The Dream Sharing Sourcebook: A Practical Guide to Enhancing Your Personal Relationships (55 page)

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Authors: Phyllis R. Koch-Sheras

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BOOK: The Dream Sharing Sourcebook: A Practical Guide to Enhancing Your Personal Relationships
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She woke up one Sunday morning with this dream, called Saul, and shared it with him. They both laughed and agreed it was best for Donna to "stay in bed and rest" that day. She felt closer to Saul afterward and realized then how "the dream was telling me to pay attention to the leader inside of me that can give me permission to rest when I need it. When I go to the meditation group now, I am well rested and enjoy it more!"
Sharing a dream with a teacher can also help you clear up problems that would be difficult to notice or approach directly. Felicia recently shared a dream with her voice teacher. In the dream, as well as in waking reality, she is having trouble learning a difficult piece of music her teacher had given her. The teacher tells her at the end of the dream, "You have to grow." The dream helped Felicia recognize her teacher's positive intentions and goals for her. After her next performance, Felicia gave her teacher a painting depicting the dream that she titled "Growing" (see Figure 11.2). "It felt great," Felicia said later, "to tell my teacher about the dream and how much I understood and appreciated his helping me 'grow' as a singer. I could also have more tolerance for the part of me that needed to confront the challenges in my life."
Dreamwork with and about Your Therapist
Although working on dreams with your partner, family, and friends can be extremely rewarding, you may feel the need for professional guidance or support to complement your dreamwork. You may want to consult a therapist to help you deal with the parts of yourself that are difficult or unpleasant to confront as they come up in your dreams. Or possibly you are already seeing a therapist and know how valuable it can be to work on your dreams in therapy, especially those in which your therapist appears. Sharing a dream about your therapist during
 
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Figure 11.2
Growing
a session can be quite revealing and useful in your treatment. Consider the following dream that Willa shared with her therapist, Dr. May.
"I Paid for This Session!"
I'm at my therapy appointment with Dr. May. Other people start coming into the room, and a group discussion starts. I'm angry and break in yelling, "I paid for this session, and I want to tell my dream!" People start leaving. I see my husband. He tells me I should tell Dr. May what I want. I tell her how upset I am and then go lie down to rest. I feel better.
"Having this dream," Willa said, "gave me courage to tell my therapist, after over a year in therapy with her, what I really needed from her. It led to a dramatic breakthrough in the treatment and an increased feeling of closeness to her as a person." From there, Willa went on to be more direct with her husband, family, and friends about what she wanted from them as well.
 
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Reaching New Heights
Any of the techniques described here with significant individuals in your life can also be used with larger groups, communities, or organizations. Many such groups are already familiar with creating visions or "mission statements," and dreamwork can be incorporated into those practices. Whatever kind of expanded dreamwork experiences you choose, sharing dreams with a variety of people can provide valuable assistance in opening up new insights and relationships in your life. You may need to experiment before you find the best routine for you. Once you find it, you can expand your dream horizons to new heights of inner experience and intimate relatedness.
The imaginative Edgar Allan Poe, who shared his dreams in engaging stories and poems, reportedly said that those who dream by day gain so much more than those who dream only by night. Bringing more of your dreamworldboth night dreams and daydreamsinto your waking life relationships can create opportunities that go far beyond your everyday expectations. And you'll never be at a loss for interesting material for conversation! The more you open yourself up to the possibilities of the dream universe, and the more you share of it, the "higher" you can get. As the teacher in Astrid's dream said, "Go for it!"
 
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Chapter Twelve
Waking Up to a New Future Together
For centuries, dreams have been the object of fascination in almost all cultures. Dreamers have served as healers, seers, and trusted advisers. By remembering and respecting their dreams, they were often believed to see the future and the ideals for humankind. Dreams can play an important part in your own life as well. As we have seen, daily contact with them not only can enrich your personal experience, but also can create the possibility of having and maintaining remarkable relationships. Dreams are not just about relationships; they can actually make the relationships happen.
There are many types of dreams, and there are many sorts of relationships. Although a great deal has been written about dreams, their impact on intimate relationships has not been truly acknowledged until recently. Through this book, you may have begun to grasp the power of this connection. Dreams and visions can be a frequent occurrence in your relationships and
 
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provide a common ground for sharing life together. Exploring your dream life and using it to co-create your relationships is the marriage of two powerful forces. Learning to put together creative ability and dream images is like mixing two chemicals to create a reaction that releases incredible amounts of energy.
Can Dreams be Your Friends?
This book was the outgrowth of a vision we created together. It started several years ago with the proclamation "We share our couple." Through many other proclamations and discussions with couple coaches and friends, from our own excitement in sharing our dreams together over the years, and by working together on personal and professional projects, we came to see that this book was "a dream come true." The writing of the manuscript has enhanced our communication, our dream lives, and our visioning about the future. It has expanded the feeling of our own power as a couple and of our commitment that others dream about their relationships as well. Visions, proclamations, and dreams are our friends and constant companions. The power of dreams in relationships is illustrated in the following dream about a gift from a mysterious stranger.
Michael had just started writing down his dreams at his wife's suggestion. At first it seemed awkward and almost silly to him. One morning he woke up with this dream.
The Welcoming Stranger
I am in a large cavern that is lit from daylight streaming in through a small hole in the ceiling. As I look up from the bottom, there are hundreds of stone stairs winding around the walls headed upward. I start to climb them slowly. It seems like an endless task to reach the top. I see a stranger in a dark robe walking down the stairs toward me. At first I am fright-

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