Posts Tagged ‘dreaming’
Astrologer Astrology
The dream astrologer often represents your intuition or unconscious insights into yourself and others. There may also be a link with a sense of destiny or direction. But perhaps you associate astrology with hocus pocus, in which case your dream might be suggesting you are being misled.
To see, be, or have connections with an astrologer in your dream suggests you are in touch with your intuition, and may be having thoughts or concerns about your future. It can also indicate intuitions concerning your innate abilities or qualities, and where they might lead.
Astrology is a modern version of an ancient realisation about forces of cosmic origin that shape and influence our lives. Unfortunately most of ancient vision has been lost. But any mention of astrology in your dream may suggest that you are now receiving the cosmic impulses in your creative activities, which will lead your life to a fuller expression of your potential.
The more deeply those heavenly signs and their traditional significance’s are studied, the more impossible it appears to consider them as a human invention. In the first place they are more ancient than the earliest records of human history; they can be traced in the earliest dawn of civilisation. The most ancient legends of all peoples are based on them.
Everywhere throughout the world the “Signs,” their symbols, and significance are found practically identical. There are some slight modifications of the symbols to adapt them to local conditions; for instance, the “Bull” becomes an “Elephant” in India; the “Crab” is sometimes a “Tortoise,” in Egypt it was sometimes replaced by the scarabeus, but it remained a “Crab” in the planispheres of the great temples of Egypt at Denderah and Esme; the meanings of the signs were unchanged. The only change of any importance that ever appears to have been made was the substitution of the “Scorpion” for the “Eagle,” and that corresponded with one of the most important facts in the whole story of humanity, which can be more appropriately referred to later.
(During the Napoleonic campaign in Egypt, Vivant Denon drew the circular zodiac, the more widely known one, and the rectangular zodiacs. In 1802, after the Napoleonic expedition, Denon published engravings of the temple ceiling in Denderah in his Voyage dans la Basse et la Haute Egypte.[5] These elicited a controversy as to the age of the zodiac representation, ranging from tens of thousands to a thousand years to a few hundred, and whether the zodiac was a planisphere or an astrological chart.)
How can we account for these signs and their traditional meanings. There is no conceivable way in which men in the earliest stages of civilisation could have obtained them from observation and experience. Uninterrupted observations over a complete Precessional Cycle, even if possible, would have been insufficient. And what could lead any primitive race of men even to imagine the possibility of any connection between the stars and their lives and destinies? Given the Zodiacal conception, its significance, and the key to “planetary” workings, by some form of “Revelation,” they would of course be able to observe its influences at work in human – and cosmic – affairs, but no human beings could ever have “invented” it. The only explanation of its origin which appears to be possible is that it was “revealed” to men in just exactly the same way as “prophecies” and all other spiritual mysteries, through the perceptive faculty of the unconscious mind at the period of its most complete activity.
Example: I dreamt my uncle Tony came to me. He asked where the toilet was and I described it. I discovered the sink was overflowing with water. P had left a tap running. When I looked however, the sink was within another sink, thus the floor was not wet. I believe I turned the taps off though.
My uncle talked to me. I noticed he had a wig on, it was also dyed black. He told me, or I knew that a group of businessmen wanted me to talk about astrology. At first I was merely going to give an “off-the-cuff” talk. Later however I began to want to really throw all I had into the talk, both off-the-cuff, and well researched talk.
The dreamer attempted to use intuition to understand the dream by exploring it intuitively not interpreting it intellectually by thinking about or looking up symbols: “The dream brings to your life the present possibilities. Bringing the possibilities to light. There was the time when you were never certain what to do with your life. Life brought pain. When this dream was lived, you were lost within yourself. The dream brought love into your life.
The first part of the dream lifts you from the recent darkness. When your uncle Tony arrives, this represents the coming from within yourself of those possibilities lost when you lost your way three years ago. You lost it them because you tried the path which left the world. There was lost the path your soul came to fulfill. You resisted the urge to teach the word. The word was lost within you. The word was my life calling you. When you resisted the call you decided to leave the world by trying to live the spiritual life. When you (recently) released love on this decision you received the power to speak the word.
The word will live within you. The life you will now live will be the word living in you. The way you live will let my world bring your world my light. The dream promises that you will bring the Star Light to many. The dream promises that you will lift many by telling them the wisdom you received from my word. The dream brings you my world.
There was, last night, the lifting of the mind. There will follow from this the possibility of lifting the mind in others. The dream was lived because you were receiving the power to speak from the word. The part where the water overflows means that the life force now flows freely. Nothing is hurt when it flows over. The present life will allow it to express without harm. It can be turned off or on as wished. The life force flows between the two sinks because they represent the two levels of physical existence, the outer and the inner. See Q’s Big Question
The child – P – represents your present love, longing, and my life within you. The toilet is the creative self now clearing problems by flushing them away which were frustrating it. The wig is the false thinking, the unconscious false thoughts, still prevalent and to be dealt with.
When your uncle brings up the subject of astrology, this means that you are now receiving the cosmic impulses in your creative activities, which will lead you in your life activities. The part where you – plan to – speak to the group, brings your life work before you. When you decide to make this work expression of your thoroughness, then you bring to the cosmic impulses your own gift of self expression”. See Star Beings
Useful Questions and Hints:
Does the astrologer give any information about your character or future – if so can you say what it is?
Do I have particular concerns about my future – if so what are they?
Did I seek help from the astrologer – if not why not? He or she represents your intuition and might hold important and useful insights.
See Using Your Intuition – Summing Up – Being the Person or Thing – Edgar Cayce
Astronaut
This points to attitudes or feelings, perhaps even ideas, that can take you beyond the ordinary view you have of life and yourself. There is also a suggestion you are feeling the courage to grow and explore what you cannot yet define. See: Space.
This might link with efforts you are making in meditation or exploring your inner world of experiences beyond your body senses. Sometimes it reflects states of mind in which you split off from your body, perhaps in an attempt to run away from or avoid direct life experience.
Useful questions are:
What is it the astronaut or I am doing in this dream, and how might that relate to my waking activities?
Am I learning anything from the astronaut?
If I stand in the role of the astronaut what is my view of life and the world?
Building Mental Hospital Asylum
This depends on what is felt in the dream. So it could be a fear of your own mental and emotional stability, or a process going on within you of meeting the traumatised or neurotic aspects of yourself and transforming them.
Example: Dreamt I was a voluntary worker in a mental hospital or insane asylum. I was only an untrained helper, and there were many professionals, doctors. I walked down a staircase from higher floors. There were many closed doors behind which, I knew, were women living as enclosed nuns in the life of prayer. But I felt there was much mental illness contained in what they were experiencing. This recalls another previously unremembered dream in which I wandered a corridor where there were cells of nuns living an enclosed prayer life.
This dream suggests the dreamer is actively and voluntarily approaching and trying to deal with his own irrational nature and neurosis. The women behind closed doors depicts aspects of his own emotions, of himself that have been closed off through practices he used to control or deal with his own neurosis. He had practised a lot of prayer and meditation, and the dream suggests a lot of ‘mental illness’ was contained in that practice – both involved in and also held in check.
The irrational shows itself in our daily life as moods that arise for no apparent reason; feelings of despair or emotional pain that destroy the pleasure of our life; crazy urges or actions; body tics and unwilled movements. The source of any or all of these we approach when we dream of an asylum or psychiatric hospital.
Example: This caused large numbers of inmates in the asylum to gather about us. The expression of love had attracted them, whereas ordinary movements or conversation did not make one conspicuous. Such a large group of these people was dangerous, because they were unpredictable and could be violent. The woman attendant withdrew because of the danger. I was in the middle of a tight crowd pressing in on me, and was afraid. The tension mounted and people began to jab or push me. Someone poked their penis in my buttocks. I tried to push them away but was so crowded I could hardly move. My fear melted, and I wildly sought some way of dealing with the situation. I began to chant, feeling that this might ease the situation. Gradually the tension lessened, and my fear decreased. Then I surrendered and allowed LifeStream to occur, knowing this was the way to deal with everyone’s sickness. Other people also began the healing movements, and I knew the healing had begun, but I would have to come back weekly and help the people until the shaking spread to everybody, and help them until they were healed.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What sort of irrational feelings or behaviour does my dream point to, and can I recognise it in myself?
Am I in a helping role or do I feel lost or imprisoned in the asylum?
What can I do through visualisation to shift and difficulties I find in the asylum? For help doing this see Stand in Role and Acting on your dream.
Atom Bomb
This can indicate anxiety regarding the external world, political forces etc, that the dreamer feels at the mercy of. Usually this about fears for the future and what might develop in the external world through the immense forces of politics and national conflict. It is often coupled with the dreamer’s survival strategies. In this way the dreamer might be trying out in the dream things he or she might do in such a situation.
The atom bomb or dreaming of a mushroom cloud can also depict the end of a particular world or way of life for the dreamer; i.e. the end of school life; divorce; loss of spouse; tremendous potential energy, but related to in a way that threatens the dreamer, and is therefore not harnessed. In other words the dreamer is relating to the change as a cataclysmic and destructive one.
It can also suggest fear of the irrational forces of life and the unconscious which may destroy all we have built in our conscious self. See: end of world dreams; anxiety; bomb; explosion.
Useful Questions and Hints:
How am I reacting to the bomb, and is this of any help – if not what might I do, considering this is a dream and I am dealing with my own feelings or anxieties?
Am I facing a massive or explosive change in my life – if so what is it?
Do I suspect that a situation is developing that might explode in a destructive way?
See Processing Dreams – Being the Person or Thing – Summing Up
Attack Attacked Attacker
In looking at many dreams in which attack takes place, it is obvious that there are many degrees and forms of attack. So attack or being attacked can represent many things such as feeling attacked or threatened by ones own impulses such as anger or sexuality; feeling surreptitiously attacked by other people and their attitude to you or their remarks; a subtle sense of being attacked by age, or a serious attack by an illness – one speaks of an asthma or virus attack for instance, but also one may be attacked by a poison, or food if one is allergic to it; one might personally attack an issue or a project, and so a dream might depict one attacking something in this sense; confidence may be attacked; it is a common term in sport or business, and so may refer to attitude or energy. This aspect of attack may also refer to ones beliefs, or to other peoples, which may be attacked and threatened; attack is also sometimes a form of defence, so may suggest defensiveness about some issue or aspect of ones life. A positive side to attack is that we often feel attacked by an emerging new insight or positive personal change. We feel it as an attack because it threatens our old way of life, our habitual way of ding things and thinking about things.
It is important to define or be aware of ones response to threat or attack in a dream. Experiments in connection with dreams in which the person runs away from attack, or is very passive, show that if the dreamer visualises changing the situation and faces attackers, their dreams and even waking behaviour changes radically. Passivity in dream situations may depict the innate feeling that we are helpless in dealing with the feelings involved. This usually dates from past experience, perhaps in childhood, where in fact one did not have the strength or maturity to meet what was happening. See Life Changes.
Occasionally attack in dreams shows a desire to be attacked in order to live out forms of self punishment or sadism. In most such cases this desire arises out of a need to remember, and make fully conscious, punishment or sadism that has been practised on the dreamer.
Being attacked: This dream usually arises because in some way you are repressing, in conflict with, or frightened off your own emotions, sexuality or anger. Occasionally the fear is about ones own potential or expanded awareness.
Attacked by animal: Feeling under threat from external events or internal emotions, impulses or ideas; feeling a victim in relationship to others and self; taking a defensive attitude. The repression or fear here is in regard to your own natural urges. Sometimes our dreams put into animal form someone who we feel is expressing anger toward us.
Attacked by shadowy or frightening figure: Our childhood traumas and fears may take this guise in a dream. So in this case the attack is depicting our feelings of fear and pain surrounding those past issues. How we meet such an attack is important. If we run from it, the trauma may remain largely unconscious, and therefore capable of influencing our behaviour negatively. Better to explore it or change it. (For help doing this see Stand in Role under peerdream work.)
Attacked by animal: Introverting one’s own aggression or sexuality; fear of one’s own natural urges; anxiety about aggression in oneself or other people; feeling attacked by an external person.
Being the attacker: This is more positive, as you are not being passive and hurt in your dreams. But you are still in conflict with whatever it is your attacking. Considering that what you attack is probably a part of your own personality, it might be better to meet it in some way. Positive self expression; defending oneself against something one feels threatened by; attempt to destroy some urge or feeling in oneself or others. The word attack is also used in many ways, so might refer to an ‘attack’ of an illness, or ‘heart attack’. Can express the difference between feeling threatened by a work/relationship/sex problem, or feeling challenged by it in a way to stimulate creativity or research.
Bird attacking: Fear of ideas, ideals or opinions; verbal attack by others; fear of the Self – a view of things that may destroy ones present more limited views or opinions.
Sexual attack: This has many aspects, and can at times be a re-playing of previous sexual attacks, or an expression of fear concerning them. But we also create dreams of sexual attack when we are frightened of our own feelings and desires. Grof gives the interesting account of a woman who experienced many images of sexual attack. He says:-
…. whenever a boy friend initiated even the most innocent sexual approach, such as touching. embracing, or kissing, she was overwhelmed with terror. It seemed to her that when such a situation occurred, her lover was actually changing physically and assuming animal features. Repeatedly, she fled from these situations in a state of panic anxiety and never wanted to see her partner again. Episodes of this kind were repeatedly relived …. with details of the physical setting, as well as the physical sensations and emotions involved. From Realms of The Human Unconscious, by S. Grof. Published by Souvenir Press.
Someone else being attacked: Anger or aggression toward another; killing off an aspect of oneself represented by the person in the dream. If the person is someone you are in relationship with, it suggests an attempt, however short, to distance oneself from them emotionally. See: fight; War.
Example: I had this dream at a time when there was a lot of talk and anxiety in newspapers and on television about nuclear war. In the dream a nuclear attack had been announced. I immediately thought of my children who are away in boarding school. I go out into the street to see if I can get to them, but realise it is hopeless. In the street everybody is walking about as if it were a holiday Sunday. I realised there was no time to get to my children so decided to join the people on the street. John C.
John had this dream at a time when there was a lot of media coverage about nuclear attack. It is therefore most likely dealing with his real fears about how he would deal with such an attack if it happened.
Example: Whilst suffering from nervous exhaustion three years ago. I had a recurring nightmare that left me feeling totally worthless and wretched. In it I underwent an indecent attack upon my person by my father. I was about four or five in the dream. It was not the attack in itself that left me with these feelings, but rather the look my mother gave me shortly afterwards – making me feel like a specimen in a jar. In the dream I sensed she had refused to be his wife fully, until he had got us into our own home again. I sense she is blaming me for not being able to continue with this threat, and that once more she will have to suffer my father’s attentions because of me. There is no one to help me so I decide to leave. I pack a small case, which I believe someone gets for me. In reality I did try to leave home at this age but got no further than the bus stop across the road. Maria.
Maria gives no indication of whether she was abused by her father, but the dream is certainly dealing with the sexual politics of her parents.
Example: Several men attacked me and were trying to drag me off somewhere against my will. As the dream progressed, or replayed, I began to realise that it only appeared like an attack because I was resisting the process. In fact the men wanted to show me something that was important to me. They were being quite gentle, but because of my resistance, it felt to me like an aggressive act. My thoughts about this are that this may represent the way I feel about events. Because of underlying anxiety, I feel events and changes, such as losing my job are very threatening and difficult to bear. In fact no harm has come from these events at all. The dream suggests that I am being led somewhere if only I would go along with things. Albie R.
Sometimes it is our response to the action that makes it appear like an attack. So it is worthwhile entering the dream again in imagination and exploring it – try Acting on your dream.
Useful Questions and Hints:
If I take the images away what are my feelings about the attack, and where am I meeting those feelings?
Is there any way I can change this dream? For help doing this see Carrying the Dream Forward.
What are the underlying issues here?
Attend
Usually shows some form of involvement in the feelings engendered by what is being attended. If it is a lecture or school, it would suggest interest in or need to attend to serious studies or thought. If it is a wedding then there is some link with relationship. Therefore consider what it might suggest or look up what was attended.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What am I feeling about this?
Are there things I need to attend to, and what does the dream suggest they are?
What is my attitude about what is happening, and how does that relate to my life?
Your body can often be a way to understand your dreams. See Using the Body.
Attic
The mind, ideas, memories, past experience; things that are out of sight or forgotten. It suggests things that are out of sight or forgotten but not really unconscious – the sort of thing you knew in the past but have forgotten or not recalled for a long time. Or a person that you have not recognised.
The attic is often a place of exploration, and sometimes a great deal of sexual feeling is hidden in it. Sometimes if you are high up and have a great view it can represent your ability to have a much wider view of life – like cosmic consciousness.
Also in some dreams it is a very frightening experience where we meet those things we would rather not see or remember.
Example: I was sleeping in an attic. A large dog was with me – a wolfhound like I used to exercise a few years ago. I and the dog would go out together. The dog was wild and free. I enjoyed being with it. together we did things like hunting which felt very real in the sense of not being artificial behaviour. Although I never washed I felt clean and healthy. Leon.
When Leon explored his dream he felt the attic was a place where he could exist but not be involved with people. The attic reminded him of the attic in a childhood house, where his mother never went because of the steep ladder. So he could go there and be alone, free of other people’s presence and influence.
Example: Then I was walking up the several flights of stairs to get to the attic room. I was holding a small dog in my arms – one of those rather flat nosed toy dogs. I arrived at the attic I put the dog down. But now the attic was empty and dark. I could feel my hair stand on end and my skin ‘crawling’. Actually I feel it all again as I write this. The feeling arose because there was an unformed dark shape creeping around at the far end of the room. The dog was really afraid and came into my arms. Then the dark creature leapt at me, transforming into a massive mouth with huge fangs and awful demonic face. Immediately I leapt at it in the same way and smashed against its face with my own huge fangs. This utterly disarmed it because it had felt, in its primitive way, to terrify me. It surprised me too that I could so immediately transform into a monster when necessary.
Then I approached the dark form, back in its original condition, trying to find out what it was and why I had met it in that way. Gradually I experienced its situation. It had originally been a human being, but had gradually lost its humanness and become this slinking darkness. I was slowly able to help it realise that it could once more take the path to become human if it wanted to. Then it asked me how that could be done. I told it that first of all it had to come out of this dark and empty place to mix with people. The human environment created a different surrounding and influence that would penetrate it and help it to change. It also asked me how I knew about its condition and how I could transform into its own monstrous form. I told it I had once experienced that condition, and that’s how I knew it was possible to come out of it. In fact it was a reflection and dramatisation of an aspect myself
If trapped in an attic: a purely intellectual approach to life. Finding an attic: pleasure at new ideas, discovering potential or wisdom from past experience, or you are dealing with things you previously thought were not important in your everyday life, or are caught up in things from the past, or in isolating yourself from ordinary life
Finding an attic: Discovering memories from the past, or a new space of the mind, perhaps a way of getting away from daily cares. Pleasure at new ideas, discovering potential or wisdom from past experience, or you are dealing with things you previously thought were not important in your everyday life.
Threat from attic: Disturbing thoughts, or something connected with what you have hidden or forgotten.
Hiding in attic: Escape from other people; retreat from everyday life. See example below.
Window or turret looking out from attic: Our sense of connection with the cosmos; wider awareness in which we understand an enormous amount about the world and ourselves we never realised before.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What did I find or experience in the attic?
What am I rediscovering from the past?
Are there influences from my parents or past family I am noticing in myself?
Do I feel a need for privacy or to get away from people?
What was I doing there?
What memories of attics come to mind?
Try Being the Person or Thing – Conditioned Reflexes – The House in Your Dream
Auction
It could mean you are considering the old attitudes and experiences of your life and culture and wondering about their value. Or perhaps seeing if there is anything of value to be taken into the present or future. Maybe looking for something, deciding what you want and what you will ‘pay’ for it in your life. If you make a living from buying and selling, then the dream would perhaps relate to your work and opportunity.
Useful Questions and Hints:
Are you buying or selling?
If selling what is it you hope to get a reward for and what associations do you have with it?
If buying what is it you want, and what does that suggest about you?
What are you doing at the auction?
Use Processing Dreams to explore your dream.
Audience
If you are leading the action and not one of the audience, it indicates that you have got the attention of many aspects of you, as when you become excited and enthused with an idea, plan or person. If you are one of the audience then it means you are giving attention to something that is interesting you, but you are not completely identified with it.
Standing in front of: You might be dealing with an important issue in your life which attracts the attention of many associated ideas and feelings – thus audience participation or attention. It might also be about desire for attention; baring one’s soul; self acceptance if the audience is positive – self uncertainty if the audience is negative.
In the audience: Witnessing some emotion or process in yourself; considering some aspect of your life. See: arena; Stage;.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What is my role here and what am I doing or taking in?
Am I receptive to what is happening?
Am I expressing something important to me?
Use Acting on your dream to really connect with what is going on in the dream
Aunt
To some extent an aunt is a role model. We gather from their success or failure strategies for our own life. Whatever feelings we have about them, whatever we think of them, the dream will use this to illustrate something for you. So consider how you would describe your aunt, what sort of person she is, and how you feel about her. The dream will be using her image to illustrate the role you see her in. If she is a success, ask yourself what in yourself you are facing regarding success. If you feel she is a failure, ask yourself what of your own feelings about failure you are facing.
If she is dead and appears in your dream it can mean that she is still very active in your life as feelings and ideas.
If you are sexually attracted to her it also indicates that you see in her something you want in your life.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What is my relationship with and feelings about this aunt, and how does that relate to my life now?
What is the central theme of this dream, and what does that indicate as the feature to consider? Is this really about my mother?
What is happening with you and your aunt?
Is she ignoring you, attracted to you or giving advice? See Characters in Dreams.
What do you feel about your aunt. See Dreams Your Magic Mirror.
Try using Talking As.
Aura
An expression of the level of your being or mind that extends beyond the narrow confines of your sensory perceptions or intellectual understanding. We know now that our eyesight is only aware of a tiny part of the spectrum of light, our hearing only aware of a small amount that dogs and bats can hear, and the radiations from our brain also are unknown to us except if we use special equipment. And all of those radiations are seen as an aura reaching out from our body and can sometimes be seen as colours or what we call an aura.
I know many people say there is no such thing as an aura. But now people are often shown wearing night or infrared glasses. These enable our poor eyesight to extend its range slightly, so the can see the aura of heat that surrounds living bodies.
Another explanation is that people who have a very intense experience of illumination or enlightenment sometimes are seen with an aura.
Sometimes we touch a concept or feeling that has massive connections, so vast they begin to build up beyond usual levels of realisation or sensing. We might call it a mega-concept, which goes on building and generating realisations we have never had before – that is, we have never made those connections before. When your mind is functioning in that way you become a different type of human being, an individual, but connected much more fully with your inner and outer reality.
So an aura around an object, person or animal depicts this function, i.e. that in the dream you are aware of more than you usually are, or more of your potential is being expressed. As such the aura show how much of your potential is shining out of you. The first example below illustrates this. See: archetype of the self.
The aura in dreams is also often associated with death, or the spirit of the person whose aura is seen – spirit being here used in the same way as ‘she had a fighting spirit’. Therefore it might suggest we are aware of wondrous or awful qualities of soul of the person or ourselves. It can also suggest power of some sort – internal energy.
Seeing an aura can link with intuitions or feelings you have about the person you see it around. Occasionally the aura indicates a health problem. In such cases the dream would include some feeling or realisation that the colours or marks in the aura showed an illness or upset in the system.
Example: I was following a woman up a hill. As I did this I experienced a very wonderful feeling. It felt as if light were beginning to shine out of me as if I had a glowing aura. When we reached the top of the hill we were arms about each other, and I had the glorious sense of being wholly myself – wholly a man. I sensed that I had reached a new level of manhood by more fully accepting myself, by more fully giving and allowing more of myself to be available to others. It felt to me as if manhood is a glory, a shining out of life itself through a particular person.
Example: When we came to my sister, I had the feeling she was ill. I can’t fathom why, but I was just about to ask him to look after her, when he stretched out his right hand and gently stroked her cheek. He said to her, “You’re dead aren’t you?” I was absolutely stunned and it was then that I was aware of how cold and white he was. I realised then that he was dead, and so he could see she was dying – due to some aura as her spirit was leaving her body. He then disappeared, and I was frantic trying to find him, to ask him how long before she would die. I was crying and almost hysterical to find him, and that is how I awoke. L. W.
Example I had a dream that I was talking to about 5 or 6 people and I was reading each person’s aura. Suddenly one of them came to me and asked if I could I tell him the colour of his aura. All at once I heard celestial songs and his aura was all white. I awoke feeling like the person had been Jesus. As a result of this dream, I had a pain in my head for several days afterward. ARE dream.
The last example is interesting because the woman dreamer begins to experience something beyond her usual awareness. The pain in the head is a common result of this as parts of the brain that were dormant or inactive begin to operate or develop.
Example: ‘I walked past a married couple who were walking up the hill too. As I passed I heard them say something about a shepherd. Looking up the hill I saw the sheep, then The Shepherd. A beautiful aura of many colours surrounded The Shepherd. I looked and felt joy and exuberance rise in me, and I ran to the couple saying it was THE SHEPHERD.’ Brian C.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What am I feeling or realising about the aura?
Does this extend my awareness of something or someone?
If I imagine myself as that aura what do I feel?
See Altered State of Consciousness – Dreams are Virtual Realities – Enlightenment.
Australia
To have Australia in your dream depend almost entirely on whether you have lived there, born there or whether it is an unknown for you. So you need to ask yourself what associations you have with the land.
But in general it could mean for many opportunity, hard-headedness, practicality, dubiousness about the irrational. See: Abroad; Australian aboriginal dream beliefs.
Useful Questions and Hints:
See Processing Dreams and Talking As to find out what your associations are – also Association of Ideas with Dreams.
Author
This may depict a part of yourself that is creative, especially to do with telling the story of your real self, your real inner passions and dreams, your life story.
An author in a dream suggests they are creative, and are a sort of author-ity.
But is the dream author really a creative person or just saying it for effect.
It might suggest ideas you have about writing, about becoming a writer, about the difficulties of doing the work. But it depends what the author is doing and what your relationship with them is.
Useful Questions and Hints:
What is it you/the author has written or is writing about, and how does that relate to your waking life?
How would I describe the character of the author or her/his abilities – and does that describe facets of myself?
Is the author ambitious or something – if so what?
What is the action or theme of the dream? See Plot of the Dream.
What is your role in the dream? See Role in Dream.
Am I meeting the things I fear or dislike in my dream? See Fear in Dream.
Authority
Might depict what has arisen in your life out of relationship with father. Or the dream might depict your relationship with authority, or a view of how you use power of authority. See conformity.
An authority figure in dreams can suggest many things, depending on the theme of the dream. So it could indicate your own best sense or intuition; a know it all attitude, which might be ‘I am right and you are wrong because I am the authority’. Or it can be about dependence and wanting someone to tell you what to do and where to go.
Useful Questions and Hints:
Am I the authority in the dream?
Am I in a passive relationship with the authority?
Am I learning or teaching anything?
See Active Passive – Carry the Dream Forward.
Autism
Virtually all of us have areas of our feelings, or responses to particular situations such as learning or a relationship with the opposite sex, in which we have been hurt or traumatised. These areas or responses may be represented by an autistic child or adult. These withdrawn or hurt parts of self can sometimes express great shrewdness or insight when met in the right way. This may be because within such experience we hold awareness of how pain or difficulty influences life, and what pains other people carry. See: idiot; Archetype of the Outcast.
So it can represent your own lack of or inability to express yourself. See I AM
(Thanks Chris)
Useful Questions and Hints:
How am I relating to the autistic person, or the autism in myself?
Can I accept that I can learn something from this person or situation?
What are the events of this dream suggesting? See: themes; habits and Crazy As a Jaybird – Sane Reasons for Some Crazy Behaviour.
Autobahn
See: motorway.