An immense metal ship sits marooned upon the desolate dunes of a dark and brooding desert. I am shown to one of two dugout canoes that have been loaded up with salvaged items from the ship by a couple of powerfully built, dark-skinned men. Sitting in the rear of the second canoe, I focus on maintaining equilibrium with the balance of the vessel as we slide across the sand. My canoe is propelled by one of the men who stands in front and appears to power the craft through mental exertion. Eventually, seeing that he is growing weary, black skin glistening with sweat, I offer to replace his toil and begin an uneasy attempt to continue our journey.
To see a canoe in your dream, represents serenity, simplicity, and independence. It is also a reflection of your emotional balance. You are moving ahead via your own power and determination.
To paddle a canoe on a calm stream, denotes your perfect confidence in your own ability to conduct your business in a profitable way.
To row with a sweetheart, means an early marriage and fidelity. To row on rough waters you will have to tame a shrew before you attain connubial bliss. Affairs in the business world will prove disappointing after you dream of rowing in muddy waters. If the waters are shallow and swift, a hasty courtship or stolen pleasures, from which there can be no lasting good, are indicated.
Shallow, clear and calm waters in rowing, signifies happiness of a pleasing character, but of short duration.
Water is typical of futurity in the dream realms. If a pleasant immediate future awaits the dreamer he will come in close proximity with clear water. Or if he emerges from disturbed watery elements into waking life the near future is filled with crosses for him.
Seeing a canoe in your dream, represents serenity, simplicity, and independence. It is also a reflection of your emotional balance. You are moving ahead via your own power and determination.
It has a profound and clear-cut symbolism. Berthelot observes that
the Biblical prophets, in order to counter the agrarian religions based on fertility
rites (related, according to Eliade, to orgies), never ceased to describe theirs as the
purest religion of the Israelites ‘when they were in the wilderness’. This confirms
the specific symbolism of the desert as the most propitious place for divine
revelation, for which reason it has been said that ‘monotheism is the religion of
the desert’ (7). This is because the desert, in so far as it is in a way a negative
landscape, is the ‘realm of abstraction’ located outside the sphere of existence
(37), susceptible only to things transcendent. Furthermore, the desert is the
domain of the sun, not as the creator of energy upon earth but as pure, celestial
radiance, blinding in its manifestation. Again: if water is associated with the ideas
of birth and physical fertility, it is also opposed to the concept of the everlasting
spirit; and, indeed, moisture has always been regarded as a symbol of moral
corruption. On the other hand, burning drought is the climate par excellence of
pure, ascetic spirituality—of the consuming of the body for the salvation of the
soul. Tradition provides further corroboration of this symbolism: for the Hebrews, captivity in Egypt was a life held in opprobium, and to go out into the
desert was ‘to go out from Egypt’ (48). Finally, let us point to the emblematic relationship of the desert with the lion, which is a sun-symbol, verifying what we
have said about the solar symbolism of the desert.
To dream that you are walking through a desert, signifies loss and misfortune. You may be suffering from an attack on your reputation. Deserts are also symbolic of barrenness, loneliness and feelings of isolation and hopelessness. The desert landscape may also be a metaphor for feeling deserted and left behind.
To dream of wandering through a gloomy and barren desert, denotes famine and uprisal of races and great loss of life and property.
For a young woman to find herself alone in a desert, her health and reputation is being jeopardized by her indiscretion. She should be more cautious.
Travelling across a desert shows the inevitability of a long and tedious journey.
Accompaniment of sunshine indicates successful journey.
Dreaming that you are walking through a desert means loss and misfortune. You may be suffering from an attack on your reputation. Deserts are also symbolic of barrenness, loneliness and feelings of isolation and hopelessness.
At times a desert in a dream symbolises the unconscious and represents the dreamer's sense of separation from it. Deserts are generally barren with little vegetation or animal life. The desert in your dreams could be bringing up issues of stagnation and periods of little growth in your life. Also, the desert could represent your loneliness and feelings of isolation. However, if you live close to the desert or love the desert, this may be a positive symbol. For some the desert may be a place where they can commune with nature and feel a sense of peace.
To see or dream that you are shipwrecked, suggests that you are experiencing some emotional conflict or are having difficulties in expressing your feelings. Additionally, the dream means that you are you ready to confront some issues in your unconscious.
Seeing or dreaming that you are shipwrecked, suggests that you are experiencing some emotional conflict or are having difficulties in expressing your feelings. Additionally, you may not be ready to confront issues in your unconscious.
From the spiritual point of view, the journey is never merely a
passage through space, but rather an expression of the urgent desire for discovery
and change that underlies the actual movement and experience of travelling. Hence, to study, to inquire, to seek or to live with intensity through new and profound
experiences are all modes of travelling or, to put it another way, spiritual and
symbolic equivalents of the journey. Heroes are always travellers, in that they are
restless. Travelling, Jung observes, is an image of aspiration, of an unsatisfied
longing that never finds its goal, seek where it may (31). He goes on to point out
that this goal is in fact the lost Mother; but this is a moot point, for we might
equally well say that, on the contrary, its journey is a flight from the Mother.
Flying, swimming and running are other activities which may be equated with
travelling; and so also are dreaming, day-dreaming and imagining. Crossing a ford
marks the decisive stage in the passage from one state to another (56). There is a
connexion between the symbolism of the journey, in its cosmic sense, and the
symbolism of the essential landscape of megalithic cults (or that seen by the
shamans in their visions). Travelling may also be related to the complete cycle of
the year or to the attempt to escape from it, depending upon certain secondary
characteristics of the journey. But the true Journey is neither acquiescence nor
escape—it is evolution. For this reason Guénon has suggested that ordeals of
initiation frequently take the form of ‘symbolic journeys’ representing a quest
that starts in the darkness of the profane world (or of the unconscious—the
mother) and gropes towards the light. Such ordeals or trials—like the stages in a
journey—are rites of purification (29). The archetype of the journey is the pilgrimage to the ‘Centre’ or the holy land—or the way out of the maze. The Night
Sea-Crossing, equivalent to the Journey into Hell, illustrates certain basic aspects
of journey-symbolism which still call for elucidation. Primarily, to travel is to
seek. The Turkish Kalenderi sect require their initiates to travel ceaselessly, since,
as we have suggested, travelling is often invested with a higher, sublimatory
significance.
To dream that you are going on a journey, signifies profits, self-discovery or progress. The scenery you see in your journey and the method of travel is telling of your feelings and circumstances you may be currently experiencing.
To dream that your friends go on a journey, signifies a welcoming and harmonious change.
To dream of the band Journey, represents advice that some of their songs may offer in some waking situation. "Don't stop believing", "Open Arms", etc.
To dream that you go on a journey, signifies profit or a disappointment, as the travels are pleasing and successful or as accidents and disagreeable events take active part in your journeying.
To see your friends start cheerfully on a journey, signifies delightful change and more harmonious companions than you have heretofore known. If you see them depart looking sad, it may be many moons before you see them again. Power and loss are implied.
To make a long-distance journey in a much shorter time than you expected, denotes you will accomplish some work in a surprisingly short time, which will be satisfactory in the way of reimbursement.
This indicates that there will be a great change in conditions and circumstances.
Good journey indicates good conditions and bad journey with troubles indicates a bad life.
Dreaming that you are going on a journey means profits, self-discovery or progress. The scenery you see in your journey is telling of your feelings and circumstances you may be currently experiencing. Dreaming that your friends go on a journey means delightful and welcomed change and harmony.
A dream about a journey represents your path in life or a part of your life's journey. It may reflect some of your fear and anticipation.
The meaning of a dream about a journey will depend upon where you are going and the form of transportation that you use.
Superstion-based dream interpretations say that if you go on a voyage by sea, you will have an unexpected visitor, and that if you take a trip to the shore, you will receive money.
To see men in your dream, represent an authoritative figure or a father figure. If you are a woman and dream that you are in a room full of men, then it highlights the masculine aspect of yourself. The dream forces you to acknowledge your authoritative and aggressive side. Consider also how the men are dressed as this will provide a clue as to what area in your life you need to assert more power.
On coins, a ship ploughing through the seas is emblematic of joy and
happiness (8). But the most profound significance of navigation is that implied
by Pompey the Great in his remark: ‘Living is not necessary, but navigation is.’
By this he meant that existence is split up into two fundamental structures:
living, which he understood as living for or in oneself, and sailing or navigating, by
which he understood living in order to transcend—or what Nietzsche from his
pessimistic angle called ‘living in order to disappear’. The Odyssey is, basically,
nothing but a navigation-myth in the sense of victory over the two essential perils
of all sailing: destruction (or the triumph of the ocean—corresponding to the
unconscious) and withdrawal (regression or stagnation). Yet Homer reserves the
end of the periplus of Odysseus for a triumphant but affectionate ‘return’ to his
wife, his hearth and home. This is a mystic idea analogous to the mystery of the
‘fall’ of the soul into the material plane of existence (by the process of involution)
and to the necessity of its returning to the starting-point (evolution)—a mystery
which has been expounded by Platonic idealism and by Plotinus in particular.
This law of the returning soul corresponds to the belief in the concept of a
‘closed’ universe (like that of the Eternal Return) or the conception of all phenomena as a cyclic organization. Navigation, as envisaged in any philosophy of
the absolute, would deny even the hero his triumphant return to the homeland
and would make of him a perpetual explorer of oceans, under endless skies. But to come back to the symbolism of the ship, every vessel corresponds to a constellation (48). The ship-symbol has been related to the holy island, in so far as both
are differentiated from the amorphous and hostile sea. If the waters of the oceans
are symbolic of the unconscious, they also can allude to the dull roar of the
outside world. The notion that it is essential first to learn to sail the sea of the
passions in order to reach the Mountain of Salvation is the same as the idea
mentioned earlier in connexion with the perils of exploring the oceans. For this
reason Guénon suggests that ‘the attainment of the Great Peace is depicted in the
form of sailing the seas’; hence, in Christian symbolism, the ship represents the
Church (28). Some of the less clearly defined aspects of the symbolism of the
ship—comparable here with the small boat and the carriage—are related to symbols of the human body and of all physical bodies or vehicles; in addition to this,
there is a cosmic implication deriving from the age-old comparison between the
sun and the moon on the one hand, and, on the other, two ships floating upon the
celestial ocean. The solar ship frequently appears on Egyptian monuments. In
Assyrian art, too, ships shaped like cups are clearly solar in character; this cupshape narrows down still further the scope of the meaning (35). Another meaning,
sometimes quite independent of the foregoing, derives not so much from the idea
of the ship as such but rather from the notion of sailing; this is the symbolism of
the Ship-of-Death. Hence, many primitive peoples place ships on the end of a
pole or on the roof of a house. On occasion, it is the roof itself (of the temple or
house) which is made to resemble a ship. Always the implication is the desire to
transcend existence—to travel through space to the other worlds. All these forms,
then, represent the axis valley-mountain, or the symbolism of verticality and the
idea of height. An obvious association here is with all the symbols for the worldaxis. The mast in the centre of the vessel gives expression to the idea of the
Cosmic Tree incorporated within the symbolism of the Ship-of-Death or ‘Ship of
Transcendence’ (50).
If you have a ship of your own sailing on the sea, it indicates advancement in riches. A
ship that is tossed in the ocean and about to sink indicates disaster in life.
To see a ship in your dream, denotes that you are exploring aspects of your emotions and unconscious. The state and condition of the ship is indicative of your emotional state. If you dream of a cruise ship, then it suggests pleasant moods. If you dream of a warship, then it means that you are experiencing feelings of aggression.
To dream that you are sailing the high seas in a ship, denotes that you are still standing tall despite the emotional turmoil occurring in your life.
To dream that a ship has crashed or sunk, suggests that you are feeling emotionally out of control. You are expressing some fear or uncertainly within your emotional state. You are afraid of losing something close to you because of certain difficulties.
To dream that you abandon ship, indicates that you need to move on and let go. Your emotion may be holding you back. Alternatively, consider the phrase "jumping ship", to indicate changing of sides.
To dream of ships, foretells honor and unexpected elevation to ranks above your mode of life.
To hear of a shipwreck is ominous of a disastrous turn in affairs.
Your female friends will betray you.
To lose your life in one, denotes that you will have an exceeding close call on your life or honor.
To see a ship on her way through a tempestuous storm, foretells that you will be unfortunate in business transactions, and you will be perplexed to find means of hiding some intrigue from the public, as your partner in the affair will threaten you with betrayal.
To see others shipwrecked, you will seek in vain to shelter some friend from disgrace and insolvency.
Seeing a ship in your dream indicates that you are exploring aspects of your emotions and unconscious mind. The state and condition of the ship is indicative of your emotional state. If it is a cruise ship, then it suggests pleasant moods. If it is a warship, then you are experiencing feelings of aggression. Dreaming that you are sailing the high seas in a ship indicates that you are standing tall in times emotional turmoil. Dreaming that a ship crashed or is sinking, suggests that some aspect of your life is out of control You are expressing some fear or uncertainly within your emotional state. You are afraid of losing something close to you because of certain difficulties.
Bodies of water represent your unconscious, your emotions, and your accumulated soul experiences. The ship in your dream could represent you and the ways in which you navigate through these parts of yourself. When interpreting this dream, consider the kind of journey and the type of ship. Some dream interpretation books say that if the journey is calm you should go forward with your plans. However, if it is a very stormy journey, get ready for an emotional upset or challenge.
To dream that you are sweating, suggests that you are experiencing some overwhelming anxiety, stress, fear, or nervousness in your life. This dream may serve to remind you that in order to achieve success, you need to endure the struggle and efforts that go along with success. Alternatively, sweating signifies a kind of cleansing or ridding of bad karma. You may be going through an emotional cool-off period.
Dreaming that you are swSeeing or eating, suggests that you are experiencing some overwhelming anxiety, stress, fear, or nervousness in your life. This dream may serve to remind you that in order to achieve success, you need to endure the struggle and efforts that go along with success. Alternatively, it may signify a kind of cleansing or ridding of bad karma. You may be going through an emotional cool-off period.
Skin is associated with the ideas of birth and rebirth. In the Egyptian
system of hieroglyphs there is a determinative sign comprising three skins knotted together, signifying ‘to be born’; it comes into the composition of words such
as ‘to engender’, ‘to bring up’, ‘child’, ‘to form’. The amulet which the Egyptians used to present to the newly-born comprised, like the hieroglyph, three animal
pelts which were attached to a solar globe. The number of the skins here refers to
the essentially threefold nature of the human being—the body, the soul and the
spirit—while the globe denotes his incorporation into the All. The symbolism of
skin is borne out by the rite known as ‘the passage through the skin’ which
pharaohs and priests used to carry out in order to rejuvenate themselves; this rite
was later replaced by a simulacrum, and then latterly it became just a panther’s
tail which kings wore knotted round their waist. This notion that an individual
may assume the characteristics of an animal, with its totemic implications, also
comes into skin-symbolism (19). There is a basic analogy here with the sacrificial
rite once practised by the priests of pre-Columbian Mexico in which human
victims were clad in skins; similarly with the wearing of skins by the bearers of
the signum in Roman legions.
To dream of your skin, represents protection or shield of your inner self. It serves as a physical boundary and how close you let others get to you. Alternatively, your skin indicates that you are being too superficial or shallow.
To dream that your skin is covered with rashes or other skin deformities, signifies your fear of facing a harsh reality. You are afraid of making a wrong impression. The dream may also be a pun that you are making a rash decision. If you dream that your skin has been burned, then it implies that you are unwilling let down your guard. Your line of defense has been compromised. This dream may also be a metaphor that you are "getting burned" or humiliated by someone or some situation.
To dream that your skin is orange, signifies self-love. You are content with who you are.
To dream that your skin is different color, suggests that you are not being true to yourself. Look up the specific color for additional meaning. If your skin is darker than your true skin, then it may mean that you are trying to hide or blend into the background. If it is lighter than your true skin, then it symbolizes fear. Alternatively, it may be a sign of sickness. Perhaps a call to the doctor is in order.
Dreaming of your skin, represents protection or shield of your inner self. It serves as a physical boundary and how close you let others get to you. Alternatively, it may indicate that you are being to superficial or shallow. Dreaming that your skin is covered with rashes or other skin deformity means your fear in facing a harsh reality. This may also be a pun to indicate that you are making a rash decision.
To see something growing in your dream, indicates that you have reached a new level of maturity or spiritual enlightenment.