I know of no writer in the western world that has so assiduously delved in the most delicious prose, explored and contemplated the problem of the past and how it and the characters in it delight us or plague us in memory and regret. This artist has filled seven volumes and used several thousand characters who have marched across his mind, to catch glimpses - and maybe more - of himself.

This journey into his life and times catches hold of one and compels one to wander through all the roads he finds it necessary to follow. We are never bored and we are often delighted to come across witty and penetrating aphorisms (for we have found these pithy remarks so true of all of us).

It would seem, for a man lying in a cork lined room for the latter half of his life, impossible to have crammed so much life, so much understanding of human nature, of human suffering and to understand at the end of it that it is the suffering through that makes for the wisdom ensuing - "We are healed from suffering only by experiencing it to the full".

To be sure, there has been only one Proust who has given us endless hours of pleasure. We read him slowly, savoring the pictures he evokes and the words he attaches. We read and we think of him, we think of ourselves, for it matters not that he writes of a society that does not exist for us - it simply does not matter. He writes of people's hearts and that is what is essential for it is the hearts of people that we can find with the super imposition of our own. It matters not what age one writes about, what the mores, the clothes or the architecture of the environment; the heart brings its pulse to ours. We laugh, we marvel, we frown, we get sad, we cry, we fall into despair.

I have prefaced this story of the woman first written about in my book "The Mother's Signature" and which has continued in many essays contained on my website. (List some essays)

What an extraordinary journey it has been for her. She tells it with the greatest of honesty which compels me to admiration for so few of us are willing to let down our hands, or take off our clothes and say, "This is who I am. This is how I was. This is what I did. This is what I have learned. This is how it feels. This is what I still have to do and this is where I stand now knowing."

DREAM: NOVEMBER 27, 2009

I have gone to the funeral of my mother and my father. Apparently, they both died at the same time. When I get there, my mother is quite dead and in the coffin. However, my father looks to be in his early 50s or so and is walking around and talking and visiting with everyone. I go up to him and say, “You are dead…what are you doing walking around?” He ignores me and just keeps talking and visiting with everyone in attendance.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

Today was my birthday. I always pay attention to my dreams on my birthday. I think they have particular significance. I wondered if my dream meant that my relationship to my imprint had finally died. Maybe my mother represents my imprint, and she is in the coffin and is quite dead.

I told Dr. Bail that when I awoke, it was very early…before 6 am. I could not sleep and went outside. My daughter and I had gone away for a few days to a resort by the sea to celebrate my birthday. I sat on the balcony and listened to the waves and watched the sun rise. I felt optimistic. I also felt hopeful. I was grateful that my life had moved so far in the past many years since I had begun the analysis. I felt much better than I had on the day before my birthday and in the days leading up to my birthday. I told Dr. Bail that yesterday when we were packing to leave on the trip, I was a wreck. I was crying and angry and kept thinking, “I don’t want to do this.” I actually knew as I cried and packed and kept thinking this incessant thought that I had become my baby self. I was literally identified with the part of me who was waiting to be born many years ago. I did not want to do it … I did not want to be born. I don’t suspect any baby really WANTS to be born. I felt as if I could hardly breathe as I drove to the resort to meet my daughter. I was crying a good part of the way. After all of this analysis, what was wrong with me and why couldn’t I just snap out of this funk?

I told all of this to Dr. Bail as well as telling him about the dream. I asked him why my mother was dead in the coffin, but my father was still alive. In real life, both of my parents have passed away in the last few years.

Dr. Bail explained that I was connecting back to the energy around my birth. The dream indicates that when I was born my mother was already emotionally dead. That is why she is in the coffin. However, my father was excited about having another child, especially a beautiful little girl like me whom he actually helped to deliver because the doctor was late in getting to the hospital. (My Dad was an X Ray technician and chiropractor but not a medical doctor.)

I was disturbed by Dr. Bail’s interpretation of my dream. To be born of an emotionally dead mother is traumatizing, to say the least. The dream indicates that as a newborn infant, I knew that my mother was emotionally dead. That would have been the basis for great confusion and pain. Had I killed her? Was her death my fault? Could I fix her pain? Could I somehow absorb it from her to save her? If I could save her, then she would be around to care for me. I would survive. The basis of the my imprint was being further established even on the day of my “joyous” birth.

I was upset with this interpretation. I did not like to hear verification of my mother’s great depression and its effect upon me. Now, as I write up this dream and the interpretation, I am somewhat relieved. My mother’s depression had nothing to do with me or my birth. It pre-existed me. I see and understand that there was nothing I could do to fix my mother. She was already dead when I was born. I did not kill her, and I could not have saved her. My job in the analysis and in my life is to save myself. My job is to become who I was really meant to be. I am not to remain the person who maladapted and adjusted her personality and her emotional self over and over and over from the time of the womb in a (false) effort to save my mother.

I understand that my imprint was powerful and overwhelming and has been a tremendously difficult obstacle for me to overcome in all aspects of my life and for all of my life. No, the dream did not herald the overcoming of the imprint. What it heralded was the further deepening of the understanding of my mother’s profound depression and inability unconsciously to love and nurture her children. She comforted us. She cooked for us. She bathed us. She took care of the house and the garden and the details of everyday living. But she was dead inside. I see now from this interpretation that all of my efforts to become the “gold star girl” and achieve and accomplish and please her in any way were for naught. Those things could never bring back the dead. They were, however, a child’s way of trying to make her mommy happy. Perhaps if my mother were not so depressed, she would love me and I could also be happy.

DREAM: NOVEMBER 28, 2009

I am a lawyer making court appearances for a client in a litigation matter. I really do not want to do this work as it is not my area of expertise. However, the client keeps insisting that I do the work. I am not doing a bad job, but I am distracted by a baby that I have been given charge of … I keep having to go to another part of the courthouse to check on the baby. It is not very convenient. I also notice that I started the day wearing a blue suit, but I ended up having to switch into a brown suit. Now my blue shoes don’t match my outfit. It is weird. During one of the court sessions, I start talking about what network executives want to hear from producers during a pitch meeting. I talk in detail as if I know all of this first hand, but actually, it is all second hand information. I have never been in a pitch meeting with a network before, and all I am really trying to do in the courtroom is establish my credibility by sounding like I know what I am doing and saying. It seems to be working.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I told Dr. Bail that I think the baby that I have been given charge of is actually me. Since I just had a birthday, I have my baby self on my mind. I suppose I am being shown and told that I need to take care of my baby self. I need to understand my baby self and help that part of me to understand what happened to her as a baby and how the imprinted material of my mother’s unconscious affected her so negatively.

Dr. Bail pointed out that my adult self is a responsible lawyer in the dream with commitments and a job to do. But in the dream I am distracted by my baby self … I am required to take care of her. He said that is a reflection of how I feel in my life today…I feel very distracted by my baby self. That is true. I feel very infantile and vulnerable.

Dr. Bail said that most of the world functions in their adult "job" mode and personality, but underneath the baby trauma in each person’s psyche is unknown, ignored and festering. The analysis gives me a chance to handle the baby trauma, but most of the world does not know anything about such issues. They appear to function as adults. They go to work, they marry, they socialize with friends, they pay their bills, they exercise, etc. But, the infant self is constantly distracting them psychologically. The infant self buried deep in the Unconscious is really running the show. Virtually all adults throughout the world are really functioning from their infant mentality, but they don’t know it. They have no idea how the imprint is affecting their decisions, their feelings and their very essential happiness. The dream is showing me that even though I am outwardly successful and functional in the world today, my infant self is calling out to me for attention.

I told Dr. Bail that I thought the blue shoes and the brown suit made no sense. He said that I was dreaming about my mother’s depression. When someone is depressed, we say that they are “blue.” In the dream, I change my suit to brown, which is good since this is a color of nature and would signify grounding and connection to the earth. However, my shoes are still blue. I am still grounded in my mother’s depression.

My association about the network pitch meeting for a television project is that I have been “faking it” a good part of my life. I have been acting like I am okay, even though for many years I felt anxious, confused and fearful inside. The analysis has changed a good deal of that. I am not confused or afraid very much at all these days. However, I still have high anxiety. I am anxious when I do not finish projects for clients in a timely manner. I am anxious when I have too many things on my “to do” list. I am generally anxious about many things – real and imagined.

Dr. Bail pointed out that the blue shoes are part of my anxiety. Until I am able to fully integrate my knowledge of my imprint and the work we have done to minimize the imprint, I will feel anxious. He reminded me of all of the dreams about the new emotional structures we have worked so hard to erect within my personality and within my psyche. He asked why those do not take hold for me. Why do I still feel that I have to “fake it” and convince everyone about my credibility? Why not just own the new person whom I have become and show that person to the world?

I cannot answer this question. I feel like a failure. I don’t know why I don’t just “own” the work. I think if I could, I would. But I am inconsistent. Sometimes, I feel powerful, and I understand my feelings. Other times, I just feel lost. Why don’t I hold myself consistently in my knowing and understanding?

Dr. Bail explained that I deny the work either because I am guilty for knowing what I know or because I am afraid that others will be judgmental of the new person I show myself to be.

Denial. Guilt. Fear.

Sometimes I just hate the work of this analysis. I think I have made steps forward, and then I see that I am still trapped in my past – denying that the new emotional self that I have worked so hard to build is even there. The dreams don’t lie. I want to own and become my new and improved, deep, emotionally responsive and feeling self. The dream says my shoes are still blue. This frustrates and upsets me. When will I be grounded in something new?

I had told Dr. Bail that during my birthday celebration with my daughter I asked her if she noticed any changes in me during the past year. She said she had not. I was disappointed in this response. I feel I have changed significantly. Dr. Bail reminded me of this interchange. Until I own the new person I have become and show it to the world, no one will see the difference in me. If I stay in guilt that I have achieved this place or fear that others will not like me when they come to know the new me, then why did I bother to do the difficult work of this analysis? It has been painstaking. We have examined every detail of my life from multiple angles. Four times per week… eight years. The microscope has delved deeper and deeper and more of me is now illuminated…more than I even imagined existed within me. So, why would I undergo this extensive analysis, work through all of the pain and suffering, make profound changes in all aspects of my inner and outer world, and then walk away from the success? I feel frustrated that I cannot integrate what I know and hold it as my own.

DREAM: DECEMBER 1, 2009

I need to take medicine. It is a “25”. The “25” in my case is a combination of “15” which is liquid and the rest, i.e., “10” which is a tablet. I have figured out that if I take tiny bites of the tablet and chew it up and swallow it, I will not gag. There are about 30 of us in the room doing the same thing… all of us are trying to take our various versions of the medicine without gagging. It is hard to do, but I think this tiny bite methodology is good, and I try to show others how I have been able to do it. Many of them are having a hard time because their medicine is in gel cap form. You cannot bit tiny mouthfuls of a gel cap. The liquid is presented to me in a tiny thimble. It is only a tiny swallow of the liquid to get it down.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I know that “25” is the combination of two plus five which is actually the number “7”. In the Tarot, the “7” is the number of triumph and victory. I think the medicine is the analysis with Dr. Bail, and I am being shown by my Unconscious that victory in my life and over my imprint is possible through the analysis.

The “15” is the “Devil” in the Tarot. The Devil card portrays a man and a woman with chains around their necks. However, the chains are loose. This indicates that they have a choice. Either they will free themselves by their decisions so that the chains are released, or they will make the wrong decisions and will enslave themselves by pulling the chains tighter. The internal saboteur always wants the chains to be tightened so that the imprint may keep its hold on the person’s thinking and actions. I have a choice. I can loosen the chains around my psyche, and I will do that by taking the medicine of the analysis and the interpretations that Dr. Bail provides. Additionally, the combination of one plus five which is actually the number “6.” In the Tarot, the “6” is the lovers and symbolizes the powers of perception – accurately understanding and interpreting what one is seeing or experiencing. Again, I think the analysis gives me the ability to do that.

I thought the fact that I was to take the pill in tiny bites was a way of dreaming about the interpretations from Dr. Bail. I go for my analysis sessions 4 times per week (down from the 5 times per week from a few years back). Each time we work on a dream and I receive an interpretation, if the interpretation is correct, my psyche feels a healing. The medicine works. I become more well. This tablet is a “10” which in the Tarot signifies the wheel of fortune…going to a higher level. The analysis certainly does take my life (inner and outer) to a higher and better place.

Dr. Bail pointed out that there are just a handful of people in the world who are doing this type of analysis of their imprint and this type of exploration of their Unconscious. Most of the people in the world are not doing this analysis, and they have (sadly) been given gel caps as their medicine. One cannot bite gel caps into tiny pieces. Those who are not in this type of analysis are not receiving the benefit of "primary cause" interpretations and consequently cannot get well emotionally and will remain stunted by the impact of their imprint on their behavior and their feelings. Unbeknownst to them, they are really acting out their entire lives through the lens of their mothers’ unconscious material which was injected into them as a fetus, as an infant, as a baby, and as a child through multiple imprinting “attacks” which their mothers unconsciously perpetrated upon them. Mothers have no choice. They themselves were imprinted by their mothers and their mothers before them.

I do not recall what Dr. Bail said about why I dreamed the number of “30” people in the room. The number “3” in the Tarot is the number of the Divine – the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Is the dream saying that everyone in the world is in the room looking to get the medicine in order to return to their Divine connection?

I had no association to the thimble other than to know that it is something that a person puts on his or her finger when they sew. Dr. Bail noted that a thimble is used to push a needle through thick material without injuring one’s finger. In a sense, this is what his interpretations are doing. He uses his own Unconscious and his knowledge and his understanding (the thimble) to push the interpretations (the needle) into a patient’s Unconscious so as to help that patient get well (hence the association to taking medicine).

DREAM: DECEMBER 3, 2009

I am trying to get through some sort of learning event. I have much to learn, but I am doing it. At one point, everyone has to get up and dance on stage with the rest of the group. Everyone must be in various forms of being undressed. I don’t want to do that. It is embarrassing. Others seem to be doing it without a problem. Finally, I get up and do it, but I am really unhappy about it. I see that my friend A. is there. Am I supposed to kiss her and make love to her? I don’t want to…she is a girl, and I am a heterosexual woman. It is all really confusing because the instructor says that I need to do what the program requires or I will not pass the course. But I don’t want to do any of these things.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

This dream feels to me to be a reflection of my life. All my life I have been trying to please others. I tried to please my parents, my siblings, my teachers and my friends. I tried to please my spouses, my daughter, my employers, and my co-workers. I have had to do things I did not like, but I have always done them. I suppose that I am told that I have to kiss and make love to my female friend A. in the dream because I felt as a fetus and as an infant that I needed to become emotionally connected / kiss and make love to my mother and her emotional turmoil. But why am I dreaming about this now, and why do I have to go up on the stage partially naked? Why do I even do it in the dream? Why don’t I just say “no”?

Dr. Bail explained that I have spent a lifetime being the “gold star girl.” I have had incessant anxiety and a desperate desire to please others so I would be loved. But he says that this dream is really about the state of the world. There is incessant anxiety and rampant panic throughout the world now all of the time. The current economic collapse of the financial markets, the wars into which the US has entered and continues to perpetuate and support, the loss of jobs, pension plans, health coverage, homes and the like have all pushed people in the US and most of the world into a dire emotional condition. This emotional panic is re-stimulating the panic that the fetus and that the infant feel when they come to believe that they must save mother from drowning in her rejected unconscious material. The baby accepts the material from the mother. What else can the baby do? The baby then has to figure out a way to tolerate this putrid, stinking, virulent unconscious material that has been heaped upon it. The baby comes up with an idea… a sort of rationalization: the baby thinks and believes that its constant attention to the mother will solve her depression, anxiety and upsets. This is a fantasy. Babies cannot fix their mothers.

Dr. Bail said that many people are striving for the gold star. They stay in a panicky and anxious state while they strive for the success, but even when they get it, their panic and anxiety persists because they are still self-identified with the baby who is trying to fix Mom. The outward success and achievement does nothing to alleviate the inner domination of the imprint. He pointed out that in my dream, most of the people got up on the stage and undressed at the instruction of the teacher with little or no resistance or fight. They did as they were told. That is the mindset of most people since they are under the complete influence and domination of their imprints. They are asleep to their true selves. They serve the imprint.

The discussion about dancing naked on a stage reminded me of the end of the stage play “Hair” where everyone gets naked and dances. Is that related to my dream about everyone dancing naked on the stage?

Dr. Bail explained that in “Hair”, the people were celebrating when they were dancing naked on the stage in the finale. There was joy because they were stripping away their defenses and feeling free. They were showing that they had nothing to hide. The song they are singing is about the dawning of the Age of Aquarius…the coming of a time of great intuition and understanding of oneself and of the world… a time of enlightenment. This type of dancing was very different from the mindless, soul-less stupor in which the people in my dream were dancing. They were far from enlightened or joyous; they were dancing in an almost drugged state because of their imprints.

In the dream, although I fight the idea of dancing undressed on the stage, ultimately, I give in and do it. This is because I am aware of my imprint and do not want to be dominated by it, but I still give in to it and become self-identified with the baby who is helpless. So, I get up on the stage and dance with the rest of the world in an unconscious stupor. My friend A. represents my mother…by allowing my imprint to dominate how I feel and how I will walk in the world, I am kissing my mother and making love to her.

Finally, Dr. Bail explained that my extreme anxiety over being behind on projects for my various clients and my incessant mind chatter about what I have not yet accomplished for them is a reflection of my (once again) being locked in my baby self world view. I have turned my clients into my mother. The fantasy is that if I can do the work for my clients quickly, thoroughly and well, then I am saving them. Just as I had to save Mom (which was my baby fantasy and impossible no matter what), I have to save my clients by handling their projects and their anxieties and their demands. As a result, I am in a high anxiety and hyper vigilant state most of the time. I cannot relax. I don’t sleep enough. I work too many hours. I am trying to please Mom. I am trying to get the gold star with my clients.

God…Will I ever be able to stop seeking the gold star? How many times do I have to dream about it? How many times do I have to have interpretations about it? How much more suffering must I endure before I can hang up the need to earn the gold star? When will I put the gold star on a shelf and walk away? When will I just be able to be me and quit trying to please my mother and all of the stand-ins who masquerade as my mother in my psyche?

DREAM: DECEMBER 4, 2009

I am going to a Thanksgiving (or Christmas?) dinner. I think it is in a restaurant that I have chosen. However, I seem to be a bit late getting there. I don’t know if there will be food left for me to eat.

In the next dream, my daughter and I are going to a big celebrity party together. There are lots of famous people there. I recognize a man that I had tried to talk to earlier on the telephone…he wanted a therapist referral, but I missed the call. Maybe I would have told him about Dr. Bail? Anyway, I have come to the party early, and there a various packages of books all around the house which the guests are to take as party favors. Each package has two books in it tied together with a ribbon. I take a set. Each person has been asked to send a piece of art which they have created to the party. I notice that the paper mache cat that I created with green beading is being used as decoration near the foot of the couch. I am pleased to see it there. I see a number of other pieces of art set up and on display. I wonder if I will be able to take my piece of art back home with me later or if it is a donated piece now belonging to the host of the party.

ASSOCIATIONS AND DREAMS

Dr. Bail asked me why I think the restaurant would not have any food for me. Even if I arrived late, restaurants always have food. The only thing I can think of is that I feel that most of my life I have been “hungry” for love. The physical hunger is reminiscent of the hunger for affection I have had since childhood. A Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner would be a celebration of sorts. I have not had a lifetime which felt emotionally celebratory.

Dr. Bail asked me to describe the house where the party was being held. It was a three story house and everything was done in white…the rooms were painted white, the furniture was all upholstered in white, there were columns and panels and everything was done in white. I think the two books which were provided as party favors were Dr. Bail’s two books – “Irmgard’s Flute” and “The Mother’s Signature”.

I tell Dr. Bail that I am not happy about the paper mache cat. We know from my dream several years ago that I only had one cat / one feeling. That one feeling was the feeling of needing to be special and needing to be loved. That is my Achilles’ heel. That is the nature of my imprint…I am not loveable, and I will do whatever it takes to get love. That includes turning myself inside out for husbands, friends, family, clients, projects, etc. My overwhelming need to be loved has caused me to get involved romantically with the wrong men. As a baby, I protected myself by paring down my feelings to just one feeling. If you only have one feeling instead of many feelings, then the brutality of the unconscious material delivered through the imprint does not hurt as much. One feeling kept me safe. All of the other feelings were pushed away because it was too painful to feel much in the emotional environment in which I grew up. But as long as the clients love me, the men love me, and everyone else loves me, then it is worth all of the pain that they inflict. It just feels like imprint pain anyway, and I am used to that. Because it is familiar, I even seek it out. I accept it without question.

There have been other dreams where I had herds of a dozen cats. Those dreams heralded that my feelings … all of my feelings… were beginning to return. I have had deeper and more expansive feelings now for awhile. I don’t wall off my feelings anymore. The analysis has brought them forward to be experienced and savored. Sometimes it does not feel great. Now, I have a dream where once again there is only one cat, i.e., one feeling. Even worse, the cat is not even alive… it is made of paper mache. Uh oh. I am in trouble here.

Dr. Bail said that the three story all white house is the place of higher consciousness. The number “3” is the Divine/ higher consciousness, and the white color would signify the purity of higher understanding. He agreed that the two books are his two books. He says that I am trying not to feel my emotions again, and as a result, I have relegated the cat to a sculpture. It is art. It is not alive. It is at the foot of the couch. This reminded him of the dream I had recently where I had chained a live cat to the foot of the house. It is the same thing again…I am trying to wall off my feelings again.

I asked him who the man at the party was… the man with whom I had spoken earlier about a therapy referral. I said that I thought the man was an actor, but I could not identify him. Dr. Bail said that the actor is mankind. Mankind has no awareness of the unconscious or the meaning of the unconscious in the life of Mankind. Dr. Bail’s books can give some understanding of that. There are two books because “2” is the number of the unconscious. In the dream, I want to make a referral to the actor about Dr. Bail. This is a way of saying that I want to help Mankind by allowing the world an understanding of how the inner world really works. Dr. Bail’s paradigm explains the workings of everyone’s inner world, the power of the imprint and the unique ability of the unconscious to guide our decisions through the interpretation of our dreams.

Dr. Bail was reminded of my dream from yesterday about people being required to dance naked on a stage. They were all dancing in a sort of a stupor…Mankind is dancing naked and unconscious on the stage of life because people know nothing about how to understand themselves. They know nothing about the Unconscious. They know nothing about their imprints. I am aware and awake from my 8 years of analysis, but I am still embarrassed to be exposed so I don’t claim my rightful understandings. Instead, I go back to relegating my feelings to art (paper mache cat) instead of owning my feelings as something to be experienced and lived. If I am to have a full, rich and meaningful life, I must experience all of my feelings and claim who I have become and show my new self to the outside world.

DREAM: DECEMBER 15, 2009

I go to Hawaii for a little vacation. I am there with my husband and my daughter. There is a small hotel that overlooks the ocean on one side but looks only at the mountains on the other side. I would like to take the ocean side rooms. However, the ocean side is a three bedroom suite, and we only need two bedrooms… one for me and my husband and one for our daughter. It is more cost effective and fits our needs better to take the rooms on the mountain-view side of the hotel since that is only a two bedroom suite. It is confusing because I am not sure of my plans, and I would really like to take the ocean side. Is that wasteful and inappropriate?

In the next dream, there has been a murder. Someone has been or is about to be cut up into small pieces. She believes that she can stop her attacker by forcing her spirit to leave her body and knock the weapon from the attacker’s hands. Her spirit leaps from her body, but it is unable to stop the attack. Is it even possible to stop a physical attack with a moving spirit? Suddenly, there is blood everywhere. Rivers of blood are coursing everywhere. Body parts are being hacked into pieces and falling to the floor. An arm is chopped into hunks the size of steaks. Fingers are sliced off one at a time. In the end, the woman is not recognizable…there are just too many small pieces and too much blood.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I was hysterical and sobbing during most of this session. I could not compose myself. The first dream was from earlier in the night, and I had awakened at 4 a.m. with the second dream. It was SO real and SO vivid that I thought it had happened. I was not sure at 4 a.m. if it was me who was hacked up, but as I told the dream to Dr. Bail, I was aware that it WAS me who was hacked up. I think I could not face this thought alone in my bedroom at 4 am. But now, in the session, I was able to understand that it was me who was hacked up in the dream. It was gruesome and frightening. Even at 4 am when I did not realize it was me, it was so upsetting that I never went back to sleep. Each time I closed my eyes, I saw the unstoppable thick coursing rivers of bright red blood. It was everywhere. It was terrifying. I could barely speak about this dream in our session.

Dr. Bail explained that this dream is another recitation of my imprint. A few years back, I had a terrifying and painful dream about being drawn and quartered with my insides being cut out while I was still alive. Dr. Bail explained then that I was dreaming about how it felt to receive the “Big Bang” from my mother… the first delivery of unconscious rejected material from her psyche. In that dream, I felt the excruciating pain of being pulled apart violently and mercilessly. Now, this dream shows me that I felt as if I were being cut to pieces…hacked into tiny bits by the force of the blows of the material that I received. Just writing this all down has been difficult. I had this dream almost 3 weeks ago, but I have been unable to write about it until now. The pain was too searing and too difficult to re-experience by writing about it. In the series of dreams that have followed, I have integrated the experience of this dream sufficiently to be able to write about it without feeling hysterical again.

Dr. Bail said that the dream shows that my defense mechanism to this pain was to leave my body. I would send my spirit out of the body so as not to endure the painful experience. As soon as he said this, I knew it was correct. I can remember times in my childhood when I would simply “go somewhere” in my mind for long periods of time. I thought I was daydreaming. I actually now think I was escaping the pain of my emotional turmoil…leaving my body in a certain sense to avoid experiencing the painful emotions. I can completely understand now why people use drugs. They want to leave their bodies and leave their conscious pain and trauma. They may think that they want to leave a currently unhappy life or existence, fighting with a spouse, dealing with financial worries or navigating a difficult or hostile work environment. In fact, those are just the external reasons for using drugs. What they are really looking to escape is the unbearable emotional pain and scarring of early infantile trauma.

This session felt like another turning point for me. It was a real low. It took 4 complete days before I stopped seeing blood when I closed my eyes during my waking hours even for a moment. For four days, I could not stop crying at the drop of a hat. I handled my business. I handled my projects. I put up a brave front. I canceled all non-critical client appointments and meals. I slept and slept whenever I could. I did all necessary work, but I limited my interactions with the world. I was too dissolved. I “holed” up in my house and tried to stay safe. I felt like a hacked up baby with nothing to anchor me. It was as if my spirit was blowing in the wind leaving me untethered and abandoned. I was miserable and bereft. I had to wait for the emotional blow of the dream to trickle through my Unconscious and make a shift in my understanding of myself. I could not think my way through the pain. This was not an intellectual exercise. All I could do was feel, process and wait for the integration to come.

Why was this dream happening now? Why did I have to suffer another imprint remembrance? Dr. Bail has since pointed out that nightmares during which a patient re-experiences an imprint experience often occur when the patient is getting ready to go to a higher level of consciousness. The imprint reaches up out of the unconscious at those times in a violent way and shakes the patient with a nightmare. It is as if the imprint is saying to the patient, “You must not leave me”. But the working through of the nightmare and the experience in the analysis is intended to minimize the impact of the imprint and the internal saboteur whose job it is to keep the imprint in power.

Dr. Bail pointed out that the first dream of this session was a follow on to earlier dreams in this series. The fact that I did NOT want to indulge myself by taking the 3 bedroom suite of rooms that faced the sea meant that I did not want to embrace the unconscious (the ocean) or hold my connection to the Divine (the number “3”). Instead, I was willing to take the smaller set of rooms and face a less desirable direction… i.e., the valley view.

DREAM: DECEMBER 15, 2009

I am going to be involved in the packaging of a film. There is a chance that we will get a very good director, but to do so means I must go to the Directors Guild of America (DGA) to engage the director. I go to the DGA to sign up “undercover”. This way, I can meet with the DGA on an anonymous basis. It is dangerous, and I hope it will be okay that I am disclosing private information to the Board of the DGA. Will it be used against me? Will it be safe?

In the next dream, I am on a trip. When I pull my car out of the garage, I find that I am on the edge of the city of London….right where the city begins. I park my car and go into the train station. I am carrying folders and files. Other people are doing the same. I think there may be a chance to store them away before departing on the trip. I am encouraged to do this by my assistant. I even put my money and passport into one of the boxes. A porter comes and takes away the boxes. I realize that it was a BIG mistake to put my money and passport into a box because that box is being shipped out on the next train and can only be picked up at a later train stop. I am furious at my assistant. Why has she encouraged me to put my things in the box, which is now being shipped to a distant location? I yell at her, “Why didn’t you tell me this was going to happen?” We rush to see if we can retrieve the box from the porter. He says he will get it off the train. I wake up before I find out if he is able to do so.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I think that the film I am packaging is the film of my life. I am going to go to the authority figures to get a director… I am going to the boss - the DGA. I think the DGA is my mother. She and her imprint and her unconscious material have run my entire life. My mother has been the director of my life and has called all of the shots.

Dr. Bail asked me if I understood the importance and profound nature of what I had just said. At that moment, I said “no”. As I write up this dream, I actually do now understand the profound the nature of that statement. All of my life, I have let my mother’s unconscious material run my life. I have been the unknowing slave of my mother’s unconscious material delivered to me through my imprint for years and years and years. It is incredible. It is profound. I went “undercover” to the DGA to check out what I would do with my film project. I am trying through the analysis to uncover the authority figure inside of me (Mother) who runs my state of mind and my state of feeling.

In the second dream, I am on the edge of the city of London. I usually associate London with a place of freedom and liberty. It is as if I am being born… that is why I am driving out of the garage (Heaven) and into edge of the city (the physical world). However, instead of continuing to drive my car, I park it at the train station and go in with all of my important papers and folders. This is not a good sign. Why do I give up my personality (my car) in exchange for the train which is a mass method of transportation? Worse, I give up my money and my passport.

Dr. Bail pointed out that by giving up my money and my passport, I was giving up my value and my identity. The fact that I let these two essential parts of myself be placed in a box and allowed them to be sent away to a distant location is a sign that I have not yet integrated who I am and who I am becoming into my inner world. It may also be a way of recounting that I sent my identity and my “currency” to a safe location as an infant and as a child so that I could protect them while I tried to survive through an emotionally sterile and relatively unloving environment.

DREAM: DECEMBER 17, 2009

I am offered the drug ecstasy at a party. I don’t take it.

In the next dream, I am in Las Vegas at a series of slot machines. I have been given $18 in quarters to play the machines. I go up to various machines and insert one or more quarters in each. I have determined a very specific configuration of how many quarters to put into each machine, exactly which machines I will deposit the coins into and in what order, and then in what order I will return to pull the handles on the machines in sequence one at a time. After all of the quarters are placed, I go back to start pulling the handles. The first pull on the first handle yields a jackpot of $220 in quarters. It is sort of amazing.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

The dream about refusing the drugs at the party makes me think of our discussion the other day about my spirit escaping from my body as a child as a defense mechanism. We spoke the other day about people who use drugs recreationally to escape their pain and trauma; I understood why drug use is so rampant. I feel encouraged that my Unconscious is telling me in this dream that I am not looking for a way to escape from pain. I can refuse the drug of escape and stay in my body. That must mean that I am finally more able to manage and understand and contain my feelings rather than escape from them. Dr. Bail seemed to agree with this.

The slot machine dream is quite fascinating to me because no one plays the slot machines the way I was playing them in the dream. In real life, a person puts in his coin(s) and pulls the handle. You don’t put coins into multiple machines in sequence and then go back to each machine and start pulling the handles. If you did that, other people might pull the handles in your absence on your coin. Or, you might forget which machines you put the money into, and then you would not be pulling the handles on all of the machines into which you invested your money.

I had none of these problems or issues in my dream. The configuration of the machines that I selected and the amount of money I inserted into each one was quite specific. There were machines in various parts of the casino…I did not select a row of machines in a line into which to insert my money. I actually had a complete understanding and memory of the unique arrangement of machines into which I was to invest my money.

I told Dr. Bail that I think that the slot machines represent various outcomes in my life that are poised and ready to happen. I told him that I feel that the 8 years of analysis have sewn the seeds for some very lucrative and positive outcomes for me. Putting the quarters into the slot machines represents planting the seeds. Now, all of the quarters have been placed. The seeds of my future are planted. In the dream, I have started to reap what I have sown. I pulled the handle on the first machine and had a pay off of $220 on a 25 cent investment. That is a phenomenal return…maybe 900%.

I win $220 on the first pull of the first slot machine. The number “220” represents “4” which is the number of balance. I am moving toward balance. I invest only 25 cents to win the $200. The number “25” is “7” which is victory. There will be many victories. The dream seems to say that all of the handles are ready to be pulled and the outcomes of my life are ready to be revealed.

Dr. Bail agreed with these thoughts. He asked me about the $18 in quarters which I received. I know that “18” is the moon in the Tarot. I think this card represents the Goddess and a sort of Divine Feminine consciousness. There are forces of intuition and psychic elements in the number “18”. Dr. Bail asked me who gave me the quarters in the dream. I did not know. He said that he was the giver of the quarters. He has allowed me through the analysis to have many interpretations that have clarified my intuition and psychic abilities. The interpretations have given me an understanding of myself and my inner world. Through the understanding and experience of my feelings, I have been able to invest the $18 of quarters into the various aspects of my life (slot machines), and I am now being rewarded with a victory of balance ($220).

Dr. Bail agreed that in real life, it would not make sense to feed the machines in the specific order and configuration that I did in the dream. However, the dream clearly says that I have carefully configured all of the steps and foundations for outcomes in my life that will be good for me. That is why I can remember exactly what the configuration of the machines is and the order in which I plan to pull all of the handles. Since I have done the work, the internal configuration of my psyche is mine to unfold.

DREAM: DECEMBER 18, 2009

I am going out for a dinner. It is a price fixed dinner which will cost $65. I need to determine if this will work for me. Somehow, I have to go to a play. Am I in it? Am I just watching? I need to get ready. Will I be in the dining room to eat or only in the dining area? When I woke up, I was thinking that I just needed to go out in to the sunlight because somehow I could convert the sun into love within my body.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I told Dr. Bail that all morning the song that had been playing in my head was “I Learned the Truth at 17”. This was a song that was played on the radio during my high school years back in the early 1970s. Here are the lyrics:

"AT SEVENTEEN"

By Janis Ian

I learned the truth at seventeen
That love was meant for beauty queens
And high school girls with clear skinned smiles
Who married young and then retired
The valentines I never knew
The Friday night charades of youth
Were spent on one more beautiful
At seventeen I learned the truth...

And those of us with ravaged faces
Lacking in the social graces
Desperately remained at home
Inventing lovers on the phone
Who called to say "come dance with me"
And murmured vague obscenities
It isn't all it seems at seventeen...

A brown eyed girl in hand me downs
Whose name I never could pronounce
Said: "Pity please the ones who serve
They only get what they deserve"
The rich relationed hometown queen
Marries into what she needs
With a guarantee of company
And haven for the elderly...

So remember those who win the game
Lose the love they sought to gain
In debitures (sic) of quality and dubious integrity
Their small-town eyes will gape at you
In dull surprise when payment due
Exceeds accounts received at seventeen...

To those of us who knew the pain
Of valentines that never came
And those whose names were never called
When choosing sides for basketball
It was long ago and far away
the world was younger than today
when dreams were all they gave for free
to ugly duckling girls like me...

We all play the game, and when we dare
We cheat ourselves at solitaire
Inventing lovers on the phone
Repenting other lives unknown
That call and say: "Come on, dance with me"
And murmur vague obscenities
At ugly girls like me, at seventeen...

I have had this song playing in my head on previous occasions. I never like it because it makes me feel ugly. I felt ugly and alone as a teenager, and I don’t like to remember or experience those feelings.

I feel confusion about this dream. I don’t understand about the dinner and the dining room… why is the dinner $65? Somehow, I know I am hungry in the dream, but I don’t know if there is time to eat. Also, there does not seem to be an appropriate place for me to eat (dining room v. dining area), and the $65 may be too expensive for me to afford.

Dr. Bail said that I was mourning the loss of my childhood. He said that the reason I was thinking about being ugly at 17 (per the song’s lyrics) was because I was re-experiencing the pain that I have tried to push away from myself from the time of my childhood and teenage years. I was emotionally hungry as a child. That is why the $65 meal seems expensive….food satisfies physical hunger but love satisfies emotional hunger. I did not have much love as a child or a teenager, and I have felt emotionally needy all my life.

Dr. Bail explained that my pain and hunger are mirrored by the pain of children everywhere. Virtually all children are in grave need of love. Their parents may outwardly love them, shower them with gifts and attention, and meet their emotional, physical and spiritual needs. This is all in the conscious world. In the arena of the Unconscious, the children are dealing with unwanted imprinted material which is traumatizing and which robs the child of the truest, deepest and most essential feeling of love. It is only love on the unconscious level that truly counts… that is where everything begins and where everything is deeply nourished. This is why I am dreaming that sunlight can bring love. Sunlight is a manifestation of the Divine light. When light from the Divine sweeps through a person, there is a feeling of deep and abiding love that is generated within the person.

DREAM: DECEMBER 21, 2009

After several years of research, a scientist named Henry has come up with a process that causes a chain reaction in the body that pushes out everything that is not needed. The different materials that you take to cause the effect are non-toxic, but each one binds with a different toxin in the body and pushes it out. It is a long process that requires just the right tweaking for each person. I am doing it. I am showing others how it works. It is a very chemical and scientific process, but it is not so easy.

In the next dream, I need to meet with T G (an attorney friend) to figure out how to get certain bills collected that I have been struggling to figure out how to collect. Apparently, each law firm must designate one person to handle matters of collection concerning the Copyright Office. TG can and should help me to figure it out. I did not know any of this. I go to see him, and I think he will likely sort it out with me.

In the next dream, my former brother-in-law H has been very sick. My ex- husband has been opening up H’s mail and dealing with letters and notices that from the government stating that unless H does his own letters in the future, H will be incarcerated. Now the government has forbidden my ex-husband to open any more correspondence. They know that my ex-husband is doing it all for H and pretending that H is actually doing it. Unless H can do it for himself, he will be put into prison.

My ex-husband is very upset. He asks for my help. I suggest that maybe he should get H to sign everything even if it is my ex-husband who is writing it all up. He thinks that’s a good idea. While we are talking, my friend Tiffany calls him to say that she cannot make it for their dinner date. Does that mean that I am now supposed to have dinner with him? Do I even want to do that? How would that be good for me?

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

The meaning of the first dream was very clear to me. I felt I was dreaming about the analysis with Dr. Bail. His particular way of doing the analysis involves listening carefully to his patients’ dreams and associations, asking probing questions and then making interpretations. Each interpretation is one of the non-toxic binding agents that function to push the toxic thoughts, feelings and beliefs from the Unconscious. Indeed, Dr. Bail’s type of analysis is a chain reaction….the more correct interpretations that are given to me, the more I understand my life. The more I act upon what I learn in a way that is consistent with the messages of the Unconscious, the healthier my psyche becomes. My life gets better. I am happier.

This chain of events (interpretations pushing out imprinted material leaving the Unconscious less burdened) has been shown to work over and over again with Dr. Bail’s patients, but as the dream says, it is NOT easy. It is a long process that requires painstaking detail. The “medicine” for one patient may not be the same as for another patient because each interpretation is unique to each patient’s dream of that particular day. The only common thread is the telling of the full and absolute truth to the patient. The truth and the correct interpretations from the analyst open the door to allowing the patient to get well. The patient, however, must do the hard work of integrating the material. It is NOT easy.

It also makes sense to me that the dream says that this whole process has been discovered by a scientist named Henry after several years of research. Dr. Bail is the scientist. His research over many years of analysis with his patients led to his discovery of the imprint. His research is based upon the scientific method. His conclusions can be verified over and over if the process of his analysis is followed. This is the basis of scientific research. It can be verified by independent testing.

My dream says that the process is also chemical in nature. This also strikes me as very accurate. The biochemistry of the Unconscious is shifted from the interpretation of the dreams, and the chemistry of one’s life is shifted when one acts upon the interpretations. I must allow the information from the dreams and the interpretations from Dr. Bail to sink into my Unconscious and become an organic part of me.

Dr. Bail asked me about the name of the scientist….Henry. What immediately came to mind as he asked me was the character of Henry Higgins in the play and movie of “Pygmalion” also known as “My Fair Lady” and based upon the George Bernard Shaw play. Professor Henry Higgins uses his knowledge of language, phonetics and words to transform flower seller Eliza Doolittle from a guttersnipe into a lady. This process of transformation is analogous in my mind to my work with Dr. Bail. My life and my Unconscious have been transformed by the words of his interpretations and the incredibly hard work and struggle I have endured to make the information my own. Much like Eliza struggled to shed her Cockney slang and undergo the process of “becoming a lady”, I have struggled to become a different and more improved human being. I suppose the only differences are that Henry Higgins is mean, thoughtless and condescending to Eliza. Dr. Bail is none of these things with his patients. Also, Eliza and Henry fall in love with one another. Dr. Bail’s patients don’t fall in love with him, but I do think that each of us falls in love with our finally freed essential self which has been released from the shackles of the imprint.

In the second dream, I am trying to get help from TG on my billing matters and collections from the U.S. Copyright Office. Again, I did not understand what I was to do, and yet, I thought he would help me.

This dream did not make much sense to me. There are no billing issues that one does with the U.S. Copyright Office. The Copyright Office is the place where people file their various literary works to put the world on notice of their ownership and authorship and to establish protection for those works. The Copyright Office is the repository of information that puts the public on notice of who owns what works of art, literature, etc.

I believe that Dr. Bail and I agreed that the Copyright Office represents my Unconscious… a repository of much information. I also believe that we determined that TG must be Dr. Bail. Dr. Bail is the person who helps me sort out the collection matters, i.e., the debts and deficits that I have incurred on an unconscious level by the actions I have taken in my life and by the effect of my particular imprint on my thinking, behavior and decision-making. Dr. Bail can help me sort out the collection issues in my Unconscious just as TG in the dream helped me with my collection matters and the Copyright Office.

In the final dream, I understood that my ex husband was a representation of my mother. H was me. In the dream, H has been very sick, and my ex-husband has been calling the shots, opening the mail, signing H’s name to the letters, etc. Now the government has gotten wise to the scam, and my ex-husband is upset.

Since I believe I am H in the dream, I am telling myself that I have been very sick. I have allowed my mother’s unconscious material (my ex-husband) injected into me by the imprinting process to essentially run my life…writing my letters and signing my name. Now, however, the truth is revealed to me by the analysis. The government (which may represent my true self and/or my Divine Parents) will no longer allow my mother to call the shots. Through my work with the analysis, I have become more of my own boss.

In the dream, my ex-husband asks for my help with the problem of H, and when I suggest that he get H to sign all of the letters, my ex-husband thinks that is a good idea. I believe this dream is an indicator that the hold of my mother’s unconscious material on me through the imprint is weakening. Since my ex-husband is my mother, and since he has agreed to let H (who is me) sign the letters going forward, it seems as if I will be able to write my own destiny and future …although my mother may have written my life history to date (the letters), I am now the one who is in a position to sign those letters. That will be my choice, and my ex-husband in the dream (mother) agrees that this process of my signing the letters will work.

I told Dr. Bail that I associate the name “Tiffany” with the expensive jewelry store chain by that same name. In the dream, Tiffany breaks her date with my ex-husband. Perhaps Tiffany is the new and improved (expensive and valuable) version of me. I am no longer willing to stay connected to my mother and to the unconscious material that she injected into me. I am breaking away from the imprint just as Tiffany breaks the dinner date with my ex-husband. I am also myself at the end of the dream, and the fact that I am also questioning whether I should have dinner with my ex-husband and contemplating the fact that it would not necessarily be good for me is a good sign. I am now actively aware on an unconscious level as well as a conscious level of the damage that my ex-husband (who represents my mother) has inflicted upon me, and I don’t want to continue to stay connected to that imprint or its impact. I am questioning all aspects of my life that would connect me to my imprint and investigating the impact that staying connected to the imprint (negative impact) would have on me.

I felt really encouraged by these dreams. I felt that I was making progress in my quest toward uncovering my essential self and breaking free of the ongoing negative effects of my imprint.

DREAM: DECEMBER 22, 2009

I am going to have a baby. Everyone in this position follows a certain procedure. First, the material that is to become the baby is extracted from the mother and placed into a sterile bag. Then the material is ground and chopped into smaller pieces in the liquid that was also extracted. Then the pieces and the liquid are blended to a certain consistency. Various tests are then run on the final product.

I am busy doing all of this, but I don’t like it much. I am not accustomed to this process. Eventually, after several people have checked my work, I am told that it has passed. Now will there be a re-implanting procedure? I guess so, but I have not yet been shown how that works.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I told Dr. Bail that this dream reminded me in a very unique way of the dream I had several days ago where I was chopped up into tiny pieces. That was an imprint dream. That was how I felt when the unconscious material of my mother was violently forced into me. There was blood and gore and fear and pain. However, in this dream, the chopping and the blending were very scientific. There was no blood anywhere. In fact, all of the material in the bag was white in color. The pieces were white, and the liquid was white. There was no bright red blood. It was not gory or unpleasant to see. Everything was measured and checked and verified. It all seemed to be part of a controlled process.

I believe that the dream indicates that I am having a baby which is the new and improved version of me. Bringing the imprinted material to consciousness and having the nightmares of being chopped up meant that those feelings of my mother are no longer stored in my psyche. This new baby who is being blended very specifically and carefully is being subjected to a review procedure and to critical analysis as part of the process of creating it. There is no fear or dread, and therefore, there is no blood or gore. The analysis with Dr. Bail is like the white color of the liquid and the materials…pure and clean and pristine. My newly born self is washed clean and is white and uncharged with negative emotion.

Dr. Bail pointed out that this dream is indicating that I am now mastering my emotional self. Instead of having emotional baggage pushed into me, I am now controlling which emotions and feelings I will allow to reside in my Unconscious. That is why there is a controlled process of determining what will be in the blended liquid and what exact consistency will be tolerated. He confirmed that I am in the process of creating a new internal self. This process has been ongoing throughout my analysis. Each time aspects of my old self have been torn down and rooted out of the Unconscious, the interpretations that revealed the stripping away of that material have also laid down a piece of a new structure that is consistent with my essential self and Divine order. This dream says that the process of this type of analysis is painstaking and scientific. It is also unique to each person. Every new understanding and piece of information from the analysis about myself and my life must be chopped, mixed and blended to the exact consistency for me … this is critical to the appropriate re-assimilation of this material into the form of my new self (new baby) and into the creation of my new personality.

Dr. Bail pointed out that the work is hard. The dream says that I am not accustomed to it. The dream also says that several people must check my work, and then I am told that I have passed this stage. This is an indicator that I must begin to show others on a regular and more consistent basis who I have become and how I have changed internally. I still keep all of my knowledge a secret most of the time. He reminded me that my daughter said she has seen no difference in me over the past year and that I had not liked that assessment from her. She does not see the difference because I don’t allow others to see my new inner self and the integration of my work on myself.

Dr. Bail said that I must develop my own internal emotional stability so that I become emotionally mature. Once that happens, others will be unable to knock me down emotionally when I come into contact with their craziness. I will be self-contained and will be unaffected because my own internal emotional compass will be guided by a new me who is in control and who understands herself and the world around her. The new structures which the analysis and my hard work have put into place will become stronger and more apparent to me and to others. This will be a goal for me going forward.

DREAM: DECEMBER 24, 2009

I am meeting an elderly lady whose name is “Bree.” She is a friend of some friends of mine. She lives in an unusual community. To get into her home, you enter at the street level and then you must climb down into the living area of the home on a beautiful wide wooden ladder. The ladder is inlaid with colorful gems and mosaic tiles and is actually a piece of art.

Everyone goes down the ladder facing the front to get to the lower floors. Unlike most ladders where people go down facing the ladder while holding on to the sides of the ladder with their hands, this ladder is so wide and comfortable that you go down it like a staircase – facing forward and easily. However, it is clearly steep like a ladder.

Once I get down the ladder to the living room, Bree is waiting for me. The entire room is done in white. The furniture, carpet and walls are all white. The views are magnificent. Bree is standing at the foot of the ladder. She thrusts out her hand to shake mine and says, “So happy to meet you.” As I put my hand into hers, I am relaxed and happy. It is a delight to see her and to shake her hand. I wake up with the song, “Oh, What a Beautiful Morning” from the musical play and movie “Oklahoma” playing in my head.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I felt that this dream was a reward of sorts. I am being shown that my work with Dr. Bail has taken me into the realm of meeting the Divine Mother. Bree is the Divine Mother. She lives in a pure, clean, white space with an exquisite decorative ladder that is more a piece of art than a ladder. I think the ladder is the analysis with Dr. Bail. It takes you down steeply into the realm of the Unconscious. At the deep levels, one’s essential self awaits. The part that was walled off and protected from the onslaught of the imprint is there to be discovered. Perhaps Bree is also the aspect of me who has been waiting for me to come and find her for most of my life.

Dr. Bail asked me who Bree looked like. I said she seemed to be a combination of the actress Judy Dench and Princess of Monaco Grace Kelly. Dr. Bail pointed out that in real life, Grace Kelly was very unhappy with her life. Although he did not know about Judy Dench specifically, he postulated that she is an actress whose job it is to portray others and that we know little about who she is herself. Why then did I analogize the Divine Mother to these two women?

I explained that to me these two women are representative of perfection. Dame Judy Dench is at the pinnacle of her acting career…well respected and talented beyond measure. Princess Grace was a world-renowned icon for her beauty and her “magical” marriage to a King. Dr. Bail agreed that I might think of the Divine Mother as looking like these two women who in my psyche represent perfection.

I told Dr. Bail that I had an extremely successful day the prior day with clients. I had been hired by two major clients to do their projects. I told him that I had fun when interviewing with them and that I really felt that my presentation and impact on them had lined up perfectly in the meetings with their needs and desires. Perhaps that was why I was singing in my head “Oh, What a Beautiful Morning” when I woke this morning.

Dr. Bail pointed out that when one is doing the work of the analysis and is integrating all that one is learning from the analysis, the patient’s life seems to make sense and to attract all sorts of positive outcomes. He analogized the process to the effect that a magnet has on metal filings… they cannot help but fall into line when the magnet appears. The same is true with a cleaned up Unconscious…all sorts of good things start to happen for the patient. The patient becomes a beacon for others and a bringer of a sort of light and understanding. Dr. Bail noted that he had written about this in one of his articles about the evolution of consciousness. In that article, he discusses the fact that Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed and others are the beacons of love and higher consciousness. Part of the point of Dr. Bail’s method of psychoanalysis is to allow a person to become a beacon in his or her own life and to be that for others in his or her world.

I do not recall what Dr. Bail said about the name “Bree”, but when writing up this dream, I went to the Internet to research the derivation and meaning of the name and discovered that it is an ancient Gaelic and English name which means “The Exalted One”. Who is more exalted than the Divine Mother? No wonder my unconscious named her “Bree.”

DREAM: DECEMBER 28, 2009

I have to get up and perform a song and a dance on stage. I am not comfortable. I feel like I am fumbling through some of the songs while others I know better. The same is true of the dance steps. I am to sing a duet with another woman while dancing a routine. She is generous and helpful…pushing me here and there on stage as we sing and dance to help me get into the proper positions.

In the next dream, I am responsible for a newborn baby. Is it my baby or am I just in charge of it? I need to change its diaper and then I can go to an event. I am trying to juggle the baby, my purse, my papers and the stroller. The event I am trying to get to is a cocktail event that is on a ship in the harbor…maybe in Cannes.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

This dream is like so many of my other recent dreams where I am to perform but am not quite equipped to do it. I am still integrating all of this new information about myself. I am still trying to become my essential self and to show the world how I have changed. The woman with whom I am singing a duet is Dr. Bail. He is helping me to figure out my life… generously pushing me here and there on the stage of my life to help me figure out the correct dance routines and songs. The baby in the second dream is mine, but I still do not want to take full responsibility for it just as I don’t take full responsibility for coming out into the world as my new self with all of my new understandings.

Dr. Bail pointed out that this is another “working through” dream. I am trying to integrate all of the information that I am learning about myself and trying to decide how to make it my own organically and deeply. Dr. Bail suggested that my going to a cocktail event on a ship possibly in Cannes relates to much of the business that I did in Cannes for many years in my profession. He said that I am trying to tell myself that I will be required to take the new information I am learning about myself, i.e., the new baby, into my working world. I must figure out how to show people in my personal world and in the working world who I really am. I am struggling about just how to really own this material and how to show it to others. That is why I am juggling the baby and don’t know all of the songs and dance routines.

I noted in our session that it is almost the end of 2009. I feel as if I have been moving through this last sequence of weeks and dreams toward a culmination of some sort. When will I know if I have actually integrated the information? Will I do that in the New Year? Will I be different in 2010?

DREAM: DECEMBER 31, 2009

I am leaving a man who has been bad news for me. I am trying to meet up with a girlfriend…she is one of a group of girlfriends. I don’t know her well, but I have called her, and she has invited me to join her and her other girlfriends at a wine bar to hang out. I take down the address and hail a cab. Unfortunately, I have to ride in the cab with this guy who I will not be dating. The fact that we have to ride together in the cab is awkward, but I can handle that…worse is the fact that I cannot seem to find the address of the wine bar in my phone to give to the taxi driver. I keep searching my contact list in the phone. I know I have the address, but I am having trouble finding it. Finally, I find it and show it to the taxi driver. The taxi driver says the address is wrong. He says there is no such place. He also sees a photo of the girlfriend in my phone and says that I don’t look like the kind of young woman who would hang out with someone so much older. I am annoyed. I tell him that she IS my friend and that I AM invited to the wine bar and that I KNOW the address is correct and that he should just take me there. I somehow know that the taxi driver does know where the wine bar is, but he just does not seem to want to take me there. The address is something like 110-64^th Avenue or 112-64^th Avenue.

ASSOCIATIONS AND INTERPRETATIONS

I think this dream has great promise but also great ambiguity in it about my future and about the decisions I will be making in 2010. I paid close attention to this dream because it came on the last day of the 2009 year. Is it an omen for the year to come?

The good part of the dream for me was that I was leaving a man who was bad news for me. I think I am dreaming about minimizing the impact of the imprint on my life. I cannot get rid of my imprint. No one can. That is why the imprint (represented by the man I am no longer dating) still rides in the taxi with me. But at least I am in control of the situation even if he is along for the ride.

The taxi driver is the internal saboteur. As Dr. Bail has explained, the job of the internal saboteur is to keep the imprint in power. I am trying to meet up with my higher self. She is the girlfriend at the wine bar. She may also be the Divine Mother who has come to inspire and guide me as I make changes in my internal world. Dr. Bail said that the other girlfriends are my angels and guides.

It is NOT in the best interest of the imprint for me to elude its impact and meet up with a higher aspect of myself or the Divine Mother. Hence, the internal saboteur/taxi driver tells me that the address I have given for the wine bar is wrong, yet I KNOW he knows that the address is correct and even knows how to get me there. He also tries to convince me that I don’t belong socializing with the girlfriend… I am too young, and she is too old. Translation: the imprint and the saboteur would prefer that I stay wedded to them and not go off with my higher consciousness. This part of the dream highlights my internal struggle with both the imprint and the saboteur.

There is ambiguity because I am having trouble locating the address of the wine bar. Will I have delays and confusion in 2010 about finding the wine bar, i.e., my real self? Will I success in 2010 in making her the driving force in my life? The dream says that I will keep searching… I will not give up until I find the address in my phone. The fact that I do find it and insist on being taken there is a good sign. But the address of the wine bar is (once again) a point of ambiguity in the dream. The 110-64^th Avenue address is the number “12” (1+1+6+4) which is the “Hangman” card in the Tarot. As he hangs upside down, the Hangman must determine whether he will view the world from his new perspective or from the old perspective. He may have to sacrifice to find wisdom. He may have to do the process all over again in order to learn. Will that be my plight in 2010? Alternatively, the address could be 112-64^th Avenue which is the number “14” (1+1+2+6+4) in the Tarot signifying the protection of the Archangel Michael. Will I be guided by the Archangel Michael in 2010 to find my true essential self and to allow her to guide my life instead of my imprint?

I asked Dr. Bail why I was meeting the girlfriends at a wine bar. He pointed out that wine is the liquid of celebration and festivities. Why wouldn’t I be celebrating the fact that I am coming into the birth of my new self in 2010?

All of these dreams and interpretations also led to a profound discussion with Dr. Bail about choice. All of my life, I have felt that life was a burden. I was always burdened with the work of the extra projects for school, the requirements of my parents, the expectations of friends, husbands, etc. Even now, I see the requirements of my clients, my work and my life as a burden. I am always trying to figure out how to get the tasks done so that I will be unburdened and free. Through these dreams I see that this is the world view of my mother. She was always constantly and incessantly burdened by her children, her husband and her household chores and duties. I adopted this view unconsciously.

Now I begin to see that EVERY SINGLE THING I DO IS BY CHOICE. I choose to work at the computer for clients. I choose to do that work even when I may not specifically want to do it in order to earn a living. That is also my choice. I want to make money and feel financially secure. I could choose not to work for a client at any given moment of the day. To say that I have no choice about it is a lie. If I choose to work to earn the money, that is still my choice.

This idea of choice applies to everything in my life. I had no idea about this. I choose to sleep when I want. I choose to spend my money as I want. I choose to date whom I want. I choose the friends I want. I choose exactly how and where to spend my time and energy. I actually have great and amazing free will to choose how to craft my life. This internal world view creates a feeling of flexibility and joy for me. This is the inner world perspective that I want to govern everything I do in 2010. From this place, I will enjoy my life. I think I may even have the possibility of being happy. Having a sense of freedom and happiness is the antithesis to the imprint. If I am free and happy, my analysis will have worked. This is the road upon which I have embarked. In the process of walking that road through the analysis, I am aiming to be happy. Dr. Bail defines happiness as having no regrets, understanding your life and feeling free all of the time. I think my analysis is making this possible for me. But he adds it is not his view that counts, it is mine - for me to define my own view as I will want to live it.

COMMENTARY

Again I am reminded of Proust, "The real voyage of discovery consists in not seeking new landscapes but inhabiting new eyes."

Analysis of this kind gives every patient "new eyes", new states of mind, that come with understanding the earliest of their traumas and what maneuvers they had to take to avoid the pain of these ever recurring again. There is a wonderful feeling of mastery of the process and an awe of the variety of elements that have been uncovered and their integration after their exploration.

We have been able to push the limits of knowledge back to the infantile, back to the fetal stages of life, and how the impact of the trauma effects the hardly formed entity and how that organism experiences its first instant of fear. It is this fear that resides in every human being. There are some that have it so deeply hidden and have a resolve to never let it out. The consequences for them and this resolve may be severe, severe to the individual and to mankind. If enough people hold to this view then a mass unconscious may affect the way they live and the way they want others to live. It may affect the government we have and it may affect how that government - all offices of which are filled with broken people, no matter how articulate, but still broken and limited in their hearts and minds - manages perhaps with grand intentions but fall with grand dysfunction.

The importance of the Mother's imprint has been well documented in this patient and in others as evident here and in my other essays. I have already said that everything has an imprint - the very heavens are imprinted with the signature of the Divine. All else in the universe carries this stamp. And so it is that our America is likewise imprinted, first with the native people who occupied this country, followed by the incursions of explorers each bringing their imprimatur to bear, each bringing their country's culture and quest to dominate the new world.

We are several hundred years into the process. Now we can begin to discern a recapitulation in what Europe went through in several thousand years; and since we, at the time of creation of our new nation were an English colony breaking free from Mother England violently, there is this violence recurring in our society. This violence is in our culture and in our public policy. We need to be imperialistic as England was over us. In each species ontogeny repeats phylogeny and so it is in the affairs of men in America. The same is recurring; an overt move now on the part of the right by an activist conservative Supreme Court making rulings which will serve the richest who want power which will eventually end in a class struggle. This class struggle was going on in Rome at the time of its turmoil.

Perhaps we are at the beginning of bloody upheavals because we have not understood how countries develop or have not wanted to study hundreds of years of European history and see that they have come to an amicable understanding that wars do not solve anything. But this took some two thousand years.

The lessons that Europe teaches us we disdain. But we will disdain it at our peril and loss. The loss will be in the lives of the common people and the loss of freedom, all for want of understanding the process of development from the small embryo which carries its own self destructive imprint into life and joins in a false enterprise later.

The life of an individual, for example this patient or any patient, who suffers because of lack of information or false information makes choices that are disastrous. This is as true for nations as it is for individuals. So far in the affairs of man nowhere in the world is the concept of the unconscious - which rules all of us - at all raised. It is as unknown as the whereabouts of "Kilroy", as in "Kilroy was here".

The patient reveals that knowing feeling has changed her life, changed her eyes, given her "new eyes", given her the greater capacity to look upon the world and see opportunities where none before were seen; and above all, this with a quiet optimism and a quiet security in herself.

January 2010