Gillian Holloway Holloway - 5 Steps to Decode Your Dreams. A Fast, Effective Way to Discover the Meaning of Your Dreams

Copyright 2011 by Gillian Holloway

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Originally published by Practical Psychology Press in 2002 and 2004 as Dreaming Insights.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Holloway, Gillian.

5 steps to decode your dreams : a fast, effective way to discover the meaning of your dreams / by Gillian Holloway.

p. cm.

1. Dream interpretation. I. Title. II. Title: Five steps to decode your dreams.

BF1091.H558 2011

154.63-dc22

2011007312

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

VP 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

This book is dedicated to that aspect of self residing in each of us that continually tries to shed light on the darkness, connect the fragments of our understanding into a meaningful whole, and reintroduce us to our abandoned talents and discarded loves: to the dreamer within.

C ONTENTS

A CKNOWLEDGMENTS

I wish to thank the clients, students, and volunteers who have been coresearchers in the landscape of dreams over the years. Thank you to the late Dr. Al Siebert, who showed me that researching real-life stories makes mysterious events clearer and more accessible. Thank you to my very grounded family, Pat, Doug, and Dev, who focus on the point, the bottom line, and the benefit, and taught me to do the same.

Chapter 1

I W ONDER W HAT T HAT D REAM M EANT

S ometimes the feeling that a dream has meaning will be so strong it will be an almost physical sensation, like having a forgotten name on the tip of your tongue. Whether or not you discuss such a dream, you are left with a haunting feeling of having been touched, of receiving communication from a deeper part of the mind. If the dream is particularly meaningful, it may float to the surface of your consciousness during the day, triggered by some word or event which seems oddly related to it.

The dreams that seem most puzzling are the most critical for us to understand.

Those dreams that stir us with the sensation of their importance, yet challenge us to unravel their messages, are often the most valuable to understand. The subjective experience of relevance combined with the conscious inability to recognize meaning is always a powerful clue that a dream is significant. Any dream that feels important may indeed be vitaleven more so if it is difficult to understand. Each of us has areas in life we tend to deny or avoid understanding. Some of us have been taught that we cannot think and feel at the same time, for example, so any experience that would evoke both feelings and contemplation causes us to draw a blank. If a dream centers on something that eludes the grasp of your conscious mind during waking life, you may find it tricky to examine the information in dream form as well. Yet, the determination and courage required for the exploration of dreams is well worth the effort.

Dreams, if understood, are a powerful resource for better understanding yourself and the complexities of your waking life. Dreams can offer insights into why you feel so strongly about certain things, what is really going on in your work setting, why relationships always seem so difficult, and what is meant by those stirrings of discontent that sometimes excite you and other times depress you. The part of your mind that creates your dreams has a stronger awareness of certain kinds of information and certain levels of understanding than does your conscious mind. As a result, your dreams contain surprising insights and perspectives on your waking life and the themes that are woven throughout your lifetime.

This is a fascinating time to explore your dreams because all over the world, an exciting leap of exploration is taking place. The superstitions and taboos that formerly inhibited our interest in dreams are falling away; the morbid fear of discovering mental problems through a troubling dream is gradually fading. In place of these worrisome factors is a new confidence as people discover empowering and encouraging ways that dreams teach us, help us understand ourselves and others, and stimulate our creativity.

You may already have noticed some intriguing connections between your dreams and your experiences in waking life. Even people who have not made a study of dreams have the intuitive feeling that they hold meaning. Many who remember their dreams have had at least one experience of recognizing what was meant in a dream. It is a strange and exciting feeling to recognize the connections between dream images and experiences in waking life. This awareness can give you a feeling of greater depth in your lifea sense that events are interconnected in ways that are not always visible but that nevertheless have impact and purpose.

You may have felt drawn to learn about dreams several times before and only now have decided to make the time to do so. Or you may have a great deal of experience with dreamwork and find that your level of understanding has evolved and changed, so that now you crave more information or another perspective.

Methods for exploring dreams and interpreting their imagery are quite varied. Some developed out of the early approaches to psychotherapy, and those methods tend to be oriented toward uncovering pathology. As a result, even today many people approach the topic of dreamwork with the fear that the process will uncover some unfortunate character attribute. In my work with the dreams of friends, students, and family, however, the reverse experience is by far more common.

Dreams tend to point out talents, gifts, and inner strengths that the conscious mind has either forgotten or ignored. You will not become involved in dreamwork and discover there is something wrong with you, but you may well be deeply moved by recovering aspects of yourself you had forgotten or talents you had long ago abandoned.

Other types of interpretation arose out of folklore and religious teachings. These methods carry with them the necessity of familiarity with and belief in certain traditions and philosophies. Without a background in these schools of thought, the methods of interpretation can be frustratingly complex and obscure. Many people have heard bits and pieces of information from differing approaches and have assumed that each truth came from the same source. Hearsay about these different processes can create confusion and even fear about a particular dreams significance.