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The Symbolism of Travel Inner and Outer · This Jungian Life Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome to This Jungian Life. Three good friends and Jungian analysts,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: Lisa Marciano, Deborah Stewart, and Joseph Lee, invite you to
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: join them for an intimate and honest conversation that brings
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: a psychological perspective to important issues of the day.
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: I'm Lisa Marciano, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Philadelphia.
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: I'm Joseph Lee, and I'm a Jungian analyst in Virginia Beach, Virginia.
• 0:28
  Speaker 4: I'm Debra Stewart, a Jungian analyst on Cape Cod.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Welcome to another episode of our Dreamography Project. Our Dreamography
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Project takes a look every month at a different category
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: of dream and It's something that was inspired as we
• 0:58
  Speaker 2: worked on our new book, Dreamwise, Unlocking the Meaning of
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Your Dreams, which, oh, look at that. I have a
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: copy right here.
• 1:06
  Speaker 4: By purest coincidence.
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  Speaker 2: We co-wrote this book to help you work with your dreams.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: And if you haven't purchased your copy yet, you can,
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: of course, do so wherever you get your books. And
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: if you have it and you love it, we'd love
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: it if you would write a review. But in DreamWise,
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: we take you through all different kinds of techniques that
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: you can use to work with your own dreams. And
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: we also do a little bit of this dreamography where
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: we take a certain type of dream. Lots of people
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: have dreams about travel. That's features and dreams. And what
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  Speaker 2: might that mean? So we wanted to take this opportunity
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: on the podcast to take a deeper dive into some
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: of these themes. And this month we are looking at travel.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: By the way, next month, we're going to be looking
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  Speaker 2: at house dreams. So if you have a house dream
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: you'd like to share, you can go to the link
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: and share your house dream. This is a different link
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: than our usual share your dream link. And we'll collect
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: all of your house dreams. So In travel dreams, we
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: are often driving cars, we're riding on buses or subways
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: or boats or planes, we're in airports. What do, of course,
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  Speaker 2: you know, as we know, no image always means the
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  Speaker 2: same thing in dreams and our associations are highly individualized.
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  Speaker 2: But taking that into account, what are some of the
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  Speaker 2: types of themes that travel might introduce into a dream?
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  Speaker 2: What might travel images stand for when we see them
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  Speaker 2: in a dream? So many of you were kind enough
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  Speaker 2: to share your travel dreams with us, and we've selected
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  Speaker 2: a few. So first, before we jump into the dreams,
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: let's talk about travel kind of as an archetype, as
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: a mythologem. What do we What do we think about
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  Speaker 2: travel symbolically?
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  Speaker 3: I think there's a lot of different dimensions to it,
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  Speaker 3: but when I think of travel for most of us
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  Speaker 3: as Americans, it's really related to tourism and that people
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  Speaker 3: go on travel adventures in order to give themselves a
• 3:25
  Speaker 3: kind of curated experience of some other culture, some other
• 3:29
  Speaker 3: environment they're hoping to be stimulated. Much of tourist travel
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  Speaker 3: is driven by a certain kind of fantasy. and a
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  Speaker 3: fantasy that somewhere else is going to give me something
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: more than where I am right now. And it's a
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  Speaker 3: particularly extroverted process. I think some of my most introverted
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  Speaker 3: friends think of all forms of travel and tourism as
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  Speaker 3: a bit of a burden. But as extroverts, we're much
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: more likely to want to engage new and novel situations, people, circumstances,
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  Speaker 3: and to feel enlivened as a result of that. I
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  Speaker 3: also think that tourism is a very bivalent drive.
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  Speaker 4: What I think about when I think about travel in
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  Speaker 4: dreams is I think about, you know, where is the from?
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  Speaker 4: I'm traveling from, and where am I traveling to? especially
• 4:29
  Speaker 4: things like medieval Europe. So we can do some time
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  Speaker 4: travel in dreams. We can travel to the opposite side
• 4:37
  Speaker 4: of the world. We can travel to the jungle. We
• 4:40
  Speaker 4: can travel to the Arctic. So what do all those
• 4:43
  Speaker 4: things represent in a dream that the dream maker has said,
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: I'm traveling to Spain or I'm traveling to Brazil? And
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: then I also think about what is the mode of transportation? Walking, biking, busing,
• 4:59
  Speaker 4: taking the train, flying, driving a car. And what do
• 5:05
  Speaker 4: those things represent?
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  Speaker 2: And how are they different from each other?
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  Speaker 4: Exactly. You know, a bike is not a car, but
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  Speaker 4: at least whoever is pedaling the bike is autonomous and
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  Speaker 4: in charge, as usually the dream ego. A car, they
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  Speaker 4: take us where we want to go. Versus collective modes
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  Speaker 4: of transportation. Trains go on a track. Everybody goes to
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  Speaker 4: the same places. It's a preset route. Same with buses.
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  Speaker 4: But those have wheels. So we explore all those different
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  Speaker 4: ways that symbolize how psyche is moving.
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  Speaker 2: And Deb, what you're talking about falls into this category
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  Speaker 2: of explanation. which we go into in the book, so
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  Speaker 2: that there are these three ways that you begin to
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  Speaker 2: build up kind of correlates with an image. There's the
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  Speaker 2: personal associations, like if there's a car, is it a
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  Speaker 2: specific car? Is it the car you drove after you
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  Speaker 2: graduated from college and it was this old beat up clunker,
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  Speaker 2: it was the only thing you could afford? Or is
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: it your brand new car that you just got? But
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  Speaker 2: then there's also explanation, which I think you were leaning
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  Speaker 2: into there when you talked about What's the difference between
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: a bus and a train? And when we think about
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  Speaker 2: kind of the function of things and how it operates
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: in the world, that can tell us something about what
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  Speaker 2: something means in a dream. Joseph, you were bringing up
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  Speaker 2: kind of tourism, but of course there's the everyday way
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  Speaker 2: that we travel. We commute to work, we go to
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  Speaker 2: the grocery store. Like you said, Deb, it matters. Are
• 6:51
  Speaker 2: we walking? Are we biking? Are we going under our
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  Speaker 2: own steam? And a lot of times these images in
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  Speaker 2: the dreams kind of relate to how is it that
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  Speaker 2: we are moving through the world? I'm also thinking about
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  Speaker 2: travel in, if we think about it sort of as
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  Speaker 2: an archetype, thinking about the way travel shows up in
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  Speaker 2: myths and fairy tales and that it may often be
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  Speaker 2: part of a quest. So the hero may have to travel.
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  Speaker 2: The hero or heroine sometimes really great distances. So you
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  Speaker 2: have to travel to east of the sun and west
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  Speaker 2: of the moon. God knows where that is, you know,
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  Speaker 2: and you may not know where you're going and you've
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: got to ask the different winds, you know, to guide you.
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  Speaker 2: So there's a sense of travel being an image maybe
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: of our life quest, of the internal ground that we
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: have to traverse, right? This year, my Wellspring Women's Retreat
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: is happening in Italy from the 10th to the 16th
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: of August. We thought hard about where to host our
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: first European gathering and in the end chose Montepulciano near Siena.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: I first went to Italy when I was 18 and
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  Speaker 2: fell head over heels in love, especially with the spectacular
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: medieval city of Siena. I was lucky enough to be
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: part of the Natruscan excavation project on that trip and
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  Speaker 2: became totally fascinated by this mysterious ancient culture and by
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Italy in general. When I've had the chance, I've tried
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: to keep up my Italian, and I've loved reading Italian
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: myths and fairy tales throughout my life. So, for my
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: annual women's gathering, this region felt like the right place.
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: I can't wait to share the local stories and take
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: some trips together to see some of Tuscany's most magical
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: archaeological sites. There will, of course, be all the usual
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: wellspring offerings too. Fairy tales, daily yoga, dream work, massage,
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: and plenty of time to relax together. I'd love for
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: you to join me. There will be a link in
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: the show notes for you to read all the details
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: and make a booking.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: And there is inner and outer travel. I mean, Dante's
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: Divine Comedy, you know, talks about an incredible travel, a journey,
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: that although it's depicted theatrically, is really a story about
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  Speaker 3: something that is happening inside this human soul. Dreams themselves
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  Speaker 3: are a form of travel. inasmuch as we are often
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  Speaker 3: far away from our waking experience of the world and
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  Speaker 3: of reality.
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  Speaker 2: I love that.
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  Speaker 3: Hermes, by the way, was the god of travel and travelers.
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  Speaker 3: He was the patron, depicted often with sandals and his
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: message sack and having access to all realms safely. When
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: I see Instagram celebrities, which are often young people, and
• 9:38
  Speaker 3: their entire processes, traveling all over the world and posting
• 9:45
  Speaker 3: images of how they got this deal and what it's
• 9:47
  Speaker 3: like to be in Thailand and what it's like to
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  Speaker 3: travel here, they really are incarnations of Hermes in the
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  Speaker 3: fullest sense of that. Traveling with an almost transcendental charmed
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  Speaker 3: process going on. I mean, these kids will often go
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  Speaker 3: places I would be very nervous to travel to, and
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  Speaker 3: they seem to do it in such a charmed, light-hearted,
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  Speaker 3: light-footed way, which really partakes of this Hermes... You know,
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  Speaker 3: Tarot Key Zero, the fool, is also the great traveler.
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  Speaker 3: You know, eyes to the heavens, sack on your back,
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  Speaker 3: dog at your heels, marching off into the experiences of life.
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  Speaker 4: And then there are also wanderers. And that's a variation
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  Speaker 4: on that theme of someone who I think Wotan was
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  Speaker 4: the wanderer, featured in one of Wagner's operas. mythologically. Cain
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  Speaker 4: was condemned to travel the earth. I'm just sussing out
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  Speaker 4: the difference between having a destination versus taking a road trip.
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  Speaker 4: And that, of course, can have a destination, but it's
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  Speaker 4: really the trip itself that matters because traveling, as a verb,
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  Speaker 4: and reaching the destination, whatever it is, are different ways
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  Speaker 4: of encountering ourselves. You know, whether it's in waking life
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  Speaker 4: out there in the so-called real world or in a dream.
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  Speaker 4: What is it like for me to be in this
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  Speaker 4: far-flung location? What does it call up in me to
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  Speaker 4: adjust to understand in myself?
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  Speaker 3: And to take on the role of the stranger.
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  Speaker 4: Yep.
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  Speaker 3: Which is interesting. I don't think people often associate it
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  Speaker 3: with that, but when you're in a really foreign land
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  Speaker 3: where the language and the culture is radically different from
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  Speaker 3: the one that you were in, the experience of the
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: stranger and the archetype constellates heavily inside of us.
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  Speaker 2: Deb, what you were saying made me think of, you know,
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  Speaker 2: one of the great travel myths, that of Odysseus.
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  Speaker 4: Right.
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  Speaker 2: And his travel home. You know, as a writer, I
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  Speaker 2: can tell you that I find it really difficult to
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  Speaker 2: avoid that most time-worn of metaphors, the journey. Like, you know, it's,
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know, but it's so there, right? Life,
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: it's a cliche, but it's a cliche because it's true.
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  Speaker 2: Life is a journey and we're always journeying whether our
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: journey takes us down the street to the corner store
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  Speaker 2: or across the world. Metaphorically, we're always in motion psychically
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  Speaker 2: toward our mysterious destination of ultimate individuation.
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  Speaker 4: So we travel through time. We travel in our imaginations.
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  Speaker 4: We're always traveling.
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  Speaker 2: And as Joseph said, we travel in our dreams. So
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: let's take a look at our first travel dream. The
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: dreamer is a 36-year-old woman. And here's the dream. I'm
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: on a modern train that is traveling around the edge
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  Speaker 2: of a large tropical bay. The beach and lagoon are
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: on my right and the jungle is on my left.
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  Speaker 2: We are nearing the train journey's end. There are a
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: few more stops left and we are parked at one
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  Speaker 2: station when a young man with dreadlocks approaches me and
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  Speaker 2: asks me if I want to get off at this
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  Speaker 2: station towards the jungle. I say no as I'm slightly
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: scared and he gives me a sad look and gets
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: off alone. Almost immediately, I wish I had said yes
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  Speaker 2: and got off the train with him, but I feel
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: it's too late to speak up now. I wake up
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: before the train moves on. And here's her associations and context.
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  Speaker 2: This dream was around the time I was first introduced
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: to Jung from reading his book, Psychology and Alchemy. Boy,
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  Speaker 2: that is quite an introduction. I also had lots of
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: other meaningful dreams around this time. Also around this time,
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  Speaker 2: I was really drawing boundaries with my enmeshed and abusive
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  Speaker 2: family to not be the caretaker and allow myself to
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: have my own needs and wants. She reports the main
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: feelings in the dream. I was excited to be traveling
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  Speaker 2: and the tropical beach and lagoon were bringing a sense
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: of peace. I felt scared and filled with trepidation when
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: the man asked me to disembark and then sad and
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: regretful after I had said no due to not having
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: the courage to get off the train. And for associations,
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: he says, travel has always been exciting for me. And
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: after an abusive childhood, I spent around 10 years from
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: age 18 to 28 traveling around and doing different jobs,
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: living abroad twice and relocating to a different city where
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: I always had feeling of forward motion. I did a
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: lot of cognitive healing during this time.
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  Speaker 3: So what strikes me as just a general theme in
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: the dream is there are missed opportunities that we have,
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: and we're always carrying this tension between safety and adventure.
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  Speaker 3: And if we think of the train as the trajectory
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: of one's life, that we do have these predetermined paths,
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: there are limited stops. which suggests these kind of immutable
• 15:36
  Speaker 3: choices that we've often made in our lives. And yet,
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: even in the structured path of the train, still unexpected
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: moments for adventure can happen if we choose, but it
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: does require that we get off of the predictable, scheduled
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  Speaker 3: life of the train in order to have something come
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  Speaker 3: in which is not Kronos, but is Kairos.
• 16:03
  Speaker 4: I'm interested in the fact that where she has traveled
• 16:07
  Speaker 4: in her dream is the edge of a large tropical
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  Speaker 4: bay with beach and lagoon on literally the one hand.
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  Speaker 4: And the jungle, on the other hand, and it's a
• 16:29
  Speaker 4: little bit of a rule of thumb, but to be
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: held loosely, that environments like jungles and forests often represent
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  Speaker 4: something in the unconscious. It's wild. It hasn't been cultivated.
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  Speaker 4: You never know what can happen in the deep, dark
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: forest or whatever. the wild and crazy jungle where growth
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: is lush, but parrots are beautiful and predators lurk. So
• 17:04
  Speaker 4: we're pretty ambivalent about going to the jungle. And what's
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: interesting is the young man says, do I want to
• 17:14
  Speaker 4: get off toward the jungle? Not toward the vacation destination
• 17:19
  Speaker 4: of the lagoon and the beach and the You know,
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: it's this beautiful scene. I'm sure the sunset is gorgeous.
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  Speaker 4: But do you want to go into the wild? And
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: the other is that it's almost at the end of
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: the route. This is getting to be last chance. And,
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: you know, this would be great to have the dreamer
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: hear we say that so often of like, what's going
• 17:48
  Speaker 4: on in your life that might call up this kind
• 17:51
  Speaker 4: of a dream?
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  Speaker 2: So, Deb, I want to build on what you said
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: and point out that the jungle is also on the left.
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  Speaker 3: Quite right. Side of the unconscious.
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: Yeah, what we think of as being the side of
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: the unconscious. And, you know, your point about that the
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: jungle is really well taken, it's an example of a
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: relatively fixed symbol. So, in Dreamwise, we talk about working
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: with symbolic images and you know, a symbol is different
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: than a sign. You can't say that a cigar means
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: a penis in a dream because it could mean any
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: number of things. But Jung also said, you know, if
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: there weren't some general signposts, it would be, you know,
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: there'd be no structure in the psyche. And so we
• 18:34
  Speaker 2: do generally think as a starting place that the image
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: of the forest is the unknown, the unconscious, the realm
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: where something unexpected could happen. where ego is not in charge.
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: And of course, that is a very common image in
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: fairy tales. And here specifically, I think you're right, Deb,
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: it's important that it's a jungle because the jungle implies
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: something that's even wilder. And I remember reading at some point,
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: so many of the plants in jungles have not even
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: been cataloged. We have no idea what kind of new
• 19:12
  Speaker 2: pharmaceuticals might arise, for example, from the study of the
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: plants in the jungle. It's really an unknown realm from
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: which much healing might come, by the way, to extend
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: my metaphor.
• 19:24
  Speaker 4: Yeah, jungles are great as an image of the unconscious
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: because they are brimming with life.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, yes.
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  Speaker 4: It's all over the place, the plants, the animals, the butterflies,
• 19:37
  Speaker 4: it goes on and on. Who knows what you will encounter?
• 19:40
  Speaker 4: Are you going to be Will there be a poisonous snake?
• 19:44
  Speaker 4: Will there be an attacking jaguar? Or will there be this...
• 19:50
  Speaker 4: gorgeous waterfall and plants in bloom and butterflies and parrots?
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  Speaker 2: Who knows? Maybe all of the above. I want to
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: just say one more thing, if I may. This is
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: a great example of what, speaking of journeys, What Joseph Campbell,
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: when he mapped out the hero's journey, refers to as
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: the refusal of the call. So that this is a
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: very typical moment in the hero's journey that occurs in
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: many myths and fairy tales where the hero is invited
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: by the mentor. The mentor comes and invites the hero
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: and the hero says, no thanks, I got something to
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: do next week. And that that refusal of the call
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: often precedes the acceptance of the call and going on
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: that journey. So go ahead, Joseph, what were you going
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: to say?
• 20:43
  Speaker 3: This is also a dream about her relationship to the animus.
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: That there is this young male that is inviting her
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: to step a little deeper into the unconscious and maybe
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: even connect to the collective unconscious if we think is
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: the jungle is being profoundly different from her. And one
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: does need the anima animus for the ego to safely
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: connect to a certain almost inhuman depth in the unconscious.
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: So there really is a setup for something that could
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: be remarkably life-renewing. When the anima animus comes and offers
• 21:25
  Speaker 3: to connect it to something that we normally would not
• 21:28
  Speaker 3: have access to, it does portend Yeah.
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: And development and growth and individuation.
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: Quite so. So her feeling of ambivalence at the end,
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: kind of wishing she had said yes, and the sad
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: look on the onimous figure's face both give us a
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: sense that, you know, next time I need to do
• 21:55
  Speaker 3: something different. Or that she might take this and think,
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: What does she need to reconsider about her own process
• 22:05
  Speaker 3: of self-revelation, her own process of self-discovery, so that she
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: could cultivate a more adventurous and, yes, saying, welcoming attitude
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: towards what's being offered to her?
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: Yeah, we've talked in the book about how in dreams,
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: as in life, and this is Karen Horney, who was
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: a German analyst back a ways. She reduces things. She's
• 22:37
  Speaker 4: a real minimalist, too. Do you go toward? Do you
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: push against? Or do you hide or run away? And
• 22:50
  Speaker 4: so I'm just adding to what you've said, Lisa, of
• 22:54
  Speaker 4: the refusal of the call. And it's interesting because the
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: dream ego says no because the dream ego is slightly scared.
• 23:05
  Speaker 4: And then she wishes she had said yes, but I
• 23:10
  Speaker 4: feel it's too late to speak up now. So that
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: adds another dimension to this, that she doesn't feel able
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: to change her mind.
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: This also happens in a context that she gives us
• 23:24
  Speaker 3: is that This was around the time that she was
• 23:27
  Speaker 3: really focused on drawing boundaries with her family. She felt
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: enmeshed and felt that they were mistreating her. So sometimes
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: the ego attitude, which here is about boundaries, which in
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: another way is saying no to being influenced, can then
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: bleed into other areas of our psychological life where it
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: doesn't really belong. that our interventions to improve our life, which,
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: by the way, can be very important, are discrete to
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: certain circumstances, but when they become globalized, the same thing
• 24:03
  Speaker 3: that helps you in one environment then hinders you in another.
• 24:06
  Speaker 3: It's like we need a very specific medicine for each
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: psycho-spiritual problem, not the same medicine for every problem.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: You know, Joseph, I love that you brought up that
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: this is an image of her animus, which of course is,
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: you know, exactly right. This would absolutely have been put
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: in the book if we'd had it before then, because
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: it's a great example of an animus dream. Actually, specifically
• 24:33
  Speaker 2: this idea that the animus is a guide. You know,
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: he's a psychopomp. He leads us into the inner world,
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: and that's exactly the invitation that he's extending. And of course,
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: In her waking life, she was doing some of this,
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: you know, in that she was beginning to read Jung.
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: She was beginning to explore that jungle. I mean, I
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: personally feel kind of positive about this dream because it's
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: sort of like she didn't do it this time, but
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: there'll be another time, you know, that she knows she
• 25:02
  Speaker 2: should have. And next time she will.
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: That's the correction.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: So if we think about what changes in the dream,
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: it's that subtle attitude. I've just been like, ah, shucks,
• 25:15
  Speaker 3: I wish I had. Which, as you said, will then
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: set her up to be perhaps a little bit more
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: welcoming the next time around.
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: Okay, let's look at another dream with another mode of transportation.
• 25:30
  Speaker 4: This dreamer is a woman. She was 29 when she
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: had the dream a few years ago. She's a teacher.
• 25:37
  Speaker 4: And here's the dream. I'm on board a double-decker bus
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: sitting on the top deck. I'm the only person on
• 25:46
  Speaker 4: the bus. It's completely empty apart from me. The bus
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: starts driving around the narrow streets of the village I
• 25:53
  Speaker 4: live in. I'm afraid that we are going too fast,
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: and I don't see how we're going to fit down
• 25:58
  Speaker 4: the streets without hitting buildings on either side. Somehow, we
• 26:03
  Speaker 4: don't manage to hit anything, and the bus keeps moving
• 26:06
  Speaker 4: with force but ease. And for context, she says, I
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: had this dream the night before I got married. The
• 26:15
  Speaker 4: engagement and marriage transition were really initiatory for me, bringing
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: up all sorts of truly crippling anxiety that lasted for
• 26:24
  Speaker 4: three years, the length of my engagement. It was a
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: tough time, but was also the time of my life
• 26:31
  Speaker 4: that brought me to therapy for the first time. And
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: I truly started to learn about myself. about setting boundaries,
• 26:39
  Speaker 4: and to develop the courage to say yes to life.
• 26:43
  Speaker 4: The main feelings in the dream, she says, were concern
• 26:47
  Speaker 4: that we were going to hit buildings by driving too
• 26:50
  Speaker 4: quickly and too closely to them. I also felt a
• 26:54
  Speaker 4: sense of aloneness. The bus felt really so empty, and
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: I felt that, but I wasn't necessarily sad or frightened
• 27:02
  Speaker 4: about it or even lonely. And yet it wasn't comfortable either.
• 27:07
  Speaker 4: It was cold and exposing. And for additional associations, she says,
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: I've realized that I dream a lot about travel during
• 27:17
  Speaker 4: transitions in my life. In this dream, it's like the
• 27:20
  Speaker 4: train had left the station or the bus with regard
• 27:24
  Speaker 4: to the marriage transition. The wedding was happening. The mystery
• 27:29
  Speaker 4: was about to unfold. And I was riding along with it.
• 27:33
  Speaker 4: It's really lovely the way she's worked with the dream
• 27:35
  Speaker 4: and the meaning she's made of it, isn't it? Yes.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: Yes, it is.
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: You know, one of the things that comes up for
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: me about this dream is the fact that it's a
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: double-decker bus, which is more typical in, you know, I
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: think it's like, we think of it as like kind
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: of iconically typical of London.
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: Yep.
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: But I, you know, I've driven in double, I've ridden in,
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: certainly not driven, I've ridden in double-decker buses here, you know,
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: sort of just between cities sometimes. And You really get
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: a view up there. It can be a little disconcerting almost,
• 28:39
  Speaker 2: but at the same time, it's kind of fun. Another
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: thing about being in a double-decker bus is the driver
• 28:47
  Speaker 2: is really far away from you. You can't see the driver.
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: And she says, you know, I thought about that with
• 28:54
  Speaker 2: this dream because she says, I mean, the only person
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: on the bus I'm thinking, is there a driver? But,
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: you know, and she says, I don't know who was driving.
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: That would be really interesting. But what I make of
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: that is I wonder if it feels like her own
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: sense of agency that's driving her forward is it's there,
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: but it's so remote from consciousness at the time that
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: she has this dream that it's only kind of dimly intuited.
• 29:18
  Speaker 3: Well, I think that captures some of the complicated emotional
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: tones and vulnerability that she may have been having during
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: the dream. I'm thinking about the transitional nature of the
• 29:34
  Speaker 3: whole context, that she's on the eve of making an
• 29:39
  Speaker 3: enormous transition. She's about to get married. She's been anxious.
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: I don't know what she was anxious about, which she
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: doesn't really tell us, but it's a big change. She's
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: driving from her life as a single person into a
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: new life, as a marital partner. And I think this
• 29:58
  Speaker 3: is not an uncommon feeling, but once we're engaged and
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: the marriage date is coming closer and closer, there is
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: a kind of a careening quality about it. More and
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: more things have to be done, more and more phone calls,
• 30:11
  Speaker 3: but what about this? And then there's the hotel and
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: then people coming in and, um, it starts to feel
• 30:17
  Speaker 3: like a kind of wacky bus that's, you know, uh,
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: teetering all over the place. Um, And I think the medicine,
• 30:25
  Speaker 3: one piece of medicine in the dream is it feels
• 30:29
  Speaker 3: a little unsafe and like this huge bus is careening
• 30:33
  Speaker 3: through the narrow streets and nothing bad happens. It feels precarious.
• 30:40
  Speaker 3: It feels uncertain. It feels like it's a runaway bus,
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: so to speak. Too fast.
• 30:48
  Speaker 4: But actually.
• 30:50
  Speaker 3: The guy who's driving the bus may have been doing
• 30:52
  Speaker 3: this for 40 years. The streets are known. The parameters
• 30:56
  Speaker 3: of the bus are well known. Just like the process
• 31:00
  Speaker 3: of getting married is ancient and well known, it's a
• 31:05
  Speaker 3: well-trodden path, even though there's a lot of energy and
• 31:10
  Speaker 3: gaining speed and momentum leading up to it.
• 31:14
  Speaker 4: I'm thinking about a double-decker bus ride as being top-heavy,
• 31:19
  Speaker 4: having ridden on one, albeit not for a thousand years,
• 31:27
  Speaker 4: that when a double-decker bus takes a curve, you really
• 31:32
  Speaker 4: feel it on the top deck. And it also provides,
• 31:36
  Speaker 4: as was mentioned before, such a nice view. When we
• 31:41
  Speaker 4: lived in Brooklyn, there were double-decker buses doing tours of Brooklyn,
• 31:45
  Speaker 4: and the top deck was always packed. we're looking around,
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: we see everything. There's a real sort of objective viewpoint
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: when you're in the bus looking at everything. I'm entitled
• 31:59
  Speaker 4: to look at everything. So I'm wondering if there's a
• 32:02
  Speaker 4: way in which something is heady. You can see a lot,
• 32:07
  Speaker 4: you manage a lot, you're aware of a lot, you
• 32:11
  Speaker 4: have a good view of everything. But it's also, imagine
• 32:15
  Speaker 4: how Awful that would be if you were on the
• 32:18
  Speaker 4: top deck of a bus and the bus is scraping
• 32:21
  Speaker 4: the sides of a narrow street. I was like, whoa.
• 32:29
  Speaker 4: So it's a really great image. And I'm liking how
• 32:34
  Speaker 4: the dream maker picks literally the vehicle, but also symbolically
• 32:40
  Speaker 4: the vehicle that says, what about getting married felt like that?
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I really like that dub, the kind
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: of top heaviness of it. And Joseph, just to embroider
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: a little bit on the point that you made, you know,
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: she kind of says this, you know, it's like the
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: train has left the station. You know, that sense that
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: if you're engaged and you're getting close to getting married,
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: that it feels like, oh, shit, I can't get off
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: this bus anymore, you know?
• 33:12
  Speaker 4: Right. Too late now.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: You know, the invitations have been sent, the deposits down
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: on the dress or whatever it is. And it's like,
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: I can't, I can't, this is going to happen. And
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: that sense, I mean, we were talking before about what's
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: the difference between a car and a bike. And, you know,
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: when you're on a bus, just a little bit like
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: being on a train, you don't have that much control
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: over where the bus stops. It's going to stop at
• 33:36
  Speaker 2: a stop. And if you're on your toes, you'll be
• 33:39
  Speaker 2: able to request that the bus stop at your stop.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: if it is one of those kinds of buses, or
• 33:45
  Speaker 2: you're just going to have to wait. Sometimes I take
• 33:49
  Speaker 2: bus travel from Philly to D.C. or something, and the
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: bus doesn't stop until it gets to its destination, and
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: you're on the bus whether or not you like it.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: You can't change your mind midway. So it really does
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: carry the sense about you've sort of handed your agency
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: off a little bit. And as both of you have said,
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: thank goodness this bus driver was, she was in good hands.
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: She was actually in good hands. And we can think
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: of the bus driver in a way of being maybe
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: more of a sort of unconscious driver, right? Because Deb,
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: as you were saying, she's up top, maybe in a
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: very heady place. Bus driver's down. The bus driver's pretty
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: close to the ground. And, you know, he or she
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: knows how to drive this bus.
• 34:38
  Speaker 3: There's a relational component also, which I find a little
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: bit sad. She's on the way to the wedding, and
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: she's alone. There's no one on the bus at all.
• 34:51
  Speaker 3: And she's exposed to the elements on the second part
• 34:55
  Speaker 3: of the bus, the top part. Now, we don't know
• 34:58
  Speaker 3: what the weather is like. We don't necessarily know what
• 35:01
  Speaker 3: she's seeing. As you were saying, Deb, sometimes... being at
• 35:05
  Speaker 3: the top of the bus where you can see everything
• 35:07
  Speaker 3: and be subject to the warm air and the smells
• 35:10
  Speaker 3: of the new city could be rather intoxicating. Here, to me,
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: it feels like being at the top of the Empire
• 35:19
  Speaker 3: State Building out on the viewing deck, where it's just
• 35:22
  Speaker 3: a lot of height, you're all alone, it's a little scary,
• 35:27
  Speaker 3: you're subject to the elements. There's a way in which
• 35:31
  Speaker 3: we can be lofty in an exalted way, But we
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: can be lofty in a way that also makes us
• 35:36
  Speaker 3: kind of anxious and feel very much alone. And that
• 35:40
  Speaker 3: strikes me in the marriage, or at least entering into
• 35:44
  Speaker 3: it here. She seems very alone. And I do wonder
• 35:49
  Speaker 3: about that experience. And it would be wonderful to talk
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: with her because I wonder if this dream is foreshadowing
• 35:57
  Speaker 3: a problem that's going to exist in the marriage, or whether...
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: this actually resolves and she arrives at the marital experience
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: and perhaps it is more warm and more welcoming and
• 36:12
  Speaker 3: is a powerful counterpoint to the isolation on the top
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: of the bus and therefore kind of a relief.
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: I'm going to just give a counterpoint to that, Joseph.
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: I had that same question as a kind of foreshadowing something.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: But I also want to say that when traditionally when
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: the bride goes to the wedding, She goes alone. She
• 36:33
  Speaker 2: goes without her. She goes to the church to meet
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: her betrothed. There's something about the necessity, maybe, of making
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: that particular journey by yourself.
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: I think psychologically, regardless of whether or not someone's there,
• 36:49
  Speaker 3: it's all on us to make these big decisions.
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: And in ancient times, a woman getting married was about
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: to depart from her family of origin and her home forever.
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: It was in many ways a kind of death in
• 37:14
  Speaker 4: order to birth into a whole new place to live,
• 37:19
  Speaker 4: a whole new stage of feminine development, life stage. You
• 37:26
  Speaker 4: leave home, you move 20 miles away, The marriage is
• 37:30
  Speaker 4: arranged by all the various family males. And you may
• 37:35
  Speaker 4: never see your mother again. Or if you do, it
• 37:40
  Speaker 4: will be on very, very rare occasions. And I think
• 37:44
  Speaker 4: that experience has echoes in modern life of I am
• 37:49
  Speaker 4: alone going into the unknown. of this new state. And
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: today it's more of a psychological state, but in some
• 38:01
  Speaker 4: sense it calls up all that. I am vulnerable and
• 38:08
  Speaker 4: I am doing this alone. Even if the church is
• 38:13
  Speaker 4: filled with people or the double-decker bus is packed, it's
• 38:17
  Speaker 4: a journey we take at some level alone.
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: And I just want to say, since we're focusing on
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: the travel and the method of travel in the dream, Joseph,
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: you had mentioned something before about how marriage is a
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: well-worn path. It's an ancient institution. Many people have done
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: it before, like this is going to be okay. And
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: the bus is a really great image for that, right?
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: Because she's alone on the bus. So like we've been saying,
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: she kind of has to go through this passage alone.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: But she's on a collective mode of transportation that many, many,
• 38:53
  Speaker 2: many people have ridden on and will ride on. So
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: the idea of being alone on a bus really kind
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: of captures that, that she's doing something in this very
• 39:03
  Speaker 2: individual way, but at the same time, it's a collective.
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: She's partaking of a deeply collective ritual.
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: I think the small roads is the thing that conveys that.
• 39:13
  Speaker 3: Like if you go to an old European city, the roads,
• 39:17
  Speaker 3: are very small in the old part of town, and
• 39:19
  Speaker 3: yet buses and cars are trying to squeeze their way
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: through this more ancient thoroughfare. So the bus and the
• 39:28
  Speaker 3: tiny road have this mix of time around it. Our
• 39:34
  Speaker 3: next dream is titled, I Become the Driver. The dreamer
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: is a 46-year-old female, and here is her dream. I'm
• 39:44
  Speaker 3: traveling on a lake in a canoe. The man in
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: charge of the boat is angry with me. Water is
• 39:49
  Speaker 3: seeping into the cracks of the boat and I start
• 39:51
  Speaker 3: scooping out the water with a frisbee. The boat then
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: transforms into a car driving on the water. A mean
• 39:58
  Speaker 3: middle-aged woman is now driving the car while I sit
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: in the passenger seat. We drive out of the lake
• 40:04
  Speaker 3: and up a river against the current. The river winds
• 40:07
  Speaker 3: up a mountain. The driver wants me to open the
• 40:09
  Speaker 3: passenger side door and I realize she wants the water
• 40:13
  Speaker 3: to wash me away and kill me. I tell her, no,
• 40:16
  Speaker 3: I'm innocent. I only made a small mistake. Then the
• 40:20
  Speaker 3: driver disappears and I am now in the driver's seat.
• 40:23
  Speaker 3: I turn the car around and float back down the mountain.
• 40:27
  Speaker 3: For context, she says, when I had this dream I
• 40:30
  Speaker 3: was preparing to divorce my husband. We had been amicably
• 40:34
  Speaker 3: separated for five years but still shared a car. When
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: I was a teenager, a friend of mine drowned in
• 40:40
  Speaker 3: a river and I have had many drowning nightmares since then.
• 40:44
  Speaker 3: She says her main feelings were anger at the middle-aged
• 40:48
  Speaker 3: driver for wanting to get rid of me, and empowerment
• 40:53
  Speaker 3: when I became the driver. As for associations with travel,
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: she says, my grandfather and I went on many happy
• 41:01
  Speaker 3: canoe fishing trips together when I was a child. Her
• 41:04
  Speaker 3: occupation is art teacher.
• 41:07
  Speaker 2: So here we have a boat and a car.
• 41:09
  Speaker 3: Reminds me a little of the Batmobile, you know, it's this,
• 41:13
  Speaker 3: it's that, it goes on water.
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: Chitty, chitty, bang, bang.
• 41:17
  Speaker 3: Chitty, chitty, bang, bang. Yeah, the miraculous car. I'm struck
• 41:21
  Speaker 3: first by the tone of the inner figures. We have
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: an angry man and a mean woman. And so there
• 41:31
  Speaker 3: is something about this kind of hostility in the unconscious.
• 41:38
  Speaker 3: And I am often curious about why these figures are
• 41:45
  Speaker 3: showing up in that way. By the way, I also
• 41:49
  Speaker 3: don't know whether these are just the dream ego's interpretations
• 41:52
  Speaker 3: of these people or whether or not they actually evidence
• 41:55
  Speaker 3: any actions that they feel so hostile. But generally speaking,
• 42:01
  Speaker 3: the unconscious turns towards us the same face that we
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: turn towards the unconscious. So if fussy, angry, hostile figures
• 42:10
  Speaker 3: are glaring at us in the unconscious, it is often
• 42:15
  Speaker 3: mirroring something inside of ourselves. So I wonder if it's
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: also a confrontation, a mirror about her own unconscious anger
• 42:25
  Speaker 3: or her unconscious mean-spiritedness that needs somehow to be addressed.
• 42:33
  Speaker 4: What I am paying attention to is sort of the
• 42:37
  Speaker 4: trajectory of the dream of what how the various modes
• 42:42
  Speaker 4: of transportation and what happens, how they change. So first
• 42:47
  Speaker 4: she's in a canoe on a lake and the man
• 42:51
  Speaker 4: in charge, somebody else is in charge. He's mad and
• 42:55
  Speaker 4: the boat is leaky and she has to use a
• 42:59
  Speaker 4: Frisbee to try to scoop it out, which, you know,
• 43:03
  Speaker 4: is obviously not an optimum tool for this. And it's
• 43:06
  Speaker 4: not an optimum kind of boat for, to be on
• 43:11
  Speaker 4: a lake. Then the boat changes to a car driving
• 43:15
  Speaker 4: on the water. And once again, there's a mean person
• 43:20
  Speaker 4: or an angry, negative dream figure who is mean driving
• 43:25
  Speaker 4: the car. And they drive out of the lake up
• 43:28
  Speaker 4: a river against the current and the river winds up
• 43:32
  Speaker 4: a mountain. So this is obviously not how things occur naturally.
• 43:40
  Speaker 4: The mean woman wants our dream ego to open the
• 43:44
  Speaker 4: passenger door and let the water wash her away. And
• 43:50
  Speaker 4: then we have the crisis of no, says the dream ego.
• 43:54
  Speaker 4: I'm innocent. I only made a small mistake. And then finally,
• 43:59
  Speaker 4: our dream ego is in the driver's seat and can
• 44:05
  Speaker 4: float back down the mountain. to a more copacetic environment.
• 44:15
  Speaker 4: So I'm liking the transition from being a passenger in
• 44:21
  Speaker 4: someone else's vehicle to having the autonomy of, as we say,
• 44:29
  Speaker 4: being in the driver's seat.
• 44:31
  Speaker 2: So Deb, you used this really critical word. You talked
• 44:34
  Speaker 2: about the crisis and you were referencing there this really
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: important idea about dramatic structure. And one of my favorite
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: chapters in the book is our chapter on dramatic structure.
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: This was one of Jung's ideas. And if I do
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: say so myself, we go through it really thoroughly and
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: teach you how to break a dream down and understand
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: different structures. And this dream, although short, does have a
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: really interesting structure because it does have the initial setting
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: and then there's some development and kind of rising tension.
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: And then like you said, Deb, there is this crisis
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: where the dream ego takes a stand and then there
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: is a resolution. So not all dreams have resolutions. This
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: one has a very clear resolution. But it also has
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: this kind of scene one and scene two. And sometimes
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: when dreams have that, The differences and the similarities between
• 45:32
  Speaker 2: the two scenes, you can kind of compare and contrast,
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: and that can help elucidate different layers of meaning. So
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: as you both kind of said, I think I'm just
• 45:41
  Speaker 2: saying it in a slightly different way, there's a parallel
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: between scene one and scene two. I'm referring to scene
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: one as in the canoe with the old man. Scene
• 45:51
  Speaker 2: two is in the car with the mean woman. Both
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: of them carry with it a sense of kind of
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: waters coming in where it shouldn't be, whether that's water
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: seeping into the boat or water's going to come into
• 46:07
  Speaker 2: the door if you open the door. And both of
• 46:09
  Speaker 2: them have this kind of other person who's in charge
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: and is kind of censorious of the dream ego. And
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: the dream ego is kind of in this subordinate role.
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: And not surprisingly, in the second scene, the stakes are
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: higher and the heat is turned up. So the first one,
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: it's like it's a canoe and she's able to kind
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: of scoop the water out. And maybe that's not so bad.
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: But then it's like, oh, shoot, I'm going to get
• 46:40
  Speaker 2: washed away if I open up this car door. I'm
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: going to drown. So it's like an intensification of the
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: initial image. The other thing that comes up to me
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: for me is that I think that, Joseph, you were
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: saying like, who are these negative dream images and what
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: is the appropriate ego stance? Sometimes it is the case
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: that the ego needs to take a stance against a
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: kind of persecutory inner figure. I think this is not
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: the most common scenario, but I think it's there. And again,
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: we do talk about it in the book, in the
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: section on the negative animus, that sometimes, I think especially
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: for women, we can have so much internal negative self-talk.
• 47:24
  Speaker 2: I'm not saying that doesn't happen to men too, but
• 47:26
  Speaker 2: I think it does happen to women more. And sometimes
• 47:29
  Speaker 2: we just have to say to that inner critic who's
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: just berating us constantly, saying like, shut up already, you know?
• 47:39
  Speaker 2: And then put the ego back in the driver's seat
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: instead of the negative complex. And I wonder if this
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: dream kind of shows that process. So here's my fantasy, okay?
• 47:51
  Speaker 2: She says, I'm getting ready to divorce my husband. We've
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: been amicably separated for five years. So being amicably separated,
• 47:58
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know, hats off to people who can
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: separate and remain amicable. I think that takes something. But
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: it also might be that it also is hard, you know,
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: because then you're not moving on with your life. And
• 48:12
  Speaker 2: did you amicably separate and not get divorced and share
• 48:15
  Speaker 2: a car because you were avoiding taking a stronger stance? So,
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm just sort of having this. And she says,
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: I was preparing to divorce my husband. So finally, it
• 48:25
  Speaker 2: sounds like in my fantasy, she's getting ready to take action.
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: and that maybe she needed to kind of defeat, I
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: don't want to say defeat, to sort of right-size an
• 48:36
  Speaker 2: inner critic before she could take that action, or that
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: those two things were linked, that inner action and that
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: outer action were linked in some way.
• 48:44
  Speaker 3: I can see that frame for the dream.
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 48:49
  Speaker 3: But if I think a little bit more positively about it,
• 48:53
  Speaker 3: that something in the psyche keeps trying to introduce her
• 48:57
  Speaker 3: to a soluteo.
• 48:57
  Speaker 4: Hmm.
• 48:59
  Speaker 3: So in the beginning, there's water that's trying to come
• 49:02
  Speaker 3: into the boat. She doesn't want that. And then there's
• 49:05
  Speaker 3: another invitation for her to encounter getting wet, getting in
• 49:09
  Speaker 3: the water. She says, no, it's going to kill me.
• 49:12
  Speaker 3: And Jung writes about this in Alchemy. When we're young,
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: the dissolution of boundaries feels wonderful. We fall in love.
• 49:20
  Speaker 3: We give ourselves over to experimenting with drugs. We're all loosey-goosey.
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: But that's because the ego isn't really well-formed. It's not
• 49:28
  Speaker 3: highly invested in itself or its characteristics. But later in life,
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: being offered a dissolution is actually much more threatening than
• 49:39
  Speaker 3: And we tend to think of it much more negatively,
• 49:41
  Speaker 3: which is why the resistance to the individuation process mounts
• 49:47
  Speaker 3: as we age, because we have to give up more.
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: So she thinks getting in the water is going to
• 49:54
  Speaker 3: kill her. And in a way, it might. It might
• 49:57
  Speaker 3: create a kind of ego death inasmuch as she might
• 50:00
  Speaker 3: not recognize herself as things kind of open up and
• 50:05
  Speaker 3: get soft and indistinct. At the end of all of this,
• 50:09
  Speaker 3: what seems to make a little bit of difference is
• 50:11
  Speaker 3: that she makes a confession. It's not so much, no,
• 50:14
  Speaker 3: I'm innocent, but she says, I made a mistake. And
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: then the driver disappears, which gives us a sense that
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: that's the magic formula. As often in fairy tales, you know,
• 50:27
  Speaker 3: there is a thing that has to happen in order
• 50:30
  Speaker 3: for the spell to be broken, for the stuff to unwind.
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: And so at that peripeteia, at that pivot point, It's
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: her confession of making the mistake, which then makes me
• 50:42
  Speaker 3: imagine that part of her resistance to the salutio is
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: her sense of guilt. And often when we feel guilty,
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: we often fantasize that life is punishing us. She's in
• 50:57
  Speaker 3: a canoe. It's filling with water. She assumes that there's
• 51:01
  Speaker 3: someone there that's trying to punish her, this mean person
• 51:05
  Speaker 3: or the The middle-aged woman who rather remarkably is driving
• 51:09
  Speaker 3: a car up of a rushing river in a mountain,
• 51:11
  Speaker 3: which is kind of amazing, actually. It's a remarkable thing,
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: but she must have it out for me. And often
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: when we feel guilty unconsciously, we really do expect life
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: and other people to be out there trying to get us,
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: trying to catch us and punish us. So there's several
• 51:29
  Speaker 3: things she's avoiding. And again, I think it pivots when
• 51:33
  Speaker 3: she takes responsibility for having made the mistake.
• 51:37
  Speaker 4: I wondered if part of the dream message, the theme
• 51:44
  Speaker 4: I was looking at, is does she accede to the
• 51:49
  Speaker 4: authority of others? She's in this canoe. The man in
• 51:54
  Speaker 4: charge is angry with her, but she starts being a
• 51:58
  Speaker 4: good doobie and scooping out the water with a frisbee.
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: And if she does that, when she does that, Then
• 52:07
  Speaker 4: the boat becomes a car driving on the water. And
• 52:13
  Speaker 4: we've amped up the negative aspect of whoever is in charge.
• 52:19
  Speaker 4: Now there's a mean woman. It's not just a man.
• 52:21
  Speaker 4: It's somebody mean. And the landscape becomes surreal. The river
• 52:28
  Speaker 4: is flowing uphill. It winds up a mountain. So things
• 52:34
  Speaker 4: get really... inflated in some way or surreal in some way.
• 52:41
  Speaker 4: And then there's the scene of open the door and
• 52:45
  Speaker 4: things will be overwhelming. Or our dream ego feels, oh
• 52:49
  Speaker 4: my gosh, I'm going to be washed away. I'm going
• 52:51
  Speaker 4: to be drowned. And what you've said, Joseph, and I
• 52:56
  Speaker 4: agree exactly that when she can say, I am innocent.
• 53:01
  Speaker 4: In other words, I had no bad intention. But I
• 53:05
  Speaker 4: did make a mistake. That is the empowering moment. The
• 53:10
  Speaker 4: driver disappears. The river is flowing in the right direction.
• 53:16
  Speaker 4: She can turn the car around, float back down the mountain.
• 53:19
  Speaker 4: And she said in her comments, I felt empowered when
• 53:23
  Speaker 4: I became the driver. I was staying in her own
• 53:28
  Speaker 4: knowing and driving her own car.
• 53:32
  Speaker 2: Joseph, I really like what you did bringing in the confession.
• 53:35
  Speaker 2: And I think you're absolutely right, as Deb just said,
• 53:39
  Speaker 2: that that's the key moment. And I think that there's
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: a way that when we're defending against the knowledge that
• 53:45
  Speaker 2: we made a mistake, like you said, we sort of
• 53:51
  Speaker 2: imagine that other people are punishing us and we may
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: even punish ourselves. And there's a way that when we
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: can just face it and say, yes, I did that.
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: Part of the paradox of admitting guilt is that we
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: can often forgive ourselves for it. So the inner attacking
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: complex lets go because the responsibility for it now is
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: in consciousness. The complex doesn't need to beat us up.
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: We've stood up and said, yes, I did make a mistake.
• 54:24
  Speaker 2: And perhaps she does feel, as I think you were intimating, again,
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: in my fantasy, some guilt about the way things happened
• 54:31
  Speaker 2: in her marriage. But she has to be able to
• 54:33
  Speaker 2: take responsibility for that and forgive herself for it so
• 54:36
  Speaker 2: that she can stop beating herself up.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: Right. As it is with all failed relationships, it's all
• 54:42
  Speaker 3: parties involved.
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 54:44
  Speaker 4: I'm also thinking about, does she tend to be passive
• 54:49
  Speaker 4: when that happens and then wind up in a canoe
• 54:52
  Speaker 4: that's leaky or a car with somebody? who's driving in
• 54:57
  Speaker 4: the wrong direction and is mean. Because right now, after
• 55:01
  Speaker 4: this amicable separation, this is when she's taking the action
• 55:07
  Speaker 4: to really cement it as divorce. I am taking action
• 55:14
  Speaker 4: to actively end it. That's a new internal stance that
• 55:21
  Speaker 4: can feel brutal sometimes. We've been amicably separated. Why am
• 55:27
  Speaker 4: I coming after you with this final blow? And that
• 55:32
  Speaker 4: may be where she feels guilty, too, of is she
• 55:35
  Speaker 4: doing something harsh?
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: But as Joseph said, sort of, you know, letting herself
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: accept her own guilt and dealing with it puts her,
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: you know, let's go back to that wonderful metaphor of
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: being in the driver's seat, of being the one who
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: is in the position of agency in the psyche. And
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: that is, you know, most of the time kind of
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: where the ego belongs if you have a car dream.
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: You know, if you have a car dream and you're
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: not driving the car, it's really interesting to say, wait,
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: who is driving the car?
• 56:06
  Speaker 4: And that takes me to the other dream figures that
• 56:09
  Speaker 4: we haven't touched on yet. She lets herself travel in
• 56:14
  Speaker 4: a canoe with a man who's in charge. And then
• 56:18
  Speaker 4: she's with a mean woman. And that those are parts
• 56:21
  Speaker 4: of her. Somewhere in her, there's a guy that is
• 56:26
  Speaker 4: the boss of an unfit canoe, we might say. And
• 56:32
  Speaker 4: somewhere in her, there's a mean woman who goes in
• 56:37
  Speaker 4: sort of an impossible direction, a river flowing uphill on
• 56:41
  Speaker 4: a mountain. And those may factor into the guilt of,
• 56:46
  Speaker 4: I made a mistake. of those parts of me, of
• 56:51
  Speaker 4: letting them have leadership, right?
• 56:53
  Speaker 3: The dream could also be seen, quite frankly, as a failure.
• 56:58
  Speaker 3: The end of the dream could be seen as a
• 57:00
  Speaker 3: regressive restoration of the persona, that it takes a lot
• 57:03
  Speaker 3: of energy to go through a divorce, a separation, and
• 57:09
  Speaker 3: forge one's own life. I would say that a lot
• 57:13
  Speaker 3: of people might agree and say, going through through my divorce,
• 57:17
  Speaker 3: was a little bit like trying to drive my car
• 57:20
  Speaker 3: up a mountainside river. There's all of this resistance. There's
• 57:24
  Speaker 3: all of this fighting forward within myself, even, by doing
• 57:28
  Speaker 3: the right thing. All of the ambivalences that we have,
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: she does finally take control of the car. And rather
• 57:38
  Speaker 3: than finding her way up to the mountaintop, which is
• 57:42
  Speaker 3: often a symbol of attainment and initiation, and there's something
• 57:47
  Speaker 3: special often up the mountain. It's usually has some kind
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: of psycho-spiritual initiatory process, kind of getting the tablets from
• 57:57
  Speaker 3: the divine. She decides, finally, I'm alone. I can just float.
• 58:04
  Speaker 3: I can just go with the river and float down
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: back to wherever this is going to take me. I
• 58:09
  Speaker 3: don't need to strive anymore. So that's an ambivalent kind
• 58:14
  Speaker 3: of moment. Is it a regression? Is it the right choice?
• 58:18
  Speaker 3: Was she being driven by things that weren't healthy for her?
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: Was she being advised by things that actually had her
• 58:24
  Speaker 3: best interests in mind? Because she needed to really get
• 58:28
  Speaker 3: going in a certain direction. There's so many different ways
• 58:31
  Speaker 3: of looking at the dream, which is why it's so
• 58:32
  Speaker 3: much fun to work with dreams.
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: This is a really, really fun dream. All three of
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: these dreams are really super interesting. And Just want to
• 58:41
  Speaker 2: thank our listeners for sharing these travel dreams with us.
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: And do remember that next month we'll be looking at
• 58:50
  Speaker 2: house dreams. So there's a link where you can submit
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: your house dream. And we are really enjoying exploring dreams
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: with you all. We are maintaining a blog about these
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: dreams and you can find those. We list the dreams
• 59:08
  Speaker 2: that we talked about. And in addition, we share some
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: others that we didn't get to talk about today. So
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: you might want to check that out too.
• 59:18
  Speaker 4: Happy trails.
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: Thanks for listening to submit a dream, suggest an episode topic,
• 59:27
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• 59:32
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• 59:35
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• 59:38
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