{"id":2276,"date":"2011-04-22T05:46:26","date_gmt":"2011-04-22T09:46:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/dreamgates\/?p=2276"},"modified":"2011-04-18T01:09:30","modified_gmt":"2011-04-18T05:09:30","slug":"four-reasons-we-must-bring-back-the-dreaming","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/2011\/04\/four-reasons-we-must-bring-back-the-dreaming.html","title":{"rendered":"Four reasons we must bring back the dreaming"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
Red-tailed hawk calls me under the white oak - RM<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As I survey the history of our kind on this planet, it seems clear to me that there are four reaons why most human cultures, before modern times, prized dreams and the dreamers. They knew the following things:<\/p>\n

1. Dreams show us the future<\/p>\n

We not only see things that will<\/em> happen (precognition); we see possible future events that may or may not happen depending on whether we harvest accurate information from the derams and take appropriate action. The dream self is forever traveling ahead of the waking self, scouting challenges and opportunities on the roads ahead. By using our dream memories of the possible future we can make better choices. Working with dreams of this kind can save your life. To my certain knowledge, I have avoided possible death in road accidents on three occasions by clarifying dream previews of potentially fatal incidents and taken specific evasive action.<\/p>\n

2. Dreams are medicine<\/p>\n

Dreams show us what is going on inside the body. Is there anything strange about the idea that in dreams consciousness make take a tour of the body, diagnosing developing symptoms and noting what the body needs to stay well or get well? The highly rational ancient Greek physician Galen wrote a treatise on Diagnosis in Dreams, insisting that it is irrational for a physician not to fail to take advantage of dream diagnoses. When we get sick, our dreams give us personal imagery that can guide the body on\u00a0the paths of healing and recovery. The body believes in images and alters its production of natural pharmaceuticals according to the thoughts and images that claim our attention. Our best source of imagery for self-healing is our dreams, which come fresh,\u00a0personal and customized, unlike the visualization scripts that are becoming popular in treatment centers.<\/p>\n

3. Dreams are a direct line to the sacred<\/p>\n

Dreams connect us to the God\/Goddess we can talk to. In dreams, we receive visitations from our authentic spiritual guides and teachers, who take the forms appropriate to our level of understanding. Dreams show us the spiritual traditions that are calling us. In dreams, we\u00a0are called to places of\u00a0inituiation, training and transformation\u00a0in the Imaginal Realm, where shamans, mystics and creators have always wanted to go. In dreams, we also have natural contact with ancestors and departed loved ones who can show us the paths of the soul after death and offer counsel on our life choices. Through dreams, we also awaken to the voices of the animate natural world around us; the spirits of tigers and flowering trees, of hummingbirds and mountains, come to restore us to membership in the circle of life.<\/p>\n

4. Dreaming is all about soul<\/p>\n

Dreaming, we learn what the soul (as opposed to the everyday ego) longs for, and begin to remember our soul’s purpose in this world. Dreams also show us where we need to go to reclaim vital soul energy\u00a0that we lost through pain or abuse,\u00a0grief or guilt or shame. Through the doorway of a dream, we can learn to reach into an earlier time or another dimenssion – perhaos a land of Lost Boys and Girls – to bring home a younger self\u00a0that went missing, with all of its gifts of enery, imagination and joy.\u00a0<\/p>\n

My book The Secret History of Dreaming <\/em>reviews the vital importance of dreaming to great events and great lives across the whole course of human evolution.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

As I survey the history of our kind on this planet, it seems clear to me that there are four reaons why most human cultures, before modern times, prized dreams and the dreamers. They knew the following things: 1. Dreams show us the future We not only see things that will happen (precognition); we see…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":224,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,10,5,19,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-active-dreaming","category-conscious-dreaming","category-dreams","category-healing-dreams","category-history-of-dreaming"],"yoast_head":"\nFour reasons we must bring back the dreaming - Dream Gates<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/2011\/04\/four-reasons-we-must-bring-back-the-dreaming.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Four reasons we must bring back the dreaming - Dream Gates\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"As I survey the history of our kind on this planet, it seems clear to me that there are four reaons why most human cultures, before modern times, prized dreams and the dreamers. They knew the following things: 1. 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He is the creator of Active Dreaming, an original synthesis of dreamwork and shamanism. Born in Australia, he survived three near-death experiences in childhood. He leads popular seminars all over the world, including a three-year training for teachers of Active Dreaming. A former lecturer in ancient history at the Australian National University, he is a best-selling novelist, journalist and independent scholar. His nine books on dreaming, shamanism and imagination include Conscious Dreaming, Dreamways of the Iroquois, The Dreamer's Book of the Dead, The Three \"\"Only\"\" Things, The Secret History of Dreaming, Dreamgates, Active Dreaming and Dreaming the Soul Back Home: Shamanic Dreaming for Healing and Becoming Whole. His most recent book is The Boy Who Died and Came Back: Adventures of a Dream Archaeologist in the Multiverse. Over the past 20 years, he has led seminars at the Esalen Institute, Kripalu, the Omega Institute, the New York Open Center, Bastyr University, John F. Kennedy University, Meriter Hospital, and many other centers and institutions. He has taught depth workshops in Active Dreaming in the UK, Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, France, the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Brazil and Austria and leads a three-year training for teachers of Active Dreaming. He hosts the \"\"Way of the Dreamer\"\" radio show at www.healthylife.net. He has appeared on many TV and radio shows, ranging from Charlie Rose and the Today show to Coast to Coast and the Diane Rehm show on NPR. His articles on dreaming have been published in media ranging from Parade to Shaman's Drum.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.mossdreams.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/author\/rmoss"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/224"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2276"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2289,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2276\/revisions\/2289"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/dreamgates\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}