E-Paper
Don't ignore your dreams!
Evidences show that few dreams significantly influence the course of the dreamer's life.
Dreams, and their interpretation made easy
Dr Francis A Menezes
Roli Books
2005
Sociology
Pages: 260
Price: Rs 195
You are rowing a boat on a river.. Somewhere in Africa and feel very happy and full of life until your boat slows down, you see a village but no people and suddenly you find yourself stuck.
Have you experienced something like this in your dreams? If yes, then the dream may have something to do with the new project that you are handling which is nearing completion and you find losing energy, says a new book `Dreams and their Interpretation' by Dr Francis A Menezes, of Indian Association for Study of Dreams.
The dreamer manager here wanted to do everything himself without involving other people in his project (indicated by the village with no people). The dream motivated him to interact with people and to involve them in his Projects, Dr Menezes says.
The volatile environment in which executives have to work often overwhelms them and renders them powerless. This feeling of powerlessness often surfaces in their dreams, the author says and adds that dreams often urge the dreamer to get out of rut and to grow into the greater fullness of potential.
What do dreams have to do with management? Plenty, says the author. "It took a couple of years before those who had come to scoff to stay on", he says.
Well known in the field of management education and applied behavioural science, Dr Menezes worked as Director of Tata Management Training Centre and pioneered "Creativity and Dream Workshops" in corporate training in India. He says he has worked with dreams of managers, public administrators, entrepreneurs religious groups and many others.
"Our dream life has a reality of its own. It is a part of the business of living. During the day, we experience a walking reality and as we fall asleep, we experience dreams", he says.
On nightmares, he says that they are dreams that produce unpleasant feelings and cause high levels of anxiety. They usually occur late at night, often during the last three hours of sleep. Sometimes, nightmares can even appear to the dreamer as soon as he falls off to sleep. There are called hypnogogic nightmares, the book says.
It is unusual for an adult to experience nightmares regularly and if this happens it is probably because the adult is trying to come to terms with a frightening event, memory or is anticipating disaster in the future.
On a relatively simple level, dream language is often figurative, that is, akin to figures of speech. For example, in day-to-day conversations, we may characterize a person to be a snake-in-the-grss, pig or pussy-cat to mean that he or she is perfidious, unmannerly, or gentle.
Similarly in dream, the unconscious may use the image of a lion, the king of beasts, to characterize power. Similarly, a dream image of rossing a bridge can be a metaphor for making an important transition.
The image of imprisonment likens the dreamer's situation to one of severe restriction. Thus, abstract thoughts are expressed through concrete imagery, the book says.
There is a great deal of evidence to show that at least some dreams in themselves, can significantly influence the course of the dreamer's life.
In dreams we allow ourselves the freedom to experiment with different solutions to the problems and try togenerate various creative responses to our questions, he says.
So a jungle in the dream may have something to do with the organisational jungle and armed characters representing the competitors, union leaders, colleagues or subordinates, Dr Menezes says while dealing with interpreting your dreams.
Dreams deal with a whole range of problems in the most fascinating and mysterious ways. Such dreams help to reduce, if not dissipate, fear, anxiety, stress and gloom.
On healing powers of dreams, the author says that in ancient Egypt, a sick or disturbed person would sleep in the temple after swallowing a potion to foster dreaming. In the morning, the temple priest would interpret the dream and administer the cure prescribed by it.
Later, the Greeks too began to focus on dreams and the problems of healing and used dreams for diagnosis and cure of chronic physical complaints.
Dreams, the Sufis say, are symbolic messages, which arise from the knowledge hidden in the center of being. In the wilderness of the unknown through which the seeker travels, these encoded messages give a forecast and foretaste of things to come.
