“Dream Momma, I dreamed I was at a water park that had been converted into the park from an old zoo. We were playing in what had beenthe elephant exhibit when I heard a loud noise and started yelling to everyone to get out because there was still an elephant there and it would be dangerous. The elephant submerged from the water and I realized it was only a baby (and unrealistically small, like an 8 week puppy). I swam over to the elephant and rescued it from non-specific "bad guys". I took it home and became best friends with it…. Those are really the only details I can remember! It was wonderful, though.”
Dream Momma likes this dream. It is an internal Hero’s Journey in which the dreamer rescues a new, undeveloped part of his psyche with tremendous (elephant size) potential. This dreams speaks to each person’s need for self-discovery, self-awareness, and self-nurturing. In the first sentence we have the conversion; something new from something old. There is play so we have a sense of youth and freedom. But then wait! A loud noise (wake-up call) occurs and or dreamer transforms from a child on the playground to a hero in the making. The mystery and the key to fully understanding this dream is to identify the elephant (a major primary symbol in the dream) and the vaguely define “bad guys.” Ultimately our hero takes home the under developed baby and internalizes it (“became best friends.”)
Dream Momma asks this dreamer to work very hard to identify what the undeveloped, yet potentially large, elephant symbol is (all the better to nurture it) and then, if desired, identify the bad guys. Hint: They are all symbols and they are all you.
Dream Momma
This article appears in Feb 17-23, 2011.