Exploratory Dreamwork: 16 Rules for Running A Jungian Dream Group

By: Ron Masa, Ph.D.
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:26:59
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1. Everyone dreams, every night of their life. Whoever makes us, makes our dreams. They come from the factory; where we all return each night to be "re-tuned" to the vibrations of our essential self.

2. Dreams are filmed live and in person within us. They reveal objective facts of our subjective (inner) life; and they do not know how to lie.

3. "Dreamer's choice" means the dreamer is always in charge of what to believe, how much personal material to share, and when to stop.

4. Please respect each dreamer's anonymity and privacy outside the group.

5. "All dreams speak a universal language and come in the service of health and wholeness," writes Jeremy Taylor. They always have healing opportunities in them and confirm that you are ready for that growth!

6. Don't believe a thing we say! Believe your own "felt validity." Dreams are a message from your inner self to your outer (or mildly-conscious) self. When your head gets the message that your heart already knows, you will feel it intuitively, emotionally and physically: Believe that evidence. The dream doesn't want you to believe us; it wants you to believe you.

7. Exploratory Dreamwork invites the group to study and wonder about each symbol in a receptive, curious manner until we begin to hear the voice of our own soul. When dreams are marinated in curiosity, they come to life, remind us of things, and reveal riddles, insights and humor. They can adjust our point of view, predict the future, link people in the group together, comment on the discussion itself, and bring our deepest truths into everyday life.

8. Explanatory Dreamwork is when someone outside your skin tells you what your dream means; beware. In Exploratory Dreamwork each person is the final expert on the meaning of his or her own dream.

9. "If this were my dream..." avoids projecting our meanings onto the dreamer and softens frank feedback.

10. "What this dream is saying to me..." acknowledges that Universal symbols speak to everyone who hears them, often in completely personal ways. The universal and the personal meet in dreamwork. Everybody's dream is everybody's dream. Any dream we work on, can teach you.

11. Dreams come from the timeless side of the psyche and are always on time. They will synchronize with everyone in the group, with other dreams discussed at the same time, and with events that have not yet happened. Emerson said, "Every man is a doorway through which the Infinite passes into the finite;" Dreams are the Doorknob.

12. There are no trivial dreams. "There is no great and small to Him who makes it all" (Blake). We have repeatedly seen one tiny dream fragment, deeply understood, change an entire life direction or self-definition.

13. Dreams always bring information you do not already know. They come from our "unconscious" side, so others can often see implications hidden from us. If you're the dreamer, learn something you don't already know. Dreams invite community.

14. Dreams are like diamonds; from every different point of view they reveal a new facet of light. Symbols have many meanings that are simultaneously true. E.g., every symbol has a light and a dark meaning; an inner and an outer meaning; a physical, a spiritual, an emotional, a mental, a cultural, and an archetypal meaning, etc. It's not that A or B is true, it's that A and B are true, and C... Group dream-work provides a valuable diversity of viewpoints.

15. Dreams are stories that store meaning and energy. They link our conscious mind with the Great Mystery, the invisible source of being. As Muriel Rukeyser put it: "The world is not made of molecules, the world is made of stories." ("Molecules" is just a creation story.)

16. We generally work with a few dreams in great depth and apply the results to everyone. Many dreams don't open before 30+ minutes of effort; afterwards, dream symbols re-congeal that layer of opaque incomprehensibility, to seal in otherworldly meaning and energy. Sometimes you must un-peel the oniony complexity all over, while other symbols will never be forgotten.

Sign up for the free 8 part email class "Discover Your Dreams: A Beginners Guide to Dream Interpretation" and newsletter: http://www.UniversityofYourself.com/DiscoverYourDreams_a.html

DreamTalk is a low-cost dreamwork email group which Dr Masa, Debbie Hart and Dr Marjorie Miles co-moderate that allows you to submit dreams for analysis and to help others understand their dreams. Info at: http://www.UniversityofYourself.com/DreamTalk_a.html

Ron Masa, Ph.D. wrote columns on dreams while in private practice for 25 years. Dr Masa has taught psychic development, Jungian psychotherapy, shamanism, and (for Naropa University) the I Ching and Dream Work. He and Debbie Hart co-lead the University of Yourself: "Helping You Hear the Guide Inside." http://www.UniversityofYourself.com

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