Vocational Dreams

Let me begin with a few questions for the reader to consider: 

1) What are Vocational Dreams?

2) What can they teach you about who you really are? 

3) Are there basic truths that such dreams can reveal to you from within the vocational doorways? 

4) What are your vocational archetypes, or calling symbols?

5) Do you have a vocational archetype that is nuclear in your personality, a source of deep motivation, and psychic energy that has been activated since childhood?

6) What are your callings, or spiritual purposes in life?

7) How can the fulfillment of your vocations lead to better forms of relatedness with your family, your community, and the world? 

       The reader may be wondering: What does my dream mean? In my practice of Jungian psychotherapy I bring over three decades of study on the psychology of CG Jung and the interpretation of and research into the nature of vocational dreams and Jungian archetypes. (For an audio recording of a presentation of my 2016 talk at the Unitarian-Universalist Church  of Berkeley, CA, on "Vocational Dreams" you may click download below.) When I think of my life’s journey, I think of it as a Self-path―a path to individuation and wholeness. Ideally, I think of my quest for wholeness as being realized through a vocation, or calling in life. I have spoken about this quest for Self-realization in my book William Everson: The Shaman’s Call. I’m writing about the subject now in a plural sense, not as one, but as numerous callings of sacred work. Life is too complex to manifest its multiple meanings through a single calling. Dreams of vocation are instinctually and spiritually patterned by a balancing function in the unconscious. The primary function of vocational dreams is to harmonize our material and social drives in movement towards increasing spiritualization, physical and emotional health, self-esteem, and the crystallization of our personal and cultural identities. 

Here is an example of a Journaling exercise for the reader to experiment with if you would like: Close your eyes and take a couple of deep breaths, at your own pace. Feel yourself sinking into your body and notice if there are any sensations, feelings, images thoughts that are present there. If you find yourself wandering just bring yourself gently back to the present. Take another deep breath and then imagine yourself approaching some kind of a doorway. It may be the door to a sacred room of some kind. Any kind of door that you can imagine there. Now imagine yourself going through that door and see what emerges on the other side. Is there an image or vision? Colors? Textures? What feelings arise for you? Sensations? Allow yourself to engage in an inner dialogue or in a way you can relate to it, with whatever you experience in your mental imagery. Stay with this experience. When you are ready, pick up your pen or begin typing into your computer whatever words want to flow through you.