Alysse Aallyn

Category: #Family

  • #Dream Therapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

    Winter – Dormancy –


    What’s happening when nothing’s happening?

      DREAMS – Why isn’t it spring yet? Sometimes the blossom withers. Why? Your dreams remain lively, so, let’s consult them. Do you dream of endless sleep? Deep snows? Hibernation? Do you identify with the drowsy bear and the sleepy sloth?

      Now’s the Time – This is the sacred moment before a burst of creativity. You are gathering your forces. Compare it to a pregnancy. Things are happening, but so slowly and deeply you are not aware of them, with the result that you may feel confused and frustrated. Instead, revel in this burgeoning becoming in the midst of sleepy peace.

      Challenge – We cultivate our desires without pushing our extracting them. We curate our sensations. Spin through pictures of animals – what jumps out? Who is speaking to you? What are they saying? Wat are you afraid of and why? Make notes and collect images. A collage creates a deeper, more resonant picture. Sometimes it’s all in the eyes.

      Danger – In sleep we are entirely vulnerable and we have cultural and historic reason to fear that state. Guard your dormancy with supportive beings, with sleep music, with healing rituals. The triple-locked doors, the blackout-curtained windows, the silenced devices protect us in our chosen nest. This is “think-time” not “party-time.” We will create a “protective spell.” Don a bracelet of “worry beads”, then summon your happiest memories and tell them by touch, eyes closed, one by one. Send every ounce of your remembered love and joy out into the universe with a command to come back to you a hundred times. A thousand times so that your love can spill over and be shared with all you touch, near and far.

      Opportunity – You create yourself. The fetus of this pregnancy is YOU. In every dreamy hibernation second you are rebuilding yourself, adding visions, promoting fresh understandings and positive interpretations. Life offers us the chances of joy and misery – use your consciousness to accept this tool and allow dream-time and prep-time to penetrate ever deeper into your subconscious, to the unconscious, and down down down, deepest of all, to the collective unconscious where we recall in our bones and teeth and cells everything that has ever happened to every living thing as if it happened to us. This is the source of all imagination and creativity, accessible to you in your dream state.

      MANTRA
      “I dream deep”

      #HAIKU : Dormant

      Embrace the cold,
      Without regret,
      Secrets kept.
      Sharp, white;
      Freshening
      Sleep.

    1. #Dream Therapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

      Dreams – Imagination-

      Let’s learn to enjoy our dreams, to look forward to dreaming. I like waking up in the early dawn because when I go back to sleep I can set an intention for dreaming – all the best dreams (and the most memorable ones) happen at the very end of sleep while you are coming up through the lawyers of sub- to semi consciousness.

      Lucid Dreaming – Is when the dreamer realizes it’s a dream. Dreamers often use their lucidity to “manage” the dream – and that’s an important step – but don’t forget we’re here ultimately to find out what the dream is trying to tell us.

      Remember – You’re the Pilot – Do you long for caretaking? Are you eager to give over the reins of your life to someone else? If so, your dreams are likely to become scary, unmanageable and unsatisfying. It is time for you to take charge of your power – you are in control of your own brain.

      Challenge – Open your Dream Journal. Date it, and write, “I want to dream about…” Fill in the blank. Be as detailed and specific as you want to be. It is perfectly OK to allow your waking mind to construct desirable dreams – great works of art got their start in just this way! You may hear a voice… someone from the past who discouraged your “day-dreaming” and wanted you to focus on your work, on the present and on them. Explore this memory fearlessly. It is not rejecting or “hating on” that person to disagree with them – there are certainly times when the priority is to focus on other things – but right now you are exploring your own brain and testing out its powers. Clearly that’s an important and necessary project. Gently take control from this Remembered Forbidder and say, “This is my time now. I am in charge.”

      Danger – We all know the cautionary tale of Scary Guy Who Live for Video Games and Doesn’t Have a Life. Do you fear the power of dreams and the pleasures of daydreaming will suck you away from Real World Competence? They won’t – as long as you are reality centered. Some people dream of different outcomes, things that are impossible – instead of finding workable avenues of growth and advancement. Positive dreaming deepens and enhances, doesn’t evade reality. It’s just that reality is so much wilder – and we are so much more powerful than we can credit!

      Opportunity – Here’s a chance to reveal your True Self. It’s OK to be scared – it won’t harm you to recall the helplessness and confusion you felt in childhood so long as you also remember the joys of accessing power – swimming, bike riding, sports, lovemaking, dance, joint projects, creation of all types. These are models for your future. Some of us believe this growth goes on and on – even after death.

      Models & Mentors – “I dream things that never were and I say, “Why Not?” – George Bernard Shaw

      “A dreamer finds his way by moonlight…sees dawn before the rest of the world.” – Oscar Wilde

      ‘You have within you the strength, the patience and the passion to reach for the stars to change the world”
      – Harriet Tubman

      “I’ve had dreams, and I’ve had nightmares. I overcame the nightmares because of my dreams.” – Jonas Salk

      Mantra – “All things are possible”

      Meditation –

      #Haiku: Imagination

      Dreams bloom
      Across brain; sinking
      Sands of wakefulness
      Glaze;
      Leave behind
      Pearl

    2. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

      Duality – Ambivalence –


      What Kind of Nightmare Is This ? We dream about things we don’t want and people we aren’t. Strong feminists dream of rape, vegetarians dream of meat, pacifists dream of fighting. It’s confusing. What gives?

        Language Isn’t Subtle Enough to Explain You – Your personality contains all feelings, all thoughts, all ideas, rippling through you in a vast subconscious well. Your unconscious connects with the “collective unconscious” of other peoples – dead, alive, even fictional. Why isn’t “hate-love” a word? You experience that regularly. How about “fear-attraction”? Common! What I’m suggesting is that we need to accept the fact that a “personality” is a dynamism, not a slogan. Ambivalence is natural. It’s healthy.

        Challenge – Facing this might seem the toughest part, but it isn’t for artists, who routinely “play” along their edge, peeking over it and imagining life on the other side. Art is the best way to express this, an enormous relief since it’s non-committal. Of course you’ll have to face the surprise of your relatives when your work becomes public: “Where did THAT come from?” But if truth be told, we’ve always been surprised to be related to these people.

        Danger – Society seeks to label and stigmatize. We need to explore our fear but we are afraid of becoming our fear. A simple safe word can’t work when people – bankers, politicians, therapists, employers – are so fundamentally untrustworthy. That is why our identification of ourselves as Brave Explorers is so vital. The vastness of our potential cannot be controlled by language. We will never be butterflies pinned down in a museum box for the instruction/curiosity of others.

        Opportunity – Appreciate your self. Don’t slam the door on yourself too soon. Sometimes the worst labeler, the most determined jailor, is Us. We are deeply afraid of wandering in the forest and losing the way to get home safe. But Brave Explorers carry Home within them. As Nelson Mandela used to quote from his prison cell, if we are the captains of our souls we can be the masters of our fates. We can learn to tolerate a little ambiguity/uncertainty/ambivalence. (Henley.)

        Models & Mentors – “It seems we are capable of immense love and loyalty and as capable of deceit and atrocity. It is this shocking ambivalence that makes us unique.” – John Scott

        “Ambivalence is a wonderful tune to dance to. It has a rhythm all its own.”
        – Erica Jong

        “The Simpsons is about alienation and the ambivalence of living with a family who you love but drives you crazy”
        – Matt Groening

        “Poetry is the home of ambiguity, ambivalence and uncertainty.” – Billy Collins

        Mantra – “I am Everything”

        Meditation –

        #Haiku: Contemplate Duality

        Causation;
        Polarity;
        Suspicious distrust;
        Embrace
        Growth process

      1. #Dream Therapy – Dream Journaling With Alysse Aallyn

        The Shadow – Dissonance –

        Dreaming of reversals? Sudden surprises or a creeping sense of unease? Upsets? Do you wake with a sense of having forgotten something important you almost understood? Feeling lost?

          Some dreams just leave us unsettled, feeling “weird”. Something touched us, but we are of a divided mind as to whether it was pleasant or not.

          You Are A Sensitive Instrument registering seismic shifts and deep tectonic disturbances below the threshold of consciousness. Remember, what we call “consciousness” is many-layered. Beneath your conscious is your subconscious – the things you’ve put out of mind.. Below that is your unconscious –the things you don’t know you know – it is the unconscious that is accessible to us in dreams.

          The Subconscious is noisy, like a neglected child. It will occupy all your attention if you let it. But the Unconscious is a lot more interesting. Something always IS “going on” OUTSIDE YOURSELF and you are alert to the many warning signals! This can be exhausting. We have been dreaming of relaxation, peace and quiet, the clear blue sky with not a single cloud, and here are all these depthless mutterings.

          And there’s a deeper layer yet! The collective unconscious connects us to other people, living and dead, the memories of your relatives, of history itself.

          Challenge – We are not going to get rid of our spidey senses and we must refuse to numb, ignore or inflate them. The key to intelligent management of dissonance is to think of the world as an orchestra playing a symphony. The more able we are to distinguish the varied instruments and musical lines the more we will appreciate and enjoy the experience. Balance is always key. In this cacophony, YOU are the important one. We accept all the levels of consciousness without fear; they will not control us. They are asking us to control them. We will schedule regular periods of rest and renewal where we put problems far away from mind and give thanks for this body, this moment, this sense of appreciation and wonder.

          Danger – Avoid a “bunker mentality.” The universe has many bunkers, but is bigger than any single one. We cultivate a hierarchy of response. Get out of bed in the middle of the night for a fire alarm, not a phone notification. Don’t allow yourself to ever feel helpless but seek out advice and encouragement from others who understand a healthy growth process. All of us live in groups, curate your group to promote intelligent awareness in an atmosphere of hope. Dissonance is never doom.

          Opportunity – We each have a chance to spend our night on the watchtower, but you don’t need to spend every night there. Consider dissonance an invitation to maturity. We are putting away childish things. The sky is NOT falling, however the climate is under legitimate scientific threat. Strategize ways to band together to take useful action. This is an opportunity to show self-love, as well as love for the group, the environment, the world and the future. Open your Dream Journal. The attitude, “I care about you so I’m going to take care of you” keeps us sensitive to the message of Universal Love that is waiting to embrace us.

          Models & Mentors – Great things are not accomplished by those who yield to fads, trends and popular opinion”
          – Jack Kerouac

          “Better to fail in originality than succeed in imitation”
          – Herman Melville

          “If you don’t fit in, you’re probably doing the right thing” – Henry David Thoreau

          “Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth”

          – John F. Kennedy

          Mantra – “I Hear You”

          Meditation –

          Haiku: Dissonance

          Nonsense;
          Clues disappeared
          Fragmenting circle
          Unsolvable
          Mystery

        1. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

          Peace – Serenity – The Power of Happy Dreams – Do you have a mental happy place to retreat to whenever you need a psychic lift?  It doesn’t even need to be a place you’ve ever actually been for you to dream about it. Multiverse proponents would argue that you’ve already been there. Do your dreams involve beaches, vacation, relaxation, memories of happy times when you hadnothing to do but enjoy yourself and revel in the moment?

          Happy Dreams are prophecies of all the peace and serenity that await us, greeting us whenwe first came into the world.

          Peace is Possible. Serenity is an Idea. Most of us are familiar with the “serenity prayer”  written by theologian Reinhold Niebuhr:

          “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference, living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; taking this world as it is and not as I would have it; trusting that You will make all things right.”

          It’s possible to maintain serenity, even when things are awful. The Serenity Prayer works as aninoculation against pointless worry, which is seen as “borrowing trouble.”

          Challenge – Like meditation, serenity is a mental state that takes practice. Take out your your Dream Journal.Make a list of your most pressing concerns. Can you do anything about any of them today? If so,appoint a time when you will take a step towards resolving this concern. If you can’t do anything aboutit, put it forcefully out of your mind. Imagine your worries as a bunch of balloons. Now let them go, one by one. Put each useless worry on a piece of paper and burn them slowly, each by each. Give yourself a“mantra”; a word or phrase you find comforting and centering, and repeat it out loud to yourself. St. Julian of Norwich recommended: ”All things will be well”, Coué offered, “Every day, in every way I amgetting better and better”, some yoga enthusiasts chant a simple “Om.” You can use a phrase from yourown past said to you by a Beloved Person – “now you’ll be fine” “You’re safe” “You’re perfect”“Everything’s all right”or the tried and true: “I love you.” My favorite is from Revelation: “Every tear wiped away.”

          Danger – We are all worried about missing something, or someone. Often that “centering person”, that reassuring person from our past is not just the one who gave us the relaxation code, but is also the one who told us what to worry about: ie.”Make sure all the locks are locked” “Have you done yourhomework?” There certainly are things to be concerned about (“Are you registered to vote?”) but there are plenty of worries we CAN’T help with. Return to the serenity prayer and start weeding out – onpaper – your Justifiable Concrns. One of the best things about Anxiety – and I mean this – is it offers anopportunity to ask for help. Yes, I say “opportunity”! Because life is  all about RELATIONSHIPS. Soworries offer us a unique chance to forge a meaningful, worthwhile relaionship with Someone Else. Who? It depends. Get ready to experiment. As with every other relationship in your life, yourrequirements, tolerance, communication goals are unique. Many people want to speak to a professional– therapist or life coach – and plenty of professionals out there are auditioning for a little – or a lot – ofyour hard-earned cash. An excellent place to start is with Proven Gurus like Tolle Eckhart or Pema Chodon who can be accessed from any library. See what you think. Evaluate their assistance. Inquirefurther.

          Opportunity – This is a perfect moment to harness the power of lucid dreaming. Lucid dreams are INTENTIONAL. Imagine that! You could go to that happy place ANY TIME you needed it and, best of all, use your night time rest as an arena and your “happy place” as a vessel to anchor your subconscious. We have worries we don’t even know about yet! But we also have powerful forces onour side. Practice sleeping to “special music” with a mental picture of your “happy place.” Aaah.

          Models & Mentors – “Do not let the behavior of others destroy your inner peace.” – The Dalai Lama

          “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference.” – Reinhold Niebuhr

          “Serenity of spirit and turbulence of action make up the sum of life”

          – Vita Sackville-West

          “Enjoy the peace of nature and declutter your inner world” – Amit Ray

          Meditation –

          #Haiku: Wealth

          Peace to dream

          Play to share

          Health to dance

          Worlds to

          Explore

          Joy to

          Extend

        2. #DreamTherapy – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

          The Lovers – Alliances –

          Do you dream of love, sex, connection? Hand-holding, hugging, family celebrations? You are searchingfor Alliances. An alliance is symbiotic, good for both sides of the equation. To reach out, you must firstdecide motive (“I Could Use a Friend” vs “I’m Looking For Romantic Connection”) and that you areWORTHY of connection. This last one is tricky because we are all looking to others for validation.  Thisis the source of many “imposter” dreams where we find ourselves naked in front of the entire class,unprepared on Test Day.

          Open Your Dream Journal – Make a list of what you want in a friend/lover, then make a list of what you are prepared to give. The lists shouldn’t be unbalanced! Are you a “giver” or a “taker”? Neither can ever be satisfied, because the music of the spheres is all about rhythm and balance.

          Learn the Steps – There is much talk of “love languages”. The man who comes and digs an unsightly hole in your front yard may be awkwardly tendering a gift. The woman who doesn’t mention you’ve been talking all night with spinach in your teeth is also trying to do “something nice.”  But in each case, the ultimate effect may feel “hostile” to the recipient.

          There’s No Substitute for Communication – If you are hoping to communicate interest without revealing yourself you are bound for confusion and disappointment. But relax; it turns out the process of communication – trying to figure out and express who you are – is satisfyingly absorbing. It always makes you feel better, even when you meet a person who “weaponizes” honesty.

          How Can That Be? – Learning to recognize Exploiters is Two-Thirds of the Game. Exploiters probe for weakness, searching for hostages. We don’t want to end up as someone else’s meal.

          We can’t get through this alone, and we don’t want to. Luckily, we are surrounded by other humans,struggling, just like us.  If we pledge to help each other, we can dispatch terror and celebrate joy! Comforting! But how can we tell the difference between Builders and Exploiters?

          Danger  – When someone is trying to destroy your self-esteem, recognize this. Even if it comes in theguise of “friendship” this person is an enemy. This is not what  friends are for. When someone is tryingto “capture” you, i.e. limit and control your possibilities and behavior, that person is a hostage-takerlooking for slaves. NOT a friend.

          Challenge – what are friends for? Friends are honest: “I just don’t like that dress but maybe it’s me.”Friends are forgiving, ‘I’m sorry, I was having a bad day. I know you’re sorry, too.”  Friends  are fun,“Let’s cheer ourselves up.” Friends are helpful: “Let’s figure a way out of this.” Are you honest,forgiving,  fun-loving and helpful? You’re ready to be a friend.

          Opportunity – Friends are a mirror in which we see ourselves. We can experiment with possibilities, wecan expand our reach.  Our intelligence is doubled, as well as our efforts.  Our sorrows are halved andour ideas are increased exponentially.  Reach out! You’re getting better at the game every time you try.

          Models & Mentors – “You are my sun, my moon and all my stars”

          – e.e. cummings

          “All that we love deeply becomes a part of us” – Helen Keller

          “Love makes your soul crawl out of its hiding place” – Zora Neale Hurston

          “Love is not proud or boastful, keeps no record of past mistakes – love rejoices in the truth” –

          II Corinthians

          “Laugh as much as you breathe, love as long as you live” – Rumi

          Meditation –

          #Haiku: The Lovers – Alliances

          Entangled

          Pair;

          Four winged

          Angel flying

          Back to back:

          Unbeatable

        3. Dream Group Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

          Loss & Suffering – Sometimes dreams are an escape from the unbelievable horror of existence. In that case, they are our art form, and we must curate them to prepare a bearable future.

          Ugly World – every religion and philosophical system has to account for the misery we see around us -storms, flood, volcanos, disease, human frustration an animal predation. Do your dream explore inner and outer pain? How much is fear, how much is anxiety, how much is collective unconscious and shared human history? We fear everyone CAN’T be happy at once. How do we educate ourselves to surf this intolerable dilemma? Let’s get out our Dream Journals.

          What’s the happiest dream you’ve ever had? Why? – How could it even more satisfyingly responsive to your present crisis?

          Lucid Dreaming –  Is dreaming when you’re aware of it. it’s trying to guide the dream and use it to replenish your spirit. Your psyche is accessible in dreams to those you choose to include. What spirits do you invite?

          Pain is Joy’s Shadow – Joy is an excess of feeling and so is suffering. When we long to “numb out”, we numb everything. If we live our lives in fear, we avoid the potential excitement of holding breath on the edge of discovery.

          Challenge – What would become of us if we allowed ourselves to feel it all? Poets feel they must indulge – artist of all kinds explore and expand the edges of perception and assessment. Possible philosophical coping mechanisms can be Buddhist – “It’s all illusion” “Practice taming the wild mind” or religious –  “Suffering brings us closer to God in developing compassion for all creation” and “Birth pangs are necessary to bring new life.” Any way we can keep our mind and soul responsive and deepening benefits the whole planet. Cultivate Dream Partners. Share your dreams with them.

          Danger – Too much suffering breeds helplessness. Our angel needs to recover from her burns and acquire some new feathers. If we stop even trying to better our human situation we attract predators to such easy prey.  Even worse, we become predators ourselves, bragging to the godless that we are the new potentates. Cruelty breeds endless cruelty. There must be a way to step off this treadmill – there’s enough suffering going around without manufacturing more.

          Opportunity – Imagination itself comes from discomfort, even misery. We see a need to expand our mental repertoire, to magically increase the very dimensions of thought that seem to imprison us. As a species we have broken through this many times. There must be further epiphanies awaiting. How does this apply to you? Ask your dreams. Open and relax your mind.  Keep track of your dreams in your journal – not just actual dreams, but your thought possibilities in reflection. What if you could not fail? Turn to your dream partners for ideas. Who are we really? Who could we become?

          Models & Mentors – “You will heal and you will rebuild yourself around the loss you have suffered”

          – Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

          “How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard”

          – A.A. Milne

          “Only people who are capable of loving strongly can suffer such deep sorrow, but this same necessity of loving serves to counteract their grief and heal them”

          – Leo Tolstoy

          “What we once loved we can never lose for it becomes a part of us” – Helen Keller

          “Death is not the greatest loss in life, the greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live”  – Norman Cousins

          Meditation –

          #Haiku: Acceptance without Exception

          Join us!

          Compassion

          Greets

          Suffering;

          Blends;

          Evaporates

          Tears

          Gently.

        4. Dream Group – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

          CREATIVITY – If your dreams are particularly imaginative and enjoyable, you are probably an artist. You have launched yourself already on the absorbing quest of reinventing the confusing realities that buffet us.

          We keep trapping ourselves in the maze but there is always a way out. Close your eyes. Breathe. Don’t we all possess inherently the goddess’ power of making Something out of Nothing? Think. Feel. Give yourself permission to explore. Look at the tactile world around you and reach out yourhands. You are the pilot of your own life. Create your own dream.

          Artists are immortalized by their own thought and effort. If their productions are intriguingly beautifulthe rest of us are drawn in and our critical senses – our rejection and our fear – are tranquillized whilewe allow the artist to work their magic upon us. Artists aspire to be magicians of the mind and soul.

          CHALLENGE  –      If you create something unforgettable you will never be forgotten. You have thepower to open hearts, minds and brains as yours were first opened, when you looked upon this amazingworld for the first time  and tried to understand what you saw.

          DANGER – There is possibility here for such overweening pride that you place your own psyche aboveCreation in importance.   If you seek worship your own soul will be hardened unto death.

          OPPORTUNITY – You will join the gods in creating something really new that the world cannotlive without. The joy of sharing, the rapture of being known, the ecstasy of expression, of beingunderstood, will be yours.

          Models & Mentors – “Creativity is seeing what everyone else has seen and thinking what no one else has thought.” – Albert Einstein

          “Creativity can’t get used up. The more you use the more you have.” – Maya Angelou

          “Creativity is just connecting things.” – Steve Jobs

          “There is no innovation, no creativity, without failure.” – Brené Brown

          “What’s so fascinating about life is the constant creativity of the soul.” – Deepak Chopra

          MEDITATION –

          #Haiku: Creativity

          You: Immortalized;

          Fireborne

          Force majeure

          Create

          Become –

          Exalt

          You.

        5. Dream Group – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

          DREAM CONTENT – RELAX – Take a deep breath as you face the content of your dreams.  

            YOU HAVE INNER RESOURCES – FOCUS your power by closing your eyes and – relaxing. Are youafraid you might fall asleep? So much the better – we need these dreams to be our map and guide.Dreaming of hot summers, beach, umbrellas, ocean, sand? You are longing for a “getaway” and the verybest and most refreshing vacation is to disappear inside yourself. Let’s learn to “see” with that Third Eye– the Wisdom Eye. Like every effort, it takes not just concentration but practice.

            DREAMS OF REAL EVENTS –  Is your brain flipping through its memories, disguising them, trying to make sense of them or imagining horrific detours? These are anxiety dreams. You fear that the causality of existence is basically nonsensical and cruel. The cure? Develop a “human flourishing” worldview. Use your models and mentors to investigate the requirements of life enhancement. What about love? When your dreams fear it doesn’t exist, you need to develop loving relationships in your daytime life.

            DREAMS OF FICTIONAL EVENTS – Are you trying to process fiction read about and seen (often dystopian). Your shy heart is shocked to its core and your inexperienced brain is trying to make sense of it. But we know much online fiction is a race to the bottom, trying again and again to go over the top.

            PRACTICE SELF-CARE – Prioritize your well-being. If you spend four hours a day watching or playing nonsensical vitriolic junk, you should spend equal time on your improvement and self-soothing regimens. Think of it. EQUAL TIME. Obviously you need to start developing self-care regimens that are way more pleasurable than passive viewing.

            CHALLENGE – Check your immortal soul. Don’t think you have one? No wonder you’re scared, if you reduce yourself to chaff like yesterday’s lawn clippings!  You are certainly aware that all of human history has been devoted to exploring whether we have souls, where they come from and what happens to them. Probably you like – everyone –  is turned off by the idea that in order to have a soul you need to follow some religion’s requirements, laid down for you by its boss.

            But seriously, think about it. If part of yourself is immortal, with supernatural capabilities, doesn’t it, by definition, exist OUTSIDE all that stuff? Who put them in charge? If your immortal soul is the freest part of you, set it free indeed.  Use your imagination to imagine THOSE possibilities, instead of scaring yourself almost to death. And then – relax. 

            Inside yourself is you find everyone you have ever known, everyone you have ever loved, is there. Ifthat’s a tough one – and I know it’s making you gulp – here’s one tougher – everyone you ever WILLknow is in there too. You can learn to reach forwards as well as back. No, it doesn’t come immediately. But the exciting news is – you have all the time in the world.

            DANGER – You fear you will lose yourself. The worst fear is that you have no self to lose. You areyoung at this, and fresh, naïve and simple. A beginner. Accept that power. It is a wonderful thing whenthe baby begins to see. But what about Evil?  Isn’t that a thing? If I have Everything inside, then don’t Ihave Evil, too. And the mystic answer is Yes. But it can’t hurt you if you don the armor. The armor isLove, and I recommend you begin to study the subject. It isn’t strong enough yet, but you can strengthenit by Will. You must educate your will.

            OPPORTUNITY – You realize now that our dreams are forcing a choice – it really comes down to thatone thing – you must choose between Evil or Love. Evil promises it will “get the job done”, it will offer“special” unique opportunities, single you out for goodies, bring you hostages and slaves. But here’s theFact about Evil – it breaks all its promises because IT BREAKS YOU. Love promises Eternity and Joy,and it takes effort. It takes discernment, knowledge, commitment and growth. Love asks you to enter aprocess. Evil says you can just “take”, or even lie inert and be showered with benefits. One choice makes you beautiful, an athlete of the Soul, the other makes you hideously ugly, a blot that sucks in lightand depresses all who look at it.  Will you make mistakes? Inevitably. But we have been assured by the greatest minds of all time that we cannot lose. So, relax. 

            Models & Mentors: “Everything you want is on the other side of fear” – Jack Canfield

            “What you think, you become. What you feel, you attract. What you imagine, you become” – Buddha

            “You can’t stop the waves but you can learn how to surf” – Jon Kabat-Zinn

            “It takes courage to say yes to rest and play in a world where exhaustion is a status symbol” – Brene Brown

            ‘You are the silent watcher of your thoughts. You are the stillness beneath the mental noise. You are the joy beneath the love and pain” – Eckhart Tolle

          1. Dream Group – Dream Journaling with Alysse Aallyn

            Danger – Risk –

            Do You Fear Sleep? Afraid of nightmares? Do you wake up gasping and trying to forget what you’ve just experienced?

            Nightmares mean you’re paying attention. Life is scary, but we need to grow, and growth requires we learn to cultivate risk if we are ever to expand and venture outside our comfort zone.

            Challenge – Study risk intelligently. No point being afraid of dragons if dragons are only symbolic. No point being “afraid” of “foreigners” if the man telling us to be afraid has a reputation for befriending people and then fleecing them.

            Evaluatng Risk :

            1. Don’t rely on rumor and innuendo
            2. Dangers provably Real
            3. Dangers Historically verified by data: “How likely is injury?”
            4. Assemble Risk avoidance strategies that have performed well for others in your situation.
            5. What exactly is your situation? Quantify.
            6. Know who your friends are
            7. Be prepared to alter strategy to maximize success and to learn from mistakes

            Opportunity – You get to find out who your friends are. Friends want the best for you, but the relationship must be reciprocal. You have each other’s backs. Know the difference between a Team and a Gang. Gangs work to suck power from individual members and concentrate it in one individual. Teams work for the success of all. Coach can’t win if the team doesn’t win.

            Surrender is The Worst Alternative – Be alert to the danger of trauma bonding in which we try to pacify attackers by taking their side. Doesn’t work.

            Models & Mentors – “Extreme Fear can neither fight nor fly.”
            – William Shakespeare

            “Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear”

            – Mark Twain

            “If you try to get rid of fear and anger without knowing their meaning, they will return stronger” – Deepak Chopra

            “We’re more often frightened than hurt, and we suffer more from imagination than reality.” – Seneca

            Meditation –

            Haiku: Risk

            Regret
            Fear of
            Fearlessness: Launch
            Wise adventures