By Hal Stone, Ph.D., and Sidra Stone, Ph.D.. Reproduced with permission.
Hal and Sidra Stone: their work and the complete article library · Further Reading
by Hal Stone, Ph.D. & Sidra Stone, Ph.D.
There are many different kinds of energy thatcan be disowned but one of the more powerfulgroupings in western culture are the ones werefer to as instinctual energies. The blocking ofselves that are related to these energies causesno end of difficulty in our lives because we don’thave a connection to our natural aggression, tothe expression of our emotions and feelings andto a natural survival energy that understandsthe need to take care of ourselves in the world.Instead, the selves that develop often have todo with being nice, overly responsible, overlysensitive, identified with the mind and also withspirituality. How the unconscious as expressedin the dream process reacts to these disownedinstinctual energies is what this article is about.
A young woman who is identified with newage spirituality has the following dream: “Iam going down some stairs that lead from mykitchen to the basement. In the basement, muchto my surprise, I discover many cages and insidethe cages are lions all of whom are sound asleepwhile new age music plays in the background.”
There is a profound intelligence that liveswithin us that is constantly trying to help usbalance things out in our psyche. The “you” inthe dream is most often the primary self andgenerally gives us a good picture of how theprimary self behaves in the world. Less oftenthe “you” is the disowned self and then we aredoing something totally counter to our usual wayof doing things. For example, a very controlledman dreams that he is driving a car very fast andvery out of control. This would be an example ofthe disowned self breaking through in a dream,something that happens infrequently in dreamsbut typically in daydreams.
The image of lions being lulled to sleep withthe aid of new age music is both profound andhumorous as the same time. The dream makesits point with great clarity and speaks to theawareness level of the dreamer to help wakeher up from her own unconscious sleep state. Whenever we do not have access to awarenessand to some level of the Aware Ego process weare living in some kind of sleep state, just likethe dreamer’s lions. How different life would beif these lions woke up and their energies becameavailable to her as they were thoughtfully andcarefully let out of their cages and allowed theirfreedom. The dream paints a portrait of herrelationship to new age spirituality that is veryclear and precise and gives her clear direction onwhat she needs to work with – her separationfrom those selves that are connected to her newage spiritual identification as well as her need tolearn how to use in a conscious way the new lionenergy that would be available to her.
On a similar note, a deeply spiritual womanwhose connection was to her church had thefollowing dream: “I dream of angels. There weremany, all surrounded with light. Some of themare carrying lilies, some palm branches. Theirfaces are radiant. They were all straining upwards.Suddenly there is a long table. Seated around itare all kinds of evil looking creatures masked andin black. The scene is like the Last Supper andthe one in the center of the table says—Don’tforget us! We’re here too.”
People often think of their communicationas a framing process. The unconscious at timesis the master framer. It does not make herspirituality wrong. It simply re-frames it inrelationship to the dark side, to the disownedinstinctual energies. It puts these energies at thetable of the last supper to make sure that sheunderstands that both the angels on the one sideand the dark and evil looking creatures on theother side are both part of her spiritual nature.
Our last example is that of a man whoattended one of our European conferences.He had been working with a spiritual teacherfor many years but he was feeling a good dealof discontent because his own male power/instinctual energy was emerging and creatingconflict in the spiritual community of which heas a part. He had the following dream about histeacher: “ I’m exploring the compound of myteacher. I see that in this compound children arebeing trained to kill animals.”
This was a remarkable dream to us, to thegroup and especially to the dreamer. It doesnot say that his training was bad. What itpoints out so clearly is that in this training, hisfeelings (children) are being trained to kill theanimals, his instinctual nature. The dream hada very strong impact on the dreamer and hediscontinued his studies with the teacher withina very short period of time.
Sometimes the emphasis on spiritualtraining and the concomitant denial ofinstinctual energies that governs so much of theconsciousness community seems—to us—unbalanced. We prefer to speak about psychospiritualdevelopment. The name itself makesclear that transformational work requires thatwe move on the path of the snake, a path thatis forever interweaving between psychological,emotional and physical reality on the one sideand our spiritual nature on the other. From ourstudy of the dream process it is clear that thehigher mind that directs this process wants us tobe in balance and requires that we embrace all ofour selves.
© 2003
Original source and copyright: Hal Stone, Ph.D., and Sidra Stone, Ph.D.. Read the original at Voice Dialogue International.