Dreamwork is in part the work of unpacking the multiple layers of meaning latent in our dreams.  Rather than looking for external, predetermined references and definitions to interpret our dreams, we explore the infinite worlds and dimensions of possibility inherent in every aspect of our dreams. While there are many ways to do this, one of the greatest opportunities we have through dreamwork is that of observing and evaluating the meaning we unconsciously give to the countless elements that make up our experience in dreamtime and awake.

We take advantage of this opportunity by observing our default assigning-meaning systems and meaning-giving habits through what associations, assumptions, reactions, and judgments we have in our dreams and while working our dreams awake.

There is great transformative power in this exercise.

While everything is as it is, we tend to assign meaning to things based on what we have learned from others, from experience, from the environment.  Much of our default meaning assignments come from external, predetermined consensual assumption.  Much of our default meaning assignments come from unconsciously adopted and developed (a) survival tactics and defense mechanisms, (b) fear of loss and lack, and (c) constant low-level stress and inner conflict about who we are and who we have been led to believe we should be.  This leads to knee-jerk projections of unconsciously assigned meaning, and to our—unconscious or intentional—active resistance to or even outright battling with things as they are, with reality itself.

If we sit with how these meanings sit with us, we may find ourselves questioning them and how they make us feel.

There are very broad or particular traits, very stereotypical traits we generalize into very limiting categories and definitions.  In this way we tend to miss out on a wide range of possibility.  Just because in working a dream we associate threat and chance of loss, lack, violation, or attack with the presence of a stranger in the shadows—whom we automatically assume an intruder, a thief, a captor, a rapist, a murderer—does not mean these are our only options.  Just because in working our dream we associate judgment, criticism, rejection, or mockery with the presence of our childhood nemesis, and competition, clash, power struggle, or outright war with this encounter does not mean these are the only outcomes.

Dreamwork offers us the alternative to delve deeper into our possibilities, reimagine the meaning of these guest appearances, and redirect the power of our symbolism.

Evaluation of meaning involves sitting with what each meaning brings up for us.  We ask ourselves how these definitions make us feel, how they are serving us, and what sensations they bring up.  As long as we are feeling ill at ease, something is not right for us.

We discover we are brave, not because we are in control, but because we are willing to face what we may find there. We begin to feel encouraged to surrender and trust what we may find there.

The uncomfortable emotional charge in a dream calls our attention and points to the areas where we need to do our work.  The same applies in dreamwork while awake.  As we notice an emotional charge, we may ask ourselves whether this response makes us feel more integrated or more fragmented. We may contemplate whether we feel more love or more fear, more connected and unified or more isolated and separate.

We may find some previously unexplored meanings can be very specific and personal, based on inner individual experience, insight, impulse, sensation, or instinct.  Encouraged to go beyond the limitations of our default meanings, we tap into a wisdom without a reference point in consensual reality—herein lies the wisdom of our dreams.

The next necessary step is to ask how we might experience things differently, and how exactly we wish to experience them. We may ask what truth we wish to experience, and what meaning would facilitate the manifestation of that truth.  This is how we create a new perspective, and from that new perspective, a new experience.  Everything becomes an invitation, an opportunity, a new possibility.

Naturally releasing the need to remain defended, and beginning to embrace reality as it is, suddenly an abundance of resources is within our reach.  We no longer feel the need to protect ourselves or preserve what we thought were our beliefs.  Not only do we get to release old paradigms, we get to intentionally decide the symbolic meaning of every aspect of our dreams and our waking life.

Dreamwork is a transformative practice in great part because it is a practice of assigning new meaning to our perceived reality.  What once was a threat is now an invitation, what was once a challenge is now a generous reflection, and with it, we inevitably transform into the limitless, conscious, creative beings we are meant to be.