“I dreamed ghosts were coming out from the walls and mirrors upstairs, killing people,” said Lynn, who called Radio 2GB this week when I was interpreting dreams on Chris Smith’s afternoon show. “In the dream, I thought I have to get mum to come and clean the house,” she added.

What does it mean?

Lynn described the house in her dream as double storey, and said she was on the ground floor, and the killer ghosts were upstairs. She really emphasised the ‘double storey’ and since dreams often employ word play, I wondered if there was a ‘double story’ going on in Lynn’s life. I didn’t mention this on air, and it’s certainly not as dark as it may sound. I’m not talking about a double life, or a secret life, but you’ll get the picture as you read on.

What I did say to Lynn in the couple of minutes or so that the radio show format allows, was that the ghosts probably represent feelings of being haunted by her past, perhaps regrets, perhaps loss, perhaps limiting beliefs.

In her dream, Lynn is in a practical space, on the ground floor. The ground floor probably represents her physical body and everyday world, while the upstairs probably represents her higher self – her mind, thoughts, beliefs. It’s up there, in the mind, that the past can live on in ghostly form to affect the way we live our lives today – and in the future.

Lynn’s dream ghosts were coming out from the walls and mirrors, suggesting that, until the dream, they were tucked away, hidden behind the walls and inside mirrors. Something must have happened, in Lynn’s life, to release her ghosts of the past from where she had safely hidden them.

Ah, but that’s the thing. Safely hiding (or blocking or denying) aspects of the past deep within ourselves is not the solution. Our ghosts of the past may be unseen, but they still influence the way we live our lives. They hold us back, keep us limited and fearful, even when we’ve hidden them so deep in our unconscious that we’ve forgotten about them. The unconscious powerfully influences our decisions and responses in life, like it or not.

The way to free yourself from the past is to bring your ghosts out of hiding, acknowledge them, and release them. Let your ghosts rest in peace, whether that means forgiving others, forgiving yourself, or simply realising that life’s greatest gifts can come in strange packages.

I asked Lyn to describe her mother. She said she was spiritual, mystical. Our radio time was running out, but I suggested that her mother may represent personal or spiritual development, so the dream solution of bringing her mother in to clean the house was a good one: clean up (the ghosts of the past) by doing some personal or spiritual work – much as I have described in this blog.

We are all influenced by our past, and a lot of it is good stuff, stuff to hold onto. Our dreams can help show us which aspects of our past haunt us and hold us back, and Lynn’s dream symbol of scary killer ghosts delivers the message.

And what of the double storey/ double story word play? There’s the story we tell ourselves about our life, the story we’re conscious of, and there’s the story that’s going on behind the scenes – behind our walls and mirrors, upstairs in our mind, deep in the unconscious, the story we’re not aware of until our dreams awaken us.

Life can be tough when your conscious and unconscious stories conflict. How wonderful then, that dreams can reveal what we need to know, and that dream alchemy can assist us to transform the inner story into a positive, supportive one that helps us move forward in life successfully and with ease.

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