Privet Investigator

Privet InvestigatorA common dream experienced by people who are embracing a new job or different belief system is being lost or trapped in a maze. Unlike the the expansive and unconscious wild wood, a maze symbolises a specific route to discovering something we don’t know about ourselves.

However, because the labyrinthine twists and turns of a maze are usually designed and constructed by someone else, it often means that we have to follow their rules to arrive at a solution, rather than following our own instincts and intentions.

If you find yourself lost in the puzzling paths of a dream maze, it is valuable to reflect on your intentions in waking life, and to consider what rules and processes are constraining your choices. Imagine yourself in the maze and use of all your senses to orient and find yourself.

Look at the clouds moving across the sky above and see where the sun is shining from. Listen to the sounds and inhale the scents and smells. Use your instincts to guide yourself to the destination that you choose. Rather than following rules such as ‘Always turn right’, just do the right thing.

Instead of being limited by a path that someone else has chosen for you, walk out of the maze and investigate the amazing opportunities in your own individual forest of the unconscious and instinctive.

Torch Songs

Olympic TorchRecently I have been exploring many dreams about the Olympic Torch.  Although the Torch has featured in a number of contexts, the most familiar narrative is that the dreamer is running with the torch, and is being attacked by what seems to be an organised and aggressive group.  The attackers often seem to be dressed in military uniforms and shouting orders at the dreamer as they try to grab hold of the Torch.

When we dream of a flame, particularly a flaming torch, often represents our individual creativity and what fires us with excitiement.  It can also be a metaphor for what inflames our passions, as in the classic Torch Song where carrying a torch for someone is how we keep the light of an unrequited love aflame.

Ultimately the person we are carrying the torch for is often our own creative self and the unrequited love we experience is a perhaps a projection of our own unrequited creative talents.  The torch of our own creativity illuminates our path into the unknown and helps to enlighten us as we move forward on our journeys.

The creativity that ignites our passion and fires our imagination is usually sparked by boundless love, rather than ruthless control.  Creativity is an energy that cannot be enforced; it can only be encouraged.  Otherwise it becomes an abstracted and remote ideal that seems to become more distant the more we run towards it.

Emotional Baggage

Aird of SleatThe emotional chaos in the latest incarnation of the Aird of Sleat* has been reflected in many dreams recently.  In waking life, the much heralded automatic baggage handling system  has resulted in the temporary disappearance of 19,000 items of luggage.  In dreaming life, dreamers have been reporting that they arrive in the baggage hall to collect their belongings, only to be embroiled in chaotic confusion.

When we dream of bags and baggage we are usually reflecting the experiences and habits that we carry around with us in our waking lives.  This emotional baggage is often no longer required and we are usually holding on to beliefs and feelings that no longer have any real value for us.  Rather than burden ourselves with the trauma of the past we can perhaps look at ways of lightening our emotional load,  so we can move forward on to the next part of our journeys.

It would seem from the experiences of passengers in Terminal 5 that British Airways perhaps need to unburden themselves of habitual working practices and chronic staff relations.  By lightening their own emotional baggage and habitual responses, they can perhaps ensure that their self-loading freight is always reconnected with the baggage that they consciously choose to carry.

*(AIRD OF SLEAT (n. archaic) Ancient Scottish curse placed from afar on the stretch of land now occupied by Heathrow Airport. – Douglas Adams, The Meaning of Liff)