dreams

If we pay attention to our dreams, instead of living in a cold, impersonal world of meaningless chance, we may begin to emerge into a world of our own, full of important and secretly ordered events. —Marie-Louise von Franz

dreams present a fresh perspective. The dream maker’s views can differ radically from our conscious mind’s opinions and values. Jung said dreams are “invariably seeking to express something that the ego does not know and does not understand.”

One study of dreams concluded that if we live to eighty years old, six years of our life will have been spent dreaming—not sleeping, which is a far higher percentage. Six years dreaming! Apparently, dreams are tied to our nature and its effort to process, metabolize, correct, and heal the fissures that lie within each of us.

Though the unconscious remains distant from ego awareness, we do have the symptom, or the dream, that is conscious, and each visitant has one foot in the dual realms. By respecting and tending this manifestation of the unconscious, we can finally begin to discern the direction of the psyche’s desire for us.

Jung asked us a telling question: What supports you when nothing supports you? What can you turn to when your instructions from the world have led you astray? What can you count on when the world you built is no longer livable? Then, in that darkness, a light flickers and the dream appears.

As Jung put it, would you not wish to converse with a two-million-year-old sage who knocked at your door, who knows what nature knows and perhaps the dreamer has forgotten? So each night, then, this source of natural sagacity comes to us and invites a conversation. Seen this way, how could we not pay some respectful attention to such a summons?

Finally, dreams are usually about the inner world. The dream maker is mostly interested in us. In waking life, the external world demands our attention; we turn our faces outward to interact with others, accomplish tasks, and achieve goals. However, the dream maker remarks primarily on things happening in the interior. We are often tempted to see d

“I have my eye on the central fire, and I’m trying to put some mirrors around it to show to others. Sometimes the edges of those mirrors leave gaps and don’t fit together exactly. I can’t help that. Look at what I’m trying to point to!”