After a nap, a dreamer awoke with the following dream fragment: “I was looking out from a big picture window at a body of water that felt like it was the Pacific. I think I was slightly higher than the water, perhaps looking from a high-rise building or condo of some sort. Suddenly, everything is shifting and moving. The view that I had seen from my window was now shifting as if I was turning 360º. Trying to make sense of it, I concluded that I must be on a cruise ship but I was totally disoriented because I thought I was in a building that was on the ground!”
In another fragment:
“I am about to be rear-ended by a car . . . or so I thought . . . but in trying to remember the details, I recall seeing myself as both the rear-ended and the rear-ender! I see myself get closer in the rear-view mirror, as well as knowing I am about to be hit. I awake before impact with my heart pounding.”
These are wonderful examples of a situation that is often seen in dreams: a dream with many points of view. It is common for dreamers to relate that they see a dream action through the eyes of many people, or as participants and observers simultaneously; that naturally confuses them. This is an interesting phenomenon and most dreamers feel that they are either confusing two dreams or must be remembering things incorrectly.
If you have even had a dream with two or more perspectives, take the time to look at the images carefully. You may realize that they are being offered to show you different ways of seeing many possibilities. Sometimes, it will appear that one perspective is your usual way of seeing things, and the other perspective is through someone else’s eyes, offering you another way of seeing something, a more distant or detached perspective. Alternatively, the different points of view may be offering you an opportunity to see the many choices before you-especially useful during times in our lives when we feel we have no choice at all.
How do we work with these shifting perspectives and do these dreams cause shifts in our waking lives? Let’s first go back and take a look at our dream fragments. In the first dream, we have a dream that tells me that the dreamer’s typical point of view is already slightly detached. I learn this from the location (slightly higher), which may also be an indication of a thinker (higher up meaning ‘in her head’) and the window (a ‘big picture’ window) where the dreamer takes in the big picture. For the dreamer, everything is where she thinks it should be with buildings on the ground, viewing the water in the distance. Then, suddenly things in either her inner or waking world are shifting and what she thought she could count on is no longer the case. She is turned around and feels unsettled and ungrounded. The only explanation her mind comes up with is that she must be on a ship.
Notice the details: If a ship is the way we travel over water, which often is symbolic of our emotions, then the type of ship it is will be important. Is it a tugboat, a canoe, a fishing trawler? In her dream, it was a cruise ship. In her associations with cruise ships, she said that they were a luxurious way of traveling where you can get a taste of the place you visit while relaxing. The dream may be telling her that when she relaxes, gets a taste of any situation, and does it with self-care in mind (luxury), then she can get a different perspective on any situation. In order to fully understand the message of the dream, the dreamer can also see if she can build a bridge between her waking life and the dream. Where in her life does she feel ungrounded and disoriented? Is there a situation that seems to be shifting and changing? The dream is both making her feelings clear to her, while offering her the instructions on how to cope.
In the second dream, we have an example of two distinct points of view. The dreamer was both the victim about to be hit, and the hitter! The dream gave her precise information on how she is in her inner world: victim and perpetrator. When she worked on the dream, she was able to get in touch with the two opposite sides of her personality. This pull did not mean she was unstable, rather that she was quite normal. She was conflicted by the many complex feelings that the dream showed to her clearly. It pointed out the way she sabotages herself as she “rear-ends” her forward movement that causes herself to stop growing. Her fear of changing was “driven” home.
If you have dreams that have multiple perspectives, try playing both parts and speaking from the point of view of each part. See what one way of thinking will show you, then shift and see what another way will reveal. Then, your real choices in any situation will be clear: Do you want to continue on as you always do, or with the new vantage point the dream affords, will you allow the wisdom of your dreams to help you shift your life?
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