Journey breaks

Since I started on a spiritual path I have had many vivid dreams. Few of them have been lucid dreams – the type that you can control because you are aware you are dreaming. I have not made much effort to progress in that area. Perhaps that is another of the steps that I will need to take before much longer, as my pendulum adventures continue.

I have a thick notebook two-thirds full of the movies that I have enjoyed while I have been asleep. Here are just a few examples.

Dream one: back to the days when I had just become a weekly newspaper editor. Hot metal is still used in typesetting. It is late in the evening on press day and I am sitting alone in the first-floor editorial offices. The reporters and sub-editors have gone home and I find that there is unexpectedly an extra page for me to sub and lay out, but there is very little copy. The deadline has passed and I am in a cold sweat. The head compositor from the printing works comes upstairs to see me and wants to know how much longer the page will be.

My interpretation of this dream, with the aid of the pendulum: I still have much to do on my spiritual path but

am worried that, because of my age, there is not enough time to do everything that I would like to achieve.

Although I have spent so many years on a spiritual path I feel as if I am just beginning. At times I seem to be overwhelmed. How I wish I had spiritually awakened when I was a lot younger.

Dream two: I am driving a car at night. I am travelling along a dark country lane and about to negotiate a bend when the car’s headlights go out and then, when I frantically try to brake, nothing happens. The vehicle veers off the road into a pitch black field and, as my pulse races, I realise I am soaring into the air and flying. There is a feeling of weightlessness.

My interpretation: although I have spent more than 20 years studying alternative spirituality, there are still surprises (pleasant ones, I hope!) on the road ahead.

Dream three: it is the late 1940s. Germany has won World War Two and taken control of this country. It is night-time and I am driving secretly to a meeting place in the heart of the countryside. I have a radio transmitter that I plan to hand over to someone else. I realise that I am a British spy, although none of my family nor friends are aware of this. I have an awful feeling that something unpleasant is about to happen.

My interpretation: I am not the person some of my friends think me to be. Because the time has never seemed

right I have not mentioned my dowsing and spiritual interests to them.

Dream four: to the spirit world, dowsers stand out like beacons, and I occasionally have dreams about people who have passed away. Two reporters I knew when I was a young journalist appeared on my personal cinema screen recently. They were not the old men they had become but were young and healthy and in their early 20s. They appeared calm and contented.

My interpretation: I do not think this needs explaining.

However, it’s worth mentioning another dream – a dream that probably comes into the lucid category. The man who preceded me as editor was aged in his nineties when he passed away. In the dream he was still quite old but looked cheerful. I suddenly thought: “I wonder if we will speak to me?” And I shivered when he said, very clearly:

“And how’s young John?”

Dream five: I am on holiday abroad with my family.

The weather has been poor and I suddenly realise that it is our last day. I feel sad that we have not had a good time.

We sit in the reception area of the hotel where we are staying and, on looking out of the entrance doors, I note that the sea is surrounding the premises.

My interpretation: at the time several minor matters were worrying me and I think this dream was connected with my emotional state. I was being challenged to tackle

the problems head on and put them behind me.

Dream six: I walk into an old-fashioned grocery shop and ask for a jar of beetroot. I am left waiting for a long time and then I notice on the counter a postcard that I had sent while on holiday at the seaside. I look at what I had written but part of it has been blanked out.

My interpretation: this was about my younger days and indicates that I was unsure about what course my life would take.

Dream seven: I am watering the very large lawn of an old house. There are huge puddles on the grass. A small message was that I should forget about it.

Dream eight: I am tracking the route of an Earth energy line when I suddenly start to run. I stride out effortlessly and am astonished at the progress I make.

My interpretation: it turned out that this dream had a very practical message. I used to be a keen jogger. But, due to ankylosing spondylitis and my age, I had not run for years. After the dream I decided to try a gentle trot. I got on fine and now regularly run short distances. But perhaps there is an additional interpretation.

Because I have become so interested in the meaning of dreams, I have taken another look at some of those I can remember from when I was younger. I will give two examples.

Dream A: I was walking in the countryside at night. It was pitch black and I could not see where I was going.

Suddenly, only a short distance away a fairground burst into life. It was a blaze of colour, with music coming from the various amusements (yes, I could actually hear the music in my head). But the strange thing was that there were no people there.

My interpretation: at the time I was aged six and my parents were getting divorced. It was not as common at that time for couples to split up and I felt uncomfortable about it. I was worried about the future but equally concerned about what neighbours would say. I wanted to hide myself away. The dream, which recurred several times, was about fear of exposure – as the child of divorced parents.

Dream B: I found myself in a desert, with the sun blazing down from a cloudless sky. There was no-one in sight and the sand stretched for miles. Then I saw that, in the distance, a torrent of water was cutting through the sand and rushing towards me.

My interpretation: I was about 12 at the time I dreamt

this. Even at that young age I thought about the great questions that humans have always pondered on (why are we here? etc.) and the water appearing in a barren landscape represented my thirst for a spiritual dimension to my life (it had nothing to do with sex, as some interpreters would claim!).