Dear Dreamers –
 Happy Season of Light.  Thanks for waiting out a dry spell while I worked on about a dozen other dream projects and never quite got a newsletter finished.
But good things happened!
 
Such as:
Ta-Da!  Updated website!  I am grateful to the sibling team of Elizabeth and Ben Blue, coach and techie, who kept me going and taught me so much about putting my work into the world.   Take a look: www.firebynight.net.    One of their brilliant ideas was to make my “Field Guide to Dreaming” a free download!   You can get it on the website, or just click here:
http://www.firebynight.net/uploads/5/5/2/8/55285479/field_guide-free-ebook.pdf.
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I have had the best time ever this fall with my dream groups, and I’ve been thinking a lot about what makes a dream group such a powerful, lively, and meaningful experience.   Mostly, it boils down to these two things: 
Dreams are given to be shared, because they matter.
And we discover, when we share our dreams, how much we matter to each other.
 
Deep, meaningful relationships can be hard to come by, and dreams – arising from the shared unconscious –can connect us instantly.
 
But only when you’re ready.  When you’re in a circle of people you trust.  When you’re sure you’ll be heard and respected.  When you know everyone understands that dreams aren’t puzzles to solve, but encounters to honor.  When nobody will try to tell you what your dreams mean, but everyone will let your dream inhabit them, body, mind and soul.  When they speak honestly from their experience of your dream to shed light through gentle questions, intuitions, feelings, and associations.   When you feel your own “aha” and share it as much  - or as little  - as you wish.   When you think of ways to play with it and integrate its wisdom in your waking life, and if you want some suggestions, they can help.
 
You can share dreams with your friend or spouse or the lady behind you in the Kroger line, and that is really helpful, even if all they do is listen.  (See Tips below.)  You can share dreams with your therapist or spiritual director or with me.
 
But to take the dream into a group of dreamers is to “build community, intimacy, and support” as Jeremy Taylor writes.  Ultimately, you find yourself “strengthened, liberated, revitalized and deeply supported and affirmed….Group work with dreams regularly generates ongoing relationship that become sources of deep emotional and psychological support of tremendous benefit to all involved.”    
 
The magic of a dream group is not only that they help you understand your dreams and your self.  Nor is it just that you help the rest of the group in the same way.   The deeper magic of a dream group is that together we open ourselves to the whole-making, soul-making powers of the Self that orchestrates the unconscious into stories, images, and feelings.  And those stories, images, and feelings carry energies that link us beneath the ego’s dominion, into the realm of the sacred.  Beyond the fear and tensions that separate us, we find ourselves in each other, and through each other, and we discover something new and meaningful every single time we open up a dream together.
 
It’s hard to describe exactly, which is why I offer a lot of free classes and demos.   
 
Come see for yourself: In January, I’m hosting two free intro workshops at Glendale Methodist and will also teach a 2-part series at USN Evening Classes.   Find details below, and on the” What’s New” page of the website. http://www.firebynight.net/whats-new.html
 
If you have questions, please send me an email and we can make a time to talk. I would love to see you there.

In this season of the celebration of Light, I’m grateful to the communities that bring us light, and that welcome the light we bring.   It takes courage, humility, vulnerability, and humor to show up and keep saying Yes to the wild, beautiful adventure of living in the both-and-more world that dreams open up for us.  Thank you for being in it together.
 
Blessings of the darkness and of the light, and may you sense the love that surrounds us -
 
Laura

Dear Dreamers,
What follows is another long post - it's the lecture I'm giving tomorrow at Main LIbrary, Read it all if you like, or just pick up the main ideas here:
1. If as Jung says, myths are the collective dreams of a culture or time, 
2. and they can arise to help out with the collective individuation,
3. then what are we dreaming about climate change?
4.  As we see the increasing threat of Earth as a wasteland, I see some links with the myths of Gaia, the Grail legend, and the Green Man.  
5. I see them because they arose in my own dreams that helped me heal from cancer, which was a personal environmental crisis.  Can we extend this to the collective?
6. I don't know.  But I would love to hear your dreams about things that threaten the whole of humanity these days: climate crisis, racial issues - please share. 

New Section just for pictures, film, and songs at the end!
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 Grail Question – key to healing
So why are we, as a species, so hard to change? To understand stuckness, we have the myth of the Holy Grail, specifically the old French version about the Fisher King.  It’s interesting that so many film versions of the Arthurian legend came to the screen in starting in the late 1960's : maybe the dying king was an apt image for the social upheaveal in America.  Chretien, in the 12th century, tells it this way: the King, for reasons unclear, is wounded in the thigh or groin. He can’t heal, he can’t die: he’s stuck. And the land mirrors his condition: crops fail, waters are drying up, there’s no rain, no food. The king feels relief from pain only when he fishes in his boat. His one hope for healing is if a pure knight arrives at his castle and asks the correct question - which is a secret.
 
So here we are: living in our tormented ego-structure, stuck in our dying land, and waiting for someone aligned to the Self, and enlightened enough to ask the right question.
 
After endless misadventures, Perceval finally arrives and asks: Whom does the Grail serve?
 
That’s it. Then king can drink from the Grail. He'shealed; consequently, the land revives.
 
The Holy Grail is the cup from which Jesus and the disciples drank at the Last Supper. Mythically, it is the cup of suffering, shared by the archetype of the Willing Sacrifice or the Wounded Healer.  It is the Self willing to serve something higher than the Ego, something higher than even good intentions, prudence, compassion.
 
And whom does it serve? The story shows deep connection: the wholeness of the Grail knight, the King, the land, and its peoples are interdependent.  Individuation of one person links to individuation of the whole.  I wonder -  if myths and dreams teach us to understand the Grail’s power, and help us choose a path of wisdom and necessary sacrifice, then could we help the whole creation – Gaia – be healed?

Green Man – life force, vegetative vitality, hidden in plain sight
 
A third helpful myth has emerged in the early 20th century. For ages, the Green Man has been hiding in plain sight – in rituals, stories, songs, and oddly, often in many old British churches. Once you know to look for it, his leaf-hidden face seems to be everywhere. Sometimes he’s pictured with vines proceeding from his mouth, the greening force emanating like a speech bubble. Scholar P.M. Araneo says: "Whilst the figure of the Green Man has appeared, disappeared and reappeared throughout the centuries, there is evidence to show that his appearance is often linked to times of upheaval, change or environmental crisis."
 
The Green Man can be friendly, but he’s also a trickster, with shades of Christ and Dionysus. He’s there and not-there, testing our perception. Invisible like viriditas, the greening power of God, and felt in the blood, like “the force that through the green fuse drives the flower.”  Common as grass, unruly as kudzu. 
 
I mention the Green Man not because I think he’s charming.  I bring up Green Man because he appears in my dreams, whether I’m dreaming for myself or – apparently sometimes – for others.

He showed up when there was an environmental crisis in the landscape of my body. He showed me I had a cancer, and he encouraged me, partnered me, helped me heal.  With his lively vitality, a wink, a knowing, a hug, a bouquet of parsley, he presented the problem as opportunity and calling. He says, Here’s your bagpipe – time to play it! He uprooted a dead tree to show me the problem.  In another dream, I’m distraught over a burned-out church, but he says Hey look – and I see his ring on my finger, huge, like a Queen Anne’s Lace flower.  He puts me out in the rain. He plants gorgeous vines that lure me off the path, and gets me lost in a strange world.  Sometimes I get him mixed up with Jesus.
 
The Green Man was my guide through my personal environmental crisis.  I hope his lively greening power will continue to visit all of us, and help us become dreamers willing to align our small selves with Whom the Grail Serves, to heal both the Fisher King (representing personal and collective power) and Gaia (the entire created life system.) 
 
It's a massive shift, almost impossible to imagine, but we must. Perceval’s story shows us that we must start within, with the simple practices for setting Ego aside, and listening for a wisdom that arises naturally through unconventional ways of knowing, including our collective and personal dreams.  The king revives. The Green Man winks. Gaia breathes.  .

Correction: Here's the right link to the Grail scene from Excalibur.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bP0LW-rvQc
 
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If you have any dreams that offer wisdom for collective healing and wholeness,  I’d be grateful to hear them. Please send to laura@firebynight.net.  I never share dreams without permission. ​

Story 1: True Colors
The other day I shared a fresh dream with a roomful of people, just hours after I woke up from it.   I NEVER DO THIS. It 's not wise, because even if you get a quick “Aha!” from your dream,  you still don’t know the whole of it, and you end up sharing something your precious vulnerable ego might regret. However, because the dream seemed to be about getting over my protective habits, and because the audience was a roomful of librarians, i.e. the Trusted Storykeepers of the World, I told it.  
 
Now that you are drooling at the prospect of this juicy dream, I'm sorry: it'll disappoint.  (And it involves coats in July, potentially a nightmare.)  But here it is:
 
I walk into a lecture hall, where people are gathering for a presentation.  I’m wearing a striking flame-orange wool coat, midcalf length, with orange buttons patterned in concentric circles.
I spot a woman I know, a civic leader (and real-life participant in one of my dream groups). As I sit down beside her, I see that beyond her another  woman I know, also civic leader (who in waking life has offered me some helpful business advice). As I lean forward to greet them, my coat gaps open and I’m astonished to see the color of my blouse -  a crimson so beautiful, so vivid and shining, that it seems almost alive.  It's the color of a living heart. 

Quickly I close my coat, because this feels so personal and surprising, and I’m not ready for anyone to see this color. ​

On one level, the dream points to that “yikes” of sharing something real or vulnerable about yourself that you didn’t realize you were saying.  This happens all the time in dreamwork.  When you tell a dream, you’re revealing your heart.  
 
The dream also reminded me that it’s often been my habit in waking life to hide my heart, sometimes beneath an overcoat of energetic presence.  Learning to share from the heart has been sometimes terrible, but in most instances a lifegiving exercise in connection, compassion, and courage. It wears me out, so maybe that big orange ego coat is helpful boundary at times.

The dream suggests it's time to connect with my inner “civic leader” energies for the practical good of the community. (The community would be both my internal energies and the literal community beyond myself.)  What might happen if I spoke more freely,  with heartfelt conviction about  - everything?  I trust there could be some changes for the general good.  
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So - to follow through on the work of dreamwork  I'll experiment with Instagram posts this summer.  Little heartbeats that could offer some truth and beauty.  Or just fun. My helpers and I figured out the techie bits, so now you can
follow me on Instagram at laurahuffdreamworker.  

Three Principles of Sharing Dreams 
Sharing your emerging self can be feel risky - but when you're ready telling dreams is a good way to start. 
 
Agreeing on a few basic principles for sharing dreams will make it go better.  Below are three general principles.  (Continue to the Tips and Titles section for a 5-step guide for partner dreamwork.)
                                           
Humility – the dream is from the unconscious, so it presents something new, which usually suggests the next steps in the individuation process.  Often, this news is upsetting to the Ego, because the dreamer has to change an attitude, integrate shadow energies, etc.  And the dream is multi-layered, so neither you nor the dreamer will ever get the whole picture. Please go gently.  The dreamer is sharing from the heart. 
As always, preface any remark with “In my dream…..”  because you are speaking, after all, of your experience of the dream. Only the dreamer can know for sure what the dream means for them, and it may take awhile to get there. 
 
 Honesty  - The best way to understand another person’s  dream is to let it get down inside you and work on your feelings as well as your thoughts.  Take awhile to really listen with mind, heart, and even body. (How does it feel?)  You can offer brilliant insights, which are very helpful.  But your honest feelings sparked by your experience of the dream offer even more profound “Aha’s” for the dreamer.
Again.  Preface any remarks with the phrase, “IN MY DREAM….” because you are projecting.
 
Curiosity – Good dreamwork includes wondering aloud, stepping into the perspectives of the various dream figures, and holding “Aha’s” lightly enough to continue learning from them.   Art, dialogue, embodiment, ritual, and play are good ways to engage a dream with a respectful, fruitful curiosity. ​

What are they? 
Moonflowers and morning glories.
Why?
You can guess. 
 
Moonflowers open at sundown and bloom all night – like dreams!
Morning glories open at sunrise and bloom all day – like waking consciousness!
 
And there’s a beautiful liminal moment, just at dawn, when the moonflowers begin to close and the morning glories begin to open, just like the liminal moment in consciousness when we can best remember our dreams.
 
Tending moonflower and morning glories together is a way of making visible our intention to tend our dreams and integrate their wisdom into waking life.  Find some seeds and start your own dream garden.  Have fun with it: plant a couple of each kind in a big patio pot.  Or plant a screen of vines on your porch, or train them into an arch to mark a threshold, or create a little tent with bamboo poles.  I like to plant dozens of them in little peat pots to give away.  
 
One thing to know about growing these dream vines: they need support.  You can use a fancy trellis, a fence, even just strings tacked to the wall – any kind structure for the vines to hold onto as they grow towards the sun.
 
Seeing as all we do here is metaphor, let’s think for a minute about that structure.
 
It’s one thing for dream interest to sprout, but it needs a bit of structure to grow well. That structure could be some basic premises that we bring to dreamwork – ideas and practices that give us support and a direction for learning.   
 
Here is a good basic trellis for helping your Jungian dreamwork thrive, thanks to master dreamworker Jeremy Taylor:
 
Jeremy Taylor’s Ten Basic Assumptions About Dreams

1.  All dreams come in the service of healing and wholeness.
2. No dream comes just to tell the dreamer what he or she already knows.
3. Only the dreamer can say with any certainty what meanings his or her dream may hold.
4. The dreamer’s “Aha” of recognition is a function of previously unconscious memory and is the only reliable touchstone of dream work.
5. There is no such thing as a dream with only one meaning.
6. All dreams speak a universal language of metaphor and symbol.
7. All dreams reflect inborn creativity and ability to face and solve life’s problems.
8. All dreams reflect society as a whole, as well as the dreamer’s relationship to it.
9. Working with dreams regularly improves relationships with friends, lovers, partners, parents, children, and others.
10. Working with dreams in groups builds community, intimacy, and support and begins to influence society as a whole.

Another kind of trellis for your dreamwork is a dream group. I really believe dreams are meant to be shared.  A dream is like a poem: we all see it a little differently, and hearing layers of meaning insight helps open up new depths for everyone, not just the dreamer.
 
You can create a group or find a local dreamworker to lead it.   The Community Dreamwork Initiative invites you to join us for summer dream events offered through the Nashville Public Library and the Nashville Jung Circle (see below).
 
One more thing. 

You know how a beautiful garden transforms your yard, and by extension, your neighborhood?  Growing dream-consciousness actually changes how you see, and how you live – and you share that transformation whether you mean to or not!  Good dreamwork habituates you to compassion and nondual consciousness.   Shared dreamwork creates deeper and more flexible relationships.  Those flowers in your garden picture the flowering of your psyche and the flowering of a community of amazement open to grace and transformation. ​

Wake up to Dreaming...
 
I love this 12th century carving, “The Dream of the Magi.”  It pictures an imaginary beginning to the Epiphany story about the wise men who left everything to follow the dazzling star.  The artist himself is a wise man, for he draws us first to the hands, not the star. This beautiful image is about waking to the touch of the angel.   

Fire by Night is glowing! 
Welcome to the first issue of the monthly letter of Fire by Night Dreamwork. Here’s a flotilla of flaming thanks to all of you who have participated in Fire by Night over the years as it’s moved from a quiet circle of dream exploration to a certificated practice with multiple offerings and outreach events.
 
You’re receiving this because you’re a current or previous Fire by Night dreamer, or you’re a friend, colleague, therapist, and creative, curious person who might be interested in dreamwork.
 
Thank you for opening up the first issue to see what’s new.