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Hi there last night l had a dream that l was standing outside…

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Answer 1

Answered in 14 minutes by:

1/20/2013

Dream Interpretation Expert: Dr. Norman Brown, PhD replied 10 years ago

Dr. Norman Brown, PhD

Category: Dream Interpretation

Satisfied Customers: 1,247

Experience: 50yrs interpreting dreams & connecting conscious & unconscious minds

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Dr. Norman Brown :

Welcome to my dream interpretation studio, where your scenes & symbols can reveal a higher source's view of you & your life & develop your wisdom. I just lost my first reply to you. Here goes again. Please give me your interpretation, so what I give to you goes further and deeper, because I'm confident it will.

Dr. Norman Brown :

You've already given out the most surprising aspect, which is one key to deeper meanings: That there was apparently NO violence involved in taking down your blue front gate. Was there any difference in the blueness or any other aspect of your front gate scene? Like the fence connected to it, the age of the gate, or anything between the gate & street or between gate and your own dwelling?

Dr. Norman Brown :

The keys to deeper interpretations lie in DIFFERENCES between what you're aware of in your conscious mind and the unconscious scene itself, EVERY ASPECT of it.

Dr. Norman Brown :

Another vital bit of information is WHAT MIGHT HAVE TRIGGERED THIS DREAM, as your own mind contains the connections between your waking knowledge and the phenomena in your dream. The science of this, Phenomenology, I first learned in relation to interpretation of German literature, for my MA & PhD in that subject, and now I apply it to dreams as well, because they are also GREAT ART in the state of first arising from your unconscious mind.

Customer:

Hello there the blue of the gate was the same as before it was taken apart.The gate was an old victorian gate the gate hadn't changed in age.It had been attached to a wall that was the same size of the gate when l was looking at it it had been taken apart and placed in piles along the pavement. At first l couldn't see the gate then l realised it was in bits along the pavement.

Dr. Norman Brown :

I'm making my first meal of the day, and also unclogging my sink with hot water, so I'll be a little intermittent here. Please give me the possible dream triggers and your interpretation--unless you want to test my skills by withholding your own interpretation (which is fine, I just want to add to what you know, and THAT is what the higher source of our dreams wants symbolic interpretation to achieve).

Customer:

Please could you give me an explanation for the meaning of this dream? Before l sign out and give you a rating.

Dr. Norman Brown :

You're trying to get me to read your dream without knowing as much as you could tell me to make my reading much deeper. But I'll do it, since you will otherwise leave without what you came to get.

Dr. Norman Brown :

Your interpretation would probably include the idea that you are opening yourself up to something new that's coming toward you.

Dr. Norman Brown :

I'll add that it's coming to you from in front of you, and not from in back of you. Most new life experiences that are announced via dreams are coming in from the back, because the dreamer is not consciously aware of them, so they come in from the unconscious mind, as the dreams do themselves.

Dr. Norman Brown :

But this dream shows you that the front entrance has been carefully prepared, by an unnoticed (hence unconscious) force carefully and nonviolently taking down your "gatekeeping" or digital (open/closed) defense mechanisms, that is your consciously flexible resistance to allowing something unexpected to gain access to your personal-dwelling, ie personality.

Dr. Norman Brown :

This might mean that the subject of your dream is not so much WHAT is coming into your personality anew, but HOW it can gain access and join you where you live. That implies to my intuition that you've been carrying out some kind of personal development practice (such as yoga, meditation or dream interpretation) that has changed your ability to accept whatever novel knowledge or personality elements (aka subpersonalities) might choose to come your way. For you don't mention ANY potential visitors, and certainly don't mention any apprehensiveness about what might be getting ready to pay you an extended visit.

Customer:

Thank you for that. No l didn't feel apprehensive but calm about the gate been taken down. Would l be right in saying that the symbolism of the dream is good?

Dr. Norman Brown :

The gate has been taken down, so now you can't stop new elements of self from at least knocking on your FRONT door. And this change in your personal defense structure has occurred without any crisis to provoke it.

Dr. Norman Brown :

It's a very brief dream, not indicating how you'll fare when a challenging new element of self actually comes (or perhaps an intimate relationship, that always challenges your core structure sooner or later).

Customer:

Thank you, XXXXX XXXXX just say that in the dream l was outside in my porch and the front door was open and it felt as if l was ready,calm and ready. I have had other dreams similar to this when they just show me the picture nothing else usually when l am in a changing cycle.These kind of dreams have only come three or four times in my life.

Dr. Norman Brown :

I bring this up, because for a significant dream like this one to be complete, its central symbolism must be "bivalent" ("good" & "bad"). So what was your gate-keeping system doing for you till now? Making sure you couldn't be "invaded" without warning, ie making sure your defenses would be activated by anything unexpected & unprepared-for that comes your way. That means you've lost one of your outer shields (like the Death-star's weapons-shields than Han Solo & Chewbaka took down), so you'll have to deal with change-agents (LOVErs & other human teachers) upclose&personal, and your process with personality changes will be less guarded too. Since I still have no idea what sorts of changes you may be facing soon that your gatekeeping function has changed to cope with, I can't offer any understanding of what your (as yet unmentioned) body/mind/emotion/spirit practice has prepared you to deal with differently. This preparation has gone on without your realizing that it would be one of the results of what your practice has been--which suggests to me that your practice has not been something labeled as psychotherapy with the expressed goal of changing your personality's defense structure.

Dr. Norman Brown :

Thank you for your latest comment. That shows me that you've been maturing in your ways of facing change--as have I, more slowly than I'd wish. Do you know this poem by RUmi?

Dr. Norman Brown :

THE GUEST HOUSE

This being human is a guest house.

Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,

some momentary awareness comes

as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!

Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows,

who violently sweep your house

empty of its furniture,

still, treat each guest honorably.

He may be clearing you out

for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,

meet them at the door laughing,

and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,

because each has been sent

as a guide from beyond.

Dr. Norman Brown :

I'd still like you to pinpoint, if you can, what physical, psychological or spiritual practices have gradually altered (behind your back, ie unnoticed by you, and gradually because the pieces of the gate have been taken down and reorganized SO carefully) your ways of coping with the guests in your house of personal soul. I have a selfish reason for asking: Perhaps you've been doing something (without thinking how valuable it might be) that I haven't been doing, and I could add that to my repertoire of psychospiritual development practices, which would reward me much more than these pitiful wages. Perhaps your practice(s) are so numerous that most of them have gone unnoticed by you, because it's only their combination that makes them so successful in a mere (how much? 30 years?) of adulthood.

Dr. Norman Brown :

But then I might have to add up what I've been doing, which might be as difficult for me as summarizing your life of self-refining attention would be for you. Autobiography is a magnificent challenge, which I've tried in earnest (and in fiction) only once, 2007-9, in an unpublished book called The Pinocchio Mysteries.

Customer:

Such a wise poem,thank you for sending it to me.For me l think that l have reached a point in my life where l need to move on. It feels like a new chapter is unfolding, like the old ways has gone and l need to move to another location although leaving my house is hard as like you have hinted it has protected me for a very long time! I have just retired from my teaching post although l still do some partime work and perhaps the symbolism of the gate been taken down indicates new beginnings. Certainly l have known about this for a while now and am developing courage to move on.

Customer:

I have a strong spiritual belief system in the widest sense and truly know that the the universe is there for all of us but what ever we take must be for the greatest good of our higher self. What we give out so we reap back.I think over the years more and more l am learning to listen to my inner voice and trust it to act for the greatest good for me.As l get older so my spirituality becomes stronger and so does my pychic awareness and l am learning to love myself something that has taken me a long long time. I am only truly beginning to understand about unconditional love.

Customer:

I have also reached a point in my life where l feel l want to give something back to the universe as l truly feel that l have been very fortunate. I sort of know about situations/people before they take place and l am seldom wrong this gift becomes stronger as l become older.I guess that l have reached a plateau where l find that l am more excepting and less critical about people and situations certainly l have been working on forgiving myself and other people who have caused me much pain in the past and am now beginning to feel more at peace with myself.This is what l strive for to be surrounded by this inner peace that will support me in whatever life may throw at me.

Customer:

I have tried to respond to your question about my spiritual development and how this has changed over the years.I would really like you to respond to this before l sign out and the implications of the dream. Thank you

Answer 2

Dream Interpretation Expert: Dr. Norman Brown, PhD replied 10 years ago

Thank you for sharing your inner beauty, for it comes through terror and suffering in their cosmic rhythm with insight and exultation. So your image of your aunty's husband stifling her inborn vow to speak her truth in life has fired up your voice to serve the lives of thousands of children. Parhaps this has been your artistic practice, guided by a divine intuition walking with you, that has led you out onto the porch in front of the house that has protected you until now. And the children have been the medium for your art, as recipients of the subtle divine guidance that emanates from how you teach.

That gives me something new to think about, since I began my teaching 49 years ago on the island of Crete. I was expecting a practice I could keep in "mind" when it was in your heart instead. Thank you from my heart.

Answer 3

Dream Interpretation Expert: Dr. Norman Brown, PhD replied 10 years ago

Please don't worry that I'm going to flood into your private dream-home space because you let your gate down in this dream and I want to use it as an example-dream to get an invitation to write interpretations for Oprah Mag. There already aren't any identifying elements in it besides your retirement from school teaching, which is a key element for being supportive & instructive to the mag's readers (tho that doesn't mean your dream would have to be used for column #1 or ever.) I don't know how I'd feel if my dream were going to be used that way myself. My wife's relationship to me was written up in Linda Leonard's (her Jungian analyst at that time) book On the Way to the Wedding, but I was only in it as the mysterious but well recommended prospective groom (and a far cry from what her other, quite possessive male analyst (who slightly knew me) thought of me. I'm just worried that I'm jumping too fast, because your dream was so fresh and instructive to me on the very morning I had written to O's editors.

Answer 4

Dream Interpretation Expert: Dr. Norman Brown, PhD replied 10 years ago

Thank you Elaine, So this is another element of your spiritual practice: CONTEMPLATION. I wonder if you've been greatly fulfilled by contemplating great art, sculpture or photographs, as I have. (eg Have you ever looked at Donatello's wood sculpture of Maria Magdalena in old age? There's a terrific video view of it in a Bill Moyers film-exposition about Florence, Italy, where Donatello & Michelangelo were both born and lived. Botticelli's Venus and La Primavera (mythologic Spring) is there too. If you've never been to Florence, you owe it to yourself to stay a week, and walk to Fiesole and up in the hills above Lucca and Valombrosa--but you might find Love coming in through your front gate. (I haven't been since 1989, so overdue to see all again--but in slow-motion adjusted for age.)

PS Did you know that Venus (aka Aphrodite, a name I prefer, because I lived in Greece, and the Romans were just copy-cats) was known not just for a vigorous career of affairs with both gods and humans, but also for embracing Serial Virginity? Every time she bathed in the ocean, she'd emerge a Virgin once again. Thus virginity is a state of mind, increasing both fear and anticipation of future love. Similarly in my dreams, when I have left my conjugal home to journey back to Italy (since 2000 mainly for the Alps), I'd dream of sleeping in Youth Hostel, and actually do it too, though it would be mostly walking hostels or Alpine Club huts with European vacationers 40-75. In thousands of French "Gites d'Etape" (walking-biking-driving guest-houses in hillside villages, now probably ~$50 for dinner, bed & breakfast together with one's peers) teachers & retiree groups would come in vans and celebrate someone turning 70.

Answer 5

Dream Interpretation Expert: Dr. Norman Brown, PhD replied 10 years ago

Thank you Elaine, perhaps I'll have tea with you in Florence some day. I am deeply touched with how much you knew unconsciously of my caring interest in you, that your dream-director composed a dream of hands repairing your heart, when that's what I needed to have done on the physical plane to put me back out on the road-of-life again myself. That's no accident. I'm grateful to the powers-that-be that led us to meet in virtual reality and help each other understand the values we've been living individually for decades already. I will have a web site up soon, where it should be simpler to connect and continue.

Hi there last night l had a dream that l was standing outside…

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