My before-birth dreams didn't stay with me throughout my childhood. In fact, it wasn't until I was an adult that I was able to recall them at all. I had to backtrack and retrieve my memories, to remind myself what happened at that time. If I hadn't done this, a huge piece of my personal history would have been erased—the family who cared for me, and the love and encouragement I received would have been blanked out. But reclaiming this information, I could now better understand my beginnings, chronicle the onset of my psychic life, and appreciate the roots of my prescience. It all began, I realized, with my earliest dreams, when in the womb I was so abruptly awakened.
By tracing your own dreams, no matter how far in the past, you can fill in missing gaps in your life. This should come as no surprise to us: We spend about ninety minutes a night dreaming, and that is some five years in the course of a lifetime. Dreams are characteristic of our species; nearly every mammal has them. Though often fleeting, dreams hold compelling information—about your childhood, the present, the future, or even about other realms, which are easier to contact in this state. The great challenge, I believe, is to recover forgotten knowledge. By illuminating hidden memories you can find once again what you have lost.
For years I've been fascinated with why the deeper memory of who we are should be so elusive. Many afternoons, hiking in the canyons, I've watched red-tailed hawks gliding over the drylands and have sensed that at one time I could fly. Although reason tells me that here and now I can't, flying in fact seems more natural to me than walking. Images in dreams spark that certainty, bridge the chasm between who we're told we are and who we can be.
Perhaps there is some protective function to remembering slowly. If everything were to come back to us at once maybe it would be too much. I once saw an intriguing Chinese film about reincarnation in which a woman refuses to drink the “serum, of forgetfulness” before she is about to be reborn. Overwhelmed by the recollection of her former lives, she commits suicide.
It may be that we must recover our wisdom gracefully, let it emerge in its own time. Dreaming can facilitate this. A pristine state of awareness, it is a direct line to a place where alchemical gold abounds and nothing is devoid of meaning. Here, time and space are nonexistent; anything is possible. Specific guidance for living your life well lies in your dreams. Like a blank canvas, they provide a medium where both the psychic and your unconscious can freely express themselves. You have only to listen.
To me, there is no such thing as a “bad” dream. Even the most terrifying nightmares, the kind where you wake up drenched in sweat, your heart pounding, are meant to be helpful. They point out areas in your psyche that need attention, and there is much to be learned from them. Emotionally intense, illuminating some of your worst fears, this kind of dream can be extremely cathartic. Once you face your demons and purge them, they no longer have the power to tyrannize you.
I once had such a nightmare when I hadn't been in a relationship for a long while and was feeling particularly vulnerable: With apparently deadly intent, two gangster types broke into my home. The man had slicked-back greasy hair; the woman was loud-mouthed and rude, blowing cigarette smoke in my face. They both strode into the living room, where I was sitting, as if they owned the house and me as well. Terrified of being killed, I froze, too intimidated to do anything to defend myself. But instead of physically harming me, in a jeering tone they announced, in unison, “Judith, you will never love or be loved by any man again.” I awoke from the dream in tears.
This is an example of a nightmare that turned out to be of value. It was a reminder that my fears were once again getting the best of me; I knew enough not to take it literally. Instead I saw it as a message that an old, all-too-familiar and painful pattern had resurfaced—one of feeling abandoned, unloved, and alone—that required some of my sympathetic attention. Rather than writing it off as just a “bad dream,” or berating myself for having such feelings, I acknowledged and readdressed my fear. Because I did so, it no longer threatened to surge out of control as fear tends to do when it remains unconscious. My dream apprised me of the obstacle I was facing so I could deal with it and move on.
Not all dreams are psychic, and yet I believe that each one carries a personalized message that we need to hear. In one of Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks, he asks, “Why does an eye see a thing more clearly in dreams than the imagination does while awake?” The answer lies in the purity of the medium in which dreams express themselves. They speak truths that are unpolluted by the incessant rambling of our minds. With that interference gone, dreams provide a natural conduit for the psychic. With all channels open, we can receive information that was previously obscured.
Throughout the years, I've been a collector of dreams. I'll jump at any opportunity to hear one. I've recorded hundreds of my own dreams and heard many more from patients, family, and friends. There is a wise economy to the way dreams are constructed; not a single detail is wasted or too extravagant to include. To me, dreams are our truest signature: I can usually learn more about someone from a single dream than from an entire hour of talking.
Once I went out with a man, an accountant, who appeared extremely conservative and uptight. It was our first date, and I was sure we weren't going to get along. Trying to make conversation, I told him I worked a lot with dreams in my practice. His face lit up and he asked, “Can I tell you a recurring dream that I've had?” “Sure,” I said smugly, certain it would validate my assumptions about him. I couldn't have been more wrong. In his dream, he told me, he was always faced with the same dilemma: His apartment was flooded and he didn't know what to do. Yet the solution he came up with impressed me. Putting on scuba gear, he learned to navigate underwater with such facility and ease that he was more comfortable than ever before.
As I understood it, the dream was a shining comment on his flexibility, the skill he had at solving problems, and his ability to acclimate to unexpected situations, all stellar qualities. After hearing the dream, I was curious to get to know him better. Although we never entered into a romantic relationship, he has become a trusted friend.
During my practice, I have come to see dreams as falling into two major categories: psychological and psychic. Most dreams, in my experience, are the former, with themes aimed at identifying and sorting through unclear emotions. Psychic dreams occur less frequently and are distinct in a variety of ways. Many times, for instance, you might experience psychic dreams that have nothing to do with you at all. Or if they do reflect your inner conflicts, even if they're emotionally charged there is a neutral, matter-of-fact segment that stands out, imparting a message. Unlike psychological dreams, those that are psychic can be oddly impersonal, marked by their remarkable crispness and clarity. Often I'm left feeling that I have been a witness, as if in a theater watching a movie.
Some psychic dreams can offer guidance—you observe an event that reveals pertinent information; a person or simply a voice counsels you; the solution to a problem you've been struggling with suddenly becomes evident. Perhaps you may not even remember the details, but you wake up resolved about a previously confusing personal issue. Then there are also precognitive dreams, foreseeing the future. In these, the knowledge I'm receiving or the scenes I observe may be familiar or completely foreign to me. I typically stand apart from these events, detached, seemingly taking dictation from some outside force. Finally, yet another kind of psychic dream is expressly meant to heal physically (while emotional healing can occur in all dreams). I may have conversations with people I've never met before who offer healing instructions about my patients, family, or me. Sometimes an actual physical healing takes place.
Differentiating these kinds of dreams, I'm still mapping the geography of an often confusing terrain, a geography that's ever changing, constantly revealing more to me. In reality, the different types overlap; their elements are interwoven. I'm always an explorer in this realm. What remains universally true is that the integrity of what dreams have to communicate is flawless: We can trust them.
PSYCHOLOGICAL DREAMS
James badly wanted to have a psychic dream. Every night, after he organized the following day's work and responded to any unanswered phone calls, he would set a blank notebook strategically by his bed. Everything had to be just right for this sweet-natured businessman but true workaholic who approached his dreams with the same compulsiveness he did the rest of his life. Dropping off to sleep, he was determined that a psychic dream would come, but each morning he would get up disappointed. Instead, about once a month he would have a recurring dream that wasn't psychic at all.
It always took place in Atlantic City, on the beach near his childhood summer home. He is walking barefoot in the sand when the weather changes abruptly and a ferocious storm moves in. The landscape turns from golden to an ominous gray. Gusts of wind whip over the water as the waves grow larger and larger. Fighting against the wind, the water sucking him backward, James is about to drown. Each time the dream ends at this moment, and he wakes up, panicked and exhausted.
This same dream had been returning since he was a child, but recently it had become more frequent. James had never dealt with it before. “After all,” he reasoned, “it's only a dream. Thank goodness it isn't real.” A tough-minded financier, he prided himself on being self-sufficient, solving the critical problems at hand, and living in the present. Psychotherapy or dream analysis wasn't for him; he had come to me to learn how to become psychic to help him with business decisions.
I'm always amazed to hear dreams with the power of the one James told, especially when the dreamer has little appreciation of its significance. Unknowingly, James laid himself bare and revealed his terror of an unidentified but haunting influence. Such fear is never without meaning. Encountering it for the first time can be one of the most exciting and transformative junctures in psychotherapy, through which enormous change may occur. But it is only a beginning.
James was naive. He expected the psychic to be handed to him in a neatly wrapped package that he could simply open without looking any further into himself. But, as is true for many people, to become psychic often requires that you do some searching introspection. When you have more pressing emotional issues to address, the psychic may become obscured. This dream was imploring James to confront the source of the fear that had been overwhelming him for so long.
“Be careful not to jump ahead of yourself,” I said. “Deal with the dream you've been given and see where it takes you.”
James was skeptical. “I don't really believe in dreams,” he said. “What good will it do me?”
“Well,” I explained, “most of all, dreams send you messages. They can alert you to a part of yourself that may be shut off. Over the years, important memories can be forgotten, some of them traumatic. They tend to bind up energy so that it's not available for other things. Once you address these memories, energy can be freed. Of course, you'll feel much better in general, but there is also more room for the psychic to come in.”
James appeared to be absorbing my words slowly. Though not entirely convinced, he agreed to take a look at his dream.
“Dreams are like mirrors,” I continued. “They can reflect some aspect of who you are now or else may focus on your past. The more emotion you have about them, the better. Even if you're frightened, stay with it. The strength of your feelings can lead us to the answer.”
“Is there something I should do?” he asked. “How should we start?”
“First,” I told him, “I'd like you to relive the entire dream while you're with me. Report every single detail. Take me right there with you. And stay aware of your impressions or feelings, no matter how unusual they seem. Try to relax and find a comfortable position to sit in. Then close your eyes and take a few deep, slow breaths.”
I paused. Realizing that this was going to be new for James, I was prepared to let him ease into it at his own pace. That leap from ordinary consciousness into a dream state can feel awkward to a beginner, and especially to someone who is experiencing this transition for the first time. When you straddle two very different realities at once, the secret is to stay aware of both. You ate totally immersed in your dream, yet simultaneously you witness and report what takes place—a balancing act you can refine with practice. Despite his skepticism and inexperience, James was a natural. In no time he was back on that same beach again, in the midst of the storm. As if the dream had just been waiting for him, he was compelled to plunge straight into his fear. This isn't always the right move, however: If emotions like fear are faced prematurely, some people get so overwhelmed they shut down. But I trusted his instincts and my own sense that he was ready, and I didn't intervene. Nervously clutching both hands together, James described his feelings.
“I'm so heavy. I want to get away but I can't. It's hard to move.”
“Good,” I encouraged him. “You're getting close to something. I know it's difficult, but stay in the dream. You've never taken it farther than this. Let's see what happens.”
“The waves are crashing all around me. I'm scared. The current is pulling me under. Water's coming into my mouth and nose. I'm choking.” James's voice suddenly sounded small, desperate, like a young child's. That was the clue I had been waiting for. I followed it, a bridge back into time that could lead us to the origin of his fear.
“James, how old do you feel now?”
He winced. “It's strange,” he said. “About eight, maybe even younger.”
“All right. Now, try to make a shift. Let your image of the ocean go, and remember what it was like when you were eight. What happened then? Does anything stand out that upsets you?” A few moments passed, and the same child's voice returned.
“Oh God,” he said, suddenly looking very pale. “I haven't thought about this for over twenty years. That was when my father was drinking. It was such an awful time. He'd sometimes punish me for no reason and then lock me in my room for hours. I would cry and cry but no one was there.”