The plan was to begin this blog on the first of June, however, being a new mother of a six month old my first thought when I wake up is my child – not trying to remember my dream. Which by the way is ironic considering I am doing a blog about dreams and the tarot. Over the course of the last 15 days I have only remember pieces of a few dreams and nothing that has really woken me up in a while. So my plans for the first day of blogging changed to the 15th of June and would be with our without a fleshed out dream. I kept hoping and asking for a dream for this day. What I got is not at all what I wanted to start out with in my blog! However, my dreams are more aware of what I need then my waking state – so in my dreams I do trust your wisdom for this day and the start of my blog.

Dream:

I am in the city with some friends. Somehow I know that my ex, Sol, is in the same vicinity and we are merely crossing paths. I see his path as a triangle. I heard that his mother owns a nail shop in this small inside mall type of place. I am curious about what it looks like and ask my friends to come sneak a peek of it. We are directed to a hallway that almost spirals in on its self to the shop. Dragon is in the name of the shop (not sure what the other word was in the name). We peek in to see that it is a shabby little hole in the wall shop that looks like an old Chinese food restaurant with a picture of the dragon on the sign. We turn around to leave.

Then I am with a group of friends that are taking me on some type of trip. Somehow Sol has gotten the group to agree to take him too. It almost feels like a group trip that you would take in college to go to another country or state. I am surprised that he is coming and uncomfortable about it. In the next scene, Sol has cornered me in a small bathroom with the door open. He is standing in front of the opening and I am close to the sink and toilet. The walls are a bright sunny pastel yellow and the fixtures are white with a white door. He comes to talk to me about being on the same trip as me. I tell him about my dog Halo (German Shepard), who was his and his families before, that she is not doing well. As I tell him about her refusing to take her pills, struggling to walk and having kidney problems, he and I both get sad with tears in our eyes. Then he turns into a German Shepard that is mostly black with brown accents (much like the other dog we owned, Ranger, who passed away several months after our separation), so I sit on the toilet to pet him as he rubs his face all over me.

He brings up his sister, which saddens me and I move towards the corner of the bathroom looking down as I tell him that I miss her still. He knows that she still cares for me deep inside, while alluding to the fact that she doesn’t speak of it or show it. Then he says that they talk about me, to which I respond, “Yes.. talk shit about me”, as I move to the sink with my face hung low. Then I am brushing my teeth with a white toothbrush. He responds that it was just the way that I had everything ready. I go to rebut his statement, and then stop myself and reply that it has been 5 years and I don’t remember the details of it all as clearly as I did. I tell him that I do not want to get into the past. He agrees. I am cleaning the toilet with a white toilet brush.

He looks at me in the eyes and in his look I can see that he still remembers the love that we once had for each other, and it softens the moment. He tells me that he wants to let go of the past and start a new relationship of being civil with each other. I want that too but stutter trying to say what I feel, not wanting to admit that I want the same. Then I manage to tell him that I would like that too. In my mind I think about how I too would like to be able to pass by him on the street and say a quick hello/how are things, instead of avoiding each other like the plague and despising each other as an arch nemesis.

As we are talking I take the toilet brush and my toothbrush and put it in the bag I am carrying. I realize how gross that is to have those two brushes together in the bag, and decide to throw both of them away in the trash thinking that I will get new ones later. Next we are on an open roof top in what reminds me of the weather in England/Scotland (overcast cloudy layer with brisk air) talking. We now begin to speak as if we were old acquaintances/friends. All of the sudden I hear my baby cry through the walkie talkie that I have in my hand, and remember that I am a mother. So I tell him that I have a son and ask if he would like to meet him. That takes him back and he replies that he is not ready for that now. I tell him how my son looks like me, and someday I would like Sol to see him.

First “Aha’s”:

I know that Sol and I cannot have this friendly relationship in real life, but at least in my dreams we can be. It gives me a sense of peace within I can look at our old relationship from a new perspective. I want to remember him with a fondness for the reasons that brought us together, not the ugly way it unraveled over the course of so many years. The toothbrush and toilet brush really stood out because they seem like such random things in the midst of this dream. However, they are very significant. I am brushing my teeth when I speak of knowing that his sister is talking crap about me. Then clean the toilet when we get in the conversation about the past. I am reminded that I too have spoken a lot of negative words and have given them crap as well. It was time for me to clean my mouth and my commode (the place that has received my crap). Then I took those tools and threw them away because they were contaminated, and I no longer wanted to carry them around with me. Upon throwing them away Sol and I were moved from a small cramped “waste” room to an open roof top where we could see the city, breath fresh brisk air, and speak to each other as acquaintances. We had moved forward from the past and had a greater perspective of where we are in the world.

This dream also comes at the close of Sol and my real life legal issues. At the end of this month we will be done with our dispute and dissolve the old ties. Both he and I will be able to move on with our separate lives completely, no longer having the past hanging around us on legal documents. The Scotland/England dream weather puts me back to the place where it all ended with us in this physical life, and now is where we can start again.

I also see the dream at another level regarding my career, considering that I did ask for a dream for this blog. I have spoken many words (brushing teeth, toothbrush) but most of it has gone to waste (toilet, toilet brush) because I have not written those words. There are so many days where I have had written my dream analysis or sections for my book — only in my head! My old ways and tools (like remembering) have wasted my efforts and time away. In addition to that, blogging is a new method of communication for me. I am opening myself up to the view of the whole world, as well as changing my tools from documenting dreams in a journal (contained space of the bathroom) to seeing the greater perspective of what my dreams can help me accomplish (i.e. standing on an open roof top).

Tarot:

For this dream I do not have a direct hit on any particular card that I should pull, but rather a deck that I should use. The dragon stood out as being the key and therefore I will be using the Feng Shui cards. I decided to use the method of shuffling the cards as I replay my dream in my head and either blindly pull out or use any that drop from the deck. The first one fell out of the deck as I was shuffling – White Tiger 6 (aka 4 of Swords). It depicts a white tiger crossing a creek with half of its body on one side and half on the other.The side that it is leaving has clouds on it and the side it is crossing to seems to have taller grass. I reminded of a couple of dreams I had when we were deep in the legal battle. In one dream my cat Cheena, who I got when we were together, was cut in half by a sliding closet door; in the other she had the rear part of her burnt in a house fire that she quickly recovered from (By the way, I call Cheena my Tigeress). I always saw those dreams as symbolic of the dividing up of property between Sol and I, since Cheena was technically both of ours at one time. He always had the back end (toliet?) while I had the front half (mouth/toothbrush?). I feel like this signifies the crossing over from the clouded part of my life into a lush and clear perspective. The book to the deck of cards states that the worst is over, and dwelling in the past will inhibit my new goals. I should disconnect from the past negativity.

The next card I pulled was White Tiger 4. Ironically I chose this card twice because I stuck it in the deck again before I was done picking all of the cards for this dream (should leave them out until finished choosing). I pulled this card for both the symbol of the dog and the dragon in the dream. It is the picture of a tiger on the other side of a bamboo fence staring intently on two little beautifully colored birds. At first I could not tell which was being contained, the birds or the tiger. But based on the large separations in the fence and the height of the fence, I know it is not the birds – they can fly away anytime they like. However I am not sure that the Tiger is completely trapped in a confined space or he just happens to be walking along the fence line of someones property. My first thought is remembering how Sol’s mother use to have stuffed animals that symbolized every family member – all of them being some big cat such as a lion or tiger (and since her family was pretty big there was a large pack of these big cats). When Sol and I got serious, his mother told me that she would find a stuffed animal to symbolize me. The day came when she showed me the one that she had found to represent my personality – it was a white domestic house cat from the Aristocats movie (not street smart, naive, and sheltered in luxury – ironically not at all like me). I should have known then that is how they would view me for my entire relationship with Sol, but I am pretty sure during the legal battles they got to see that I was really a Mountain Lion (a genetically close relative of the domestic cat). So if he and his family represent the white tiger, then I am the birds on the other side of the fence. We will always be on different sides of the fence about the way it all went down. However, I am free to fly away, land anywhere I want to be and view the world from a greater perspective, while they are confined to only view from the earth bound perspective and limited in exploring the world by man-made dividers. Since I did pull this card under the request to understand the dragon and the dog symbolism in my dream better, I will have to view this card in that context as well. Originally Sol’s family owned Halo and Ranger and they were confined in a very small kennel for two large dogs on the side of the house. When his parent’s asked us to take the dogs because they were moving, Halo and Ranger were able to freely roam the entire yard. Eventually when they calmed down, they became inside/outside dogs and a closer part of our family. So I see the Tiger as representing the dogs confinement prior to me, and their freedom symbolized by the birds, when they came to me. I have given them a good life that they have enjoyed until their dying days. In regards to the dragon in my dream based on this card, I feel it is speaking to me about Sol’s mom whom also collected dragon statues. She is the matriarch of the family and was always the underbelly current of the family with or without them being conscious of it. Should I have relations with anyone even in the extended family, she will be watching or somehow know. The book from the deck speaks of changes that are happening but not completely solidified, and for me to take my time moving forward. I think this is in regards to both with my past relationship with Sol and my blog. Although I would love to write a blog every day, in reality I cannot live up to that at this time in my life. I am still adjusting to being a mother, and I enjoy really digging into each dream on many levels.

As I am shuffling and get to the part of the dream about Sol’s sister, The Hermit card comes flying out. I am a bit perplexed by this card; nothing comes to mind instantly. The Hermit holds a lantern in the darkness. Perhaps it is the little bit of loving memory that she still holds onto. I remember when I told her that I was going to leave Sol. She was so understanding and thanked me for being so good to him for the majority of our relationship. I was shocked to hear her say that, but relieved to have been seen, even for a moment, for how I had been to him for so many years. The Hermits robe is mostly black and white with some bright red flowers about it. Sol’s sister was very black or white when it came to the matters of the family, and which side she would reside on at the end. It may sound strange, but I respect her for who she is even if she talked crap about me or shared every secret I ever told her. She was always who she was and I knew how she would be once it ended – because she never hid her opinion or backed down from her stance. As I look at the circular shield that has the design of a wheel on it, I remember the saying “what comes around, goes around”. There are parts of the end of the relationship that I handled very poorly and learned from the hard way, but there are other parts that were going to end badly either avenue I chose. My savior through the rough years of the legal battle was finishing my course work and thesis at University of Philosophical Research. The wheel depicted on the shield represents the Eightfold Path to help people walk the “Middle Way”. The Eightfold Path consists of the: right view, right thought, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right contemplation. I too need to walk the middle path between hate and love, blame and guilt, sadness and joy when it comes to Sol and his family. More than that I need to be mindful of what I say, think, do, etc when they come up in conversation or thought. Once I find that equanimity within, I can really move on without. The booklet on the Hermit card states that this card is about planning in order to create success for my career (Hint: Always read the tarot explanation of the cards booklet after you have first analyzed the cards so that you are not swayed from what you see. The booklet should be used as an additive to your understanding – not as THE ANSWER. Reading both the upright and reversed meaning can help you get an overall understanding of the negatives and positives of the situation.) Well since I pulled this card with Sol’s sister in mind and the fact that this the first dream I used for my blog, I suppose that it is also suggesting that I should utilize some of the strengths that I appreciated about her to do this. The notion that she was always direct and upfront with how she felt about issues is one that can be useful to me hear in my blog. Just based on the fact that I went ahead and wrote this for the world to see, is a good start. But it is also more than that – I need to create a plan to get this blog up and running more consistently. In the process, I need to let go of my self-doubt and apprehension about how, what, when, etc. In fact, I have not even marketed this to my friends and family yet because I haven’t been able to be as consistent with this blog as I want to be. It needs to happen.

Next two cards will be analyzed in Part Two of this article.

“Aha’s” throughout the day:

For the past few months I have been working on creating a course for the University of Philosophical Research (UPRS) that I would teach next year when they get their Bachelor’s program up and running. I recorded the first lesson to send in as a sample to UPRS, and have been transcribing the darn thing for weeks. It takes me about 45 – 1 hour to transcribe 5 minutes of the recording. Its not that I don’t type fast, its just that I have to keep going back to hear everything since I talk way to fast on the tape. The whole lesson is approximately an hour long and I only get usually one day a week if I’m lucky of someone babysitting my son so that I can just focus on the task at hand. Needless to say, I realized today that I cannot continue down this road for the other 9 lessons, as well as create other courses with 10 lessons like this while being a stay at home mom. I started seriously looking into transcribing and/or dictating options. I was reading about Dragon Dictation, when I got the hit. First of all my dream referenced a dragon in the dream title of Sol’s mother’s nail shop. It hit me, my old “shabby” way of doing business needed to be replaced with the new tool of Dragon Dictation. I have been wasting (toilet reference) so much time transcribing my work, when I could be using this new system that lets me speak while it types my lecture for me. It will be so much faster and easier for me to be hands free while trying to create a lecture and take care of my child. I may be able to sneak in a few more hours during the day to get the first few lessons done by the middle of next month (as a new mother, I have little energy at night to work on it once my son is asleep). So this Dragon Dictation is my new tool for my old relationship with dreamwork, and a new tool for my very old dream of being a professor of world religions. I was also reminded that the image of the dragon from my dream, as well as the nail shop looking like a Chinese restaurant is referencing that we are in the Year of the Dragon.

When I was choosing an image to represent this dream, I googled the words “new tools”. The images led me to the one I have chosen of a hand with various “new” tools to communicate. The title was “New Tools for a New Year: Communication”. The title ties perfectly into this dream analysis. It displays the various types of social media that are available to communicate. This blog has opened me up to new social media outside of Facebook and Skype, that will help me communicate with the world through this blog. This picture led me to think of the transit of Venus and how it is said to open lines of communication. In my dream, I was actually able to communicate with Sol in order clear the air with him in my mind.