A GREENING TREE BEING: A 10 MINUTE JOURNAL MEDITATION

From my Seminar and Workshop Series:: JUNG, THE RED BOOK AND THE INNER JOURNEY ©2012

with Dr. Florian Birkmayer

ACTIVE IMAGINATION

In the desert the solitary is relieved of care and therefore turns his whole life to the sprouting garden of his soul…

I look down at myself. I am fully covered in green leaves, which spring from my body. A strange being grows through me. 

I am a laughing being of the forest, a leaf green daimon, a forest goblin and prankster, who lives alone in the forest…neither disposed nor indisposed toward men, full of mood and chance, obeying an invisible law and greening and wilting with the trees, neither beautiful nor ugly, neither good nor bad, merely living, primordially old and yet completely young, naked and yet naturally clothed, not man but nature, frightened, laughable, powerful, childish, weak, deceiving and deceived, utterly inconstant and superficial…and yet reaching deep down, down to the kernel of the world.

SOLILOQUY: WRITE FOR TEN MINUTES

I am a greening tree being, who loves nothing but greening and growing…

I let the wind and distant cries and commotion of opposites blow calmly through my branches,

I want to exist from my own force, like the sun which gives light and does not suck light….I recall my solar nature and would like to rush to my rising…

 

All quotes on this page are excerpted and adapted from C. G. Jung’s Writings. 

Dreams: A Door to Imagination & Creativity: a Workshop by Victoria Rabinowe

San Diego Book Arts | Workshops

THE POT OF GOLD: A DREAM JOURNAL EXERCISE

 Legend tells us that if you catch a leprechaun, he must take you to the ancient treasure that is guarded in a pot hidden at the end of the rainbow. 

Catching the meaning of a dream is like catching a leprechaun. You must be creative to capture it.

Use found images to explore the paradoxical tricks in your dream.

Search for mischievous, diversionary dream pranks as well as the treasure hidden at the end of your dream’s ethereal rainbow.

Let unexpected things happen. 

Is your dream a vanishing pot of deceptive, insincere nonsense or the golden treasure trove of insight and understanding?

 

It is by going down into the abyss

that we recover the treasures of life. 

Where you stumble,

there lies your treasure. 

Joseph Campbell

LEAP AND THE NET WILL APPEAR: A DREAM JOURNAL EXERCISE

Since we get a “free” extra day this year, perhaps we can honor it by relinquishing control and allow ourselves to jump from one place to another, vault over obstacles, leap into the dark spaces and spring into action!

EXPLORATION

Write for 10 minutes. In a few condensed sentences, write about what happened in the dream. Leave out the details. Focus on the Action. Who did What? Where? How? When? How does the dream end?

Riff about what is going to happen next in the dream? Open up your expectations and assumptions. Riff about what would happen if…. ??? Take a Take a Leap of Faith as you let your mind wander in a stream of consciousness.

LANDSCAPE OF THE MIND / THE SOUL OF PLACE: A DREAM JOURNAL EXERCISE

Each dream has a particular environment, atmosphere or ambiance with its own unique qualities. Within the inner life, there is no separation between our minds, our bodies and the spaces we inhabit. The ground we walk upon or the architecture we inhabit, has a voice as vibrant as any of the characters in the dream. When we animate the landscape, we invite the indwelling spirit of our surroundings to come forth. The setting of a dream has the spirit of place and the presence of our souls.

EXPLORATION

Take ten minutes to write in a stream of consciousness…

How do the dream characters view the world and their place in it?

EVERY END IS A BEGINNING: A DREAM JOURNAL EXERCISE

The Ouroboros is an ancient symbol depicting a dragon, snake or serpent swallowing its own tail to sustain its life in an eternal cycle of renewal. It appears in a circular form which symbolizes the cyclic nature of the universe: Creation out of Destruction, Life out of Death. The Ouroboros is a symbol for the integration and assimilation of opposites in which we incorporate our shadow. This ‘feedback’ process is parallel to the experience of working with dreams throughout our lives.

In our dreams, we often seem to be chasing our own tail in the repetitive themes of our lives. We feel condemned to recurring cycles of our life patterns. Yet, the perpetual movement of our dream narratives create a self-fertilization for self healing. As we track our dreams, we sense the cyclic pattern which continually returns, like the Ouroboros, to our beginnings in an eternal homecoming. The enigma of the dream is like the paradox of the Ouroboros who symbolizes “The One” that emerges from opposites – the beginning that originates from its own end.

EXPLORATION

Drop all of your preconceived notions about the “meaning” of your dream. Allow found images  from magazines to guide you. Just as our dreams point to what is possible, allow found images and text to invite what is probable. Use the pictures to make a collage page in your journal.   Through free association of feelings, relationships and memories, allow your inner Ouroboros to point toward the unity of transformation and integration. “Shift Happens” by simply swallowing your own tale.

PANDORA’S BOX: A DREAM JOURNAL EXERCISE

Pandora was originally an earth goddess whose name means giver of all gifts. Her symbol was originally a honey vase filled with blessings; the source of all things. Her story DEVOLVED in a mythic inversion during the shift from matriarchy to patriarchy during the Hellenic Period. Pandora was demoted from her revered status as a goddess who gave all good things to men. She was transformed into a mortal woman who introduced every conceivable evil to mankind. Her gifted feminine nature was turned into a shameful and deceitful complexion.

EXPLORATION

Curiosity is the most fundamental key to creative DreamWork. Those of us who explore our interior worlds are guided by a sense of wonder for the strange and fascinating worlds within. Release some aspect of the dream that seems stored or trapped. When you dare to open your dream, what energy are you are releasing? Is it something fragile, fearsome, precious, or secret? Does your thirst for self-knowledge become a Pandora’s Box? Is your innate inquisitiveness an invitation to unforeseen complications? Does the opening of your dream reveal a gift or a curse?

Write for ten minutes and see what spills out.