Symbol Watcher

My rendering of the wooden floor tile in my dream. Although there are many elements which speak of wholeness in this graphic, it is not a mandala. I'll explain the differences and provide Jung's characteristics for a mandala in a blog later this week.

I can recall only a handful of dreams I’ve had in which a graphic pattern was a central symbol. But I had one late last week and I’ve been trying to make sense of it for days.

The dream is very long so, for the sake of electronic brevity, here’s a shortened version:

I am in the living room of my “home” (not where I reside in conscious life). I see the dark turquoise paint has begun to peel off my living room wall. It’s rolling neatly down to the floor, revealing the white drywall underneath. I realize the paint is peeling because there’s a leak somewhere; water is dripping down the back of the wall.

Now I’ve gone up to the attic to find out what part of the ceiling is leaking. I am surprised at how large the attic is. It’s actually a very wide, long hallway. Nothing is stored in the attic, but I can see the opening to another room at the far end. I can’t see how large the room is or what’s in it.

I look down at the floor. It’s made of a beautiful, rich wood — like cedar or redwood or teak. The wood is cut into square tiles that repeat throughout the entire space. The walls are made of the same rich wood but they are cut in long planks that run on a diagonal from floor to ceiling.

I wonder why the workers who built the house went to such great pains to build the attic with such quality and detail. I look up and see an open sky light. Then I see a second one that’s open but covered with a screen. I look to my left and see that a portion of the upper part of the wall is completely open. I realize the attic has been open all this time, but I didn’t know it. I think of winter time and the attic being open to the cold and I wonder if it’s made the living areas of the house colder.

I look at the floor again. The wood is wet from the rain, but I realize it’s the kind of wood that is made to withstand the elements. I understand the leak in my living room is not coming from the attic.

Now I’m standing on the outside of my house. I look up very high above my head and see water streaming down from the roof line. The wood is not of the same high quality as the wood in my attic, so the rain has rotted it through. I know this is where the leak is coming from.

Since this is a blog and not a book, I’m going to focus on the symbolism and interpretation of the middle part of the dream: my journey through the attic. When I think of an attic, I think of a place where we store things from our past that we rarely use but that we may want to keep for sentimental or reference reasons, such as family heirlooms or old paperwork. So in dream symbolism, I associate an attic as my psyche’s repository for my individual life experiences.

At first, I couldn’t understand why there weren’t any objects there — only the wood-laden walls and floors and the sky-lit roof. Then I realized my attic being empty is a comment on me feeling that I don’t have any life experiences that are hidden from view. Either because of my own candor or the candor of others, my ups and downs are well known among the people closest to me. It’s all quite open and exposed to the outside.  

I suppose anyone who’s gone through any sort of self-induced disclosure or public prying knows what it’s like to have an empty attic. For me, discovering this open dream attic forces me to ask myself: have the harsh feelings and cold assumptions of the outside world (winter) caused me to become a bit of a hermit, to withdraw and distance myself from other people (have my experiences made the living areas of my house colder)? As I thought about this part of the dream, I teared up and became very sad because I know the answer is yes.  

So at the same time I’m beginning to realize how my open-book life has affected my relationships, the dream also points out that I have the inner strength to withstand what the outside world brings in. There’s no reason to stop. I need to keep moving along my journey. This is the comment my dream makes through the symbolism of the wooden floor tiles and walls.

My dream attic screams movement. Its proportion is that of a very wide and long hallway — a passageway to that room at the far end. The wall planks slant forward, not straight up and down or back. The wood tiles are a paradox in that their design both points to the center yet repeats out ahead of me to create the entire expanse of floor.

In Man and His Symbols, Aniela Jaffé tells us, “The square is a symbol of earthbound matter, of the body and reality.” The square relates to physical space, the four directions. In some circumstances it can also refer to the four functions of consciousness — thought, feeling, intuition and sensation. It’s a shape of balance. It’s a shape that comments on earthly existence and our relationship to it, in it. The square is the here and now of this life. 

The two lines that form an X speak to me of symbiotic movement to and from the center, to and from the four corners (the directions I take my life and the functions of consciousness I utilize to carry me in those directions).  This center point represents the balance that is possible for me to achieve within myself and therefore within this world if I can manage to bring these disparate aspects together. 

The triangles perform double duty to me. Each acts as a directional device pointing to the center. But each also seems to represent a certain element of my psyche. A triangle pointing up is a male symbol and a triangle pointing down is a female symbol. The triangle on the right says something to me about consciousness and the one on the left reminds me of what is within myself that is shadow and unconscious. So it seems the triangles are showing me that I must also strive to incorporate these aspects of myself, to bring them together, in balance, at the center.

What also struck me about these tiles is that the square and the triangle shapes are each doubled within the tile. There is a square inside a square. There are the triangles created by the two intersecting lines and then the triangles within each of those four quadrants. I’m not sure, but perhaps this is to emphasize the importance of the task I have in front of me, and/or to reassure me that I have the power (times 2 maybe?) to accomplish it. I’m not sure.

What I do know is the strength, richness and intricacy of the wood in my attic touched me and I’m grateful I was given the dream.

Please feel free to post any thoughts you have on the dream I’ve shared with you or on any dream you’ve had where a graphic element has had special meaning for you.

– Writeye  

May 19th, 2009 | Tags: attic symbolism, square symbolism, Triangle symbolism, winter symbolism, wood symbolism | Category: Dreams, Jungian Psychology |  Print This Post |  Email This Post | Leave a comment

Martyred around 303 A.D., St. Romanus of Caesarea spoke out in favor of the church. His tongue was subsequently removed on the order of Emperor Galerius.

Baring teeth and protruding tongues have long been displays of aggression and dominance in the human and animal kingdoms.

Along with their self-protective power, teeth can also symbolize vitality because they are crucial in helping us break down and consume food. Teeth are also associated with sexual potency. Various species bite their mates during sex.

In dreams, loosing teeth or needing to clean ones teeth could point to a need for the dreamer to examine power issues in his or her life.  Perhaps the dreamer’s sexual energy is waning for some reason. The dreamer could also be loosing power in some other area of life — perhaps in some personal, non-sexual relationship, or in a work relationship. Other symbols in the dream should help narrow down the interpretation. 

If the dreamer is very domineering and perhaps even destructive in some aspect of his or her waking life, a dream of loosing teeth may show the necessity to find a more balanced outer attitude when dealing with others. Conversely, maybe the dreamer is not usually aggressive enough in conscious life and a dream of having an inadequate number of teeth is a comment on needing to take the necessary steps to ensure a nourishing and fulfilling life. 

Brushing teeth in a dream may be showing us that we need to clean up some aspect of the agressive/defensive or sexual side of our psyche.

Tongues, when extended, symbolize aggression right along with teeth. But a stuck-out tongue also communicates defiance — just ask any teenager whose ever stuck her tongue out at her brother or sister, or even her parents. Tongues are also associated with flames because both are red and moving and consuming.  Tongues are crucial to our ability to form the sounds that become the language we need to communicate. So if we have a dream in which our tongue has been cut out, what force within or without is stifling our ability to speak? If we find ourselves with a forked tongue, we may need to ask ourselves if we are communicating in a harmful, deceitful way. 

– Writeye

May 12th, 2009 | Tags: teeth symbolism, tongue symbolism | Category: Dreams, Jungian Psychology, Symbol Brief |  Print This Post |  Email This Post | Leave a comment

Video Link: Face Transplant Recipient Talks About Being Thankful and Forgiving

I’ve been following the story of Connie Culp with some fascination and much admiration. She is the 47-year-old woman who underwent the first total face transplant in America. She lost her face five years ago when her husband blew it away with a gun shot blast.

Connie’s story has captured me because she has lived through — on a physical level — one of the more painful psychological experiences a person can have: Connie has lost her face.

From our earliest childhood, we are taught the importance of adapting to the larger society, of fitting in.  Jung reminds us in his work, The Relations Between the Ego and the Unconscious (Volume 7), that we adjust our individuality to conform to the various segments of society with which we’re associated: our families,  employers, ethnic and cultural groups, social networks, religious affiliations, etc. “This arbitrary segment of collective psyche — often fashioned with considerable pains — I have called the persona. The term persona is really a very appropriate expression for this, for originally it meant the mask once worn by actors to indicate the role they played.  . . . Fundamentally the persona is nothing real: it is a compromise between individual and society as to what a man should appear to be.”

I am so struck by Connie and her story. Especially in Western culture, we are judged so severely for our looks. We change our dress and hair (especially women) to fit in to the particular social situation. Studies have shown we are more receptive to attractive people on first meeting than people we deem unattractive. As humans, we even have an embedded blue print for attractiveness that has to do with the symmetry of our facial features. In an interview that aired this morning (I’ve included an excerpt above), Connie tells Good Morning America’s Diane Sawyer a wonderful story of how she turned an encounter with a little girl who was frightened by her looks into a learning experience for both the child and the girl’s father.

What happens to us when our personas are stripped away? When we are cast out because we are no longer the “compromise between individual and society as to what a man should appear to be”?

Some of us are cast out because of something we did that the group finds unacceptable and some of us are cast out because we are victims of someone else’s negative projections, misunderstandings or out-and-out anger. I’ve experienced both and Connie has certainly experienced the latter in one of the most painful ways I can imagine.

Jung tells us that we still need our various personas as tools to function effectively in a collective world, but he stresses that it is unwise to identify too much with any one mask because if we lose that mask, it may be a fall from which we won’t be able to recover.

It seems to me this is a lesson Connie has learned well and is trying to teach the rest of us. Whenever we are stripped of one of our masks, it can give us the hard-earned gift of coming into closer contact with our core individuality, if we’re willing to let go of the who who is no longer.

As Connie pointed out to the little girl in the grocery store, her face is not who she is.  It seems to me that Connie’s wisdom is in her ability to let go of her old identity, to be grateful for and make the most of the  new life she has been given and forgive her husband for the pain he caused her.  

– Writeye

May 8th, 2009 | Tags: Connie Culp, face transplant recipient, persona | Category: Current Events, Jungian Psychology |  Print This Post |  Email This Post | Leave a comment

I’ve been having one of those mornings when I haven’t been able to decide what I should do today. I feel so many responsibilities staring me in the face and they’re all running through my brain simultaneously. I want to write and I’d like to do some research to see what type of freelance and part-time writing opportunities are out there. Then there’s my cat-fur laden carpet that needs to be vacuumed, my food-splotched kitchen floor that needs to be mopped and my allergy-aggravating dusty furniture that needs to be cleaned.  It’s all been calling my name, all at once.

Incapable of making a decision, I picked up a book I started a couple weeks ago.  For me, the mystery of books is that I always seem to find some information or insight I need in my life right then and there, even though I’m not necessarily looking for it in the particular book I’m reading.  And so it went this morning, when, in his book Pathways to Bliss, Joseph Campbell taught me the following: “All life has drudgery to it.  . . . In Zen, however, even while you’re washing the dishes, that’s a meditation, that’s an act of life. It’s not a chore . . . Sometimes the drudgery itself can become part of the hero deed. The point is not to get stuck in the drudgery but to use it to free you.  . . . When you know, from the heart in the middle, this is when you bring the factor of love in. As long as the dishes aren’t it, you’re just trapped in the chore. When you love the dishes and you think about what they mean in your life, when they’re your family’s food, sustenance, and all, then it’s all transformed into metaphor and you’re free.”

After I read Campbell’s words, I realized I need to practice moving through my day with an inner balance, not letting myself feel split because I’ve tagged some things that require my attention ”chores.” Cat hair and dust in high enough amounts are irritating whether you’re an allergy sufferer or not. If I begin to think of vaccuming and dusting as “metaphor” for keeping my family healthy and more comfortable, then the tasks become demonstrations of love and kindness and not dull duties. I never looked at housework that way before (making meals, yes, but housework, no).

When I’m ready to take a break from writing today, I’m going to try grabbing the vacuum with a little more gladness in my heart.  

– Writeye

May 7th, 2009 | Tags: housework as metaphor, Zen philosophy of finding joy in all aspects life | Category: Books, Jungian Psychology |  Print This Post |  Email This Post | Leave a comment

Nichols reminds us that sustained candlelight is achieved through living. "One of the shutters of the Hermit's lamp is blood red, so that the light filtering through it is touched with the color of flesh-and-blood humanity -- tinged with the passion and compassion distilled from the experiences of a lifetime."

I’ve been sitting here in my home office this morning trying to decide what I want to post on my blog. As I was waiting for my brain fog to clear, I lit a candle. I go through a lot of candles. I need the light.

Often, when I’m meditating on a dream I had, or when I’m asking the tarot cards for some illumination, I’ll sit in front of a candle. During the times when I become relaxed and open enough to hear my inner voice, it seems as if the candle streams rays of light right to me.  

The ritual of lighting candles is found in most religious traditions. It’s a way for a universal phenomenon to be brought down to our small, individual, human level.  Advent candles, Eucharist candles, Menorahs, Diwali lamps, candles at Buddha’s feet . . . all lit in our attempt to achieve some spiritual enlightenment during our ongoing battle with the black void of ignorance.

I said earlier that I use Tarot cards as one tool to help me along in my journey. I think it’s interesting that there’s only one card among the major arcana of the deck that shows candlelight. It’s the Hermit. In her book, Jung and Tarot  An Archetypal Journey, Sallie Nichols talks about how candlelight stands as a symbol for both psychological and spiritual insight. “His lamp seems an apt symbol for the individual insight of the mystic.  . . . the Hermit offers us the possibility of individual illumination as a universal human potential, an experience not confined to canonized saints but available, in some degree, to all humankind. . . . He offers us that inward light whose golden flame alone dispels spiritual chaos and darkness.”

So if candlelight, from a psychological perspective, symbolizes spiritual insight gained through inner knowing, I think we’d be wise to take note if it shows up in our dreams.  Are we able to light the candle and keep it lit? Is someone helping us light it? Who is that person? Remember, the person might represent an aspect of ourselves. Is the candle protected from negative influences (both internal and external) such as wind and rain? If not, what blew it out?

– Writeye

May 5th, 2009 | Tags: candlelight symbolism, Hermit tarot card symbolism | Category: Jungian Psychology, Symbol Brief |  Print This Post |  Email This Post | Leave a comment