I woke up early this morning and ended up back in bed. Sometimes this is the best time for working through "old stuff", old ghosts that rattle around in my closet, trying to get my attention for resolution.
Just a short hour ago, I was engaged in a rather feverish, violent dream in which a major "hook" (shenpa) for me was working itself out.
Oh, to have liberation from that hook! My life would exceed any possible wishes I could have for quality!
And, oh, what a hook it's been... one that has had its claws deeply embedded in me, digging deeper and deeper, for over forty years. It's ruled me more than I've realized in my day to day life, yet clearly and painfully in my more lucid times.
In these dreams, which seem almost like a contact with the group consciousness, that place where we see our life lessons and our karma so clearly, I am often the observer. This time, I was a participant. I acted it out from truly within me ~ not watching from a distance.
It was hard.. and my heart pounded like the proverbial drum, scaring me near to death in the ferocity. And it was verbally violent.
For some reason, I've always had the need to please those who have no interest in being pleased by me. I've had a need to fit in where I am not welcome. Yet I've lived for the table scraps of these people who may toss some my way on occasion. I've allowed them to create my self-image... always the image as "not good enough". If I was good enough, they would want me, they would have an interest in me, they wouldn't leave me, they would want to nurture and be a part of my life.
And, indeed, there are plenty who do! They are just not the ones to whom I've given my best energy. They are not the ones who have gotten the best parts of me while I cast my pearls before those who might turn around for a momentary glance before they turn their backs and move on.
What a waste!
It's as though I've continually tried to play that scenario out, over and over again, in the venues where I always lost the most.
I have never been one of those who is "socially desirable". I will never be one of those people who is included in all the latest scoop, or the "in group" of any arena. I'm not one of those who is invited to the gatherings or sent cards or any of that stuff. It's just not how my life has gone. Not this one, not those in my private life, not now, not ever. I am not on the phone trees of life.
For some unknown reason, I've been unwilling to accept that, that it is simply not my path. I am needed elsewhere.
The voice from deep within me where the wisdom lives screamed out to me in my dream, "Stop trying to water the orchids in the desert." Don't look for orchids in the desert is a common expression of mine, a bit of wisdom passed along by someone much wiser. It's a snippet I never forgot. It's not terribly profound but it impressed me in my youth as describing something otherwise indescribable... because this trying of mine, this need to find things where they do not exist, is an overriding pattern.
But "watering"? Wow. That was a new one. And it makes so much sense! We can continually water something ~ but if the soil is wrong and the plant is in the wrong place, it won't grow anyway, no matter how much we water it. We need to give our energy and time in the right place and to the right people!
Yes, I knew this before in a broad way.. in an intellectual way ... but the dream gave me enough access to my wiser self that I'm listening this time at a gut level.
So I'm letting my iron grip go. I'm pulling my claws out from those whom I may have done this with ~ here or elsewhere ~ trying to hang on to you, putting you in the uncomfortable position of not quite knowing what to do with me ~ I release you. I release me. I release me to give my energy to those who need it and want it. If we go in different directions, that is how it is meant to be. I'm through trying to control it. I'm done craving attention from those who don't offer it or give it willingly.
I'm ready to see how it shakes out. I'm ready to bring those into my life who want to be in it. The door is open. The coffee's on. The jasmine smells sweet. Come on in!
Things always happen.. as they should.
~*
Saturday, October 06, 2007
Feverish dreams....
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
20 comments:
To thine own self be true, eh?
Our dreams are our subconscious at its best and its worst. Either way, it's good to pay attention, for it is there where many of our problems are resolved. We need only to pay attention. Bravo, Chani.
Anvil, in terms of authenticity, yes. And I think I am usually authentic. It's just that I've been authentic in places where it's not necessarily needed or wanted. :)
~*
Pam, I've always thought of dreams as effluvia from our daily life.. kind of like space junk.. but occasionally they really do serve a good purpose. :)
~*
Peace,
~Chani
Oh, yes. This is so true of so many of us, whether or not we recognize it.
Your dream also produced a magnificent post, Chani.
And it reminded me of a time when I was in a relationship that was far more important to me than it was to the man, so I was trying to control it.
I did everything I could to work on myself so he wouldn't cheat on me anymore with women who could only be described as sluts. (I shudder to think of this now, but I was far needier then, and didn't understand sexaholism.)
One day, my wiser self sent me a little meditation. "Water seeks its own level," which we all know from science class.
But this time, it came to me that this man was like water seeking his own level while I was frantically building dams to keep him at mine.
It was so clear, and I let him go. The fact that he continued to stalk me for 12 years is not relevant to this story.
You have so much good and beautiful energy, Chani, which will easily grow orchids in the right hearts and souls.
To waste it would only deprive you and the ones who are truly meant to love and treasure you.
It is so difficult to let go of that need for acceptance. I have struggled (and still struggle) with it in my life, as well. I hope that your decision to water those plants that want to grow with you brings you many blossoms!
P.S. I'll have some coffee!
I know it well. The trying to fit where you are not wanted. I also know the joy of letting go of that and finding out I fit exactly with some amazing people.
I love how you were open to that dream. potent.
Can I come for coffee?
Wonderful post, important dream. Best of all? How receptive you were to its meaning.
I take mine with milk and sugar, please. ;)
This post really speaks to me, Chani. And I think most of us who comment here have seen you struggling with this for a while now. It is not an easy thing to want what you think you can never have.
I grew up on the outer. The school I went to had over 500 students in my year level alone and I was "the fat kid". For the first few years of that I struggled with it a lot. I didn't want to lose the weight just to fit in. I wanted people to be able to look at me and see who I was, not my weight.
At one point I decided to lose the weight - for me and my health, not for them - and I did. I dropped a lot of weight very fast by walking home from school instead of catching the bus which was a couple of kms at least, every day, and watching what I ate. I went from a size 16 to a size 10. Not one of the kids treated me any differently. I may as well have kept the weight on.
It made me pretty unhappy and in the end I decided to change schools. The new kids didn't know me as "the fat kid" and they accepted me for what was on the inside because the outside was presentable. I was the lead in the year 12 play, and that meant a lot to me. I was finally a member of the "in" crowd - but I soon found out that was not an easy thing either. When you get what you thought you wanted, you sometimes realise that it is not what you thought it was at all.
These days I'm my own in crowd. I don't need anyone else to validate me or accept me. I do that for myself. It's not ego so don't confuse it with that - it's healthy self-esteem. I esteem me. Nobody else has to. ;) They can if they like. If not, it's no great loss.
I'm kind to myself. I catch those negative thoughts "you can't do this" "you're not good enough" "you're not smart enough" "you're not blah blah etc" and I say no, that's not right. I am able to do anything I put my mind to. I am good enough. I am smart enough. I know my strengths and my weaknesses.
I think catching those negative thoughts and correcting them is one of the most important things one can do for oneself. They come from everyone who has ever put one down and not accepted one. It is a tape in ones head that plays all day long without being noticed - it is like self-hypnosis. It is virtually hypnotizing ones self to fail and feel lesser than others.
Madonna says it beautifully in her song "Like It Or Not" -
You can call me a sinner
and you can call me a saint
Celebrate me for who I am
Dislike me for what I ain’t
Put me up on a pedestal
Or drag me down in the dirt
Sticks and stones will break my bones
But your names will never hurt
This is who I am
You can like it or not
You can love me or leave me
Cause I’m never gonna stop, no no
I'll bring my Gaggia coffee machine and make ya'all cappuccinos and lattes? ;) Those are the Italian coffees I know how to make, I can learn to make the others if you don't take it that way.. just let me know and I'll look it up on the net. ;)
Cheers!
Snoskred
www.snoskred.org
For me, wanting to be included in a group that doesn't really want me comes from needing to prove that i have value.
When i no longer needed prove that i had value to anyone it was a great day.
You've had a great day.
Wow, this is an amazing post. I'm glad that the wise part of you is speaking...and that you can hear it. Isn't it an amazingly humble and grateful feeling when you do?
Regarding your comment - I think sometimes dreams and insights and thoughts are just that - face value. I think sometimes they are our subconscious arranging things in our spirits so the obvious yet hidden truths can finally rise to the surface. Isn't it so often as you said - that you knew it before, but broadly. And then, there it is, clear as day, right when you need it, and you wonder how you managed to ever forget or not realize.
But...sometimes I think there is something more. And what that something is, or how, none of us could do more than speculate. Elizabeth Gilbert (who wrote Eat, Pray, Love, which I recently blogged about turning Oprah down for) talks about how sometimes she hears a voice. Its in her head, not audible. And its HER voice, but not. It fits with who she is, but with content too wise and true to be anything she could really have pulled out on her own. Call this God, or Us, or Source, or Higher Power - or call it wishful thinking. I don't know. But it does seem like sometimes there is something there I can't quite explain or understand...
The problems, I think, come when people either 1. deny that this could ever happen, that there could ever be communication with/from the Divine. Or 2. when people who have experienced it once come to believe their every thought or dream is the same, and do not apply humility and gratitude, and become tyrants and cult leaders...
I don't know...just a few thoughts, and I've rambled on past what you were asking me to, I think. So I'll come back to this - I love your post. Amazing, wonderful. I hope you can live it out. We're all here because we want to be. :)
catherine
Chani, I know I have been in that position, and it was quite a revelation when I became aware of it. I have also recognized it in others. I think so many of us fall into this trap, and we either don't realize it or continue to lie to ourselves to avoid facing it. Release is comparable to requital.
Stop trying to water the orchids in the desert.
This is a wonderful image. Your post really spoke to me.
It sounds exhausting, trying to grip what doesn't want to be held. Sounds like a great, self-renewing plan.
oh Chani. I wish for you freedom from your hook. Your soul is so beautiful.
What a powerful dream, Chani. I can say that I learned this lesson early in life, but I still suffer pangs sometimes. I think you will have so much more energy flowing toward you this way, rather than away from you.
what an amazing post. we all have hooks, some more debilitating than others or some more sought after perhaps, to recognize and release...just as you are doing. i read this and felt lighter for you, for the release.
i hope you'll continue to share how it's going, this new path you've stepped onto. very powerful stuff, sister.
wow.
wow.
that dream. that experience. it sounds so hard yet in the end so freeing.
so the coffee is on? i'll bring cake!
Beautiful post. Thanks for sharing such a powerful dream and your reception of it.
Coffee?? Where's the coffee??
I'm sorry did you say something else?? ;)
I'm glad things feel like they are coming to some resolution. Good for you!
I've heard that to be an observer in our dreams is to be disconnected from ourselves. Perhaps as you grow, you are becoming more connected and that is why you are now an active participant in your dreams . . . ?
I used to have a recurring dream of being chased. I read that if I turned and confronted my attacker that it would help in the healing process. As soon as I told myself that I would do just that the next time the dream appeared, it no longer came. Here's wishing you lots of peace, love and healing, Chani. You deserve it!
Post a Comment