Personal Meaning of House: My dragon dream took place in the house in which my husband grew up. When Fred and I were dating I was invited often for meals, and after our marriage it was the setting for numerous family gatherings and fun celebrations. I have many warm associations with this house, all involving Fred and his funny, quirky family. Although my mother visited there a few times, I do not associate this house with her. I find this a curious aspect of the dream. The kitchen in Fred’s house was the core of family activity and most of our gatherings were centered around meals cooked by Fred’s beloved grandmother or stepmother (with whom he had a conflict-filled relationship). My mother never entertained and she cooked only the simplest of meals out of necessity, never passion or even interest, so her presence in this kitchen is an odd detail. The room in the far left corner of the house, streetside, was the bedroom shared by Fred’s brothers George and Tony. I adore them both and imagine them dreaming many beautiful dreams in there. In realilty, of course, the room had no garage door, although there were high windows. The actual garage was on the other end of the house, on the right side next to the kitchen. This was the garage I was heading for at the end of the dream.

Cultural Meaning of House: Houses everywhere represent protection from the elements, family, warmth, and comfort: nurturing qualities all. Kitchens are traditionally the purviews of grandmothers, mothers and other women who prepare food for their families. They are also rooms in which flour, milk, water, yeast, sugar and salt are mixed and baked in ovens, a magical process which transforms them into nourishing bread.  Kitchens also have fresh water available for cooking and cleaning up.

Archetypal Meaning of House: Houses represent the psyche and everything that goes on in our minds. Archetypes are mental pictures of physical instincts. The needs of all five instincts (nurturance, activity, reflection, sex, and creativity) can be met in houses. This dream features three instincts. Nurturance is represented by the house, my mother, and the kitchen. The kitchen contains two especially vital symbols: a  womb-like oven which transforms basic elements into the bread of life, and a source of water, the cleansing, life-giving element associated with humanity’s maternal Source, the Great Mother (she’s also associated with dragons). Activity is shown in the dragon’s banging on the roof and walls, and in my dream ego’s walking, then running away.  Reflection is symbolized by the windows which provide an outlook into the unconscious, the dragon with its fiercely knowing, staring eye, and the keys representing access to secret knowledge and wisdom.

Do you see the wealth of multi-leveled meanings I can glean from these symbols?  All but the dragon are parts of everyone’s personal life, yet most also appear in the myths and fairy tales of every culture. I’m still working on the dream. It could take a long time to understand, if ever.  For now I’m just letting it cook.

Looking for the psychological meanings of public myths and private dreams is a powerful way to train your intuition, heal yourself, and increase your wisdom. Sometimes you won’t like what you see: Who likes the Wicked Witch of the West?  Yet, if you can imagine this story from a different perspective—as did the writers of the Broadway play Wicked who told it from her perspective—you’ll see how even the most terrifying villains can have benevolent intentions and teach valuable lessons. I’ll illustrate with a recent dream.

Dream #4346:  A Dragon Wants to Enter The House

I’m in a house. My mother’s in the kitchen. A dragon is outside flapping its wings against the roof and banging against the walls of a room in the far left corner. I walk down the hall and stand in the doorway. The opposite wall looks like a garage door with windows in the top half. The dragon is hanging down from the roof, its gigantic head framed in the windows. One huge eye stares at me. Its open mouth is lined with pointy teeth.

As I turn away in fear it bangs on the window. I hear a crash. He must have broken through. I call out to my mother, “Run! We’ve got to get out of here!” This feels like Fred’s old house so I know the door to the garage is ahead and hope we can escape in my car. Then I realize I don’t have the keys.  I ask my mother where they are and hear her voice saying they’re in the family room.  Oh no! I’ll have to go back toward the dragon to find my keys.

I awoke with my heart pounding. Do you see how archetypal the symbols are?  House? Kitchen? Mother? Dragon? Windows? Doors? Eye? Teeth? Keys? About the only things missing are a hero, some woods, a sword and a horse! This is a drama about the unfolding of my private myth. So far I understand that a powerful unconscious emotion (the dragon) is desperate for my ego’s attention. Although I’m gaining perspective on it (I glimpse it through windows separating me from the unconscious) I still fear it. It has something to do with the nurturing (kitchen) I received or didn’t receive from my mother, and also with my husband (I’m in the house where he grew up).  Finally, the keys to this mystery relate to family (the keys are in the family room). For the next several days I’ll carry this dream with me, feeling its feelings, talking to its images, looking to developments in my waking life for new insights.

Why am I telling you this dream? You can’t possibly understand the complexities of my inner life, and even if I did, I wouldn’t share them all here. But I want you to see my trust in the benevolence of dreams, and I’d like to help you work with yours. So with the understanding that your responses say more about your inner life than mine, I welcome your projections. Perhaps I’ll share some of mine next time if I think they could be helpful.

Jung is not the first person to understand this, although he was one of the first Western medical professionals to study it for himself and write about it in a way that could be comprehended and accepted by the Western scientific mind. Indeed, many Asian traditions have taught this concept for thousands of years. Consider this quote by the Hindu professor Ravi Ravindra:

“The struggle to know who I am, in truth and in spirit, is the spiritual quest. The movement in myself from the mask to the face, from the personality to the person, from the performing actor to the ruler of the inner chamber, is the spiritual journey. To live, work, and suffer on this shore in faithfulness to the whispers from the other shore is spiritual life. To keep the flame of spiritual yearning alive is to be radically open to the present and to refuse to settle for comforting religious dogma, philosophic certainties, and social sanctions.”

Contrary to popular belief, authentic spirituality is not just a function of how many souls we save or how well we know scriptures or how hard we pray or how many rules we keep or what we believe or how often we attend our place of worship or how much money we donate to the poor. Likewise, spiritual maturity is not limited to a particular religion or set of beliefs. Rather, it is a function of our willingness to further the unfolding of our capacity for full living, endless loving, and authentic being.

We’re supposed to discover our true selves and connect with the sacred Mystery within. We’re supposed to learn how to accept and love ourselves because that’s how we learn to accept and love others. Every religion has spawned mature spirit persons whose mystical experiences and intuitions taught them that God indwells the soul. This means that our spiritual growth is not just a function of searching for God outside ourselves but also of honoring the “kingdom” within. (I could just as well have said “queendom” but it wouldn’t resonate as deeply as this more familiar term for sovereignty. I wish there were a gender-neutral word for the inner chamber that is not one-sidedly masculine, but honors both the masculine and feminine drives of every psyche. Any ideas?)

The search for self-knowledge is a path to spiritual maturity and dreams are invaluable tools on that path because they show us unsuspected aspects of our unconscious selves. These insights heal us and our relationships and bring spiritual meaning to our lives.  Why? Because knowing that we are known and loved by something with far more power than our puny ego, something sacred that lives within us and only wants the best for us, increases our sense of self-worth and helps us live with more forgiveness, integrity and compassion.  If  learning from our dreams how to rule our inner chamber is not a spiritual practice I don’t know what is!

What did you dream last night?

If the relationship is to prosper we must withdraw our projections. In practice this means (1) acknowledging that the qualities we dislike in them are also parts of us, and (2) developing the positive qualities we’ve disowned in ourselves and assigned to them. Here’s why this works:

1: Withdrawing projections reduces separations and hostilities. Insofar as we believe our negative projections are true of others, they are acts of judgment which separate us.  Then completely innocent remarks are grounds for suspicion and misunderstanding and justification for blame.  Insofar as we believe our positive projections are true of others, they are one-sided contracts which we have written for them. Then if they break the contract we resent them for changing, misleading us, or forcing us to develop qualities we want them to carry.  “S/He betrayed me!” we think.  S/He was supposed to be the (choose one) logical one, wise one, practical one, romantic one, provider, nurturer, bill-payer, social director, problem-solver, creative thinker, muse, perfect lover, etc., but s/he’s changed!”

2: Withdrawing projections strengthens and heals relationships. Seeing that the value we thought was in the other is really in ourselves generates empathy and compassion. As our hearts soften we relate to others with more warmth, trust, openness, caring and honesty.

3. Withdrawing projections creates understanding and wisdom. It is not constructive to assume that our perspectives or values are common to everyone. It is constructive to recognize that they are true for us. When we neither over-value nor under-value our truths or those of others, we are on the road to wisdom.

4: Withdrawing projections re-energizes and empowers the body, mind, and spirit. Projection is a way of giving our libido, or psychological energy, to others. When we realize that the libido we invest in others is a projection, they lose their overpowering significance and the energy we invested in them returns to us. Knowing that the influence originates within us releases vitality, activates hidden potential and produces a oneness of being.  This brings a childlike state of bliss and a treasure of accumulated libido which can constantly stream forth like the energy of a child.

This is the psycho-spiritual meaning of the last image from the film, 2001: A Space Odyssey, in which Dr. David Bowman is transformed into a fetus floating in space and gazing at the Earth from within a transparent orb of light. He has evolved through the hero’s journey and been reborn as an enlightened spirit warrior with a cosmic point of view. No longer projecting his inner truths onto others, no longer ruled by instinct or ego, he no longer wants to control society but only to benefit it.  In my projection, this is the  best possible outcome of every soul’s odyssey through inner space.

So several years ago I was working on a project with some unusually spiritual, accomplished and intelligent women. Over time I noticed that one whom I particularly admired had a tendency to say things to me that felt like mean, personal put-downs, especially about my thinking, writing, and teaching on psychological and spiritual matters: subjects I considered my areas of expertise. Her comments hurt me very much and it became increasingly difficult to contain my anger.

Feeling this angry at a casual acquaintance was a new experience for me. I knew from my Jungian studies that my strong response to her meant there must be a part of me that was like a part of her, but I couldn’t imagine what it was. One day when we were alone I finally told her how angry I was about a comment she had made in response to an observation of mine. She was flabbergasted! She had no idea she had said something hurtful and asked me if I would let her know the next time it happened!

That’s when I finally got it that she was as well-meaning as I was and we both had a somewhat intellectually proud and spiritually critical shadow of which neither was aware. Ouch! Others saw these tendencies in her too—no doubt they likewise saw them in me—but no one I knew seemed to have the problem with her that I did. Why was I so sensitive? Because her comments confirmed my Spiritual Bully’s criticisms of me. Since I couldn’t see him in myself I couldn’t get angry at him for causing me so much pain, but I sure could get angry at her! As you can well imagine, it was tough accepting the truth about this particular inner space alien!

Another example. The family of a man I once knew told me he was very controlling. One day he attended a workshop I led on the shadow. After an exercise in which attendees were to list 5 people they had problems with and why, he said the people on his list were very controlling. “This can’t be right,” he said somewhat defensively and indignantly. “I’m not the least bit controlling and everyone knows these people are, so how could they represent a part of me?” See?

So how can we discover our projections? By noticing our emotions. Anything that evokes a strong emotional response in us is related to one of our unconscious issues or complexes as Jung called them, and we project parts of these onto others! We love who we love or hate who we hate because in them we see qualities we suspect might belong to us as well. The stronger the emotion, the more unconscious the projection. We don’t want to believe in projection because we don’t want to see the shadows lurking in our inner space. But there are several very good reasons why we should learn to recognize them. I’ll share some next time.

After my post “Animal Healers” in which I said that we project our unconscious emotions onto animals, a reader wrote, “I am a bit confused about the concept of “projection” within the context of Jungian Psychology. I hear Jungians use it a lot, and I get the concept in general, but only in a vague sense. For example, I understand that we “project” our own subconscious concepts of perfection on our beloved, but I’m unsure what that means. Are Jungians saying that the world we see is simply a hologram of what our subconscious minds expect to and want to see? How do we differentiate between what is existentially in the world from a projection?”

This is a great question and I won’t be able to explain it adequately in just one post, so I’ll continue next time. Projection is one of the most difficult psychological realities of all to understand because we do it at an entirely unconscious level. Your ego believes it is the center of your psyche and that everything pretty much revolves around it. Moreover, it believes it knows exactly what you are doing, and why, at any given moment. To convince your ego that it is mistaken is akin to Copernicus and Galileo trying to convince our forebears of only a few centuries ago that contrary to the evidence of their eyes, the sun does not revolve around the Earth and there is an unimaginably vast universe beyond the bowl of the sky with contents and influences yet to be discovered.

It is no coincidence that during the second half of the 20^th century people throughout the world became fascinated with science fiction novels, television shows and films like War of the Worlds, Star Trek, Star Wars, E.T. and 2001: A Space Odyssey. Freudian and Jungian psychology were entering collective awareness in a big way during that era, and a major discovery was the reality of the unconscious self. With our growing awareness of an unknown inner universe came a parallel interest in the outer one.

The idea that we might contain potentially dangerous unknown contents made us extremely uncomfortable. Since these unconscious phenomena were still inaccessible to our egos, we dealt with our anxiety by imagining and exploring ideas about aliens and space ships and planetary wars going on somewhere outside ourselves and the known world. “As above, so below,” as the ancient saying goes. To put it another way, “As without, so within.” Whether or not space aliens are physical realities remains to be seen; but there is no doubt they symbolize psychological realities.

This is an example of projection. Jung said (Volume 6, paragraphs 783 and 784 of the Collective Works) that a projection is a transferral of our own unconscious contents onto another person or object. It is an automatic process that happens to everyone and is not under our ego’s conscious control. When we project our negative unconscious contents onto others we make them responsible for our discomfort, flaws, or problems. This helps us get rid of painful, incompatible contents. We do the same with positive contents of which our egos are still unaware. Then we make those onto whom we have projected them responsible for our happiness or salvation. Thus do we demonize others in whom we see our negative contents and create God-images out of entities, real or imagined, onto whom we project our positive contents. This, of course, is how wars, love affairs, and religions are formed.

Next time I’ll give some examples of what projection looks like in everyday life. Meanwhile you might want to ask yourself who you demonize, who you love, and why.

During 2011 I did something on this blog that I have rarely done before: speak openly about my progressive religious views. Both of my parents came from families that were deeply religious in orthodox, literalist ways. My mother’s brother remained true to the conservative beliefs of his Baptist church until the day he died. Late in their lives my mother and her sister dared to ask themselves a few shocking questions, like, “Were Adam and Eve real people? Is Satan real? Are Eden and Hell real places?” but they too remained closely tied to their churches to the end.

My father’s parents were strict Baptists. To my knowledge, Daddy was not religious in their way, but he did attend church and sing in the choir. And I have no doubt whatsoever that his gnawing guilt over having blatantly broken the 7^th Commandment had something to do with his death from a heart attack at the age of 43.

Being raised in this kind of environment naturally had an effect on me. Completely unaware of the negative side effects of my religion, I became deeply “religious” at the age of 17. But the unresolved issues of parents are always passed down to their children, and the more unconscious these issues are, the more powerfully they seek resolution in those who inherit them.

Thus, in retrospect I can see that my most pressing issues are all about trying to heal my parents and rectify their mistakes. The themes of my work are empowering femininity, (my mother aligned herself with the masculine values of “tunneling through the mountain” while repressing her feminine, feeling and nurturing, “river going around the mountain” side); and uniting masculinity and femininity (my parents divorced, after all) in my psyche, relationships, and God-image.

Anyway, back to this blog. When I finally found the courage to write openly and honestly, I discovered to my great surprise that my progressive thinking was not only accepted, but the posts from 2011 receiving the highest number of views were almost always about religion! In fact, my Dec. 14^th post titled “How’s Your God-Image Working For You?” received an all-time high of 257 views in one day! Being surrounded by religious literalists for most of my life had pretty much convinced me that my views would be perceived as heretical by most people, yet every single comment in response to my religious posts has been overwhelmingly positive!

I can’t adequately express just how affirming, freeing and empowering this is. It has given me the confidence to recommend an extraordinary book I’ve just finished. I don’t do this often, but this one is simply a must-read for anyone questioning traditional religious beliefs. Written by N.M. Freeman it’s titled “The Story of Q” and is about the many ways in which people are effected by religion. It’s deceptively simple on the surface, but deeply profound, and although a fictional novel, it’s based on actual historical events. This book is truly mind-expanding and I suspect will be life-changing for many who read it. Why? Because in language anyone can understand, it blasts religious literalism right out of the water and reveals the true, historical, underlying meaning of the Bible and all religious scriptures, showing them not to be about “right belief,” but about opening to the soul’s journey through life.

If this sounds at all interesting to you, I hope you’ll give yourself a special gift this year and read “The Story of Q.” (I’ve already ordered six more copies for gifts.) And please let me know how it touches your soul. Happy New Year, dear friends, and thank you for your readership!

Certainly mammals have body structures, nervous systems, organs, instinctual needs, and even DNA very similar to ours. So when they’re sick, wounded or in pain, we know how they feel. Moreover, although most animals can try to flee from danger, there are always forces—including humans and Nature herself—that are far more powerful. Knowing our own fears and vulnerability, we can relate to that aspect of animals too.

Then there’s the unconditional love some animals give us. It’s so comforting when your dog follows you around, your cat purrs contentedly in your lap, or your horse comes running at your approach. You feel known, appreciated, valued and of value. A happy, thriving pet reminds you that you can be loving, nurturing and morally responsible. We crave these good feelings and love the animals who elicit them, so it’s only natural that we get emotional when they suffer or die.

Repression and projection have something to do with this too. All of us deny some of our unwanted qualities and project them onto people and animals. For example, you might repress feelings of sadness, loneliness and self-pity and dislike people who are always feeling sorry for themselves, yet you can feel painfully sorry for sad-eyed animals who are lost, neglected or abused. And let’s face it: feeling sympathy for an animal is better than feeling nothing at all!

The bottom line is that we all need humanizing and healing, and for whatever reason, animals have an uncanny knack for helping; especially with emotions like love, pain, and grief. For instance, when my parents divorced I cried my heart out. But when my father died three months later I didn’t shed a tear. I was so traumatized that I shut down emotionally so I wouldn’t hurt any more. Denying pain became so important to me that I even refused novocaine when I went to the dentist! For years I couldn’t cry for myself, and my obsessive stoicism wasn’t always easy to be around, but I could practically use up a box of tissues watching an animal movie. I still can!

Over the years Miss Lottie, a sensuous siamese cat; Peri, a perky little chihuahua/terrier mix; Shadow, an elegant, high-strung thoroughbred gelding; and Bear, a handsome and gentle golden retriever, have been my teachers, therapists and healers. Training and caring for them taught me patience and respect for the ways of others. Their simple joy in being alive taught me greater awareness and appreciation for my body and the life in it. Their love and devotion to me helped me feel and express more tenderness and love to everyone, including myself. And the tears I shed at their deaths softened my heart and taught me more compassion.

By the way, Isabella, or Izzy as Matt’s family calls their new puppy, is fine! Apparently her problem was caused by the supposedly “safe” puppy chews I gave her to keep her from chewing on the furniture! So it was my fault. This is tough for me to take, but being the sweet little love sponge that she is, I know she wouldn’t want me to blame myself. I’m trying not to…

I am so grateful to all of you who have been following and would especially like to thank those who have taken the time to write so many kind, thoughtful, and thought-provoking comments. Meeting and interacting with you was a major highlight of 2011 for me. Thank you, my dear friends, and Happy New Year to you!

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 26,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 10 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Who were you this time last year?
What secrets were caged in the dark?
What fears did you dare to release?
What strengths await birth in your heart?

Obviously, I’m no poet so I’ll stop while I’m ahead! Instead, in this last post of 2011 I’d like to share a real poem by Tim Rice about the Birth/Death/Rebirth cycle of Life. In combination with Elton John’s exquisite music, it never fails to send my soul soaring. But before you watch and listen to the video below let me set the stage, so to speak.

Last week my husband and I took our children, their spouses, and their children to New York City for a Christmas treat. It’s something we’ve wanted to do for a long time, and this year the grandchildren were old enough to appreciate and remember it. We stayed at the Marriott Marquis in Times Square and in the four days we were there did all the things tourists do, including attending the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall, taking a carriage ride through Central Park, gaping at the gigantic video screen ads and scrolling news flashes in Times Square, ice-skating in Bryant Park, riding the subway to the American Museum of Natural History where we stood in awe beneath the giant whale and compared our heights to dinosaur skeletons, selecting dolls and matching outfits for the girls at the American Girl Store, letting the boys design and order their own basketball shoes at Nike, and buying a few final Christmas toys at the vast Toys R Us mother store.

As if this weren’t enough, we saw two Broadway plays. Spider-Man’s amazing flying feats over the audience dazzled our grandchildren, but for me, the highlight was watching Lion King through their wonder-filled eyes while my own spilled over with tears.

I know what I’ll be thinking about on December 31st as from the comfort of our home we watch the crystal ball descending in Times Square. Along with the birth of Baby2012 I’ll be celebrating the births of my children whose lives fill me with joy, and of my grandchildren who have brought new blessings of hope and love into my life. I’ll be celebrating all the little psycho-spiritual Births I’ve experienced as I’ve grown through despair and hope, faith and love to find my place on the path unwinding in the Circle. I’ll be celebrating all my little Deaths too, and the Big One yet to come. And I’ll be celebrating the Rebirths I’ve already experienced as well as the ones that await me on the other side. I’ll be celebrating the Circle of Life.

If you’ve been following this blog, you’ll notice the archetypes of King, Queen, Divine Child, Wise Elder, and Shadow in the picture above and video below.  They’re in this story because they’re in us. Like baby Simba, they’re waiting to become conscious, mature and healed so they can find their place in the path unwinding in the Circle. May 2012 bring you closer to your place in the path. Enjoy the video!