December 2017 Newsletter

Hello, and a delightful December to you!
Welcome, or welcome back, to my newsletter. Today's issue has an article about dreams, with a few clues to help you make sense of them. Enjoy!

Dreams can be about ordinary life, family and housework and the people we work with in the office. They can bring up long-forgotten scenes and characters from our past, maybe relatives who have died. They can be fantastical, where we have conversations with a tree or a wild animal or an infant who is wise and well-spoken, or where other laws of Nature like gravity seem to be suspended. We know the dream is trying to tell us something, but how do we make sense of it?

Two nights in a row in the past week I dreamed about my energy teacher, which I do fairly often. I'll be travelling to see her in a few weeks for a workshop, so it makes sense that she is on my radar, so to speak. In one dream she was telling me to go check on a male student, to make sure he'd received some secret personal password. I was worried that the students didn't seem to be taking their learning seriously enough, fooling around and chatting instead of paying attention. This probably reflects my own desire to be a good student and learn everything I can, plus my past history of being a high school teacher with unruly students, rather than predicting anything which will happen at the upcoming workshop. I am constantly fascinated at how dreams can combine our past with our present and make a consistent coherent story from that. I have great respect and admiration for this particular teacher, and hope her other students feel that way too. Now that I think of it, I hope my past and current students see me the same way.

One big key to understanding a dream's message is how you felt about it. Were you frightened, or excited, or angry, or perhaps just observing the action calmly? As with watching a movie, you may be caught up in the dream characters' lives, identifying with their struggles, especially if you yourself are a main character in the dream. What can you learn from this more removed viewpoint, when you're not in the middle of the action? If an animal is in the dream, could this be a new ally showing up for you, bringing the speed or courage or camouflage ability you'd like to have more of? If a character does something admirable or something upsetting, could a part of you be behaving that way when you're awake? One school of dream work says every dream character is a part of the dreamer, so it can be interesting to ask "What part of me is like that villain (or hero, or damsel in distress, or ...)?". Then what do you want to do with what you just discovered?

Please don't dismiss a movie that comes to you in your sleep as "just a dream", considering it to be meaningless or unimportant. Simply writing down the details of a dream, as well as whatever you felt about it, or what it reminds you of, can often yield helpful new insights. If you were carrying around a question, stated or not, could there be an answer in your dream? Maybe guidance came through about your career, or your relationship, or your health. I think our dreams are just one more channel for information to come to us, no more or less important than our hearing or our sense of smell. Pay a little more attention to your dreams, in a wondering curious way, and you may be surprised what you find out about yourself or your life.

To read about a recent dream of mine which could have been frightening, and surprisingly wasn't, click here.

Have you wondered if my work could help you?
I'm now offering complimentary Discovery Session consultations of 20 to 30 minutes, for us to discuss what you're looking for in a coach, and to see whether you and I feel like a fit. To schedule your Discovery Session, click here.

Do you want your own copy of future newsletters?
If a friend forwarded this to you, or you're reading it from Facebook or LinkedIn, this is a hit-or-miss method of receiving it, and you might not see it next time. If you'd like to be on my distribution list, you can join here. You can unsubscribe at any time. Thank you!

Please send me your questions and comments
Let me know what you've wondered about concerning energy medicine or vision or dreams. I'll be glad to write a short article addressing that topic. Thank you to those who have sent me questions, or see a question you asked me in a private session written about here. You're helping many other people! Enjoy the start of your December. I'll write again in a few weeks. Take care!