On the Cover of the Rolling Stone

In a "USA Today" story recently, a woman reporter relates the Pope's opinion on women priests, which is No. She concludes:

"Women priests may not top his list, but perhaps Francis is serving women through his focus on global poverty and hunger. Is that enough?" Uh, no; it's not enough.

Theology professor Alice L. Laffey makes a similar point in her op-ed, saying: "Throughout the world, women and their children make up the greatest percentage of human beings living in destitution. Their main concern is not women priests but food, health, education and physical safety. Francis' genuine concern for the real lives of the poor and suffering warmly embraces women."

In other words, Francis is serving women through his focus on global poverty and hunger, because for some obscure reason, the majority of the world's poor are women and children.  So look how much he likes women; he's going to talk more about what they need and maybe see if he can get them some management positions in the Vatican, (although most Vatican positions of authority require high ranking clerical ordination).

Here's my take on Francis' position: The majority of the world's poor are women because women have no status in patriarchal government, in patriarchal religion nor as the Divine Archetype.  Patriarchy is an old fashioned word for men rule, make all the decisions concerning women and children and God looks like one of them, an old white guy.  In patriarchal paradigms, woman's power is stripped from her; consider that it's been less than 100 years since American women got the right to vote  If you wonder what it took to get the 19th Amendment passed, watch Hillary Swank's portrayal of Suffragist leader, Alice Paul in "Iron Jawed Angels."  You may have to close your eyes during the part where jailers force feed the prisoners on a hunger strike; it's gruesome.  But that's what our grandmothers had to do to get us the vote in this great country.  Now when do you think women in some Muslim nations, or in Orthodox Hebrew communities or in the Catholic Church will get equal rights? By the way, American women are not guaranteed equal rights under our constitution, as we somehow couldn't manage to pass the ERA.  

Women are poor because women are on a sliding scale of denigration in patriarchal cults around the world, so don't tell me that the head of one of the big 3 global patriarchal cults is doing enough for women by talking about how they are poor and need help.  By the way, I think he talks in general, about poor people, not poor women, but we all know how inclusive patriarchal language can be.

So then comes an interview in the Wall Street Journal yesterday, Ash Wednesday, (the infamous time of penitence for Catholics that kicks off, wisely enough with Mardi Gras) with the Jesuit editor of the Catholic magazine, "America", James Martin.  Headline: "Women Could Have Greater Role in Church, Pope says." (Sorry, it's a little hard to watch with a straight face because he has a big black cross smudged in ashes on his bald pate.)

Gee whiz, I wonder what Pope Francis has in mind for our new roles in the church?  Ordination?  Making Pope Joan known to the world or apologizing and asking the church to do penance for the millions of victims. the majority women, of the bloody Medieval and Renaissance Roman Catholic Inquisition? Gee, what could the Pope have in mind, because he already said ordination is off the table because he doesn't want to see women "clericalized," huh?  Now that's sweet; he doesn't want to see us bothered with those long black robes and stiff white collars, but maybe we can run the Vatican equivalent of the PTA or go help the poor like Mother Teresa.  Besides, he says, we've talked about ordaining women in the Church before and decided against it; there's no need to revisit this pesky little subject.

Now, according to Father Martin, the Church has already said no because...(No, not because we don't have a penis like Jesus did, that wasn't the reason he gave), because if Jesus had wanted women to be priests, he would have started off picking one as an Apostle, which he didn't; so there, women can't be priests now.

OMG!  Did he just say that?  Despite the volumes of scholarly exegesis on John 20:11-21, in which Jesus appears first to Mary of Magdala on the third day after he's crucified? She doesn't recognize him  (most departed appear looking terrific and I'm sure that's not what she was expecting), until he says her name, and she knew him.  (Did they embrace?) "Don't cling to me" he says,  "because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go and find the brothers and tell them: I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my god and your god."  Jerusalem Bible

You see, the word "apostle" is derived from the Greek, "apostolos"; John wrote in Greek. It means messenger  or ambassador.  Now whom did the Lord choose as his first "messenger"?  To whom did He first appear, though Peter and the Beloved Apostle were duly fetched by Mary when she found the tomb empty.  Yeah, they searched around, found the linens and went running back to establish a religion based on artifacts.  Mary stuck around and was rewarded with the real thing; she was first to see the Risen Christ and the first to "take the message to the brethren, "Jesus is Alive.  He is Risen;" Mary of Magdala was first to proclaim this message.  The first Apostle to the Apostles was a woman, selected as his ambassador by Jesus himself.  She was also made a disciple by Jesus, (Luke 10: 38-42; since I know the good Father Martin might argue that one can't be an Apostle without first having been a disciple) the day she and her sister Martha were supposed to serve the food for the hungry dozen, but Mary was sitting there at Jesus' feet listening to Jesus teach.  Martha complained, but Jesus replied, "Mary has chosen what is better and it won't be taken away from her."  Did I mention that the word disciple is derived from the Greek word that means "to sit at the feet of a teacher" and that it was a crime punishable by death to defile the Torah (the holy Hebrew laws Jesus was purportedly teaching) by teaching it to a woman?  

Jesus was a Feminist; his treatment of women with respect and compassion probably contributed greatly to his condemnation by the religious authorities of his day. If he was running the RC today, we wouldn't be having this conversation, but he probably never intended the institutions that came after his death; he taught that "the kingdom of God is within you."  What's more, according to many ancient but non-canonical (meaning the RC won't credit their authenticity) texts, women had lots of authority in the early Church. Just one century into the "Christian Era, not so much.  How did that happen; ask Paul, a great proponent of keeping women silent and veiled.  

There are lots of skewed reasons for not ordaining women, beginning with the mythical fact that women are guilty from the get go; if it wasn't for Eve, we'd all still be living in paradise.   In reality, women threaten the very bedrock of the patriarchal RC church, that God is Male.  When I was a divinity graduate student and a candidate for priesthood in the RC through the "Women's Ordination Movement" of the 70's and early 80's, our motto was "New Women, New Church."  We weren't going to lie; you have sexist repressive dogma and we're here to take ink to that parchment and make some alterations.  For one, we will call God "Mother" as well as "Father" in recognition of the great historical and ancient Goddess traditions that were all but silenced by patriarchal brutality; we will bring back the full Divinity of the Feminine Archetype and represent that archetype in our priesthood. 

Okay, so it's no surprise we didn't get ordained; we were and are an open threat to the misogyny that has reigned too long. 

I can understand the Pope-u-larity of this pontiff; he's definitely a relief after the tight ass party line toters we've had recently, but he's got to walk the walk, not talk it.  Religious theater like foot and baby kissing doesn't do it; neither does unexpected papal humility, charm or ordering your own pizza. Francis says he can't change what Pope John Paul II (J2P2) said on the subject of Women's Ordination, despite that he's been contradicting that particular predecessor on other matters, like Gay inclusivity and letting divorced Catholics take communion.

"For now, though" the news reports, "Catholics have to settle for slow, subtle shifts, which, to give Francis credit, are already occurring."  

Really?  Why do women and men who support women's ordination have to settle for anything?  It's crucial I think to speak out now; there is no reason not to ordain women and every reason, including historical precedent to ordain them.  If Pope Francis wants to earn his picture on the cover of the Rolling Stone ("the thrill that will getcha when you get your picture on the cover of the Rolling Stone." playing in the Vatican?), he needs to act to bring real balance not just to the Roman Catholic Church, but to the Modern Collective Psyche that cannot function, as Carl Jung warned, in such a state of disequilibrium without creating the collective psychosis we are clearly experiencing today.  Raise women to equal status with men, physically by ordaining them and psychically, by restoring the Divine Feminine.  If there was ever a Pope who could accomplish this, outside of John XXIII, it's Francis; I hope he wants to.  Let's all focus on sending him the message: "Ordain Women, Hail Mary, Save Humanity"

What's My Story?

In a recent interview I say that we're in the midst of a spiritual revolution and that dreaming is at the center of it.  One aspect of the Consciousness/Awareness movement that we're experiencing right Now is the individual practice of "Mindfulness." Mindfulness encourages us to be the watcher as well as the do-er; the Self as well as the Ego, Jung might say.  More and more people are learning to "watch yourself."  Dreams are Magic Mirrors that let you see your "little self" your ego, as your Self, your Observer does.   In his latest book, "The Boy Who Died and Came Back," Part IV: At Home in the Multiverse, "The Double on the Balcony," Robert Moss writes some very fun stuff about this topic.

I've written here about one of my all time favorite dream sequences, In the first, I hear a voice that says, "Can the Ego be dissolved?  What is the role of the Observer?"  Dreams are often koans, mental jigsaw puzzles or parables.

Two months after this dream, I got my answer by way of a lucid dream, perhaps an OBE because of the hyperconsciousness of the experience. I was in what Robert Waggoner calls the Clear Light, though I hadn't read his books, yet.  I always chuckle that I had this transcendent experience as an unexpected dream gift. I came awake from the dream saying, "I'll never be able to explain this, not even to myself."  In my dream my sense of "I" was in that Light, as I came to, the sense of Oneness I experienced began to fade, my separateness became stronger.  As my ego took charge of waking life, I could re-enter my dream and feel the sense of awe over and over again.  Today, these many years later, that dream is my portal to the Light; the feeling is still strong.

What I learned from the dreams and where they took me in my studies is that the Ego needs an Observer to keep it in check and to help it really blossom.  In my two previous posts reviewing Robert's new book, I talk about the power of story.

As human beings, maybe even in some animal clans, we love stories.  "Tell me a story"is frequently the request we hear from young children.  I love to hear stories or to read them, but what this dream koan and the many wonderful teachers of Mindfulness, like Eckhart Tolle, have taught me is that my thoughts are frequently telling me stories that aren't really that groovy.  I might quite unconsciously be telling myself the story of a puny checkbook and a robust bill basket while I'm brushing my teeth.  What I've learned to do is say; "Aha, listen to that story!  Where does that get me?  Is this the story I want to entertain.  Duh; no."

By listening to what I'm really telling myself all the time, I can choose the best story for me.  Okay, "all the time" is perhaps not realistic; the drunken monkey, as Buddhists call the ego/mind, is a tricky and slippery little devil.  Luckily, Monkey isn't hard to please once you get to know it through Observation.  Dreams hold up a mirror that helps us see Monkey working.  Dreams knock on our inner doors and ask us to open to our own Wisdom and connect to the Light.

In a recent extended-family drama, the kind of thing that has the phones ringing and different relatives chiming in, I found myself feeling fearful, protective of the Me and Mine.  I asked for a dream of guidance; "What can I do?"  I dreamed that two of my nieces, (one was purely a dream niece), wouldn't allow me to use their make-up; yet, all I needed was a simple eyebrow pencil. I felt they were shallow, heartless and careless of my feelings.  I woke up feeling the sting of rejection.  Reality check: real niece, but not the relative involved and unlikely to deny me an eyebrow pencil, dream niece not someone in waking.  As I lay there feeling the strong emotion this dream evoked and trying to fit it with my question to the dream source, I saw what my dream was saying.  "What can I do?"  I can focus on my heart; I can marshall my kindness, (when I first typed the question, I found I'd written, What kind I do?:-).

As often happens, these nieces were Shadows my Ego was casting with its fearfulness; their behavior mirrored an unconscious story that could dictate my conscious behavior. I relaxed and focused my awareness on my heart chakra and bathed it in emerald green light. I expanded my heart center with every breath.  My dream gave me the perfect answer.  As I wandered through the emotional land mine (I wrote "land mind") of the crisis, I was predisposed to close down in fear.  I focused on my heart and trusted that step by step, in the moment, things would work out.  And they did.  The outcome opened a door that had been shut in anger and created new possibilities for personal growth on everyone's part.

This is one reason I think dreaming is at the forefront of the Spiritual Revolution.  If Self-Awareness, Mindfulness is at the heart of Enlightenment, really of Being, then dreaming is a vital practice.  In dreams we get to talk to and listen to the Observer, who has a much bigger picture to offer than the blinkered Ego.  What's my Story?  I'm writing it as I live it.  I write as consciously as I can and look to my dream stories for the best suggestions, the best plot ideas for my waking ego to use.  I stay connected to my dreams so that my Big Story, the reason I joined this human experience again, will inform all the little stories, the personal dramas that can take too much time and sap too much energy, unnecessarily.

Each of us has a Story.  Together, we  are the Book of Life - All of Nature included.  No one can tell us what our story, what our purpose is, but we can lose the thread and go off narrative if we're not connected to the Watcher, our own Soul Mate in the Multiverse.  Dreams are an organic, innate avenue to Spirit.  All we have to do is pay attention, listen and learn; then we'll each find our own story and how best to live it.

May it Be So!

The Power of Story II

I finished Robert's new book and wrote the following as a review on Amazon; since most of it is new thoughts on my reading experience, I'm sharing it with you, as well.

Robert Moss’ new book “The Boy Who Died and Came Back” is reminiscent for me of reading Carl Jung’s “Memories, Dreams and Reflections.”  It’s not quite an autobiography, it’s more like being allowed to follow a seasoned explorer of the dreamscapes through the life memories, events and encounters with the Unconscious, in Jung’s case, more like the Multiverse in Robert’s, that have shaped their teaching and practice.

Robert Moss is a master storyteller. The many stories about dreaming adventures in his new book open new windows for anyone interested in lucid and conscious dreaming. The book offers possibilities like dreaming our way into ancestral realities that can be accessed through the parallel universes of dreaming where all time is NOW.


It’s a very easy read, especially for someone who finds dreams and dreaming a fascinating topic. Robert Moss began teaching his own dream approach “Active Dreaming” in the mid-80s and has been refining this rich synthesis of modern dreamwork with ancient and shamanic dream practices ever since in the workshops that he teaches around the world and in his numerous books on the subject.


This book allows us to travel into the dreaming of people around the globe; it’s global Active Dreaming in action. As a certified and practicing teacher of Active Dreaming, I appreciate the many examples of journeys he’s led in so many lands because they inspire new dream plans for my own workshops.  As a dreamer, I appreciate the inspiration I’ve found in these pages for conducting further experiments of my own in the dream worlds 

From this book, I’ve also come away with a deeper reverence for Nature and learned new ways to connect with Her in waking and dreaming. Many of the stories Robert shares illustrate how we can dream with the land we inhabit. What some might call Eco-dreaming today is part of Active Dreaming as a practice remembered from indigenous peoples, ancient and contemporary, around the world.  Nature speaks through signs, symbols and dreams, listening to these helps us attain the balance our race must reach and maintain if we’re to survive on this planet.  If we pay attention, we dream with the land we inhabit and perhaps we visit the lands our ancestors inhabited in order to return with wisdom and healing to apply in our waking lives and in our communities. 

Robert calls his method  “Dream Archaeology.”  My favorite chapter on this wonderful theme is chapter 40: “Dreaming with the Goddess” where he pays tribute in beautifully compelling and poetic prose to both the Goddess, Mother of all Lands and all People, and to the great scholar of ancient Europe and Goddess traditions, Marija Gimbutas. The stories of his dream adventures conducting workshops in Gimbutas’ native Lithuania in this and the following chapters are among my favorite in the book. “Dream archaeology gives us ways to grow her (Gimbuta’s) vision, to enter into authentic communication with keepers of ancestral wisdom, to find clues to meaning and leads for original research – and to help heal the collective and cultural soul loss that blights our age.” RM P. 284 “

The Boy Who Died and Came Back” is both a dreaming primer for beginners and an esoteric dream map for seasoned dream explorers.  It’s a rich read for the senses, too; his descriptive prose is beautiful. Telling us about a dream circle he led in the Adirondacks, on a wonderful Garnet Mountain during a lunar eclipse he writes:


“We danced until the return of the light.  The sun’s light, reappearing at the bottom of the moon’s disk, rolled up like a drop of liquid gold over the face of a bronze mirror.” P.292


As a long time student of Robert’s, I know that a central focus of his work is resurrecting the Art of Dying for our modern Western society. Making Death your ally is an ancient teaching and one that he writes and teaches about frequently. This book takes you “Through the Moongate” and into the Multiverse. It lights the way in the cultural darkness that is our Western heritage to the possibilities that await us once we learn we are infinite spiritual beings living in these finite physical shells, but living with a purpose, a story, a contract we came to fulfill. Robert shows us how his dreams led him to this knowledge and how our own dreams can enlighten us.

Here’s the endorsement Robert receives from the renowned author of “Life After Life” Dr. Raymond Moody: “Robert Moss' extraordinary life story, told with beauty and passion, confirms that there is life after life and will inspire all who read it to transcend the fear of death and live richer deeper lives."

  

The Power of Story

Robert Moss just released what he called his favorite of his numerous books on dreaming, "The Boy Who Died and Came Back: Adventures of a Dream Archaeologist in the Multiverse." I agree with him, it’s my new favorite, too.  Let me tell you why, but let me first say, I’m not quite finished. I’m two thirds done, but I’ve got a lot to say, already. 

Robert is a master storyteller. The book speaks to me of the power of each life story, across time. He tells his own story and invites us to tell ours, even if just to ourselves.  How? In our dreams, our big stories are hunting us”, as Robert likes to say.  Joseph Campbell puts it like this: Myth is the collective dream, dream is the personal myth. 

Once we become conscious to the fact that we are dreaming ourselves into being, once we learn to dream well, we can write our own stories into the future and heal the bitter stories from the past, whether in this lifetime, healing the wounded child within, or addressing a past life experience that might be lingering overlong.  We can find ourselves and heal ourselves through dreaming.

Fascinating examples from his own and other dreamer’s lives weave this exciting dream primer together.  I find myself putting the book down, closing my eyes and checking the dreamways he presents for myself.  Maybe that’s why I’m not done after two days; it’s a very fast read, unless you stop to experiment.  I’m not bothered though, because the results have been great so far.  Following his examples, I’ve opened new dimensions of my own multiverse and am more excited than ever about Active Dreaming.

Robert writes about his childhood encounters with death, what today would be called NDEs, but in those days were known as “he died and came back” which sheds light on his title. One of the most powerful tools he’s developed in Active Dreaming is what he calls “soul recovery” as opposed to “soul retrieval” which requires a shaman.  Robert writes in his book, “Dreaming the Soul Back Home” that each of us can be our own shaman by living parallel lives in waking and in dreaming.  In this beautiful new book, he shows us how these teachings came to him, how he lived what he’s teaching.

I recall how dreams have been maps I’ve used to travel the roads of my waking world. One very Big Dream from my twenties is titled, “Let Me Tell You My Story.” To live consciously, with heart and mindfulness in the multiverse of experience that dreaming allows is to live in the waking world full of wonder, curiosity, joy, courage and hope.  To know yourself is to know your own story and to create it as you go.

As a long time student of Robert’s, I know that one of the central focuses of his work is resurrecting the Art of Dying for our modern Western society.  Making death your ally is an ancient teaching and one that he writes about and teaches frequently in his workshops. This book takes you “Through the Moongate” and into the multiverse; it lights the way in the cultural darkness that is our Western heritage to the possibilities that await us once we learn we are infinite spiritual beings living in these finite physical shells, but living with a purpose, a story, a contract we came to fulfill.  Robert shows us how his dreams led him to this knowledge and how our own dreams can enlighten us.

Here's the endorsement you see on the cover from Dr. Raymond Moody, a renowned pioneer of NDE studies:

Robert Moss' extraordinary life story, told with beauty and passion, confirms that there is life after life and will inspire all who read it to transcend the fear of death and live richer deeper lives."

I feel that many Roberts wrote this book, in an integrated and conscious way, but in a real sense.  There’s nothing plodding about the narrative; it’s at times playful, at others poignant and revealing of one of those selves, it’s always entertaining and often evokes wonder and curiosity. 

I know from my own experience, so much of what I’ve read in this book is true and I can’t wait to give the new stuff a try.  This is a book that opens doors and invites us to get to know ourselves in the most intimate way possible, on a soul level.  In his discussion of meeting his Higher Self, Older Self, Double in Heaven, as the Yoruba put it, he invites us to encounter our own in dreams and dream journeying.  By sharing his own path, he invites us to embark with more zest, gusto and certainty on our own.

I can’t leave out how much I enjoy the wonderful “archeological” information that the scholar Robert always provides in his work.  This book is resplendent with historical and mythic dream information.  My fact gathering self delights in highlighting all his wonderful references, couched in story and myth in such a way as to capture my curiosity mightily.  As a student of all things interesting, I love this.

When I finish the book, I know I’ll be the wiser dreamer and dream teacher. I’ll re-read it immediately, more slowly.  I recommend this book to absolutely anyone, whether you’re a frequent dreamer or not.  If you find yourself incredulous, give it a try yourself before you let your ego tell you flight is impossible.  We live in a multiverse, perhaps living parallel lives happening all at once outside of our puny concept of time.  Robert didn’t make this up; modern physicists are discussing the exact same thing. Brian Greene, the well known physicist to the lay folk, has a new book titled: The Hidden Reality: Parallel Universes and the Deep Laws of the Cosmos. 

In this book, Robert holds out many exciting possibilities for dreamers to try in dreaming and waking dimensions, because the story of how he did it is so compelling. I'm sure I'll have more to say about it in future posts.

Don't forget to mark your calendars for May 10th, The World Day of Active Dreaming.  

Active Dreaming Is It.

Last Tuesday I called in to Robert Moss's monthly "Way of the Dreamer" radio show on HealthyLife.Net to share with him and with Active Dreaming enthusiasts from around the world why I love using Active Dreaming, the dreamplay practice that Robert created in the mid-eighties and has fine tuned ever since.  I also wanted to share my plans for The World Day of Active Dreaming (WDAD) I told you about for May 10th, 2014.

Here's the interview - the program of January 14, 2014.  Robert talks about the WDAD event and takes calls from five Active Dreaming teachers and practitioners from around the world.  My conversation with him starts at 33:53, but if you have time to listen to the whole show, it's well worth it.

At the beginning of the program, Robert reminds us about the intention Active Dreaming teachers voice in every dream circle around the world:  "we come together in a sacred and loving way, to honor our dreams and the powers that speak to us in dreams, to live our best dreams and to bring the gifts of dreaming and dream healing to those around us, in our world, in our time."  We have been dreaming this dream of a dreaming society together for over two decades.  Inspired by Robert's prolific writing, teaching and speaking about Active Dreaming, the community of Active Dreamers is multiplying, birthing new groups around the world.  Since the early days, Robert's vision has been about creating a dreaming community, a society that once again holds dreaming in great esteem. WDAD is an excellent way to show that this dream is happening NOW. Active Dreaming is global.  Community events happening at the same time around the world will heighten the energy that is manifesting as this renewed connection to our ancient birthright of dreaming.

The first caller, Ana Maria Stefanescu, speaking from Romania to Robert, shares her vision of dreaming as a journey to the heart and tells us she's planning a workshop on 5/10 focused on this theme.  She also shares a wonderful example of what Robert calls, dream archeology, in a dream where she meets her Romanian ancestors and describes beautifully in an article Robert posted recently on his blog.  It reminds me of the many times my Lucumi ancestors have visited me in dreams and how we've honored and danced the Orishas.  My exit strategy at death, which I envisioned in a dream, includes the sound of their drums.

Next came a wonderful AD teacher, hospice worker and artist from CA, Valerie McCarney.  I'm not sure how to link directly to this, but Robert posted on WDAD's FB page December 18, 2013 an article by her, "Dreams that Comfort and Heal", that is a wonderfully powerful illustration of how dreams prepare and midwife us through death, as I just mentioned.  The painting she posted with her amazing stories "Ice Cold Blue Day," is a haunting picture of a tree in winter that speaks to her sensitivity and artistic talent at once.   Valerie also sparked a neat idea about "flash cards" we can hand out with the Lightning Dreaming steps printed on them, something wallet sized.

The third caller, Susan Morgan is a teaching colleague in the Active Dreaming community of CT.  Susan is a veteran Active Dreaming teacher who teaches in many venues around the state, famously at the Dragon's Egg in Mystic.  Susan said there were many bear sightings in the dreams she's hearing lately.  In one group journey I led recently, we all went into hibernation to the dreaming place that bears go.  I had the most wonderful journey as a teenage brown bear getting to hibernate with the adults for the first time instead of having to be in the nursery wing of the caves.  I went out of my body in my deep sleep and danced as Ursula in the night sky.  My joy knew no bounds.

Fourth was me.  I took the opportunity to remind Robert just how good a teaching tool the DVD series we did together is; besides shameless self-promotion, it's true.  If you're going to teach this method, the introduction to Active Dreaming taught by Robert in person in these programs is invaluable.  He agrees.  I also took the opportunity to commend him and the other dreamers who came up with the idea of WDAD; focusing this much strong dream energy on one day is bound to have some wonderful results.  I got a kick out of Robert teasing me about my succinct endorsement of Active Dreaming; after studying and practicing many dream work approaches, Active Dreaming is it, I said.  But, you already know I feel that way, if you read my blog.

Robert's last caller was Savannah Caitlin from Vancouver, Canada.  She presented a great idea for encouraging dream work as a random act of kindness.  A great community service in her area is the "take a book/leave a book program".  I've seen pictures of amazing kiosk designs all around the world for this kind of community perk.  Savannah thought leaving some inexpensive journals set up to use for AD and perhaps one of Robert's books would be a great way to kick-start greater community interest and dream awareness.  She also got me thinking about what tools should go into a "dream healer's" doctor bag.  In a dream she had, she saw each new certified teacher at a teacher training with Robert receiving a teacher's kit in the final ceremonies; in each bag is a small stuffed animal, each unique to the particular dreamer, an animal companion or guardian that reminds me of Phillip Pullman's animal daemons in the "Golden Compass."

A teacher commencement kit, I love the idea.  Did I mention what powerful resources and essential tools for teachers "The Way of the Dreamer with Robert Moss" and "Wings for the Journey" are?    Oh, I did, sorry.  Here's a link, though.

It seems fitting that the first international day of Active Dreaming is launched in the year of the horse; the carrier of dream messages, fast as the wind, between the worlds. WDAD has already generated great excitement among practitioners of AD.  I'm looking forward to the planning and the event; I know it's going to be everything we dream it to be.  Robert will be talking with many more AD practitioners in the upcoming programs and I'll keep you posted on what I discover.

May your best dreams come true.

A Wish for Each of You

"I Can Hear the Angels"
Shapeshifter
Podsafe Audio

What Do Dreams Mean?

Last night, I was looking through past journals for dreams featuring a particular character, a dream practice I really enjoy.  To make this kind of search easier, I've created monthly title pages for the front of each month’s entries in any particular year.  I’ve posted before about how I like to use three ring notebooks with dividers sectioning each month to create my journals because it allows for additional material to go in at any time, making it easy for me to add to past entries. So in front of every month's entry is a page titled, for example, January 2012 and then a list of dream titles and dates, like: 1-21 "My Pet Gorilla." As I go through older journals, If I get to a title and don’t remember the dream, I turn to that page and scan the dream narrative for recognition. Sometimes, a dream I don't remember pops out with the force and energy of a present dream; it's just the dream I need at the moment.

So it was that last night, I read a dream I hadn't remembered dreaming. I read my notes on the dream and the synchronicities that surrounded it that I'd recorded and realized I've grown with the help of this dream; this dream opened a door to greater awareness for me.  I don’t feel that way anymore, those things don’t weigh me down any longer, and it’s because of playing with and honoring the dream that I arrived at this new juncture on the road to inner peace. 

A dream dialogue is a life long safety net; it’s access to my own higher consciousness, to my guides and friends in dream dimensions.

Granted there’s the occasional bogey-person in the wardrobe. I’ve had many dreams that, as I like to say, have scared the pajamas off me.  I recently came across an account of a dream re-entry I recorded about two dreams I apparently didn't write down because I didn't like them.  I titled the re-entry journey, "Two Really Bad Guys." Reading the entry, I recalled the way I’d honored and practiced with the dreams, but I very much regret that I didn’t write the dream narratives down.  I’ve seldom experienced a nightmare that didn’t open an important door to self-exploration and understanding, so here are two opportunities I chickened out of preserving.  

I make a major exception to how I'd approach nightmares when it comes to Post Traumatic Stress dreams that are, to me, the psyche screaming with the pain of images seared on its visual screen by waking world nightmare experiences.  I believe PTSD dreams can be faced and used for healing with the gentlest, wisest of help.  It's different, however, when I'm facing a non-post traumatic stress nightmare which challenges me to brave up, go back in with whatever allies I need and find out what it's about.  Two really bad guys can turn out to be important messengers, guides or even transform into guardian angels when confronted and understood.

A dreamers understanding of personal dreams increases as the relationship to dreams deepens. Meaning evolves out of familiarity and respect, as in any relationship. Journaling dreams helps you follow your own path to your own center.  It’s like being in love, once you discover that relationship to your dreaming self, it’s not a task to write down the messages and experiences of that dimension.

There are two things I hear a lot from people who find dreaming a puzzlement: "I had this weird dream." and "What does it mean?"  The first one’s not so bad; the second leaves me  looking like a deer in the headlights back at the person.

Weird when applied to dreams is a relative term.  Of course, it’s weird; all waking reality rules are suspended. You’re in a dimension where you can fly like a bird and keep yourself safe by using your imagination to help create a good outcome.  If you judge the dream world by waking world standards, then it all seems weird and nonsensical.  Learn the language and the culture of dream realities and you change your experience of dreaming; just as knowing about the people, the language and the culture of foreign countries improves your chances of having a great experience visiting there.

But, “What does it mean?” 

Only the dreamer knows the meaning of the dream; I’d like to hear that question changed to “If this was your dream, what thoughts and insights would come to your mind?”  Then I’d know that the dreamer realizes I have no “answers” for them, I’ve just been invited to participate in the magic of the dream as a fellow dreamer.

I know people don’t mean to abdicate their power when they ask the “what does it mean” question. I know that many people in our culture haven’t yet developed a relationship to their own inner experience through dreaming, so I do understand it’s a normal question, but I don’t usually understand my own dreams immediately.  Meaning is an evolution, it unfolds over time between the dreamer and the dream; it takes pondering.

Keeping dream journals helps me map my way in life. Often when I review my dreams, my conscious mind catches up with my unconscious, or my dumber self catches up with my smarter one. I ponder dreams and let their message emerge as I live my waking life with my dream in mind.  This was Carl Jung's approach to a dreaming practice; he believed that if you pondered a dream, lived with it for a while, almost always, something will come of it. 

When someone says, “I know what that dream is about”, I might suggest that dreams seldom just present what we already know.  There’s a wonderful element of irony, the trickster and the unexpected in dream messages, so even if I get an obvious message, I’m always open for the surprise message it might also convey, once I've reflected on it for a while.

Dreamplay is a doorway to the Self; ancient and modern indigenous cultures have always recognized this and created dreaming practices for making those nightly journeys.  It’s time we in the West reach the hundredth monkey stage with dreaming.  Claiming our individual human psychic independence through the practice of dreaming would create a sea change for collective humanity, one dreamer at a time. 

Robert Moss, author and creator of Active Dreaming, has proposed to the ever growing number of Active Dreamers he has trained around the world that we honor our work by celebrating The World Day of Active Dreaming on May 10th, 2014.  Each of us who practices Active Dreaming will organize some sharing event in our community to honor this day and the practice of dreaming.  

I'm in, so I'll be letting you know how this comes together when it does.