Queen of Swords

This morning I dreamed I was doing internet research, glanced away from the computer, saw a small cobra on my desk rearing up -- and woke up fast!

So much for sleeping in this morning. . .

The rest of you probably aren't as fascinated by this as I am, but I think that there's only been one other time in my life when my dreams were working out a clear, consistent issue over several nights.

Last night I had a reprise of the themes of a large, shadowy sea creature and -- surprisingly -- a little girl in a harness.

( Behind a cut, since I doubt this is as interesting to everyone else. )

Keys to this dream: I was being assisted by a man -- and receiving moral support from other men -- but my dad did not appear in the dream at all. The shadowy creature in the depths was more visible and clearly harmless -- although it still made me nervous simply because of its size and unfamiliarity. The little girl might have been nervous, but she wasn't in a panic about what she was being asked to do.

I'm hoping that eventually I'm going to be in the water and making nice with the sea creature. We'll see how things progress. . .

Only one image lingers from last night's dream. . .

I am sitting in the prow of my dad's 8' fiberglass boat, the one he owned for decades and which was a constant feature of our family's summer excursions. We are in the waters of Puget Sound, near my sacred island. Dad is in the back, his hand on the controls of the outboard motor. We're racing across the water, bouncing over the waves.

It is an image from my life, one repeated many times over the years, one of the special bonding activities my dad and I shared. On the water.

I remember the last time we did this in life, the last time the family went to the island for a vacation. I remember how it felt to be racing both across and with the water, the delight in the bouncing up and down with the wind in my face. It was a sensation of pure joy.

My subconscious seems to be settling down and getting with the program.

My subconscious is reminding me that I have been doing my father the same disservice I have been doing myself in characterizing him primarily as ruler of Swords. He is a life-long fisherman, a life-long boater, a man of deep and intense feeling, even though he has often kept it hidden by the rules of discretion that govern men of his class and generation.

My father is also a man of Water.

Last night's dreams culminated in a sequence in which I tried to prepare a completely novice group of women for a battle. By the end of the dream it was an SCA war, but I can't remember now if it started out that way.

I had a relatively small group, perhaps a dozen or so people to educate, organize, and lead -- and I was utterly unable to do my job. The primary group splintered into little sub-groups, each of which was absorbed in its own conversations, most of which had nothing to do with the preparation for battle. Every time I tried to get them all together, something in our conditions shifted, so we had to move, or someone new came in. . . and everything fell apart again. (Hurm. Sounds like my own mind being unable to focus and constantly getting distracted from my primary goals by irrelevances.)

I think my Ex-husband (with whom I took the field in SCA battles on more than one occasion) was on the other side, but there were at least three parties to the conflict.

The beginning of the battle was soon upon us, and I frantically tried to arm my warriors -- only to realize that many of them had real weapons, not SCA fighter weapons. I was hurrying up and down the line, trying to explain to each woman that she could not actually strike with those weapons.

Finally someone -- I think it was pathdancer -- called to me that the battle was about to start. I hurried to my place in line to find that one of my "fighters" had tried to be helpful and had brought me my sword -- but it was the real sword I bought in the summer of 2007, not an SCA sword, and there was no time to run back and exchange it.

I was about to enter a recreational combat with a real weapon, and I was angry at myself for not being better prepared, angry at the person who'd tried to help me by bringing the wrong weapon, and angry that I was about to fail as a fighter and a leader because I couldn't strike without doing harm.


Which all resonates very strongly with the non-rational fears which I believe are part of the reason why I continue to struggle turning my vocational practice into actual work. Except, as I type this, I realize that when I touch those fears while I'm awake, I perceive that there is a threat of harm to me if I pursue them. The dream suggests that I'm actually afraid that I'm unfit to lead and that if I actually use my gifts I'll bring harm to others.

The last bit immediately brings up memories of 'learning' at a very young age that answering all the questions in class made me a "show-off" and I needed to be considerate of the feelings of others, give them a chance to respond too. As far as I can presently discern, that's the root of my inhibition about stepping up and offering my gifts to the world: that somehow my letting my light shine will intimidate others or make them uncomfortable.

Somehow I need to learn the lesson from the Marianne Williamson quote which a_belletrist posted last week. I always remember the opening line: "Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure."

What I forget is the closing lines:

As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

I experience this frequently in the presence of others who have allowed their gifts to shine. But I have not yet internalized it for myself.

My gifts are not a threat to those around me.

And while it is within the realm of possibility that I could cause harm to someone if I made a major error during a spiritual direction session, it's actually unlikely that my mistakes in a session or classroom will actually hurt anyone.

Is that what I need to look at more deeply?

Two days left in admin hell!

I have to buy a new bathing suit today for the trip.
Not looking forward to it.

Dreamed last night that I got to Florida and it was snowing.
That really put a crimp in the Everglades open-boat tour.

Thanks to everyone for the book recommendations!
I went with blessed_harlot's recommendation of Snow Crash, and a historical fiction novel I found called On a Highland Shore. However I'm keeping all the suggestions for future reference. If anyone has additional recommendations, please feel free to leave them at the previous post or on this one.

Just woke from a nightmare in which I was in bed, desperately fighting something I couldn't see or feel that was trying to eliminate me. I was struggling wildly, unable to call out. I woke up straining and hot.

The only reason waking up is anything of a comfort is that my dream was set in an entirely different house.

Actually. . . I have dim images of two others in the dream. One was an older man, an ally, who at first was unable to reach me. The other was a shadow-figure of who/whatever had been attacking me. It darted off into another room and vanished through a closet when my ally arrived.

I couldn't see my ally clearly, but his energy reminds me of one -- or the other? or both? -- friend-allies I met in a dream a few months ago: one who this time appeared as a sturdy, vigorous gray-haired man, and the other a large black man with a warrior-tribe overtone.

Usually in my dreams I can fight off whatever is threatening me. Not this time. I was losing, and there was nothing I could do about it. It was my allies who saved my life.

I'm not going back to sleep for awhile.

I hate it when I can't remember my dreams, or remember only fragments. It's like being deprived of part of my own life.

Last night's dreams combined images of work, family, spirituality. . .

In one, someone from work had decorated a classroom around a theme that I think related to a book. When I went in, I found dozens of black and white drawings of people hanging from the ceiling, and as many models of ravens. The overall impact was of a lot of black all massed together above peoples' heads. I didn't like it at all, but everyone with me was enthusiastic. The man who did the decorating was especially eager for me to like it. I'm not sure why.

The dream continued on, and I was in another large room filled with medical examination tables, each of which had a person from work or school. A doctor was working his way through the room examining us, but when he got to me the exam was more thorough, checking my body in a way that required him to lift my gown. I told him to stop, that I didn't want him doing that in a room with other people, and he hadn't examined the others that way so why was he doing it with me. I don't think that he had an answer.

Then he shone his little flashlight onto my forehead, and it revealed the hole in the third eye position where the black crystal went in. He found it very interesting -- and did not seem surprised, as if he had been expecting it. Thinking about it now, I'm wondering if this was a more subtle version of my periodic boundary-testing dreams.

This morning 9thmoon posted a weird and wonderful dream she had last night.

I am re-posting her dream and our follow-up conversation with her kind permission.

9th Moon: I dreamed that [other names omitted] qos and her boyfriend Aragorn, and me and [omitted], went to a terribly expensive, formal, multiple-course dinner at a fancy restaurant downtown, wearing tuxes and strapless gowns with beaded shawls, and then we went to see Lord of the Rings ON ICE at Key Arena.

Me: Did I really have a dress-up dinner date with *Aragorn* in your dream? I'm jealous that I missed all the fun! (And I love skating shows too!)

9th Moon: Yes, and you were gorgeous, too, in soft gray silk with crystals and pearls sewn on the bodice and the shawl, and your hair curled and piled on top of your head, with sparkly eyeshadow. *grin*

Me: Aaaarrggh! Next time, invite me ahead of time!!

It's Saturday morning after a very long, stressful week and a half.
I was up until past eleven last night hanging out with my daughter, since we hadn't seen each other all week.

Why am I wide awake at 6:40am?
(And have been for the past forty minutes?)

I'm doing some LJ and email, and then will head back to bed.

In the meantime, I had another "violating boundaries" dream -- but this time I was the violator. In a quiet, unintentional way.

I had been walking and evidently I had been so lost in thought that I had inadvertently crossed the border from the US into Canada. I looked up and suddenly realized that the road and landscape around me weren't familiar and there were red maple leaves everywhere.

The border station was behind me, so I turned around, hurried back, and went inside, hoping that they would let me cross back into my own country again, for I had no ID, no passport, and nothing like a good excuse.

But the woman who heard my story was sweet and compassionate, and helped me out. So did bookchick, who for some reason was working in their storeroom. Eventually they got me onto a tour bus (or car) that was heading back into the U.S.

Evidently some part of myself is a bit nervous about the potential newness in my life in one or more of several areas.