ANALYZE THIS!

So, I had this dream. 

It felt like a nightmare, although it involved nothing more sinister than a napkin.  A yellow napkin, made of paper.  The scene was as follows: I was rushing off to a party (yippee!) when a gal I went to high school with, Susie Sunshine (yes, her real name), came up to me with the napkins in question.  I was reluctant to stop, and told her I didn’t have time, but there I stood, impatiently hearing her out while she rambled on and refused to shut up.

In real life I’m very good at disengaging from needy people because I believe people should take care of themselves.  I’m not talking about being heartless.  But many folk don’t take responsibility for their own well-being and take advantage of softies who don’t know how to say no. There are users who will glom on to you until kingdom come.  I don’t allow that.  It’s important to set boundaries. We all have our own work to do in life. You can’t carry someone else’s burden, nor should you when it’s their karma to deal with.  Sometimes it takes a while to figure out that someone has an underlying agenda.  I’m not against being helpful, generous or kind when the spirit moves you. I’m talking about being compulsively "nice", avoiding users, manipulators, and parasites who refuse to carry their own load, or dump their neuroses on you.  I learned from my mom, “The duty of another is full of danger”.

At any rate, I’m itching to get moving in the dream but I’m now accommodating
Ms. "Sunshine" by handling her problematic napkins.  They had a few smudges and blemishes on them, a touch of lipstick here, a bit of food there.  A few looked like they’d been unfolded, and could benefit from pressing and refolding to become presentable again.  I took a napkin and started folding it. Despite my desire to get cracking and go to my party (!) there I stood obliging someone with an incredibly trivial “problem”. I realize she’s not stopping talking and has no intention of ever stopping talking.  I simply must go.

So, I go.  And wake up.

The first thing that came to mind in analyzing this dream (which left me with a cloying, queasy feeling) was that these yellow napkins were nearly identical to a collection of unblemished, large, square yellow napkins that I inherited from my senior neighbor Shirley, who left my apartment building nearly a year ago to move into an independent living community.  I had just used up her last napkin a few days ago.

The feeling from the dream was “sticky”, as this dream woman was clinging to me when I was trying to escape (while we were not friends in high school, the real Susie was “sunshiny” and smiley).   I couldn’t understand what the dream signified for me.  Until I opened the morning’s email, and all become crystal clear. 

My innocent yellow “nightmare” didn’t have to do with my old neighbor, Shirley.  It had to do with my current author, Sherrey, for whom I had just narrated a third audio book. Even their names are similar, which is how psychic messages work.  It’s like playing charades: “sounds like….”.  Her books heavily featured yellow sticky notes (Shirley’s yellow napkins) and baked sticky buns (the cloying, sticky feeling my dream left me with).  Sherrey is very upbeat and super friendly, not unlike Susie Sunshine, so all the names and analogies were perfect.

I had just completed production on her audio book when the author emailed a new list of excerpts she had revised and wanted me to rerecord.   During prior productions this author had frequently changed her mind about the most trivial of things pertaining to her writing, requiring ongoing redos on my part.  Unless I’ve made a mistake, rerecording is not standard business practice in audio book production.  A book is expected to be edited and complete by the time it moves to audio production. Redos also cut into my compensation as I’m paid by the finished product, not by the hour. My stomach sank when I saw her new list of requests. The dream was prescient.  

During recording of the previous two books I’d narrated for her, I nearly lost my mind trying to field her ongoing requests and rewrites, keeping them to a minimum, and had set ever more substantial boundaries to safeguard my sanity.

My subconscious collated sugary Sherrey, neighbor Shirley (come to think of it, she also used to cling to me with numerous requests for help, to which I always acquiesced!), and dredged up Susie Sunshine from the past to ice the cake.   Yellow napkins, yellow sticky notes, and sugary sticky buns were all signposts pertaining to the issue. 

With this latest list of requests for changes, the clingy, cloying author was “sticking” to me, all right.  Once I figured it all out, I was relieved, as well as amused.  I explained that I had already gone through one pass of agreed upon changes for her, but that I had not agreed to a second pass.  Boundaries.  I was relieved.  She was not.  I was delighted with the accuracy of my “early warning detection” dream, as well as my decision to maintain strong boundaries.

Being psychic, I’ll dream of little things that I see hours later in waking life.  These visions make me smile, for they confirm that my intuitive energies and connection to Spirit is active.   For example, I dreamt of 1) a very poufy, tufted Afro on a father and son, 2) some loose change on the ground that I picked up, and 3) pussy willows someone had picked the buds off of.   Petty stuff. 

I saw a kid the next day with the very Afro I’d dreamt about, and later on a grown woman in Central Park.  On the way to Central Park with my dog I saw a beautiful, abandoned bouquet of orchids mixed with pussy willows.  Neither plant is common.  They were pristine, lying on top of a construction site dumpster, so I decided to pick them up when we returned from our jaunt to the park so I didn’t have to schlep them around.  While in the park, I found a quarter in the grass. Returning home, I swung by the orchids and pussy willows but someone had already taken them.  A single pussy willow branch remained, with only a few buds, as if it had been “picked clean”.  The items were not important in and of themselves, only that I had precognitively “seen” them. These small, specific examples are not accidental when seen twice within a few hours, once in the dream state, then again in 3D life.  It’s a form of synchronicity.

Learn to analyze your dreams by keeping paper and pen by the bed.  As you make the concerted effort to recall and record them, your dream memory will grow stronger. You are establishing contact with your subconscious, your spiritual guides, and your higher self when you set the intention to remember, and learn from the symbols that are being shared with you. Ponder your dreams as I have, above.   The more you do it, the better you'll get.  

The Spirit realm is subtle in nature.  You have to learn how to still and center yourself, then listen and see with inner ears and eyes.  Spirit messages are also often symbolic, and not necessarily verbal.  Learn to think in code.  Everyone has a different system.  No one will be better at interpreting your dreams, your symbols, than you. Learn to develop and trust your intuition.  Trust your feelings.  Trust yourself.  You are a delicious mystery waiting to be explored, and there is Help available to you, from Above, and Within.

© 2017 Valerie Gilbert All Rights Reserved

Valerie is the author of RAVING VIOLET, MEMORIES, DREAMS AND DEFLECTIONS, SWAMI SOUP and BRILLIANCE BREWING: A Meditation On Change.  The books are available in print, e-book, and audio, narrated by the author.  

Valerie leads psychic development/guided meditation/past life regression/personal growth workshops in New York City, and privately.  A healer, psychic, medium, and channel, you may book private sessions through her website.

For more information on Valerie's full line-up: 

http://valeriegilbert.weebly.com