Tonight's guest Rosemary Guiley has explored the fascinating terrain of dream animals. "Animals are the dream world's greatest teachers," she writes in an article(1) from her website. She suggests that animals that appear in our dreams represent the unconscious and as such can reveal material from deeper or higher layers of our being.
Certainly animals have played a major role in mythologies and religions throughout the ages, and these associations and symbols can reverberate in our dreams. James Hillman, the author of Dream Animals(2), refers to these creatures of our psyche as "archetypal eternal images." These inhabitants of our imagination, he says, are unpredictable, and cannot be "captured" into a single meaning.
Guiley believes dream animals can point us towards traits that we need to develop. "Whether they seem to be friend or foe, dream animals are our spiritual allies, guides and teachers," she writes. Meanwhile in the humdrum waking world, my cat seems to be saying nothing more than, 'get away from that computer and open up a can of cat food!'
--L.L.(3)
1. http://www2.angelhaven.com/vl_articles/dreams/view.asp?=203
2. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0811813274/ctoc
3. http://archive.coasttocoastam.com/info/about_lex.html