NOT interested in dreams? Really?

NOT interested in dreams? Was she SERIOUS? After all, wasn’t she a HYPNOTHERAPIST! How could she NOT be interested in dreams?

When I recovered from my state of complete dumb-foundedness, I realized that my colleague’s training had probably never introduced her to dreams and dream working. I know mine didn’t. I was dream working long before getting bitten by the 'Hypno-bug.'

The thing is … everybody dreams. Not everyone recalls their dreams, but that’s easily remedied. The thing to keep in mind is that every night everyone is averaging 4 or 5 dreams. That’s a lot of dreams over the course of a lifetime!

Some of those dreams are good. Some of them are bad. And some of them are downright nightmarish.

So why do we dream?

We dream because dreaming serves an important purpose. Researchers have learned that, like sleep, dreaming is linked to both learning and repair of the body-mind.

Dreaming supports our overall health and wellness.

The Shamanic perspective suggests that there are three kinds of dreams. Night dreams. Day dreams. And this dream.What’s interesting is that they make no distinction between them. They’re all dreams.

As Hypnotherapists, what we generally work with is “this” dream. We work our craft to resolve the underlying cause of a person’s “bad” dreams; those internal conflicts, fears, inadequacies and such which play out in their daily living.

Day dreams are those involuntary imaginings or flights of fancy we all experience while awake. Some of them are flights of fancy where our mind is focused attentively on something pleasurable – receiving accolades for accomplishment, winning the lottery, experiencing a romantic liason with Brad Pitt (or Angelina) – obviously, these are good dreams.

Unfortunately, too many of our day dreams are bad dreams. We call them ‘worry.’

As Hypnotists we routinely use this naturally occurring state of focused attention. We invoke day dreams through suggestion using future pacing, mental rehearsal, guided imagery, and other techniques.

Night dreams have fascinated people since the earliest times. The ancient Egyptians and Greeks took dreaming very seriously, building temples and shrines where dreams could be invoked for the purposes of healing and guidance.

The modern-day experience of the dream temple occurs in offices where therapeutic dream work is facilitated for the same purposes - healing and guidance.

Dreams speak the language of image and emotion – the same language of the subconscious mind. So as Hypnotherapists we are uniquely positioned to work with dreams!

When a client’s presenting issue is a recurring nightmare, Hypnotherapy is a very effective method for finding resolution. Once the cause is uncovered and resolved (usually something from childhood) the anxiety-generating reruns come to an end.

Dreams can serve as a healing ‘barometer’ to provide the CH with feedback following a session, perhaps by indicating partial or complete resolution, or by surfacing the next layer calling for healing.

I have found that having a foundation in working with my own dreams has deepened my understanding of regression work. It has helped me to develop an intuition I apply in sessions. It’s hard to explain. Things just stick out. The mind works through association so contrasts, play on words, exaggerations, and minimizing are just a few of the valuable subconscious cues that grab my attention.

Most important - dream working has taught me to stay curious, naïve even, and not rush. All dreams are sent in service of healing and wholeness – even the bad ones. Even cancer. I teach the client to trust the subconscious mind, as I do. Rather than try to force things we simply allow the answers to be revealed through the process. 

Dream working has taught me a gentler approach.

Our dreams have their roots in our daily living. They are the subconscious mind’s way of showing the conscious mind what’s most important. It’s just not what we think. It’s what we have been avoiding, what we haven’t wanted to look at, and it feels uncomfortable.

As John Gray wrote, what we can feel, we can heal. 

Dreams provide natural gateways into the subconscious mind, where all our feelings and memories reside. Work with the subconscious mind and the doors to the past will open to allow healing. And it will happen automatically. 

Not interested in dreams? Are you sure?