Ancestral Dreaming

I'm inspired by Samhain and Day of the Dead to speak about ancestral dreaming.

This can have many meanings. We may dream about the land where our blood ancestors lived. We may dream about the land upon which we were born. We may dream about lands we lived on in past lives.

And it's not just the land that comes to us, but the ancestors as well. I know many people who have dreamed of grandparents, great-grandparents, and even more distant ancestors who have passed away and visited in dreams. In my own work, I've come to believe that it's not just blood ancestors, but the people I call spiritual ancestors, who come to us as well.

Three years ago, on the morning of Halloween, I had just such a dream.

I see a spinning globe with red lines being drawn all over it. One line is drawn down Eastern Europe or Africa, I'm not sure which. Then I hear someone telling a story about hundreds of orphans. I am one. I am in a house with the people who adopted me. I am drawing a big blue and green eye on my hand between my pointer finger and thumb. It is shaped like the eye of Horus. As I draw the eye, I have a memory: I work at a market. Every day I see another girl who works there who has a beautiful brown horse. I want to go see her, but I am afraid. Finally, I do. She has symbols drawn in purple on her hand...one is a half-moon, another may be an eye. She is a gypsy and a psychic and she tells me I have the gift too. That night, as I am drawing the eye on my hand and having this memory, a violent storm blows in with lots of lightening and pounding rain. I am scared at its power and feel it's related to me somehow. My adopted mom and I look out the window and see our house surrounded by a flood.

That night, I was lucky enough to work this dream in a class I was taking. We did Gestalt dream theater in which each piece of the dream is played by someone in the room. When I walked up to the woman playing the gypsy psychic, she said, "This is your lineage." I had shivers.

I knew the ancestors had come to me in my dream. You can see the importance of the land in the dream as well, from the map to the market to the house. And storms play a big role in my life, so it's no surprise I have a violent, scary storm raging outside in this dream. I've worked with this dream on and off during these three years and it continues to bring me gifts.

I encourage you to do your own ancestral dreaming, especially at this time of the year. Speak to the ancestors. Call out to your ancestral lands. See what comes.

Here are some other writings on ancestral dreaming to whet your palate.

Dream Genealogy by Amy Brucker

Connecting with the Ancestors on Day of the Dead/Samhain/Halloween by Robert Moss

Initiation Dreams by Erin Langley

Somatic Dreamwork

Ever since my first exposure to it in a class called Dreams & the Body taught by Karen Jaenke, somatic dreamwork has become one of my methods of choice, both when doing my own dreamwork and when working with others.

Somatic dreamwork involves listening to your body, and specifically finding where dream images live in your body. According to the somatic dream theorists, dreams live in our bodies in much the same way memory is stored in our bodies. The dreams stay in our bodies until we unearth and work with them.

How does one connect the body and the dream? A great technique is focusing, developed by Eugene Gendlin, who wrote one of my favorite dream books Let Your Body Interpret Your Dreams. Basically, the dreamer closes her eyes and focuses on her body while holding the dream or a specific dream image in mind. Usually within a few moments a body sensation or felt sense appears. It can feel like a stabbing pain, a murky unpleasantness, a warmth, tingling in the thigh...any number of sensations can appear.

After finding the felt sense, the dreamer stays with it as long as comfortable and tries to see what the sensation has to say. This can involve asking it a question or merely staying with it to see what comes up. In my experience, what the felt sense has to say surprises the dreamer and leads to an "a ha." Other times, the felt sense moves around like a slippery fish, trying to escape detection. Usually though, if the dreamer stays with it, she will gain insight into what the dream had to say through the body sensation.

While working with Karen in a recent session, she asked me to feel a specific dream character in my body. Immediately I felt nauseous, one of my least-favorite sensations. However, I tried to stay with the nausea. As I watched it and allowed it to be present, it began dissolving and eventually morphed into relief. Instead of pushing against the nausea, which had a specific message, I allowed it to appear and held it gently, listening to its message. After I received the message, it did not need to remain and it disappeared. This is important: often body symptoms have a great deal to teach us if we are willing to listen to their messages rather than pushing or medicating them away.

Remember my friend with the house dream? I used somatic dreamwork with her, asking her to feel where the house lived in her body. It turned out that the house was her body. This caused her great surprise and gave her a valuable message.

I recommend trying this the next time you have a dream you can't figure out. Choose the most potent image from the dream. Close your eyes and ask the question, "Where does this live in my body." Give it time to appear. Follow your body sensations...do you have a crick in your neck? A warmth in your leg? Any sensation you have is valid. Then stay with the sensation. Arnold Mindell would recommend amplifying the sensation, making it more intense in order to get its message. Then ask the sensation what it wants to tell you. Listen. If it moves, allow it to move and simply follow it with your attention. Patience and an openness to your body's messages are key.

I've found that these methods get past all the complicated work with symbols and archetypes. Don't get me wrong: I love work with symbols and archetypes, but sometimes I want to find the message of the dream in its pure and immediate form. And this method can be incredibly and deeply healing.

The Reluctant Dreamer

She said she never remembered her dreams. She said she felt intimidated about working with dreams because everyone else has epic dreams with many scenes and incredible characters and she doesn't have those kinds of dreams.

I asked her if she could remember anything at all from the last few weeks. She paused. "No," she said. "Nothing." Pause.

"Although I do have a theme."

A theme? How was that possible if she hadn't remembered any dreams at all?

"Well," she said, "the theme is houses."

Aha! We were on to something here. I asked her if she remembered any of the houses.

"Not really. I mean, there was one house, a beautiful Victorian." And then she described an amazing house in full detail. I could picture it in my mind, she described it so well. I knew this was my chance.

I asked her if she would be willing to work that dream.

"Dream? That isn't a dream, it's just one image."

I told her even one image, especially one remembered in such detail, counts.

We proceeded. I asked her to become the house through a technique called gestalt, and asked her to answer questions as if she were the house. When she finished, I proposed she read the answers imagining she was reading about herself and not the house.

At first she was silent. Then she clucked her tongue, shook her head, and widened her eyes. I wasn't sure if I'd bombed or hit the nail on the head.

"Wow," she said. "That's amazing. It totally tells me about myself right now."

From there, I asked her to feel where the dream lived in her body, which led to more insights. This is why I love dreamwork. It brings us home, right to the center of ourselves, and shows us what we haven't been paying attention to.

All you need to work a dream is one image. Even if it is in black and white. Even if all you can say is that you remember an elephant. Or a pencil. Or a bush. You can tease a lot out of an image: what feeling does it evoke? What does it remind you of? Even those two questions can take you on an amazing journey of self-discovery. It doesn't have to be fancy, you don't have to know about archetypes and symbols, and you don't have to have an advanced degree in mythology. All you need is a little time, the dream image, and a mind and heart that are willing to hear what your soul wants to say.

Gratitude Sale

I have so much gratitude for those who read my blog, support my art, and make me and my work feel welcome in the world.

And so, for the rest of the year, I am having a sale to say thanks.

Details
Buy any of the following:
*two 11x14 prints from October Photography
* a one-hour aura reading
* a one-hour dreamwork session
and get another item from the list FREE.

Mix and match! Buy two fabulous gifts for two fabulous friends, or get one item for a family member and treat yourself to the other item! There are endless possibilities.

THANK YOU for all of your support this year!

Intuitive Readings and Dreamwork

I am thrilled to announce that I now offer intuitive readings! For the last 18 months I have studied in the clairvoyant training program at Intuitive Way. I am trained in several types of readings: aura, past life, spirit guide, relationship, life path, and career, as well as custom readings.

Why get an intuitive reading? They validate you and give you a healing. They help you grow and transform. This is not me giving you advice. This is me communicating with your higher self/spirit in order to give you a direct link to your inner knowing. The process is illuminating and exciting.

Visit my intuitive reading page at Katrina Dreamer to find out more. I'm currently running a special: buy a 30-minute session and you'll receive a 15-minute session free.

I am also proud to offer private dreamwork. As you know, dreamwork is one of my passions and I find the process endlessly exciting. It is often difficult to do dreamwork alone; working with someone else who can offer feedback and help you unpack the symbols takes the pressure off of you to figure it all out on your own. I only go as deep as you are ready to go and I always create a safe space for the dreamwork.

Visit my dreamwork page at Katrina Dreamer to find out more. I am currently offering a special for dreamwork as well: if you schedule a 1.5 hour session you will receive a free 15-minute intuitive reading.

I look forward to working with you either as a reader, a dreamworker, or both!