River 22
Kate
Trusting the Process 1994

~~~~~~dream~~~~~~

I dreamed a friend came to my home with a bottle of champagne. It was as though our previous disagreement had not happened. She embraced me and I told her that I loved her. We had the champagne.

In a similar dream another friend entered carrying a bottle of champagne, which she opened and poured. She asked me if I wanted some. I refused, saying I’d stick to the cask of white wine I had in the fridge. I placed the cask on the table. Then I noticed she had on the table two bottles of champagne wrapped up with cellophane with cards and ribbons. She said they were for me. I felt very grateful about this, but I had the feeling I just couldn’t take her champagne.

~~~~~~

I had started to have problems with some really close girlfriends; two separate instances, in fact. After the first girlfriend and I clashed, violently, many things were said in the heat of the moment. My friend, I realised, was carrying around a lot of ‘shit’. She was threatened with bankruptcy and I was very close to the situation, going to court on her behalf and taking on her problems, as well as my own. Exactly one week later, after no contact, I had the first champagne dream. Another week passed and I received something through the mail which I’d been waiting on from her, so I rang her to thank her and it was as though nothing had happened. Our relationship is now very healthy and we have never mentioned the incident to each other.

The attitude of unconditional acceptance and understanding which the dream had inspired gave Kate the opportunity to see her friendship in a new light and handle it differently. When the second friendship was challenged, it was Kate who required the unconditional support.

On the second occasion I had become very drunk at a function with a friend. I may drink at home, but for some reason on this occasion, I did it outside, in public. Wrong, I know, but everyone makes mistakes. She rang me up and really went to town about the incident a couple of days later. About a week later I had the second champagne dream.

I have often tried to let my friend know of my spiritual feelings towards my close friends, namely forgiveness and unconditional love. For a while she didn’t let the incident drop, but rang later, very drunk, to tell me that she loved me and to ask if our friendship was intact.

Before the champagne dreams I truly believed in keeping friendships, even at the cost of my own beliefs. I allowed my friends to dictate to me, thinking they knew better than me about almost everything.

After the second champagne dream I started to assert myself, not in an aggressive way, but with sincerity, empathy and unconditional love. I had no idea how easily influenced I had been, how little I had trusted my own process. Looking back on my decisions with my friends I feel fantastic, knowing I have the power to make my life something wonderful instead of carrying other people’s ‘baggage’ around with me. If I have a conflict with someone, I try to find out what the real problem is.

I learned to let people ‘go’, to turn the other cheek and wave goodbye, wishing them love and peace and maybe hoping they would learn to love me for who I am. I no longer bury my head in the sand. Now I confront situations head-on, calmly and assuredly, knowing what I want in my life: love, respect, loyalty and a lot of fun!

Kate acquired access to further inner strength through a third dream, one in which she got more in touch with her male side, quite literally!

In this dream an actress, Tina, came into the bathroom and embraced me. She had a penis. I could feel it up against me: it was weird. Then I discovered I had a penis too and woke thinking ‘How strange, I’m an androgynous creature, and so is Tina’. In the dream hallway, I remember looking at a huge portrait with fire all around the gilt-edge frame. I asked Tina how the effect was achieved and she explained that it was done by setting chux wipers on fire all around the frame.

I have been assisted in my dream interpretations by a psychologist/ hypnotherapist with whom I’ve been working for a year. I learned from this dream to contact my own powers to stand up for myself, to no longer play on the female side of my nature by being a receptacle in my relationships, whether those friendships be with men or women. I can now be penetrating rather than a receptacle, and no longer need to be ‘used’ in relationships. I don’t need a man and I am starting to balance my Yin and Yang.

The dream also showed me that my relationship with my lover needed cleansing, as depicted by the cleansing flames around the picture of relationship. I realised I wanted more from a relationship than what Nigel could offer me. I wanted a relationship to be as beautiful and perfect as I could make it: ‘gilt-edged’.

Physically I had put on heaps of weight since my miscarriage two and a half years ago, and it just seemed to drop off after these dreams. At first this was boosted by a conscious decision to attend Weight Watchers, but now I eat well, still drink the occasional wine and am so active and full of energy that I’m an entirely new person. As Louise Hayes says, ‘When you learn to love yourself, miracles happen’, or something to that effect!

The last two months of my life have been extraordinary! My life has moved at such a pace, socially and work-wise. I have achieved and accomplished so much in this time and had a lot of fun doing so.

Recently I had two occasions to assert myself - strange circumstances, strange tests - but I did so. I trusted my process of harmony and brought these situations around from potential aggression to harmony and respect. I now feel I have the tools to lead my life on the path I have chosen, working out relationships and going with the energies that make me feel good. I guess the anger I came to the psychologist with in May 1994 has come into balance in some way. Sometimes I still feel angry, but not in the same way as before. I try to find out where it’s coming from and work through it, rather than losing my head.

I feel so much more at peace with myself. I try to make peace and forgive all aggressors and I am finding that loving, gracious people are now entering my life instead.

Jane’s Interpretation

Each dream has a similar beginning but concerns a different friend and ends differently. Each relationship, like the champagne offering, is handled in a different way. Since Kate felt comfortable about the ending of each dream, we can assume that her dream choices were appropriate for each relationship. Had she felt unsettled about drinking the first bottle of champagne, for example, or mean for not accepting the champagne gifts in the second dream, her dream handling of each friend would be questioned. A common ‘dream couplet’ is to have two dreams which start in the same way and have opposite conclusions, but the dreamer feels good about one scenario and uncomfortable about the other. In these cases the dreamer has effectively role-played a difficult situation and decided which felt ‘right’ for carrying through in waking life. Kate, however, felt pleased with each outcome, so I would interpret this as meaning that each friendship needed to be handled individually.

I would have asked Kate to consider the differences between these two relationships until she could see the benefits in ‘letting bygones be bygones’ with one, while deciding not to accept the offerings of the other friend no matter how attractively packaged they might appear. The second dream shows Kate’s decision to use her own resources, or to express herself in her own way (her own wine), rather than to go along with the friend’s style or to be bought by her. Kate had, in fact, looked at her dreams from this angle, and saw the need to check that all her relationships were mutually rewarding.

Ocean Dip
Caroline
Warning 1986

~~~~~~dream~~~~~~

I was in a dark room with what appeared to be a hospital bed. Then I felt as if I was not in hospital but a morgue, and the beds were the tables that are used in morgues for postmortems. I also felt that maybe there were bodies on them. I was by a door and suddenly there was a great sucking sensation dragging me out through the door. All was still dark but I felt as if I was surrounded by awful things and that what was trying to drag me through the door was incredibly evil.

I was not frightened but I was determined that the evil thing was not going to get me through the door. So I hung on to the door jamb and shouted ‘No!’. I woke my husband up by grabbing him (as I hung on to the door jamb) and I was actually shouting ‘No!’ out loud.

~~~~~~

I was a solo parent and this dream occurred just before I married my husband. My children were sixteen and eighteen years old. My ex-husband had made life difficult for the previous few years and life was pretty tense around the time.

The intensity and the incredible feeling of evil in the dream was as if someone was trying to get into my mind. I discovered that my eighteen year old son had been dabbling in the occult and I felt that somehow this dream was connected with him and his activities. Although I knew some symbolic meaning was there, I was also aware of a clear warning that I had to act somehow, somewhere.

Shortly after the dream my son turned to spiritualism and I became interested as well. Between 1986 and 1993 I slowly realised that I had to go in a direction which seemed to unfold as if I was being shown a slow motion film, as I discovered myself and my capabilities.

Although my health has deteriorated in some areas, my mind and self-esteem have improved. I have made the correct decision because of the peace that is coming into my life.

Jane’s Interpretation

This kind of dream can indicate the dreamer’s fear of death and beyond, but it is more likely to be symbolic of the dreamer’s vulnerability to waking life events. Some might interpret this dream as a direct experience of ‘evil spirits’, but I feel it is more beneficial to examine the dream’s symbolism.

The hospital suggests the potential for cure or healing, but the setting rapidly becomes a morgue and the focus is on ‘postmortem’. Was Caroline analysing (carrying out a postmortem) on something that had ‘died’ in her life? The evil, sucking sensation started after noticing the postmortems, so it could be that Caroline was suddenly becoming aware, in going back and analysing her life, that she was being ‘sucked’ away, no longer in full control of her own life. The hospital setting still shows the potential for healing once Caroline stands up to her discovery, as she does do in the dream, ‘hanging on’ and screaming ‘No!’ in defiance.

In interpreting Caroline’s dream I would have asked her what she felt had died in her life and in which ways she felt she was losing control. I would then suggest she ‘hang on’ to the feeling of power and defiance she contacted in the dream to give her strength to make her ‘comeback’ in waking life.

The fact that Caroline’s son was involved in the occult at the time would have added to her feelings of vulnerability. Being stressed, she would have been susceptible to mind-control by others, living or dead, and her gut reaction to the dream was a good emergency reaction. She strengthened herself against her son’s occult interests and joined him when he turned his focus towards a more healing, spiritual path.

As the survey dreamers progressed through their dream-inspired life changes, growing personally through their learning, discovering new abilities and often putting new attitudes and lifestyles into practise, their personal relationships often came under pressure.

Anne, Rowyn and Moni, for example, found they had to move on, to walk a different path:

"Looking back I feel wonderful about what happened. I regret that Andrew couldn’t handle the changes and that we couldn’t work things through together. I became more assertive and wanted, and got, my needs met, which was difficult for him to accept."
Anne

 "I feel positive within myself and confident I have chosen the right path spiritually but I must confess that at times I feel as if I am leaving others behind. It’s like you possess this inner knowing of how events will change or affect others but they don’t ‘feel’ the same sensation. Sometimes it’s a lonely feeling. They can’t, or won’t, comprehend your experiences, dreams or situation, and most of the time if you voice a dream or a feeling, they reply in ridicule and suspicion."
Rowyn

"In my heart I love them, since I can see only the backgrounds they grew up in and the knots in which they have unwittingly tangled themselves; but loving them is one thing and deciding not to accept the hurt they offer in return is quite another."
Moni

Others, such as Akira, Francoise and Mary needed time alone to develop and realise their new potential as individuals before relating with their partners in improved ways:

"I travelled and had never felt quite so free. It was the first time in my life since I was a teenager that I had not been in a relationship. There was just me and I realised that life was exciting and that I could do whatever I liked!.... I am much more in control. Back with Simon I am now much stronger and know that I am fine, on my own or in partnership."
Akira

Francoise moved away from the family after her dream, and from that perspective reconsidered her relationship with her partner:

"I realised that I still loved this man, but not in the way that it was. Now I have this new strength and foundation, we are re-evaluating our relationship at a more fulfilling level."
Francoise

Mary, who had called an end to her relationship just prior to her dream, discovered:

"Eventually, after some years apart and no contact, I met the man again. We had both changed so much, gained in maturity, self-esteem and confidence. We married; now we are very happy."
Mary

Willow and Kate discovered that the changes in their lives resulted in better relationships all round:

"My attitudes to everything and everyone have been altered for the good and it has made all of my personal relationships so much more satisfying."
Willow

"I feel so much more at peace with myself. I try to make peace and forgive all aggressors and I am finding that loving, gracious people are now entering my life now instead."
Kate

Perhaps ‘life-changing’ is too mild a description for some who felt that their dreams inspired changes which were personally transformational.

"I may still be that person, but only in looks and body structure. On the inside, my thinking and perceptions have changed in a way that is much better than ever before."
Julie

"I am now a totally different person. No-one can believe the changes in me. I look younger physically. I used to be so thin, just strained, drained all the time. I’ve gone back to being a kid again."
Sarras