Comments on: I am dreaming of…initiation?

By: Deborah Lipp

Deborah Lipp — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:47:21 +0000

Ben, that’s good advise. Although I don’t know the Kaplan-Williams book, I have long recommended “Inner Work” by Robert Johnson, which is all about this sort of thing.

By: Ben Gruagach

Ben Gruagach — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:41:38 +0000

Karen gave an excellent interpretation so it’s difficult to add much. One thing I might suggest is doing some work to interact directly with the dream characters you feel might be most helpful for deepening your understanding.

I wrote an article about the topic a while ago. It’s on my website at http://witchgrotto.com/content/view/71/9/

If you can get your hands on a copy of Strephon Kaplan-Williams “The Jungian-Senoi Dreamwork Manual” it has the best suggestions for working with dreams that I’ve ever seen.

By: Karen

Karen — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 13:09:49 +0000

You’re welcome.

By: Deborah Lipp

Deborah Lipp — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 12:43:59 +0000

Karen, thank you so much for this interpretation. Even though Kali’s eyes didn’t appear in the dream, my dreaming self knew the eyes were there on my waking body, so I think that’s a valid inclusion.

By: Karen

Karen — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 05:14:16 +0000

You expected young, you got old (Shaman), you expected a female, you got a male, Shaman offers literal birth rather than other transformation, intentions become something supposedly physically manifested so one can physically examine them (painfully, abusively), orthopraxy (correct practice) becomes abuse (wrong practice), Kali’s eye gets cut out (blinded) in an x like fashion in order to see (intentions), familiar (friend?) does the unfamiliar, wounding.

Everything seems topsy turvy, wounding you. What could have been sexy becomes horrific, unpleasant, bewildering, and “unnecessary.”

Things seem surreal — Kali’s eye is cut out in a cartoonish fashion, leaving an “+” where the eye was, similar to popular outsider images of voodoo dolls’ with their stitched “x” eyes only the symbol is turned — the wound forms a physical plus sign, as if someone is trying to make something wounding a positive, you submitted to it by being caught off guard in a situation you unexpectantly find yourself in.

Hmmm. Perhaps an old belief/relationship, not initiation, is what the dream is really about, since everything is topsy turvy. Perhaps what is blinding is really deepening insight.

It definitely involved Kali. Metangi, seen as an aspect of Kali by some, is often represented as someone who makes everything topsy turvy. Might not have anything to do with it, maybe it does.