Dream about leaving home
We continue our dream workshop with a dream, a young man was kind enough to offer for me to comment on. He writes:
“I dream that I am leaving the house I grew up in, where my mother still lives and start towards the bridge which leads to the largest city in our area. I went to school on this side of the bridge and most of my friends live here. This is where I work as well. I only go across the bridge on business or for pleasure, to go to a theater or a good restaurant. I get to the middle of the bridge and then find it harder and harder to cross. As I reach the far side, the journey becomes easier. I think of my mother and my friends. It feels like if I cross the bridge something will be permanently changed. I have crossed he bridge often in the past without any kind of anxiety. What can this mean?”
He continues: “I don’t think I am anxious about anything especially. I am concerned about what kind of career I should choose, if I should go to university, which would be across the harbor, or is I should take a trade where I could train in this city.
I appreciate his graciousness sharing the dream. In the first place he wrote the dream down and included a lot of details. That is essential. He also adds some thoughts which are helpful.
What does it mean to leave the house one grew up in? This is a variation of the three little pigs leaving home to “seek their fortune.” Leaving home is a big step. It tends to stir up many primitive emotions. We want to go and be on our own and yet we are scared to be on our own.
Leaving home and mother is a double whammy. Mother was the one who brought us into the world, and to whom we turned to protect us from the world when it became too threatening. If our relationship was good then to leave her may feel like we are abandoning one of our primary sources of comfort and safety.
The same is true of leaving our friends and familiar surroundings. We are cutting ourselves off from many of our resources. To do this stirs up many anxieties.
Bridges tend to symbolize change. We go from one side where things are familiar to another where everything is new. No wonder we begin to get anxious in the middle of the decision. It may feel like it is harder and harder to proceed.
It sounds like his psyche is saying to him that it will be hard to leave home but that if he goes to university across the harbor that he will find life easier.