NOTES FROM THE UNDERWORLD: A Blog about Dreaming and Living a Life of Awareness

Welcome back to the dream blog, which has been soundly asleep throughout the long winter! Here again I’ll be sharing experiences of the dream world, ways to pan for the gold of dream wisdom and how to carry its gifts into daily life. In addition I’ll share my perspectives, commentaries, experiences and random thoughts on what I’m learning as I work at living an aware, conscious life. You can join the conversation on the blog, or simply receive and read what is here, and contemplate on your own.

May all words offered here, by me and you, uplift our thoughts, feelings and actions in this world!

In September 2013 I had the most amazing dream of my life. It began a new phase of my life as an artist, my experience of Spirit as it operates in my life, and a deeper sense of what the space of dreaming can be. Here is the dream:

I am in a huge wide hall with high ceilings. On one side, from floor to ceiling is a wall to paint on. In the room is a man, dark-haired, wild, spontaneous, known as the Master Painter. He moves very quickly and it is hard to actually see his face. I am painting, completely absorbed and full of certainty as I put color and background on the huge canvas. I put red, orange, yellow, flame-like color and forms up. Other forms are emerging out of this background of color- the face of a woman, a billowing orange material .The Master Artist calls my art mentor( a real person from waking life) who is also working in the dream studio, and has a discussion with him. He then starts to put form and people’s faces onto my canvas.

I start another painting, huge also, with a blue background. There is a whole crowd of faces in the lower right corner, and from top to bottom, left to right is a slash of blue light, like a pathway. In a third painting the face of a woman emerges on a shield – I know it to be Athena’s Shield, and I have great feeling for it. I work on pulling out her facial features, especially her eyes.

In the meantime my art mentor has put a woman’s face on the canvas with the fiery red/orange background. The woman in this painting has wings billowing out some, but still wrapped around her like a cloak.

The Master Artist then flies up in the air, and comes back down in a chariot pulled by a herd of deer. They all land in the studio, clunking down in exuberant disarray. He moves around the studio as fast as the speed of light, in an incredible display of power.

I wake up from the dream awestruck. While there is much in the dream of great personal meaning ( the identity of the Master Artist, the kinds of paintings, working with my mentor, etc.),  I will share what then happened to my painting. My art mentor and I review what had been given in the dream and over the months that follow, I work on several canvasses with the same approach used in the dream studio. He and I actually work on a practice canvas together, to amplify and practice what the dream asked.

Here is how the method goes. I randomly lay out a colorful background with texture and movement on the canvas. The images are subtly suggested or just appear somewhere in this background. I then draw the images out, slowly amplifying them, and allow them to grow in ways that they seem to want. Certain images feel like the important “seeds” of the “transmission from within”. Those I do not change. New images may appear, and the backgrounds and settings change continuously until they set themselves in some way. What appears is often directly related to the original dream, i.e. a collection of deer showed up in one of the paintings. The end result is a bevy of goddesses and gods, and a whole host of mystical, magical creatures, enchanted scenes, all drenched in a kind of primitive, childlike energy glistening with new life.

While the dream story and the paintings are magical, much more magical is the experience of a benevolent force, the “Master Painter” coming up from within me, guiding me in specific ways. Not just for me. My art teacher/mentor was in the dream studio receiving guidance, and, I suspect, many of you are there as well, dreaming, painting, and more..

Why have I been given such a gift, such a juicy experience? To invite me to see how divinely guided I am in all aspects of life? To experience the delight of the creative force rushing through in ways it chooses? To be tapped on the shoulder to channel a specific KIND of energy? To know with greater awareness the creative powers that do exist within. Yes. All of the above.

Questions you could ask yourself are:
1. Do you wish for this kind of guidance? How do you express the wish?
2. In what specific ways and in what situations are you being guided in your life? Are there syncronicities, hints, intuitions, or specific directions from dreams, life events, from what people say to you?
3. If life is truly a classroom, what does IT seem to be teaching you? What is the name of the course that you are In?

Enjoy thinking about these questions!!!
with love and friendship, Jude