Books

Archetypes

• Automobile represents your ego

• Horses represent our physical bodies.  

• Dog symbolizes animal like masculinity or something dangerous.  

• House represents the total psyche of a person

  • Basement – deep, repressed issues. 

  • Attic – sometimes carries the place where things are stored but universally means the highest part of the self or the spiritual self.  If you have the interpretation of superficial surface then look at the dream from both angles.  

• Shadow is the negative figure of a person or the parts of the self we do not want to recognize.  A figure who represents your shadow is usually the same sex and is behaving in a way that you don’t want to recognize or someone you really don’t recognize.  

  • The shadow could be a different skin toned person.

  • When we embrace our shadow side, our shadow side growth happens there.  

• Wise one – this can represent the higher part of yourself.  

• Water - according to Jung, is considered to be a symbol for the unconscious.  

• Opposite sex - represents the inner masculine or inner feminine qualities inside that person.  Everybody has both.  Dreams pull out these inner human qualities.  

• Death – usually means transformation in the spiritual sense of the word.  Something needs to die so something new can happen.  

• Sexuality – it’s the inner self coming together (feminine and masculine) and they are making wholeness.  

Robert Johnson’s Four Step Process of Interpreting Dreams

Step 1: Make Associations

• List every significant ‘thing’ in the dream.  

  • Follow the dream in order

  • Look at everything – not just what sticks out to you.  

  • Ask, “What does this remind you of?”  Or “What connections do you make with that image?”  

  • Ask how the dreamer describes someone.  “Explain who that person is to you.”  

• Another way to ask people is to ask, “Pretend I am an alien from another planet and I don’t know anything about your world.  Explain everything to me.  What is the function of that item in terms that someone from another planet would get.”  

  • This helps state the obvious.  Stating the obvious sometimes hits home for the dreamer.  

• Be careful of the slippery slope.  

  • Don’t allow the dream to be forgotten because you are chasing a rabbit.  Make sure all associations come straight from the dream.

Step 2:  Dynamics

• Ask yourself:

  • How do all the associations from Step 1 affect the inner life?

  • How does each one make you feel?  

• This step is more specific with feelings.  To track the feelings is to tap into the inner life for the feelings emerge from the inner life.  

• This step gets you more vulnerable and scared.  

  • Make sure to listen and follow the dreamer for they control the process, timing, intensity, etc.  

  • This is a place to reassure people.  

  • Let your body language and tone of voice communicate acceptance, love, care, etc.  

• This step might also be a place to just name the anxiety – “you seem scared.”

• This step hits home for what the dream is communicating to our outer life.  

• Remind people this step deals with the inner life.  Gently bring people back to how all of this is relating to what is happening to your inner life.

Step 3:  Interpretations

• What is this saying about my personal life?

• Choose one that you are not quite aware of

• Make sure to keep responsibility for yourself 

• Stay with what is here that I don’t know.  “What do I not know that I know?”  

• Stay with it past your automatic associations and you may get a deeper message.  

  • There is a balance here.  The more experienced a person is with interpreting dreams the more trustworthy the automatic associations can be for the dreamer.  

• If your dreams are always flattering, then you are probably missing the point.  Dreams hold up a mirror to what is not working and what needs to be changed.  Dreams want to make your life better.  If they flatter you, you may be missing the point.   

Step 4: Rituals

• Do something physical to symbolize the interpretations.  

• There are a lot of reasons why we distract ourselves from performing rituals.  A lot of people think the ritual makes the dream too real.  Others think it is silly.  

• So in what ways do you resist the ritual?  

  • There are one time rituals and a regular ritual.  There are different ways to do a ritual.  

  • You can feel silly.

• You may need to ask yourself, “Where does this serve its purpose in life?”

• If doing a ritual that calls for you to change a ritual then you will want to pay attention to that.  But the ideal way is to connect to the dream and add something to your life that connects with your dream.