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LUCID DREAMING: How to Make the Most of a Magical Opportunity · 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 2: I'm Deborah Stewart, a Jungian analyst in Cape Cod.
0:43
Speaker 3: A little over half of us have had that strange
0:47
Speaker 3: and uncanny experience of lucid dreaming. About 23% of people
0:52
Speaker 3: say that they lucid dream every month. Various mystical practices
0:57
Speaker 3: cultivate lucid dreaming as part of their spiritual practice and
1:02
Speaker 3: even a preparation for the afterlife. 19th century occultists worked
1:07
Speaker 3: tirelessly to escape the body and travel the inner planes
1:11
Speaker 3: at will. and the recently published Dan Brown book, The
1:16
Speaker 3: Secret of Secrets, also explores the uncanny powers of consciousness
1:22
Speaker 3: and the possibility that maybe consciousness extends beyond the physical brain. So,
1:31
Speaker 3: when we find ourselves lucid dreaming, we often will take
1:35
Speaker 3: it as an opportunity to feel omnipotent. We'll want to
1:39
Speaker 3: vault into the air, resting the power of the dream
1:44
Speaker 3: away from the dream.
1:45
Speaker 4: Maker and putting it in the hands of the ego
1:49
Speaker 4: may be an uncertain proposition that deserves some careful consideration.
1:57
Speaker 2: You know, this has been a topic that has been
2:00
Speaker 2: very frequently requested on the podcast. And I think I
2:05
Speaker 2: felt a little resistance to talking about it because there
2:08
Speaker 2: isn't a big opus of work around lucid dreaming and
2:14
Speaker 2: Jungian dream work, that intersection. It's there, but it's a
2:19
Speaker 2: little sparse. And I know there's a lot of excitement,
2:22
Speaker 2: like you're saying, Joseph, about lucid dreaming so much online.
2:27
Speaker 2: Whenever I'm looking up something and dreaming on the internet,
2:30
Speaker 2: it's just you can't help but find something about lucid dreaming,
2:33
Speaker 2: a lot of activity about lucid dreaming in places like
2:38
Speaker 2: Reddit and that sort of thing. So this is something
2:40
Speaker 2: that really appeals to a lot of people, but we
2:42
Speaker 2: as Jungians, I think, are generally a little bit suspicious
2:47
Speaker 2: of trying to cultivate a lucid state for the purpose
2:53
Speaker 2: of shaping the dream experience, because it feels like kind
2:57
Speaker 2: of the colonization of the unconscious on the part of consciousness. Now,
3:03
Speaker 2: It doesn't have to be that way. And I think
3:06
Speaker 2: we're going to talk today about lots of different ways
3:09
Speaker 2: that lucidity can enhance our dialogue with the unconscious, let's say.
3:16
Speaker 3: I think it has a lot to do with preparation.
3:18
Speaker 3: I mean, as I said, it's not uncommon when people say, oh,
3:23
Speaker 3: I had a lucid dream last night. And when I'll say, well,
3:25
Speaker 3: what did you do? And most of the people I
3:28
Speaker 3: talked to say I jumped up into the air and
3:30
Speaker 3: I was soaring all over the place. It was the
3:32
Speaker 3: most wonderful euphoric experience. And yet, is that really the
3:39
Speaker 3: best thing I might have done if I had a
3:42
Speaker 3: little window of opportunity to actively and fully engage the
3:48
Speaker 3: content of the unconscious? So part of it is I
3:51
Speaker 3: think people take it a little bit superficially.
3:54
Speaker 2: Right.
3:54
Speaker 3: That it's kind of a game.
3:57
Speaker 2: You know, you made this great point when we were
3:58
Speaker 2: prepping this, is that in a lucid state, you can
4:02
Speaker 2: do anything you want without any consequences.
4:05
Speaker 3: Right.
4:06
Speaker 2: There's something about our modern perspective that it's almost like
4:10
Speaker 2: that's what we long for. I think we're aware that
4:13
Speaker 2: we live in a world where whatever we do has consequences,
4:17
Speaker 2: and that's a very painful realization, whether it's that, you know,
4:21
Speaker 2: when we're unkind to our partner, eventually it you know,
4:26
Speaker 2: erodes the relationship or the way that we're living is
4:30
Speaker 2: destroying the planet. Everything we do has consequences. How great
4:34
Speaker 2: it would be to live in a world where nothing
4:37
Speaker 2: we did had consequences. And, you know, that's kind of
4:40
Speaker 2: a childlike state in a way. When we're children, we're
4:43
Speaker 2: not aware of the consequences that our actions have. And,
4:46
Speaker 2: you know, it can be a little bit like being
4:48
Speaker 2: in a video game where you can, you know, steal
4:51
Speaker 2: cars and you never worry about having to serve any
4:54
Speaker 2: prison time. Or you can murder lots of people and
4:58
Speaker 2: there's no consequence. Or you can die and you just respawn.
5:02
Speaker 2: It does have some place, I think, that fantasy realm.
5:07
Speaker 2: But it's interesting that we kind of long for that
5:10
Speaker 2: and that some people are willing to go through a
5:15
Speaker 2: lot of effort to be able to get to that
5:18
Speaker 2: place in their dreams.
5:20
Speaker 3: I think it's very exciting for people to feel that
5:24
Speaker 3: they can step into a whole other universe where they
5:27
Speaker 3: can make things happen very magically. It's like suddenly you're
5:30
Speaker 3: in a Harry Potter novel, and you can do all
5:35
Speaker 3: kinds of extraordinary things. Fun, exciting, it's powerful in a
5:40
Speaker 3: certain fashion. But if we think of the dream as
5:45
Speaker 3: a kind of medicine that is very carefully crafted by
5:49
Speaker 3: the dream-maker... who I think of as the self, that
5:53
Speaker 3: the dream maker has been watching us, coming to certain
5:56
Speaker 3: conclusions about where we are in our journey, and then
6:01
Speaker 3: carefully crafts the dream to try to nudge us in
6:05
Speaker 3: a particular direction to affect us. Now, in order for
6:09
Speaker 3: the dream to deliver its medicine, the ego also has
6:13
Speaker 3: to be changed. And this is where sometimes listeners will
6:17
Speaker 3: hear us talk about the dream ego, So we have
6:21
Speaker 3: our experience of our waking personality. And then when we
6:26
Speaker 3: fall asleep, the dream maker seems to be able to
6:31
Speaker 3: put certain parts of our ego to sleep. We no
6:35
Speaker 3: longer think discriminatingly or maybe it'll suspend our disbelief so
6:41
Speaker 3: that in the dream you're having coffee and then the
6:44
Speaker 3: rhinoceros comes out in his underwear and starts talking to you.
6:48
Speaker 3: And in the dream ego, it seems perfectly reasonable for
6:51
Speaker 3: that to be happening. So there's a way that our
6:55
Speaker 3: disbelief is suspended, which allows our whole nervous system to
6:59
Speaker 3: engage in the drama of the dream. As soon as
7:04
Speaker 3: that's violated and we realize that we are awake in
7:08
Speaker 3: the dream world, what I suspect is that the dream
7:11
Speaker 3: loses its power, and its power to help us, actually.
7:16
Speaker 2: I think that there are some people who would disagree
7:21
Speaker 2: with that, that in some sense, and this is not
7:26
Speaker 2: my personal experience, but I have read accounts of people who,
7:30
Speaker 2: for whom lucidity created a kind of intensification in terms
7:37
Speaker 2: of the dream's ability to deliver a message. So, but
7:41
Speaker 2: let's talk about that. But just backing up for a second,
7:44
Speaker 2: you know, Aristotle spoke about lucidity in dreams. So we
7:49
Speaker 2: have to recognize that it's something that does happen spontaneously
7:53
Speaker 2: for some number of people. He wrote in his fourth
7:59
Speaker 2: century treatise on dreams, often when one is asleep, there
8:05
Speaker 2: is something in consciousness which declares that what then presents
8:10
Speaker 2: itself is but a dream. So this has certainly been
8:13
Speaker 2: around for a long time. Neuroscientists pooh-poohed the idea that
8:19
Speaker 2: there could be lucidity in dreams. But someone realized, a
8:24
Speaker 2: scientist realized, that he might be able to use eye
8:26
Speaker 2: movements as a way for the lucid dreamer to signal
8:30
Speaker 2: that he was lucid. And so it was captured in
8:33
Speaker 2: the laboratory. I'm just going to read a little bit
8:35
Speaker 2: from the book, This Is Why You Dream. And that book,
8:40
Speaker 2: by the way, is by... Rahul Jandial, and we'll have
8:45
Speaker 2: that in our book list. And he says, The eye
8:49
Speaker 2: movements produced large, distinct zigzags on a scroll of paper
8:54
Speaker 2: on the electrooculogram. Hearn watched with astonishment. Moments earlier, he'd
9:01
Speaker 2: been half asleep watching the ink tracing scroll past as
9:05
Speaker 2: he'd been up all night monitoring the recording equipment. What
9:09
Speaker 2: he saw on the chart paper jolted him awake. knowing
9:13
Speaker 2: he was witnessing history. He later wrote that he was
9:16
Speaker 2: as excited as if the signals had come from another
9:19
Speaker 2: solar system. That moment officially opened the door to the
9:24
Speaker 2: rigorous scientific exploration of lucid dreaming. The slashing strokes up
9:30
Speaker 2: and down on the scrolling chart paper would become seismic
9:34
Speaker 2: shocks in the neuroscience community. It was the first time
9:38
Speaker 2: someone had signaled in real time while dreaming proving that
9:43
Speaker 2: in at least one case, in one person, it was
9:47
Speaker 2: possible to be awake inside the dream. So they've subsequently
9:53
Speaker 2: done further research along this line. And of course, I've
9:56
Speaker 2: kind of mapped this territory very well. So, you know,
9:59
Speaker 2: the person is in REM sleep and there's like another
10:02
Speaker 2: level of consciousness. So it's interesting that scientists are very
10:08
Speaker 2: curious about this process.
10:10
Speaker 3: Yes, I think this has moved forward now that we
10:13
Speaker 3: have these functional MRIs so that they can do an
10:17
Speaker 3: EEG so they understand what's happening in the brain, and
10:21
Speaker 3: then they can see which parts of the brain light up.
10:25
Speaker 3: So there's, oh, I'm not even going to try to
10:29
Speaker 3: pronounce those things, different parts of your brain start talking
10:32
Speaker 3: to each other. So there's lucid REM sleep and there's
10:37
Speaker 3: non-lucid REM sleep. And as they compare those two things,
10:41
Speaker 3: different parts of the brain are coupling and creating a
10:45
Speaker 3: kind of synergistic process so it really is a unique
10:50
Speaker 3: brain state maybe it's a kind of genetic ability maybe
10:54
Speaker 3: it can be learned many people do think it can
10:56
Speaker 3: be learned.
10:57
Speaker 2: Oh yeah have you ever had a lucid dream.
11:01
Speaker 3: I have i don't have many of them and i've
11:03
Speaker 3: spent a lot of time trying to cultivate out-of-body experiences
11:07
Speaker 3: and so i can with some regularity have an out-of-body experience,
11:14
Speaker 3: I consider them fairly similar.
11:17
Speaker 2: These are waking experiences, the out-of-body experiences.
11:22
Speaker 3: No, I lose all body awareness. I mean, it really
11:25
Speaker 3: is like I'm in a dream world.
11:26
Speaker 2: But it's not happening when you're asleep, is what I'm saying.
11:29
Speaker 3: Well, I'm going from the waking state into this inner world.
11:34
Speaker 2: Right.
11:35
Speaker 3: And that transition, one would say, is that falling asleep?
11:39
Speaker 3: It's changing some form of consciousness. To me, it feels
11:43
Speaker 3: like lucid dreaming in as much as I am in
11:47
Speaker 3: a dreamscape and the laws of nature are different in
11:52
Speaker 3: that inner place. The question is, that can, for many
11:56
Speaker 3: of us, happen accidentally, where I just have this shift
12:01
Speaker 3: of consciousness in the middle of a dream, but it
12:04
Speaker 3: may be possible, which I think is true, is that
12:07
Speaker 3: we can seek the shift of consciousness and so we
12:10
Speaker 3: know that we are transitioning and maintaining awareness. And I
12:15
Speaker 3: think one of the signs of let's say an out-of-body
12:19
Speaker 3: experience as well as a lucid dream is that I
12:22
Speaker 3: lose all consciousness of my physical location and my physical body,
12:26
Speaker 3: that my whole sensorum is in this inner world and
12:31
Speaker 3: I have my full cognitive abilities to explore, to ponder,
12:35
Speaker 3: The delicacy of it, and I think this is true
12:38
Speaker 3: with lucid dreaming as well, is that sometimes it's rather
12:41
Speaker 3: exciting to be in these states and the smallest amount
12:45
Speaker 3: of adrenaline just pops you right out and into a
12:49
Speaker 3: waking state. So staying really calm, super controlled seems to
12:56
Speaker 3: be one key.
12:57
Speaker 2: So I have had Some lucidity in dreams. I find
13:01
Speaker 2: that it's more likely to happen when I'm doing a
13:04
Speaker 2: lot of really intensive dream work. So I'm really writing
13:07
Speaker 2: down my dreams every night and talking about them in
13:11
Speaker 2: analysis or working with them myself. Then I'm more likely
13:16
Speaker 2: to have a lucid dream. But it has been a
13:18
Speaker 2: long time since that's happened. But when I've been lucid
13:21
Speaker 2: in dreams, it's more like this. I'll be like, oh,
13:24
Speaker 2: I'm dreaming about going to the airport again. I have
13:26
Speaker 2: a lot of dreams about being at the airport. I
13:28
Speaker 2: have to remember to write this down or I have
13:29
Speaker 2: to remember to bring this to analysis or I wonder
13:32
Speaker 2: if this is the same airport as in my last dream.
13:34
Speaker 2: So it has that kind of quality to it. It's
13:37
Speaker 2: just like maybe another layer. So it's not, you know,
13:41
Speaker 2: maybe one of the things that we're also lifting up
13:44
Speaker 2: to or maybe we should be lifting up or distinguishing
13:47
Speaker 2: between is when you become lucid in a dream and
13:50
Speaker 2: when you decide to direct the dream. To me, those
13:53
Speaker 2: are two different things. Perhaps the first kind of precedes
13:58
Speaker 2: the second. So a lot of people who are seeking lucidity,
14:02
Speaker 2: they want to become lucid so that then they can
14:05
Speaker 2: choose to, you know, have sex with a million interesting
14:08
Speaker 2: people or fly, like you said, Joseph, or do something
14:11
Speaker 2: really cool versus, wow, here I am in this kind
14:16
Speaker 2: of double state, you know. So the dream worker, Melinda Powell,
14:21
Speaker 2: who I've had the pleasure to meet, she's at the
14:23
Speaker 2: Dream Research Institute in London. She's written a really beautiful
14:26
Speaker 2: book called Lucid Surrender. And it's her thesis that sort
14:32
Speaker 2: of the value of lucidity is in the former, that
14:37
Speaker 2: you become aware that you're dreaming and then you're able
14:40
Speaker 2: to kind of experience and perhaps integrate these different states,
14:44
Speaker 2: that it isn't about at that point taking advantage of
14:49
Speaker 2: your lucid state to implement your ego agenda. But it's
14:55
Speaker 2: more about having access to more. And she gives in
14:59
Speaker 2: her book, and again, we'll put this book in our
15:01
Speaker 2: book list. She gives in her book a really quite
15:06
Speaker 2: lovely example of one of her lucid dreams. So I'm
15:10
Speaker 2: going to be just reading a passage from her book
15:12
Speaker 2: here for a second. She says, In ordinary waking life,
15:15
Speaker 2: we perceive ourselves to exist in a single reality, bounded
15:18
Speaker 2: by space and time. However, in lucidity, we may find
15:22
Speaker 2: ourselves conscious of multiple dimensions of being, as in the
15:26
Speaker 2: following dream, when I had some years ago into my
15:29
Speaker 2: practice of lucid dreaming, a time when I was also
15:32
Speaker 2: running a counseling center. So here's her dream. I sit
15:35
Speaker 2: in a room where my dream teacher from waking life
15:38
Speaker 2: gives a lecture. Feeling very tired, I fall asleep as
15:42
Speaker 2: I listen, and in my dream sleep, I become lucid.
15:46
Speaker 2: This is a dream within a dream, and she's lucid
15:48
Speaker 2: within that dream. The dreamscape lifts like a veil, and
15:52
Speaker 2: I find myself standing at the edge of a massive hall,
15:56
Speaker 2: the floor covered with a fiery-colored Persian prayer rug. Surprisingly,
16:01
Speaker 2: numerous babies crawl around on the rug like little miracles
16:06
Speaker 2: of light. Even as I recognize the infants as representations
16:10
Speaker 2: of the spirit's creative potential, I they also remind me
16:14
Speaker 2: of my own longing to have a child. On the
16:18
Speaker 2: opposite side of the hall spins a white light form
16:21
Speaker 2: set against glowing darkness. I am aware that, by means
16:26
Speaker 2: of lucid surrender, I can receive spiritual replenishment from this
16:32
Speaker 2: numinous being of light. As I stand observing this scene
16:36
Speaker 2: before me, I am aware of multiple dimensions at once. Myself,
16:43
Speaker 2: Asleep on my bed, the lecture room in which the
16:46
Speaker 2: initial dream took place, the dream sleep in which I
16:51
Speaker 2: become lucid, the hall full of babies, and the mystery
16:56
Speaker 2: of the spinning light form in the shining darkness. Becoming
17:00
Speaker 2: aware of these five levels at once, I collapse to
17:03
Speaker 2: the floor and wake up. I think she means wake
17:07
Speaker 2: up in her sleep. Surprised to find myself back in
17:10
Speaker 2: the lecture room with others gathered around me. So still
17:13
Speaker 2: a dream. A dream being mimicking my hand movements tells me,
17:18
Speaker 2: you were sitting there in a kind of trance speaking
17:21
Speaker 2: about how all five dimensions fit together.
17:25
Speaker 3: What a great example of being able to wake up
17:29
Speaker 3: in the unconscious and to stay poised and curious and
17:34
Speaker 3: wondering rather than rushing to take action. And so lucid dreaming,
17:39
Speaker 3: I think, is exactly what Jung was talking about with
17:44
Speaker 3: active imagination, when it can happen with a full sensory immersion.
17:48
Speaker 3: When Jung is describing in the Red Book and the
17:52
Speaker 3: Black Books, these very full sensory encounters with these inner figures, boy,
17:59
Speaker 3: it sounds like lucid dreaming, which is activating these several
18:03
Speaker 3: brain centers simultaneously. We know that Jung was working with
18:08
Speaker 3: some yogic techniques, certain pranayama can induce some of these states.
18:14
Speaker 3: There's also some techniques people, if they're interested, could try out.
18:18
Speaker 3: One of them has been done with some double-blind testing
18:23
Speaker 3: where people sleep for six hours and they stay up
18:27
Speaker 3: for 30 to 60 minutes. And then as they're drifting
18:31
Speaker 3: off to sleep, They make this determination that I will
18:35
Speaker 3: have a lucid dream, or I will wake up in
18:39
Speaker 3: my dream. And this little pattern of six hours, 60
18:45
Speaker 3: minutes up, make a determined statement, seems in these laboratory
18:50
Speaker 3: tests to increase the number of lucid dreams that people
18:54
Speaker 3: can have. And again, if they can go in with
18:57
Speaker 3: that level of lovely respect and curiosity, something extraordinary can
19:03
Speaker 3: definitely happen.
19:05
Speaker 2: I mean, Melinda's story is interesting because she has just surrendered,
19:09
Speaker 2: and she's an observer who's almost better able to take
19:12
Speaker 2: in more, partly because of the lucidity. She can be
19:16
Speaker 2: in these different levels. But I have heard, Joseph, much
19:19
Speaker 2: like you're talking about, people using a lucid experience to
19:23
Speaker 2: deepen engagement with the unconscious. So unfortunately, I can't remember
19:28
Speaker 2: where I read this. I think it was very many
19:31
Speaker 2: years ago, but it really stuck with me. So I'm
19:33
Speaker 2: going to try to sort of repeat it. But someone
19:36
Speaker 2: was having a kind of recurring nightmare of being sort
19:39
Speaker 2: of met by an intruder, let's say, you know, in
19:42
Speaker 2: his apartment, someone breaks in. And it was just this
19:45
Speaker 2: kind of terrifying nightmare. It was just happening again and again.
19:49
Speaker 2: And eventually, I can't remember if he worked on becoming
19:52
Speaker 2: lucid in the dream. I think he may have. And
19:55
Speaker 2: so the next time it happened in the dream space,
19:59
Speaker 2: he instead of responding with his usual defensiveness or running
20:04
Speaker 2: away or attacking the intruder, he said, you know, what
20:08
Speaker 2: what do I need to know? He engaged the intruder.
20:11
Speaker 2: He used his lucid state to engage the intruder. And
20:17
Speaker 2: that resulted in an incredibly rich process of dialoguing with
20:24
Speaker 2: this dream figure. And it's something we very much might
20:27
Speaker 2: find in active imagination. We could do that in active imagination,
20:31
Speaker 2: but he did it in the dream and it resolved
20:34
Speaker 2: the nightmare and it resulted in a lot of insight.
20:38
Speaker 2: So I could imagine someone becoming lucid and being like,
20:42
Speaker 2: I'm going to make the intruder fall down the stairs,
20:45
Speaker 2: or I'm going to make the intruder into a clown
20:47
Speaker 2: or something like that, which wouldn't be the same thing
20:50
Speaker 2: as inviting the intruder to come forward and talk. So
20:54
Speaker 2: I think, you know, when we talk about lucidity, in
20:57
Speaker 2: and of itself is not good or bad, let's say,
21:00
Speaker 2: but it's sort of like in service to what? Mm-hmm.
21:05
Speaker 2: Are you seeking lucidity or taking advantage of your lucid
21:09
Speaker 2: state to impose an ego agenda on the dream? Or
21:15
Speaker 2: are you using it to invite more engagement with the unconscious?
21:20
Speaker 3: Yes, and I think that moves us between the sacred
21:24
Speaker 3: and the profane and back and forth. And often, particularly
21:28
Speaker 3: with a lucid dream, we aren't necessarily prepared to have
21:33
Speaker 3: a lucid dream. We kind of surprise ourselves with the realization.
21:38
Speaker 3: So I think it takes a certain discipline and determination
21:41
Speaker 3: to have the right attitude, a useful attitude to our
21:47
Speaker 3: lucid dreams, to engage the characters, to learn, to wonder
21:52
Speaker 3: what's happening. I think that creates a different environment that's,
21:57
Speaker 3: I think, much more conducive and just as you were
22:00
Speaker 3: reading from the book, much more profound, more healing perhaps.
22:03
Speaker 2: And, you know, it's interesting to note that a lot
22:06
Speaker 2: of cultures have been very interested in lucid dreaming. And,
22:11
Speaker 2: you know, particularly what comes up is Tibetan Buddhism. So
22:15
Speaker 2: in Buddhism, there's this important thing that happens, right, when
22:20
Speaker 2: the Buddha sits under the bow tree and achieves enlightenment.
22:25
Speaker 2: And what he has to do while he's meditating is
22:29
Speaker 2: He faces various demons. He faces the seductions of pleasure
22:35
Speaker 2: and status and all these things that try to lure
22:38
Speaker 2: him away from his meditation. And then he faces these
22:42
Speaker 2: terrible demons who try to frighten him out of his meditation.
22:48
Speaker 2: And his task is to recognize that these are just
22:53
Speaker 2: emanations from his mind and they're not real. They are...
22:57
Speaker 2: manifestations of Mara or illusion. And it's by being able
23:02
Speaker 2: to recognize these things as illusory that results in him
23:07
Speaker 2: achieving enlightenment. So in Tibetan Buddhism in particular, I believe,
23:12
Speaker 2: there is a belief that what happens after you die
23:17
Speaker 2: is a period of 40 days in which you are
23:19
Speaker 2: in the bardo. So it's this kind of in-between life
23:24
Speaker 2: and death sort of state. And the understanding is that
23:29
Speaker 2: the bardo state is exactly like the dream state. You know,
23:33
Speaker 2: the Plains Indians of North America, for example, believe something
23:37
Speaker 2: very similar. They believed that to die is to walk
23:41
Speaker 2: the path of the dream without returning. So for Tibetan
23:46
Speaker 2: Buddhists and others, the dream state is just like the bardo.
23:51
Speaker 2: So therefore, dreaming is an opportunity to kind of practice
23:55
Speaker 2: what you're going to face in this space between living
23:59
Speaker 2: and dying. The hope is that in that bardo state,
24:03
Speaker 2: you will be able to not be seduced by the
24:07
Speaker 2: pleasures or be frightened by the demons, and then you
24:12
Speaker 2: will be, you know, kind of released into the afterlife.
24:15
Speaker 2: So the Tibetan Book of the Dead is all about
24:19
Speaker 2: learning how to do that. And so there are Tibetan
24:23
Speaker 2: dream practices that are sometimes referred to as dream yoga
24:26
Speaker 2: to cultivate a lucid state so that you can practice
24:33
Speaker 2: disengaging from these strong feelings, frightening images, deliciously wonderful experiences,
24:44
Speaker 2: and recognizing them as illusory. I mean, I think that's
24:50
Speaker 2: in part kind of relevant to our more psychological understanding
24:55
Speaker 2: of dreams. It seems like it's related in some way.
24:58
Speaker 3: Well, I think so. It goes back to this idea
25:01
Speaker 3: of respect. One of the terms that the Buddhists use,
25:05
Speaker 3: which reminds me very much of the book quote you read,
25:08
Speaker 3: is you are able to tell yourself this is a
25:12
Speaker 3: dream and then sustain a non-grasping clarity. I like that.
25:20
Speaker 3: So just as we were saying, to not manipulate the dream,
25:23
Speaker 3: but we are bringing more curiosity, more consciousness to whatever
25:29
Speaker 3: is happening there. We might have a bit of audacity
25:33
Speaker 3: in as much as nightmare figures that we might normally
25:36
Speaker 3: run away from. Maybe we run towards, give them a
25:38
Speaker 3: big hug, do something different. But having the right attitude
25:44
Speaker 3: makes all the difference in fairy tales, by the way.
25:47
Speaker 3: Tell us that all the time.
25:48
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
25:49
Speaker 3: Come into the uncanny world, you've got the right attitude,
25:52
Speaker 3: things go fairly well. If not, things go less well.
25:58
Speaker 2: You know, just what you're saying made me think of something.
26:02
Speaker 2: I mean, a lot of times we see if we
26:04
Speaker 2: track kind of a dream series, like you're saying, kind
26:06
Speaker 2: of run towards some terrible thing. If you track a
26:10
Speaker 2: dream series long enough, you'll see something like that, right?
26:13
Speaker 2: There may be this like amorphous, terrifying content. And then
26:17
Speaker 2: in the next stream, a month later, it's no longer amorphous.
26:21
Speaker 2: It has a form, but it's effing terrifying. And then
26:25
Speaker 2: maybe a couple months later, it's like a little bit
26:27
Speaker 2: less terrifying. But it's possible that a kind of the
26:31
Speaker 2: right attitude and a creative use of lucidity, you might
26:36
Speaker 2: be able to speed that up. Because again, like once
26:41
Speaker 2: the terrifying thing has a form, instead of running away,
26:44
Speaker 2: You might say, well, wait a minute, I need to
26:46
Speaker 2: turn toward it and say, hey, how you doing? And
26:51
Speaker 2: that might speed up a kind of psychological process. So
26:54
Speaker 2: I think it, again, I think it can be used
26:57
Speaker 2: in service to, you know, a greater connection with the unconscious,
27:02
Speaker 2: which is, in a sense, is the point of dream work.
27:06
Speaker 2: And I would say also the point of a Jungian
27:08
Speaker 2: analysis is to forge that very strong kind of communication
27:13
Speaker 2: channel between consciousness and the self or the dream maker.
27:18
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think with some coaching, particularly let's say in
27:21
Speaker 3: the Tibetan tradition, people can go in with this intent
27:25
Speaker 3: to investigate the nature of one's mind. But that would
27:31
Speaker 3: be something that's a little more coached, a little more curated,
27:35
Speaker 3: a little more specific than kind of mucking around. the
27:39
Speaker 3: way most of us did when we were kids, discovering
27:42
Speaker 3: we were awake in our dreams.
27:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, when I think about the purpose of
27:47
Speaker 2: the Tibetan dream yoga, you know, to sort of disconnect
27:51
Speaker 2: from it, you know, from a Western perspective, it sort
27:55
Speaker 2: of feels like they're saying, you know, privilege the ego,
27:58
Speaker 2: but I don't think it's quite the same thing. I
28:00
Speaker 2: think this is where Eastern philosophy, it translated into Western language,
28:07
Speaker 2: loses something. It is to sort of disconnect from it
28:12
Speaker 2: in a way that feels, in essence, a little bit
28:16
Speaker 2: similar to what we were talking about when someone, say,
28:20
Speaker 2: is going to turn around and face the giant snake,
28:23
Speaker 2: let's say, that you recognize its autonomy, perhaps, and you
28:32
Speaker 2: don't diminish it. I liked what you said about sort
28:36
Speaker 2: of an ungrasping or when you talked before about how
28:39
Speaker 2: the adrenaline can sort of pop you out of it.
28:42
Speaker 2: You cultivate a real observing stance. That seems to me
28:48
Speaker 2: to be the thing that's the same. That you're able
28:52
Speaker 2: to somewhat dispassionately observe it feels like a common thread there.
29:00
Speaker 3: One of the other benefits people report from lucid dreaming
29:03
Speaker 3: is their ability to retain this kind of very vivid
29:08
Speaker 3: and meticulous detail, that the more consciousness the ego has
29:13
Speaker 3: in the dream, the more likely you're going to carry
29:16
Speaker 3: back a more accurate memory of the encounter because more
29:20
Speaker 3: of us, more of consciousness is present during it. Yeah.
29:24
Speaker 2: And actually, I'm always interested in learning more about dream
29:28
Speaker 2: recall because so many people on the podcast ask about that.
29:32
Speaker 2: So I'm always like looking for new techniques. And it's
29:35
Speaker 2: often that when I'm engaged in those searches that I
29:39
Speaker 2: find information about. lucidity. And some of the things that
29:43
Speaker 2: encourage lucidity also encourage more vivid dream recall. So there
29:48
Speaker 2: is some overlap there. So I think you're right about that, Joseph.
29:51
Speaker 2: A lot of the things that you might do to
29:53
Speaker 2: encourage lucidity might also help you retain dreams more vividly.
30:00
Speaker 2: So one of the things that's interesting about this is
30:01
Speaker 2: that as far as we can tell, Jung never mentioned
30:06
Speaker 2: lucid dreaming.
30:08
Speaker 3: I found that really interesting, too, as I was kind
30:11
Speaker 3: of searching through the collected works. And von Frantz also,
30:15
Speaker 3: who in some ways is a bit more of a mystic,
30:19
Speaker 3: she also doesn't mention it. So I wish they had.
30:22
Speaker 3: I would love to know how they worked with that
30:25
Speaker 3: material or what they made of it. I do find
30:29
Speaker 3: it strange that either they were having them, but they
30:31
Speaker 3: discarded them as perhaps not useful to the process, or
30:35
Speaker 3: whether this is just a very unusual process to have
30:40
Speaker 3: a lucid dream, and it maybe is more rare than
30:43
Speaker 3: we realize.
30:44
Speaker 2: Or was it that because they were attending so carefully
30:49
Speaker 2: to their dreams and so engaged in active imagination that
30:54
Speaker 2: that material came out in these different ways?
30:57
Speaker 3: Well, Jung certainly said that. I don't know which of
31:00
Speaker 3: the biographies, but towards the end of his life, he
31:04
Speaker 3: was quoted as saying that he just no longer dreamed.
31:07
Speaker 2: Yeah.
31:08
Speaker 3: And he felt that that was because he was talking
31:10
Speaker 3: to the unconscious all day long, so there wasn't much
31:12
Speaker 3: for the unconscious to say back to him in the
31:15
Speaker 3: dream state.
31:17
Speaker 2: And, you know, von Franz, I was lucky enough to
31:19
Speaker 2: get to see the inside of von Franz's tower a
31:22
Speaker 2: number of years ago. Von Franz had an active imagination room.
31:27
Speaker 2: It was this little room that had this incredible mural
31:31
Speaker 2: in it. And that's where she would go to engage
31:34
Speaker 2: in active imagination. So I think it was so much
31:36
Speaker 2: a part of her life to engage with the unconscious
31:39
Speaker 2: like that. You know, I think active imagination is a
31:42
Speaker 2: really good parallel to a lucid dream the way we've
31:46
Speaker 2: been discussing it. It's kind of, it's an invitation to
31:50
Speaker 2: have a more intentional conversation with the unconscious. And so
31:57
Speaker 2: it may be that they were just doing so much
32:00
Speaker 2: of that that they didn't lucid dream. Because I do
32:03
Speaker 2: think that if you're attending so much to your dream life,
32:06
Speaker 2: it's likely that you'll have some degree of lucidity. And
32:10
Speaker 2: I will say that in my practice, people who focus
32:14
Speaker 2: a lot on their dreams and also people who do
32:17
Speaker 2: a lot of meditation are more likely to report some lucidity.
32:22
Speaker 2: I don't have a lot of people who lucid dream.
32:26
Speaker 2: And I don't think I've ever had an analysand come
32:29
Speaker 2: in and really talk about that experience of like, yeah,
32:32
Speaker 2: I was just dreaming, so I jumped off a building
32:34
Speaker 2: to see what would happen, you know. Yeah, it's almost
32:37
Speaker 2: like that's a different goal.
32:40
Speaker 3: So what I was thinking as you were talking is
32:42
Speaker 3: how in a number of mystical traditions, you will find
32:46
Speaker 3: this idea that the adept becomes sleepless. So for instance,
32:53
Speaker 3: in the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna, who was the perfect warrior,
32:57
Speaker 3: also never slept, but he had an eternal wakefulness. A
33:03
Speaker 3: number of other mystics talk about this eternal wakefulness, and
33:07
Speaker 3: what they mean is that the body will fall asleep,
33:11
Speaker 3: but the ego will remain awake and interactive in these
33:16
Speaker 3: various inner worlds, and then return to body consciousness afterwards.
33:21
Speaker 3: And that is thought of as a kind of attainment,
33:25
Speaker 3: And that seems to be related to changes in the
33:28
Speaker 3: pineal gland in those systems. If we remember that the
33:31
Speaker 3: pineal gland is responsible for producing melatonin, which is the
33:36
Speaker 3: primary hormone that puts us into a sleep state, one
33:39
Speaker 3: would think that changes in the pineal gland could create
33:43
Speaker 3: alterations in our sleep states.
33:45
Speaker 2: So one of the things that makes me think of
33:48
Speaker 2: Joseph goes back to the science of lucid dreaming, which
33:51
Speaker 2: I have a very tenuous grasp of.
33:53
Speaker 3: Me too.
33:54
Speaker 2: But they found that there is a different gamma brave
34:00
Speaker 2: wave frequency that's associated with lucid dreaming. And it's associated
34:06
Speaker 2: with meditation in contrast to just regular REM sleep. I
34:12
Speaker 2: guess it's 40 hertz. And this higher range of 40
34:17
Speaker 2: hertz is actually more pronounced when the lucid dreamer is
34:22
Speaker 2: not trying to control the dream. So like there is
34:27
Speaker 2: something very special about that state. I guess the implication
34:32
Speaker 2: is it's somewhat similar to meditation, but that it's even more.
34:38
Speaker 2: When the ego is not grasping, to go back to
34:41
Speaker 2: what you said.
34:41
Speaker 3: Before, Yeah, I think the seduction of power can contaminate
34:47
Speaker 3: probably every human experience, but certainly is corrosive when we're
34:53
Speaker 3: engaging the unconscious. It doesn't particularly appreciate being bullied and
34:59
Speaker 3: tends to actually produce a paradoxical response.
35:03
Speaker 2: And do you have a sense of... I mean, look,
35:06
Speaker 2: I know that Jungians in general, we're a little bit...
35:10
Speaker 2: distrustful of lucid dreaming for the reasons that I think
35:13
Speaker 2: are probably obvious. But when you say it can kind
35:17
Speaker 2: of bring about these negative results, do you have any
35:19
Speaker 2: sense of what might happen if we're constantly resting control
35:24
Speaker 2: of our dreams and using this, I would say, kind
35:28
Speaker 2: of sacred capacity to be in relationship with the unconscious
35:32
Speaker 2: for ego purposes? Do you have thought about that?
35:37
Speaker 3: My concern is that it can lead to a really
35:41
Speaker 3: serious inflation that to have that experience of being kind
35:47
Speaker 3: of godlike you know flying and doing whatever you want
35:50
Speaker 3: or maybe assaulting people or trying to seduce every inner
35:53
Speaker 3: figure you can find it can give the ego this
35:57
Speaker 3: sense of omnipotence and lack of boundaries and because it's
36:01
Speaker 3: a full sensory experience we can trick part of our
36:05
Speaker 3: nervous system into thinking we've done that and normalizing it,
36:09
Speaker 3: thinking that, oh, well, this might be okay. And there
36:14
Speaker 3: are certain impulses in our psyche that we need to
36:20
Speaker 3: observe from a distance until we attain enough muscularity to
36:26
Speaker 3: really stand face to face to it. So being in
36:32
Speaker 3: a lucid dream and acting out really with a lot
36:38
Speaker 3: of primality, can put us in the way of very
36:43
Speaker 3: powerful forces that aren't so easy to put back in
36:48
Speaker 3: the bottle once you've uncorked it.
36:51
Speaker 2: You know, I'm aware that we have colonized so much
36:55
Speaker 2: of the natural world. It's difficult to find a space
37:02
Speaker 2: of the Earth's surface that hasn't been touched in some
37:05
Speaker 2: profound way by humans. You know, that's just untouched nature.
37:11
Speaker 2: And in some sense, our dreams are that little bit
37:16
Speaker 2: of untouched nature that hasn't been kind of paved over
37:22
Speaker 2: by consciousness or had a parking lot erected.
37:26
Speaker 3: Right, or optimized for the ego agenda of some kind.
37:30
Speaker 2: Yeah. And dreams are kind of endangered in a sense.
37:37
Speaker 2: You know, they're endangered by our alarm clocks. They're endangered
37:43
Speaker 2: by the fact that we don't get as much sleep
37:47
Speaker 2: as we should. They're endangered by the fact that we
37:50
Speaker 2: maybe don't value our dreams as much as we should.
37:54
Speaker 2: You know, the Jungian analyst Anthony Stevens says this, as
37:58
Speaker 2: we wander ever further into the materialist desert that our
38:03
Speaker 2: civilization has become, Our dreams are the only oases of
38:08
Speaker 2: spiritual vitality left to us. They represent our primordial habitat,
38:14
Speaker 2: our last wilderness. And we must protect them with as
38:19
Speaker 2: much fervor as the rainforests, the ozone layer, the elephant,
38:24
Speaker 2: and the whale. So I think that that's a little
38:28
Speaker 2: bit of a cautionary note to sound that we want
38:34
Speaker 2: We want our dreams to remain that bit of kind
38:36
Speaker 2: of protected wilderness within.
38:39
Speaker 3: That's a beautiful quote, that we need the irrational. And
38:46
Speaker 3: when the ego comes in and takes control, even if
38:48
Speaker 3: it's benevolent control, we're putting a kind of or installing
38:54
Speaker 3: a structure that makes sense to us. But much of
38:58
Speaker 3: the magic, and the medicine of the unconscious doesn't really
39:02
Speaker 3: make sense. It defies logic. It's strange and uncanny. And yet,
39:08
Speaker 3: when we swim into it and then come back upon waking,
39:13
Speaker 3: we are refreshed, not just in body, but we're refreshed
39:16
Speaker 3: at the level of soul. We've come to some place
39:20
Speaker 3: that I think there is a way that lucid dreaming
39:24
Speaker 3: can be in service to individuation if the right attitude
39:28
Speaker 3: the non-grasp attitude, could be cultivated and carried into the
39:35
Speaker 3: dream state. There are a number of techniques that are
39:38
Speaker 3: easily accessible to toy with this, and now even technology.
39:43
Speaker 3: The Monroe Institute does interesting stuff with this using sound technology. Hmm.
39:49
Speaker 3: I think that it could be a useful tool. And
39:55
Speaker 3: some of you just naturally lucid dream several times a week.
40:00
Speaker 3: I mean, you're pioneers. You're trying to figure out how
40:03
Speaker 3: to live in that world, how to make it work
40:05
Speaker 3: for you. And hopefully you've come to discover that it
40:11
Speaker 3: too is sacred space.
40:13
Speaker 2: Yes, that's really well put. And if you'd like to
40:17
Speaker 2: learn more about working with your dreams, remember that we
40:21
Speaker 2: have Dream School. It's our 12-month online self-paced program. You
40:26
Speaker 2: get to hang out with us every month. Each of
40:29
Speaker 2: us has a live program that we offer. It's a
40:31
Speaker 2: really great community of people. Our Dream School students join
40:35
Speaker 2: dream groups if they like, and those are very rich,
40:39
Speaker 2: wonderful experiences that connect people across the world who are
40:43
Speaker 2: interested in dreams. So take a look. You can head
40:46
Speaker 2: over to our website, thisunionlife.com, and you'll see more information
40:50
Speaker 2: there about Dream School. And maybe now is the time
40:55
Speaker 2: to switch to a dream.
41:08
Speaker 3: Today's dreamer is a 42-year-old male who works as a lawyer.
41:12
Speaker 3: for a conservation non-profit that deals with water issues. And
41:18
Speaker 3: the title of his dream is The Elk in the Castle.
41:22
Speaker 3: And here is his dream. I'm wandering through the endless
41:26
Speaker 3: stone halls of a dark and abandoned cathedral-like castle. Tall
41:31
Speaker 3: gray walls, faded red tapestries, and endless holes. I feel
41:38
Speaker 3: aimless and searching. In one shadowed corridor, I find a
41:43
Speaker 3: massive animal, perhaps a deer or elk or some ancient ancestor.
41:49
Speaker 3: It's exhausted, frightened, and out of place, clearly more lost
41:54
Speaker 3: than me. Through an intuitive telepathic connection, I assure it
41:59
Speaker 3: that I mean no harm and can help it find
42:02
Speaker 3: a way out. I'm not surprised it understands or trusts me.
42:07
Speaker 3: As we walk together, I realize I don't know the
42:10
Speaker 3: way out, yet I feel an overwhelming duty to guide
42:13
Speaker 3: and help. If not me, who? Eventually, we find a
42:18
Speaker 3: breach in the castle wall. Outside is not a forest,
42:22
Speaker 3: but a vast, empty sky looking down a cliff. Extending
42:27
Speaker 3: from the castle is a narrow ridgeline path steeply descending
42:32
Speaker 3: into clouds below. It looks dangerous. but I'm convinced it's
42:37
Speaker 3: the only way to free the elk. Using the same communication,
42:44
Speaker 3: I convince it to try the path. The elk hesitates,
42:49
Speaker 3: then steps forward, looking back for reassurance. After only a
42:54
Speaker 3: few steps out, it slips and falls 50 feet to
42:57
Speaker 3: a ledge below, alive but mortally injured and in agonizing pain.
43:03
Speaker 3: I stand at the edge and watch helplessly, overcome with grief, horror,
43:07
Speaker 3: and shame for having caused the pain and eventual death
43:11
Speaker 3: of this great animal. I also feel immensely guilty for
43:15
Speaker 3: trying to help but ultimately making things worse. At the
43:19
Speaker 3: same time, also feeling a strange relief that the unbearable
43:23
Speaker 3: burden of this responsibility has lifted. I am somehow free
43:28
Speaker 3: again to continue wandering aimlessly aimlessly in the castle halls
43:32
Speaker 3: without responsibility. The dream ends. For context, he writes, I
43:39
Speaker 3: thought about this a lot, and there was nothing of
43:42
Speaker 3: note in my waking life, such as life transitions. I
43:46
Speaker 3: have a pretty great job in a meaningful community and
43:50
Speaker 3: integrated life. I do note that generally I am unable
43:55
Speaker 3: to remember dreams, often going months without being able to
43:58
Speaker 3: remember fragments or echoes of dreams. But this dream was
44:02
Speaker 3: one I awoke from and remembered very vivid details and
44:06
Speaker 3: the story arc. Even months later, I remember details and
44:11
Speaker 3: feelings very well. As for feelings in the dream, he writes,
44:18
Speaker 3: At first, the main feeling was aimlessness. Then with the elk,
44:23
Speaker 3: there was a sense of duty and purpose and fulfillment
44:26
Speaker 3: from being able to help another being. As we continued
44:30
Speaker 3: to be lost, The feeling turned to that of being
44:33
Speaker 3: burdened and uncertainty, but also wanting to keep up appearances
44:39
Speaker 3: because I had convinced the animal to rely on me
44:42
Speaker 3: for its safety. After the elk fell, I felt horror, guilt,
44:48
Speaker 3: and helplessness at what I had done. But I also
44:52
Speaker 3: felt a sense of relief because the burden I had
44:54
Speaker 3: taken on was now out of my hands and I
44:56
Speaker 3: could go back to being aimless in the castle and
44:58
Speaker 3: not tied to that sense of duty. For associations, he adds,
45:04
Speaker 3: the castle is old and feels almost from an ancient civilization,
45:09
Speaker 3: and I don't know how or why I'm there. The
45:13
Speaker 3: elk seems majestic, but also pitiful given its circumstances. I
45:18
Speaker 3: feel cold to help it.
45:21
Speaker 2: Well, this obviously feels like a big dream. Feels like
45:27
Speaker 2: a big dream, and I can immediately, I mean, it's
45:30
Speaker 2: kind of a devastating dream. And I can immediately generate
45:34
Speaker 2: a lot of fantasies about what it might mean in
45:37
Speaker 2: a person's life. But it's also one of those dreams
45:40
Speaker 2: that feels like it could have a kind of collective
45:43
Speaker 2: significance as well.
45:44
Speaker 3: What are you imagining that way?
45:47
Speaker 2: Well, in terms of collective significance, one of the most
45:49
Speaker 2: striking things is that he sort of enjoys, well, there's
45:54
Speaker 2: a slight, yeah, I'm going to say there's a sense
45:56
Speaker 2: that he enjoys wandering aimlessly without the burden of responsibility.
46:02
Speaker 2: And there's this great tragedy that happens that this majestic
46:07
Speaker 2: animal has been, is suffering and will die. But he,
46:11
Speaker 2: but there's, and there's a part of him that feels
46:13
Speaker 2: really bad about that, but there's a part that's like,
46:14
Speaker 2: just wants to go back and aimlessly wander through the castle.
46:18
Speaker 2: And when I think about environmental degradation, and he does
46:21
Speaker 2: work for an environmental organization, you know, I can, I
46:25
Speaker 2: can relate to that because in a way, you know, there's,
46:29
Speaker 2: you know, there's a kind of a massive die-off of
46:31
Speaker 2: species going on. And I personally can hook into that
46:35
Speaker 2: and feel just an overwhelming sadness about it. And then
46:40
Speaker 2: most of the time I just disconnect from that awareness
46:42
Speaker 2: and I go about, you know, checking out Instagram or
46:45
Speaker 2: watching the latest show on Netflix or just kind of
46:49
Speaker 2: wandering aimlessly and forgetting about my responsibility because it's just
46:55
Speaker 2: almost too overwhelming. So I wonder about that. I mean,
46:59
Speaker 2: it's sort of like, what is that great ancient elk?
47:04
Speaker 2: What could that represent? And where does it need to be?
47:07
Speaker 2: You know, and I'm asking this in the most general way.
47:10
Speaker 2: Is it something that needs to die? I mean, he
47:12
Speaker 2: mentions it might be an ancient ancestor. And there were
47:15
Speaker 2: these kind of, there was this period in evolutionary history
47:19
Speaker 2: when there was like these massive mammals and there was
47:22
Speaker 2: a sort of like, super big version of kind of
47:26
Speaker 2: an elk. I can't remember what it's called, but, you know,
47:28
Speaker 2: I think there's one at the Natural History Museum in
47:32
Speaker 2: New York. I could probably poke around and find its name,
47:34
Speaker 2: but it's like, it's huge. You know, I mean, elk
47:37
Speaker 2: are huge. Moose are huge, but these are really huge.
47:42
Speaker 2: But those animals are extinct, you know? So is this
47:46
Speaker 2: something really ancient, but it's kind of run its course?
47:50
Speaker 2: Or is it kind of the last of its kind?
47:53
Speaker 2: I don't know. My imagination is just kind of going
47:55
Speaker 2: different ways with it. An endrocathere. I can't believe I
47:59
Speaker 2: just thought of that. An endrocathere.
48:01
Speaker 3: Oh, my gosh. Yes, there is something mythic about this,
48:06
Speaker 3: you know, supernaturally enormous elk. And we might investigate some
48:11
Speaker 3: of the particulars about what makes elks unique among similar
48:16
Speaker 3: animals like deer or moose. And then we might be
48:19
Speaker 3: able to translate that into a kind of metaphor. I
48:23
Speaker 3: found myself emotionally responding to the dream ego's certainty that
48:31
Speaker 3: all is safe and then beckoning the creature, the animal, forward,
48:36
Speaker 3: kind of shushing it, reassuring it, and having something horrendous happening.
48:40
Speaker 3: I mean, the amount of guilt that I know I
48:43
Speaker 3: would feel for doing that would just be just crushing.
48:48
Speaker 3: But if I think of the dream being like a
48:52
Speaker 3: fairy tale, generally speaking, the animals know more than the ego.
48:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's great. I like that.
49:01
Speaker 3: So there's an inversion here where the ego is telling
49:04
Speaker 3: the instincts what's real, what it should do. It's looking
49:08
Speaker 3: back kind of worried. And I think the metacommunication is
49:15
Speaker 3: the ego really can't and shouldn't Tell the instincts. you know,
49:21
Speaker 3: what's right and what's wrong or what reality is, because
49:26
Speaker 3: the instincts know things that the ego just can't know.
49:29
Speaker 2: Ah, yeah, that feels that feels just right. You know,
49:34
Speaker 2: because what I'm aware of is that, I mean, first
49:37
Speaker 2: of all, just the emotion of this dream really moved me.
49:41
Speaker 2: But I'm aware that it ends, you know, if we
49:43
Speaker 2: look at the lysis of the dream, if we look
49:45
Speaker 2: at the resolution, you know, he goes back to just
49:49
Speaker 2: wandering aimlessly in the castle. So I'm just going to
49:52
Speaker 2: go back and find that last sentence. He says, I'm
49:55
Speaker 2: somehow free again to continue wandering aimlessly in the castle
49:59
Speaker 2: without responsibility. So that's kind of a regressive movement. You know,
50:05
Speaker 2: we're always interested in kind of if we look at
50:08
Speaker 2: the arc of the dream, what's sort of what's true
50:10
Speaker 2: at the beginning, what's true at the end. And, you know,
50:14
Speaker 2: hopefully if it's sort of a good progressive story, something
50:17
Speaker 2: has changed. And really there's, you know, in the beginning,
50:22
Speaker 2: he's wandering aimlessly in the castle. At the end, he's
50:24
Speaker 2: wandering aimlessly in the castle. And you don't get the
50:27
Speaker 2: feeling he's going to find his way out because he's
50:30
Speaker 2: not even really that bothered by it. Right. So I
50:34
Speaker 2: wonder in what way he might be wandering aimlessly through
50:37
Speaker 2: the castle of life. I'm very aware that this is
50:40
Speaker 2: sort of a midlife moment. He's not bringing up any
50:44
Speaker 2: midlife issues, but it sure sounds like something might be
50:47
Speaker 2: cooking on the inside. But I think you're right, Joseph.
50:50
Speaker 2: There is this sort of inversion that, I mean, when
50:54
Speaker 2: I first read it, I thought, oh, it's really good
50:56
Speaker 2: that he feels this sense of responsibility to the elk.
50:59
Speaker 2: You know, that felt really positive to me. But then
51:02
Speaker 2: there is this kind of certainty that comes in. I
51:05
Speaker 2: want to go back and find that language.
51:07
Speaker 3: That there's an elk there and the dream ego says,
51:10
Speaker 3: I feel an overwhelming duty to guide and help. But
51:14
Speaker 3: maybe the elk was going to be your guide. That
51:17
Speaker 3: the elk was there to give you help because you're
51:21
Speaker 3: wandering endlessly in these dark holes.
51:25
Speaker 2: And it says it looks dangerous, but I'm convinced it's
51:27
Speaker 2: the only way to freedom for the elk. And so...
51:31
Speaker 2: You know, again, it's like the ego sort of deciding it.
51:34
Speaker 2: And so, you know, like another way this dream might
51:38
Speaker 2: go is I find this elk and it's scared and everything.
51:41
Speaker 2: And I don't know how to help it escape. You know,
51:44
Speaker 2: we're just sort of there together feeling lost and I'm
51:47
Speaker 2: trying to comfort it or something like that. More just
51:50
Speaker 2: like allowing the ego to not know, you know. It's
51:54
Speaker 2: interesting that once he escapes from the castle, which I'm
51:57
Speaker 2: reading along, I'm going, oh, my God, oh, my God,
51:58
Speaker 2: they found a way out of the castle. But then
52:00
Speaker 2: there's not a forest. There's sort of a, there's a cliff,
52:06
Speaker 2: you know, there's under a vast empty sky. So it's,
52:09
Speaker 2: there's a sense of, you know, God, it's sort of
52:14
Speaker 2: the spiritual, again, this is where it feels kind of collective,
52:19
Speaker 2: is because we no longer have the defining grand narrative,
52:25
Speaker 2: let's say, of the Christian, you know, mythopoetic worldview. What
52:30
Speaker 2: we find when we stop aimlessly wandering through the castle
52:34
Speaker 2: of our minds often feels like we're under that open
52:40
Speaker 2: sky and there's just a cliff. Like, where is there
52:43
Speaker 2: to go in terms of understanding our place in the
52:46
Speaker 2: cosmos or what any of this means? You know, it's
52:50
Speaker 2: a real moment of psycho-spiritual confrontation and perhaps even terror
52:58
Speaker 2: for some of us, although I don't hear that that's
53:00
Speaker 2: in the dream. But what we find instead is a
53:03
Speaker 2: kind of certainty. It might be an over-reliance on a
53:08
Speaker 2: rational perspective. Well, this seems like the way to safety,
53:13
Speaker 2: you know, and.
53:15
Speaker 3: The elk is not so sure. The elk is like
53:19
Speaker 3: a child, almost, you know, looking back for reassurance. So
53:23
Speaker 3: the tricky thing here for me is that I'm convinced
53:27
Speaker 3: it's the only way to freedom for the elk, that
53:30
Speaker 3: the ego gets this very determined attitude that is wrong.
53:37
Speaker 3: So there's a real confrontation here that if this were
53:41
Speaker 3: my dream, I would call into question some of the
53:44
Speaker 3: things that I'm convinced about.
53:47
Speaker 2: That's interesting.
53:48
Speaker 3: And for my own sense of freedom. Where am I
53:51
Speaker 3: so sure that this is the path to freedom for me?
53:55
Speaker 3: Could be financial freedom, could be some other kind of freedom.
53:59
Speaker 3: But for no reason that is clear in the dream.
54:03
Speaker 3: It looks dangerous, but I'm convinced it's the only way. Well,
54:09
Speaker 3: it's not as if he's looked for a bunch of
54:11
Speaker 3: other ways. It's that the ego has decided that the
54:16
Speaker 3: elk needs to be somewhere else. we don't have any
54:20
Speaker 3: sense of the Elks looking to run off or even
54:23
Speaker 3: to leave the castle for that matter.
54:25
Speaker 2: Well, it does seem like the Elk is lost, more
54:28
Speaker 2: lost than he is, but he may be more lost
54:31
Speaker 2: than he thinks he is in life, you know, because
54:33
Speaker 2: he says, no, everything's fine, everything's great, but something in
54:38
Speaker 2: the unconscious is not okay. And it's also, it seems like,
54:42
Speaker 2: and maybe this just needs clarification, but that, um, You know,
54:47
Speaker 2: the elk is down there suffering, and he's like, I'm
54:50
Speaker 2: going to go back to the castle and wander around.
54:52
Speaker 2: It seems like there's a moving away from suffering.
54:56
Speaker 3: The sequencing of the language can make the dreamer sound
54:59
Speaker 3: somewhat cavalier. And yet, you know, if any of us
55:04
Speaker 3: have been in the misfortune of clipping an animal on
55:07
Speaker 3: a highway and you're zooming past and now there's some
55:11
Speaker 3: poor animal on the side of the road, you know,
55:14
Speaker 3: How many of us can slam on the brakes, pull over,
55:17
Speaker 3: do something about the injured animal? It's very challenging depending
55:22
Speaker 3: on where you live. So he's not going to jump
55:26
Speaker 3: down the 50 feet. He doesn't have a gun to
55:29
Speaker 3: put it out of its misery. So there's that mix
55:34
Speaker 3: of guilt and freedom that fate, so to speak, has
55:39
Speaker 3: taken out of his hands. But is it fate? Is
55:43
Speaker 3: it fate? Or has he orchestrated the demise of this
55:50
Speaker 3: frightened beast inside of him? Because he's walking aimlessly around
55:57
Speaker 3: the castle. He encounters an image of affect. He finds
56:05
Speaker 3: this image of exhaustion and fear and lostness. And then
56:12
Speaker 3: once that is dispatched, then he can kind of happily
56:16
Speaker 3: go back to wandering the castle because he doesn't feel exhausted, frightened,
56:20
Speaker 3: or out of place, or even lost. Because that's been,
56:26
Speaker 3: at the very least, pushed over the cliff so that
56:29
Speaker 3: it's somewhere else, away from the ego, so I can
56:33
Speaker 3: come back and not have to feel that.
56:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, that feels right. I'm curious if the dreamer has
56:41
Speaker 2: a way of, like you said, kind of pushing off
56:45
Speaker 2: the cliff this relationship with himself in some ways.
56:50
Speaker 3: So the wandering, the exhaustion, the fear, the out-of-placeness, the
56:54
Speaker 3: lostness all needs to come together, not be broken apart.
57:00
Speaker 2: Yeah, it just reminds me of that... That part from
57:04
Speaker 2: the Red Book, right in the beginning, when Jung says,
57:07
Speaker 2: my soul, where are you? Do you hear me? I speak.
57:10
Speaker 2: I call you. Are you there? I have returned. I
57:13
Speaker 2: am here again. I have shaken the dust of all
57:15
Speaker 2: the lands from my feet, and I have come to you.
57:17
Speaker 2: I am with you. After long years of wandering, I
57:20
Speaker 2: have come to you again. And so, you know, it's
57:25
Speaker 2: a little bit the same, like there's something ancient there
57:28
Speaker 2: that's been left and forgotten. that now there's the possibility
57:32
Speaker 2: of reconnecting with, but somehow it doesn't go well. Yeah,
57:37
Speaker 2: it feels like a very big dream. I'm reluctant to
57:40
Speaker 2: sort of come down too hard on any one particular
57:44
Speaker 2: understanding of it because I think there's a lot there,
57:47
Speaker 2: and I can understand. It's understandable that the dreamer has
57:51
Speaker 2: been sitting with it and thinking about it, and it
57:55
Speaker 2: feels really hopeful to me that the dreamer's taking it seriously.
57:58
Speaker 1: Yes.
58:00
Speaker 3: I think that he could think of this ancient deer
58:03
Speaker 3: or elk as an image of his soul. And then
58:07
Speaker 3: there's that famous biblical passage, Like as the heart desireth
58:12
Speaker 3: the water brooks, so longeth my soul after thee. And
58:16
Speaker 3: the word H-A-R-T is an old word for a deer.
58:22
Speaker 3: So his soul is wandering with him in this dark
58:27
Speaker 3: castle cathedral. He comes across it. There is a sense
58:32
Speaker 3: that he does have a duty to take care of
58:34
Speaker 3: his own soul, if not me, who? But then he
58:38
Speaker 3: does dispatch it, unfortunately, and assumes that, you know, it
58:43
Speaker 3: should be somewhere else away from him. So there's something
58:47
Speaker 3: just tragic. It's a very tragic dream.
58:51
Speaker 2: You know, it's also interesting that it's a cathedral-like castle,
58:55
Speaker 2: because if we think about castles are old, cathedrals are
58:58
Speaker 2: old and they're also having to do with religion. So
59:01
Speaker 2: some kind of old musty ideas in the culture, maybe
59:05
Speaker 2: about religion that are interesting. I'm not like perhaps. that
59:10
Speaker 2: the elk doesn't need to leave. I mean, it says
59:12
Speaker 2: it's out of place and I get that, but I wonder,
59:15
Speaker 2: is it? Or is an old kind of cathedral castle,
59:20
Speaker 2: could our inner cathedral slash castle be a living place
59:25
Speaker 2: rather than simply kind of a musty old museum?
59:29
Speaker 3: And that the task is that the elk is supposed
59:32
Speaker 3: to connect with the dream ego, like mission accomplished. Like
59:36
Speaker 3: that's the task, and then you and the elk go
59:38
Speaker 3: on your adventures together. But the ego makes this decision
59:42
Speaker 3: that it's got to kind of get that elk out
59:45
Speaker 3: there in the natural world when perhaps it really belongs
59:50
Speaker 3: next to you.
59:52
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, certainly if it were me, I'd want
59:55
Speaker 2: to do an act of imagination with this.
59:58
Speaker 3: Absolutely.
1:00:01
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