Through the course of any life, we come to various crossroads. We become “stuck”, challenged, or simply unsatisfied with the details and tone of our lives. Whether we find ourselves facing emotional and psychological struggles, the loss of a job (which may reveal an under the surface desire for a passionate work), a “spiritual crisis of ‘faith'”, difficulties in relationship, concerns over the “state of the world” or simply a longing to be more fully alive, we inevitably come to junctures where we see that what has worked before is no longer serving. On the many roads of life and death that we walk each day and traverse each night, many moments appear in which we find our selves invited to question whether who, how and what we have learned to be is still of benefit to us and those we love. In the soul, in our hearts and minds, we may connect with healing energies and practices that put us in relationship with a wisdom that is inherent in our very beings. Dreams, Sound and the Breath, as well as Creativity are all potent vehicles for accessing and inviting depths of intelligence and feeling that hold the vital keys to fulsome ways of being and acting, during and within this lifetime.
“I have known and worked with Travis Wernet for decades, first as a student of mine at Wisdom University in Oakland, California, and currently as a valued colleague and friend. Over that time I continue to be deeply impressed with Travis’ intelligence, his skill – as both a musician and a teacher/workshop facilitator, his dedication to the highest ideals of individual integrity and collective social awareness, his vision of a better world of reconciliation and progress, and his indefatigable good humor. I would urge you to avail yourself of Travis’ many talents and innovative ideas.”
Reverend Jeremy Taylor, D.Min.
Co-founder and Past President of the International Association for the Study of Dreams, (IASD), Founder-Director of the Marin Institute for Projective Dream Work, (MIPD), Member of the Board of the Unitarian Universalist Society for Community Ministries (UUSCM)
It has been and continues to be a deep pleasure and privilege to assist and guide people from many walks of life to benefit and learn from the vast wisdom that visits us in our Dreams, Meditations, Vision-Quests and which arise from the Soul and arrive through the Spirits. This work is continuously satisfying, rich, rewarding and releases vast energies that are useful to life within and without.
Working with, sharing & remembering the storehouse of Dreams that visit us, we stand with wise, complex, meaningful and often humorous dramas that fulfill our lives.
Music, Breath and Sound imaginatively yet accurately and potently reveal our visions of deepest longing, inviting our dreams to enrich us every day and every night, bringing our awareness into the present and into the body, creating a home and a true sense of belonging for spirit and soul. Inner work can be a vital path to becoming who we were always meant to be.
Examples of dreams that have enriched and influenced our collective lives include:
* the co-creation of the Google search engine by Larry Page
* the invention of the modern sewing machine by Elias Howe
* the hatching of a multitude of scientific breakthroughs, like the theory of relativity as manifested by Albert Einstein inspired by a recalled dream from his youth.
Several musical creations have been born in dreams, including Tartini’s “the Devil’s Trill Sonata”. Paul McCartney’s “Yesterday” emerged from a dream and has been recorded by at least two thousand other artists and played upwards of six million times on the radio.
Dreams offer up these kinds of wildly creative and supportive energies every night as we go to sleep, witness, participate in, see and remember them.
Honoring dreams through discussion, sound healing, breathwork, painting and shamanic practices allows us to reap the following rewards:
- Dreams give us an experience of our total selves, and show the way towards health and wholeness through previously unseen, practical, profound messages of experience
- Sound opens us to an emotional ‘felt-sense’ of vital living energies within and without, creating awareness and connection with our dreaming selves and the world around us
- Shamanic practices and drumming provide active tools for accessing true imagination to support everyday levels of real assistance with work, relationships, ecology and creation
- Work with projections shows us what is true for ourselves and each other and encourages taking responsibility for our own lives, maintaining self-empowerment and true livelihood
- Sleep dreams and waking visions reveal information as well as calls to action and being, assisting physical, psychological, spiritual, emotional and vitally helpful paths to becoming “fully human”
- Breath opens us to Spirit and unveils energy that exists in the body, connected to past experiences, emotions, thoughts and choices and allows us to release and deepen the understanding of how we can make and co-create the experience that is being asked of us and which we would choose in the “present” and connects soul, spirit and body
- Painting and creativity help us to become aware of the subtle, “still small voice within” and gives us a portal to intuitive guidance, where we recognize each moment is an opportunity to relate with spontaneous realities that can teach and instruct us and apprentice us to the vital energy within and without
A Little Bit About Projective-style Dream Work & Sound Healing
A projective-style approach to dreams operates on the bedrock of firsthand knowledge that we all imagine or dream-up our own versions of experience. We do so based on our unique/shared thoughts, tendencies, feelings and prior learning. This phenomenon is described as projection. As a conceptual and experiential tool, projection shows us how we each place meaning and value on events, situations and people in uniquely personal and yet universal, shared fashions. We see meaning and value in the dreams (and also in waking life) based on our imaginings and projections, which often shift, grow and change over time yet have their origins deep within, on personal and cultural as well as archetypal levels.
Working with dreams in groups and one to one highlights and offers instruction for each of us based on this ubiquitous, all-pervading, human activity of dreaming. Certain sounds open us to immediate understandings, awareness and feelings that allow enriched being and multi-layered insights with a renewed clarity and honor for the mysterious. This practice provides a touchstone for recognizing how we project in waking life in a wide variety of settings and circumstances. It affords us the chance to increase our knowledge of the energies that influence how we may choose to co-direct our lives. Working with the breath becomes a powerful and robust tool for embodying the deep and wide vital energies of Life and Death.
I am currently working on expanding my consciousness by trying to practice Lucid dreaming. However, I also, in general, have paid close attention to my dreams as vehicles for problem solving, messages from other planes, and prophecy. They have served me well, and I want to become more of an active player with them.
Thanks
Coral
Sounds great Coral! Glad to hear you’ve enjoyed some of the benefits of working with dreams, it helps to work in a group or with at least one other person to receive insights and support that are difficult to see on our own also. Let me know if you’d like to set up a session to see if some one to one work would be of assistance in becoming a more active player! All Blessings, Travis W
This is the right blog for anyone who wants to find out about this topic. You realize so much its almost hard to argue with you (not that I actually would want…HaHa). You definitely put a new spin on a topic thats been written about for years. Great stuff, just great!