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...and the power to manifest them.
The origin of dreams: What are
dreams, and where do they come from?
Dreams are soul-speak: they're messages arising
from the deep self, arriving as the mind becomes quiet, calm,
transparent. These messages shimmer with truth: as artist Brian
Andreas says, "I don't have the presence of mind to make
up lies when I'm asleep." Sleep literally puts the mind
to rest, permitting the wisdom contained within our center of
being, within our body's center, to be revealed.
Dreams speak to us in images and archetypes.
They create whole environments of meaning, illuminating our personal
predicaments and linking us to the continuum of human consciousness.
Dreams provide a conduit for our own instinctual knowing and
for the universal wisdom that wants to move through us. Dreams
express the intelligence of Source Energy in terms and images
we can understand.
Asleep, we receive the intelligence of Source
Energy through dreams. Awake, as our minds enter a similar state
of receptivity, we receive its messages through myth, imagination.
Moving within the realm of mythic imagination, our bodies become
dreambodies, dancing to rhythms and sounds that are ancient,
eternal, timeless. We dance with and within the Great Goddess,
the Power of Be-ing we have known by many names.
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In Russia, this Great Goddess has been known
as Dennitsa;
in ancient Greece, Danae; in Babylonia, Dunnu.
In Ireland, she has been called Danu, Danuna, and Dana.
Her name is the origin of our word "dance."
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What kind of movement, what kind of breath,
frees us to live within our dreambodies? We animate our dreambodies
when the steps or poses we've been learning become channels for
personal revelation. When we no longer have to think about how
to move, we can open ourselves to allow the dance to move through
us. Free of planning and premeditation, the movement itself becomes
meditation. Our minds become quiet, calm, transparent, simply
witnessing. We move and breathe from our body's center, giving
direct, uncensored, unmediated expression to the life force concentrated
within our center of being.
The power to manifest our
dreams: As we dance, open to the flow of universal energies,
the same intelligence that informs our dreams courses through
us and moves us. But our dancing can be more than receiving;
it can become invocation as well. As we add the elements of desire
and detachment to the images that our dreambodies enact, we send
our dreams out into the world as intentions. And as our intentions
serve our soul purpose and align with universal purpose, we dance
our dreams into actuality.
When you're energizing your belly with movement
and breath, you're awakening and amplifying your life force,
your power to promote creation. You can direct your pro-creative
power to manifest your deepest desire—to dance your dreams into
being—by making a visual image of your intention and using this
image as a focus for your movement.
Here's a way to create your own Image of Intention,
based on a process I've created for participants in my Honoring
Your Belly workshops:
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Image Your Intention
- Gather several sheets of plain white paper
and a selection of colored markers or crayons. Sit quietly and
comfortably with these materials in front of you. Deepen your
breath into your belly, deepening into your inner source of
wisdom and guidance.
- As you focus your awareness within your center,
let a core desire emerge into your awareness. What does your
soul yearn for? What is it that you want so much that tears
practically come to your eyes at the thought of having, doing,
or being that? What is it you want so much you can practically
taste it? And most important, what is it that you're 100 percent
willing to receive?
- Our capacity to desire something for ourselves
has at times been severely damaged. We've often been criticized
or punished for being "selfish" if we want something
for ourselves. We're rewarded for putting our own desires on
hold while we busily help others to make their dreams come true.
Sometimes we misguidedly believe our own needs will be met by
meeting the needs of others. We often lose our capacity to desire
our own good; instead, we often try to make ourselves "desirable"
to others.
- As you image your intention, allow your desires
to make themselves known. You may desire something material—for
example, the environment and tools for creative expression.
Or you might desire to take part in an activity, a gathering,
an event. Or you might desire a state of being—for example,
a way of feeling or healing, a way of experiencing your wholeness.
- Keep breathing and feeling into your belly,
waiting patiently, remaining open to receive this knowing. Allow
yourself know what you want to be, do, and have. Censor nothing.
Receive all the information that's coming to you about your
desire.
- Let your desire emerge as a visual image,
a word or phrase, or a sensation. Keep checking in with your
belly as possibilities emerge, asking your inner guidance questions
such as: "Do I really want this? Am I really ready and
willing to receive this in my life?" Wait until you hear,
feel, or see an undeniable "Yes!" in your gut.
- Now, with your hand as a direct extension
of your inner knowing, take up the color or colors that automatically
appeal to you and let shapes, lines, colors, and shadings spill
out onto paper, allowing an image of your desire to come into
view.
- As necessary, use several pieces of paper,
revising the images until you have the picture that faithfully
represents your desire. Take all the time and paper you need
to depict exactly what you intend to manifest in your life.
- If you feel ambivalent or uncertain about
what you want, remember that you don't have to address your
most ambitious desire at this time. Focus on something you absolutely
know you want, deserve, and feel good about having in your life
right now.
- Some people prefer to represent their desire
on paper with a word or phrase, rather than with a visual image.
If that's the case for you, make your Image of Intention by
writing the word or phrase that best articulates your desire
on the paper, using your favorite color and style of lettering.
Or, you may want to make a collage of words, phrases, and pictures
that you cut out from magazines and newsletters.
- When you're ready to begin your dance practice,
post your Image of Intention on the wall in front of you, or
simply make your image your internal point of concentration,
the focus for your movement.
- As you move and breathe, see and feel that
with each exhalation you're releasing any beliefs or patterns
of behavior that have interfered with actualizing your desire
in the past. With each inhalation, see and feel that you're
drawing your Image of Intention directly into your belly.
- Continue moving through your day in the grateful
knowledge that your intention, serving the best interests of
all concerned, is already on its way into manifestation.
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And as your desires evolve, create a new image of intention
as the focus for your dance.
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