People are after me, and maybe want to kill me? It’s based on a misunderstanding and something I haven’t done. Fortunately, I have people who know me and help me escape to another country.
There are many details in this dream I don’t remember. I am not sure who is after me, although I think it is – or started with – some neighbors. They see me as someone completely different from who I am. They saw me in a situation and, based on their own trauma, chose to interpret it in the worst possible way. The situation in itself was normal, innocent, and would make sense to them if they had known the whole picture.
DAY RESIDUE: MIGRATION
One day residue in this dream is from last night when I read this text from my wife:
The vast majority of people migrating at this incredibly significant time we are living on Earth do so because they have NO other option. Sometimes these people are underwater, other times they are threatened with death due to war, or displaced by the dire living conditions in countries facing hunger. These are people who have lost everything.
Open your eyes. Open your heart and recognize that the humanity of migrants is as real as your own.
Imagine it were you and your family being forced to migrate. Open your eyes and your heart.
Yes, and that can be me. We can all find ourselves in this situation, especially in our time of global ecological crisis which will lead to mass migrations unlike anything we have seen before. (We knew that several decades ago but it doesn’t seem that the world has prepared for it. Instead, people in the US have elected an authoritarian leader scapegoating immigrants, including the ones who have already lost everything.)
Help them because they are human like you. They want release from suffering, just like you. They want happiness, just like you. And if not for that simple basic humane reason, then help them because it could be you, and it can very well be you in the future. If you feel protected by privilege, then question that. Is that how you want to live your life? Treating others in a less than kind way just because you imagine you are in a privileged position?
CHILDHOOD AND LATER EXPERIENCES
Another aspect of this dream is that throughout my childhood, I was often blamed for things I hadn’t done. My older brother and his friends blamed me for what they had done, and my parents believed them and not me. Students at school would blame me for something one of them had done, and I got in trouble with teachers and principals. In most of these situations (all I can remember), I didn’t even know what had happened. I was just a convenient scapegoat.
I was good at school, loved learning, and was concerned about following the rules. They used me as a scapegoat to avoid trouble, likely to pull me down a peg or two, and because they knew I would not retaliate or say who had done it. I wanted to do what I saw as right. My parents had taught me to not speak up and not get others in trouble.
Later, it became more clear to me that not speaking up and not trying to set things right was self-defeating, especially in these situations, although I still have that pattern ingrained in me.
I have had these experiences since then too, although fortunately not as frequently, and sometimes people who knew the situation have spoken up on my behalf. (Often, they have been upset at me since I don’t do it myself.)
It’s happening even now in a few different ways. There are situations I could set right and clear up, but I feel a bit paralyzed. I have done it half-way.
The dream helps me see my pattern of not speaking up for myself, and not setting things right, even when I could. It’s self-defeating and doesn’t help anyone. And yet, it is quite deeply ingrained in me.
A FEW THINGS I NOTICE
I notice I feel like a criminal even if I didn’t do what they think I did. I feel like that in passport control and when I see police. It triggers something in me from childhood, from the times I was innocently accused of things and didn’t have anyone to back me up. It’s deep in me. I imagine how they see me, and a part of me lives in that perspective.
In the dream, I did have someone backing me up and helping me. They helped me flee, and if the dream had continued, maybe they would have helped clear me and prove my innocence.
Another aspect here is that I sometimes do this too. I judge people for something they say and do, and if I knew the fuller picture it would look different. I may not agree with them, and I may still do what I can to stop them, but it would make sense. I would understand them.
And, of course, I am not always innocent. I would shoot dried peas on windows with a blowgun as a kid, and stole apples from abundant apple trees. I sometimes judge and look down at people. I haven’t always followed the rules. And so on.
ALL IN ME
The previous is about what the dream brings up about my life in the world.
My life in the world reflects dynamics in me, and that’s even more clear when I recognize the dream elements as part of me. It’s all me.
Some parts of me accuse me of things I haven’t done and want to do terrible things to me. Other parts feel hurt, scared, and paralyzed. Other parts again are supporting and helping me.
I am the one accusing me of having done things I haven’t done, I am the one imagining and joining in with that perspective. I am the one that feels hurt, scared, and paralyzed. I am the one helping me when this is happening.
REMEDIES
One remedy is to stand more firmly in reality. I notice parts of me drift into their perspective even if it’s clearly wrong. This helps when I notice I do it to myself, and when I find myself in those situations in life.
I spend time with the part of me that came up in response to the dream, the one that’s hurt, scared, feels hopeless, and so on. You are welcome here. Stay as long as you like. Thank you for protecting me. Thank you for your love for me. I love you.
I notice the nature of what comes up – the hurt, fear, frozenness – which is the same as my nature. The consciousness I am forms itself into it and that experience. I rest in that noticing.
I did some tonglen just now for me in childhood, in those situations, and included the others involved. I will continue to explore that.
The image is created by me and Midjourney