Dreams ~ Revealer of Secrets

If we require an answer to a problem, we need to go no further than our dreams. They speak to us; they spill the beans about what the concern is really about and what we need to consider or do about it. I was at a psychoanalytic conference in which dreams were discussed in highly technical and empirical ways. Raising my hand I offered, "Let's cut to the quick here. Dreams spill the beans. They tell us what's going on in situations, in relationships, and what people are about as opposed to what they seem to be about." They are the revealer of secrets.

C.G. Jung wrote of the dream as the "harbinger of fate, a portent and comforter, a messenger of the gods. Now we see it as the emissary of the unconscious, whose task it is to reveal the secrets that are hidden from the conscious mind, and this it does with astounding completeness" (On the Psychology of the Unconscious 1917/1926 CW 7, 21).

A while back I thought of attending a conference on the soul in clinical practice. I thought it would be a very good time to meet others with whom I've had a virtual relationship for years. That night a dream spoke. It showed me with a tightly-knit group of conference attendees. Everyone was drinking Kool-Aid. I thought in the dream, Oh no, they're drinking Kool-Aid. I stopped just before placing the glass to my lips.

The dream told me that I'd weaken or lose my individual perspective by attending the conference and engaging in professional schmoozing. I listened. I didn't go. A dream revealed what I did not know, saved me time, energy, and recovery. There was no question in my mind what the dream was saying. It said it directly and with "astounding completeness."