It is only when we wake from dreams that we know we have been dreaming. Similarly, this life may be realized as a dream only when we awake in Cosmic Consciousness." Paramahansa Yogananda
Dreams are a feedback mechanism of our subconscious mind and Higher Self. Most of us don’t have the ability to talk to our soul, or Higher Self, directly in a voice, so the soul uses dreams as one of the ways it seeks to communicate with us. Most of our dreams, however are created by the subconscious mind until that time that the incarnated personality begins to awaken spiritually.
Dreams are like a newspaper printout of our previous day’s thinking, feeling, and actions. Instead of this newspaper being in words it is in symbols. The key to understanding dreams is to understand that every part of the dream is a part of ourselves. By examining the organization of these symbols in the dream we can become more conscious of what we are creating, and causing to happen in our lives.
It is very important to understand that the conscious mind is not always conscious. For example, maybe we are being rude to people in real life and are not really aware of it. Our dreams can then give us a dream of a very rude individual taking his irritability out on people. The subconscious and/or superconscious mind is giving us feedback. We cannot come into self mastery of a pattern unless we know what it is.
A lot of people don’t pay attention to dreams because they don’t understand what they mean. Dreams are like a foreign language. When you are first exposed to a foreign language it is meaningless. Once you study that language, in a very short time it is easy to understand. The same is true of dreams. Dreams are the foreign language or really the universal language of symbols.
Very often people will have prophetic dreams, or dreams of past lives, which are a category of dreams unto themselves. Another common occurrence for people is to have recurring dreams. These types of dreams are especially important for it is saying the subconscious mind and/or soul are trying to make you aware of a certain pattern in which you are stuck.
Most of our dreams, as I have already said, speak to the inner organization of our thought and emotional patterns, however sometimes dreams can also be giving a clear outer life statement. For example, if you dream about a particular person who is about to get in a car crash, the dream may be reflecting that person as being an inner symbol or part of your own personality that is about to crash. Or the dream might be making a statement about this real life person. Maybe your Higher Self and soul, is giving that other person guidance through yourself. That is why I am a firm believer in sharing my dreams with my friends and loved ones when I have dreams about them.
In interpreting dreams there are personal symbols and universal symbols. It is always safer to look at the symbols in your dreams as personal. An example of this might be the symbol of a cat. The standard universal meaning for a cat is independence in most dream books. You, however, may have had certain experiences in childhood that gave cats a special and specific meaning for you besides this, or other than this.
It is also very important when dealing with your dreams not to give your power to them. I bring this up because I know people who have had a bad dream and they let the bad dream depress a good part of their day. We must find a balance of honoring and acknowledging our dreams, yet also understanding that we need to own our personal power and cause our own reality.
It is also a very helpful practice in the morning to reenact our dreams. When we get up in the morning there are certain dreams that we don’t like the outcome of. For example someone may be breaking into our house and stealing things. We can reprogram this negative pattern by re-visualizing the dream in the morning and having the police come and arrest this burglar and take him to jail, and then have all our things returned. This procedure corrects the faulty pattern that the dream was indicating to us.
Another common process in dreams is to be flying. This could be a symbol that we are flying in our lives in a psychological sense, however, it could also be a real experience. When we dream at night we leave and very often "astral project". Our flying dreams are, hence, a lucid dream of our astral travels.
Another common phenomena in dreams is for the Masters to contact us in our dreams. When we are dreaming we are experiencing ourselves in a spiritual state without our physical bodies, so it is easy for the Masters to enter our dreams. Sai Baba, the great Master from India, has said that no one ever dreams about Him without His willing it.
Carl Jung, the great Swiss psychologist and contemporary of Freud, called some dreams big dreams, and other ones more normal dreams. Big dreams were the ones that were even more important to remember because they were often created by the soul, or the Masters.
Very often people get scared when they die in a dream. They think that this means that they are going to die. This is most often not the case. When you have a dream of yourself, or some part of yourself that is dying, this can be a very positive dream. This could symbolically mean that you are dying to a certain phase of your life, or part of yourself that is negative. You are being given a message of death and rebirth.
Another confusing symbolism to people is the act of making love in a dream to someone other than your spouse. This does not mean that you should do this in real life, or is something you should be embarrassed of. When we make love to someone we are symbolically connecting with that part of ourselves. Focus on the meaning and symbolism of the person you are making love to.
The Senoi Indians’ entire culture is based on dreams. They look at dreams as being almost more important than real life. Every morning upon arising they share their dreams with each other as a sacred ritual. There are many wonderful books that have been written about this most amazing group of people.
Another common occurrence in dreams is to be given direct messages. Very often we don’t even need to interpret our dreams, the meaning is given in a clear straight forward message by your soul, a Master, or some symbolic person in your dreams. Words in dreams very often have double meanings. For example, you might have a dream about bugs flying around. This may have to do with someone bugging you.
Another very important thing to look at in your dreams is to see where the conscious mind, or where you are in the dream. In other words, are you just watching the dream, or are you actively participating. An example of this might be you being two hundred pounds over weight, eating too much food, in the kitchen.
This dream image as compared to watching someone else be over weight and eating too much food is a very important differentiation. The dream image where you are watching this occur shows "disidentification" from the process. The pattern of overeating is still in play, however you are aware of it. In the first dream there is no awareness of disidentification from the pattern.
This example gives the importance of watching the sequence of dreams you are having. By watching the sequence of dreams you are having you can watch the development of your consciousness, from total identification to a negative pattern, to disidentification, to self mastery.
How to Remember Our Dreams
This is a very easy process. All one needs to do is give their subconscious mind suggestions right before bed. This can be done verbally, or in writing. Writing might even be better because the physicalness of doing it helps it get into the subconscious mind a little easier. Just say, or write, "I am remembering my dreams tonight" ten times. This will program your subconscious mind, to wake you up.
It is then a good idea to have a small lamp or flash light and pen and paper near your bed. If you don’t write the dream down or at least take some notes it is a good likelihood you will forget it in the morning. The interesting thing about dreams is that you remember them from the back forward. They are like a thread or fishing line which you are reeling in. If you don’t catch that initial line it drifts away.
It is of the highest importance that you write your dreams down at least in the morning. Just the act of writing them down is healing and integrating. Often the meaning will come to you later in the day or days, or even weeks later. They are also helpful to refer back to when watching your dream sequences.
If you get stuck in interpreting them pray to your Higher Self and soul for help. They will give you immediate insights then or later in the day when you are in a more quiet and receptive moment. It is also important to try and watch how your inner life perfectly correlates with your outer life. Remember what Hermes said in his great Hermetic Law, "As within, so without. As above, so below."
Sleep Walking
Another very interesting phenomena of the sleep state is sleep walking. What is happening here is the person is identified with their astral body, however the physical body is moving along with the process.
I once had a client who was a young adolescent. About two hours before bed he was planning to steal his parents car and go visit his girl friend. After planning this whole affair out, he changed his mind just before bed and decided it wasn’t worth the risk of getting in trouble and getting punished. His conscious mind decided not to do it, however the plan was still in his subconscious mind, and this was an adolescent that was not in control of his subconscious mind.
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