Be Sure to Smell the Roses!
Like the pedals of a rose, a dream’s meaning may take a while to unfold, only coming to complete disclosure many years after the dream itself was dreamed. What may appear to be at first a tightly bound and unpromising dream, could be just a bud making its first appearance, and eventually come into full glory it is own season.
Most of us have no trouble remembering a great dream or one loaded with feeling. There are usually three or four dreams that will hold clear in the memory over a lifetime. But in our lifetime we have many thousands of dreams, which for most people, pass by unrecognized, devalued and not learned from. Dream journaling, the practice of recording every dream we can remember, is a significant step to reclaiming the lost wisdom in those other dreams. It is a way of cultivating the unpromising buds and most importantly, it is a way of harvesting the magnificent result.
When we have a dream we remember, most of us will give it a moment’s thought and then forget about it. If we have good memories, or good associational abilities, we might remember the dream when something happens in our waking life to trigger the memory of that dream. Then we might see the connection between the dream and what it might be saying about something happening in our waking life.
Writing down the dream allows us to not only make note of the dream, but it also encourages us to give more than a passing thought to the dream. We can reflect on it and ask ourselves what this dream is trying to tell us about our lives right now. More importantly, it will also allow the dreamer to come back months and years later to see how that dream—one which may have long been forgotten—unfolded and blossomed, and how it manifested over the years, giving perhaps an entirely different meaning than the one first ascribed to it, and giving new insight into a major theme of life’s meaning.
- There may be a meaning given to the dream at its first appearance, in mid-bloom perhaps some months or years later, and in full bloom when the dream fully manifests itself, sometimes much later in waking life. Reviewing the dream journal at various stages, and making note of the various meanings given to the dream at each stage, gives new and growing perspectives.
- The dreamer may also note other dreams that may be related to, or be an development of the original dream.
With these dreams as guideposts to see how they correspond to and inform waking reality, inner spiritual growth may be monitored and appreciated. The dreamer can easily see then that one tiny dream may blossom into a magnificent flower or may contain the seeds for a garden of roses, and that deep within us lives the wisdom for living our lives.
To learn more about dreams and dreamwork, visit my website at http://www.healingdreamgarden.com.
during office hours on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays, 8:30 AM to 3:30 PM Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time.
Fran Kramer 