Some Dream Games and Meet My Cat

When I'm going through a dream dry spell, I turn to my journals from years past and play some dream games; this way I don't obsess about not remembering my dreams. Plus, the perspective that time gives me about the meaning of past dreams is one of the major marvels of working with my dreams.

For instance, I'll go through past journals and make note of the images in the dreams of a particular month. I write summaries of each under the dream dates on a new page which I then install at the beginning of that month. When I go back to that journal the next time, each month's summary page sparks more understanding for me of my life journeys. I recognize personal struggles with love and fear, my health and my spiritual development; they're tremendously relevant to me now. Often an image makes me laugh while, at the same time, it's opening my eyes to something difficult for me. This is a convincing proof to me that dream messages come from some divine source of Love.

For instance, today while perusing my 2001 journal, I opened at random to the summary page for the month of September. The first summary describes a dream where pairs of my shoes are scattered across the bedroom floor; my note reads, 'The many different paths I've walked.' I also note that one pair is 'baby shit brown' and I wrote, 'very old shit'. I think that's a wonderfully funny way to point me to childhood wounds which might still be holding me back.

As I write this I realize that I chose September, 2001, a time that shook our collective world. I remember that I had several dreams dating from July 4 of 2001 up through September featuring terrorists. Robert Moss has written about how many people from around the world reported precognitive dreams with elements of the fateful 9/11 catastrophe in them. I'll take a closer look at mine; perhaps it will give me something to share with you in a future post.

Back to dream games, though, this illustrates how re-reading old journals often uncovers dreams of the future which weren't recognized as precognitive at the time. That's just what happened with the arrival of my wonderful cat Sunny.

After the death of my cat, Lucy, in 2005 I decided I didn't want any more pets, I wanted to be free to travel, etc. My husband kindly accepted my wishes, though he'd always rather have animals around him. One early morning in August of 2007, I opened my back door on a glorious day to find a beautiful gray and white Maine Coon under my lilac bush, skinny as a rail. He looked up at me and MEOWED! I knew he was saying, "Feed me; I'm hungry," so I put out a can of tuna and he let me pet him while he ate. It's a very long story, but it was love at first sight. Now he's installed as the grand pasha of our home and we're both very happy to serve him.

What I couldn't figure out is why I didn't dream about him ahead of time; with my past cats, a dream had foretold their coming. I went back in that year's journal and, sure enough, in June I found a dream entry telling how a dear friend (who in waking life was always threatening to drop off a cat for us) had brought us a Maine Coon kitten. The last line of that dream report is, 'And I couldn't believe how much I love him.'

I often tell people this; we dream the future all the time, we just don't pay attention. If we write dreams down, we learn to pay attention. Using dream journals for self-reflection, meditation and personal growth is not only rewarding, it's fun. I hope these ideas are of some service; I'd love to hear yours.