Eastern. He wore a long white gown and his arms were full of harvest produce, fruit and vegetables. He explained that he ate once a day and ate everything at the one meal. He then put down the food and took both my hands, palms upwards. He examined them for a minute and then pointing to a place on each hand told me I was capable of being very efficient; also something else I can’t remember. He then looked at me and told me there was something I should have done but didn’t, but again I cannot remember. He then told me to look at his forehead and see what was written there. I looked and saw the lines on his forehead were placed so that they spelt out a word explaining what he was. It was something like MEEK. He then told me to look again and I would see my own self written there. Again I looked, and this time saw the word BITTER. The other people there could not see the writing, and he told me everyone had what they were written on their forehead. He then pointed into the audience and said, “But you will do the thing you came to do. You will do it!” He pointed beyond me, but I felt the words were for me.’

This particular dream is really more of a prelude to initiation, but it does explain many things. First of all, what we have called ones ‘potential’ is often symbolised in dreams as a holy man, guru, yogi, master, saint; or as Jesus, Mohammed, Krishna, or some great person. His arms are full of harvest because this part of our being holds all the fruits of our experience, as well as the future possibilities of self. It is therefore very important what this being tells us in our dreams. In this case, the man found that after the dream repressed bitterness poured out of him for some months. In the next dream by another person, initiation is taken a step further.

Example: ‘I was walking along a street in London, and my wife came hurrying up to me. She looked very excited and said, “I have found a Master” (a saint or holy man). I was very sceptical and told her so. Nevertheless she insisted, and asked me to come and see for myself. We walked to a printing firm nearby, where a few people were already waiting for the master. I reviewed my scepticism, thinking that this was probably a man who was very clever and spoke much occult nonsense, and so everybody thought he was godlike; or at least, all those who desperately wanted to find a god-like man. Just then a man walked down some stairs from the building and said quietly to those waiting outside, “He’s coming.” Outside the building was a loading bay a few feet high. On to this walked a slim man of middle height, in his thirties. He seemed very ordinary and was bald except for the sides of his head, where his hair was a sandy ginger colour. He appeared a very passive man, and began to talk quietly, with little emphasis, his gaze above our heads, as if looking beyond us.

As he talked I thought to myself that I had heard all this before. I had read it in the Bible and a number of other books, but it hadn’t done me any good. Neither could I see myself even beginning to live up to it. In fact I dismissed the man as a dreamer. He didn’t talk for long, however, but soon finished and came down from the bay. We all walked slowly along the street, some of the people asking him questions. When we neared the end of the street he stopped. We also stopped, and were facing him in a small irregular semi-circle, there being about six of us. He didn’t speak, but looked at the person on the extreme left for a few moments. Nobody said anything, and he then looked at the next person. I watched him but had no idea what he was doing until his gaze turned to me. Suddenly it was as if a bolt had struck me and pierced me to my inmost being. I knew this man understood every fragment of my life – more than that – he loved me as I have never been loved before. A floodgate opened in me and a torrent of emotion and love swept over me. I stumbled forward impelled by the current of my feelings, and embraced this stranger with a fervent love. As he held me the turbidity smoothed and became a calm love, and I stepped back. His gaze turned to my wife and I saw her expression change under the impact of his eyes. Now I had no doubt – he was a master.’

The dreamt of guru can open the floodgates to our ability to feel love, to realise what is in the way of our own growth, and to catch a glimpse of our own infinite potential. One of the ways a master confers his grace, or initiation, on his pupil is by ‘look’, by ‘touch’, by instruction or pointing out things, or by being lifted up as if to a great height so seeing a vast view of life.

Worshipping an external guru: Suggest you have missed the point of meeting your own Self, your own  spirit or centre. It shows a form of dependence upon another instead of finding ones own holy centre.

Here is a dream telling the story.

“In my dream I had the definite sense it was a yoga or Eastern seminar inside the room. I watched a man as he was pausing, he stood in front of the open door and with feet fairly wide apart, bowed his head right to the floor, with hands held in a salute. This presented his bare behind to my view. His clean and hairless rectum was very evident. In writing this down though, I realise there was no view of genitals.

In exploring the dream I first felt the posture to be one of surrender or acknowledgement of a teacher. But it was also a very powerful stance, and had in it the bums up sign. I imagined going into the room as the man. As him I felt intelligent, confident, willing to reserve my opinions to learn. In the room an Eastern man in robes and regalia sat on a stage, a guru. Many people sat on the floor as if meditating. The guru figure was not saying anything. I had the sense of people trying to get wisdom from him, even if he were not speaking – as if his silence held wisdom. I sat and opened to learn what this personage was communicating. As I looked he winked at me. I felt this was a communication, as was his silence. He simply sat and looked around the room. Occasionally he ate something, then got up and left.

Useful Questions and Hints:

Did the guru give me a new experience of yourself?

Was I uplifted in some way?

Were there things about my attitude such as bitternes or scepticism that held back my own wonder?

See Jesse Watkins Enlightenment – Edgar Cayce – Enlightenment – Methods of Awakening – Techniques for Exploring your Dreams

 

Gypsy Gypsies

Intuition, psychic faculties, irrational aspects of your feelings, perhaps pressurising you toward things you don’t want.

They may represent the instinctive wisdom or intuition such people have, or the feeling of being confronted by someone you do not understand or even trust.

The opportunity to enter a life of apparent greater freedom, or even a wild romance. Meeting with the challenge of manhood.

Useful questions and hints:

What are my feelings about Gypsies?

Do I wish for a more carefree or romantic existence?

Is this about using my psychic faculties?

Do I feel rootless, or without a real home?

See Using Your Intuition – Being the Person or Thing – Questions