07-08-03 @ 4:06 am EDT

Blithering time.

I find myself wondering about dreams and their importance. In the Ojibwa culture, at least (and I know in many others), they held a much greater and different significance than they do for us today and in this society. I rather wish I had contact with some Ojibwa who follow traditional ways so I could ask their thoughts on this matter without annoying or pestering them. Even if I knew of some I get the feeling it would be like "that annoying white girl who thinks she can know what we're like." I hate being the annoying white girl who thinks she can ever fully understand someone else's way of life. And I don't know such people anyway. So...all of this is just me, blithering, but trying to take a slightly different view of dreams.

I wonder how it is that one determines what is a "big dream" and what is a "little dream." By big dream I mean a dream of great personal importance. I believe Jung coined the term, or at least made use of it. What I took it to mean is that big dreams are the ones which stick with you and supposedly have a much deeper meaning than it appears on the surface. They're the dreams that stick in your head even years later and demand that you pay attention to them; they're the ones that always come back to memory. Little dreams are just the bitsy, confusing ones that fade away just like that unless you set them down in writing, and even if you should do that, they just don't evoke the same feelings as big dreams. I am of the opinion that ALL dreams hold some amount of importance, even if it's just to rehash everything you did that day, in a confused order. I don't think any dream, even such inane dreams as my hamster hat dream or my monster broccoli dream, is entirely pointless and useless. IMO you would not be having the dream if it didn't serve a purpose, albeit a small or hidden one.

The difficulty lies in sifting the two types of dreams apart, and in recognizing a big dream when you have it. For now all I have to go on is gut feeling; is that really the only way of determining if something is a big dream or not? Gut feeling? Paying attention to the dreams which stick with you for a long time and make you feel a certain way, and ignoring or putting the rest of them on hold? I would never advise that ANY dream be ignored, but how do you know which ones to really pay attention to? Just go on how much they made you think when you woke up and remembered them later on? Because at this point in time, I have no other way of telling one dream from the other.

Here is where I would ask the native, is this the wrong approach and EVERY dream should be treated with the same importance? How do you dedicate an equal amount of time and energy to a dream if it does not evoke the same amount of emotion in you?

I just read that when seeking visions, children were told to receive the good ones and reject the bad ones. How does one tell them apart? Is there any relationship between a "bad" vision and a little dream, or is a bad vision just a vision which predicts bad things to come--and is rejecting it a way of trying to control the influence of bad things in our lives? Whereas ignoring little dreams is just a way of avoiding dream overload? Because I know from experience that dream interpretation is very exhausting and one cannot rightly focus on every single one of their own dreams. They'd quickly wear themselves out.

Plus, if you focus too much on the dreams of others, you risk wearing yourself out when it comes to looking more closely at your own. In the end we are the only ones who can really know the content and meaning of our own dreams. All an interpreter can do is present some ideas which may or may not be right; it's up to us to figure out if they're right or not, and why.

My current dream journal has over 800 entries, with more on the way. At DreamJournal they're all separated into titled entries so I can keep better track of them, whereas in my Writing.com version they're grouped into long, single entries for each day, which can make it difficult to browse if one doesn't know the date of the dream. At the moment there are 808 dreams; here at Writing.com there are an additional two which have yet to be proofed and posted on the other site. I can browse the list and point out which dreams out of those 808 stuck with me as being potential "big dreams." I was going to do this, and in fact sat here for maybe the past twenty minutes trying to sort through them, but it's just too hard. Some seem important but didn't have as big of an impact as others, or perhaps they were topical only at a certain time. Others are recurring and the theme sticks with me more than the dream itself. Some really stuck with me but didn't give me the same feeling of importance as others. So...even though I can pick out the dreams that seem really important, or that really stuck with me, I can't sift the two apart to tell which ones are the real "big" dreams. Otherwise, I would post the titles here for you. :/

Sometimes it's really easy to tell right off the bat if something is a big dream. I think my most recent one was probably "Abducted By Rabbit Aliens!" (07/03/03: 3 Dreams), though for some reason, today, the dream that sticks with me is "The White Buffalo Whispers" (03/19/03: 4 Dreams), simply because of its similarity to what a native vision might have been like. I honestly wonder what a native might think of this dream if I described it to them. Would they see it as a big dream or as meaningless based on its source? Do they really view dreams differently depending on who had them? Is a dream less important, for example, if it was dreamed by a white person with little understanding of native culture, who does not follow the native path, and doesn't live their ways? Or is it just as important as any of the visions they would have had?

Like I mentioned already, I've been reading (The Ojibwa Woman), and it's talking about how emphasis on dreams was placed more greatly on boys than on girls; because boys were expected to have visions, whereas girls were expected to menstruate, and to keep away from polluting people during that time. I thought of Charmian and Silver Eagle Feather and such from Manitou Island and how their status--Silver's, at least--is pretty much accepted even though they have by no means entered menopause, simply because of the power they manifest. I can get away with justifying this by saying it's artistic license and the tribe portrayed is not Ojibwa, just based on them. Still, I ponder over this. Are exceptions made nowadays concerning such matters? Is a woman unable to hold such power until she's old, or have things changed? Is a vision or a big dream from a girl or a young woman written off, or accepted, or accepted with reservations (no pun intended, honestly), or what? Some reasons why I wish I had the proper channels to seek information through.

Would Charmian's dreams and visions in the story mean so much to others if they happened in reality rather than in fantasy?

I would be immensely flattered if someday somebody in the know were to come across one of my dreams online, in particular the buffalo one, and see it as a dream of power and let me know so. It'll never happen, and perhaps it's just another wish for attention, dressed up in different clothes. But the desire is there. Maybe I just want to feel special, or to know that dreams really mean something to people other than the one who dreamed them? Dreams are very personal things, and to hear that one had an impact on someone else is an intense form of flattery.

A long while back I went to an EZBoard and asked for an interpretation of said buffalo dream. The result was quite interesting, even if not every symbol in the dream was covered (for example, nothing was mentioned of why I seemed to be a native boy, a troublemaker, in my dream). *sigh,* I just wasted ANOTHER twenty minutes trying to find that, only to find it's probably been deleted by now. I really wish I would have copied it somewhere, and I intended to, but never did. I think I'm losing the mood for this entry now, with all these disappointments piling up. :( What little I do remember had to do with the babies in the dream representing projects I had going which might need my attention, or new projects that were being born (the pregnant woman). The buffalo taking my head in its mouth had something to do with the crown chakra, but that's really all I remember. I was surprised by how much sense the interpretation made because the reference to a new project being born or nurtured reminded me of my writing situation. I truly wish I'd saved that post...

I'm not even sure what other points I wanted to make in this entry. There's a part of me that detests those people who try to pass themselves off as following a certain path when they are just wannabes (white people who take spirit names and pass themselves off as natives being in the know, for example) who pick and choose things from certain faiths as they see fit, but on the other hand there's a part of me that wants to be part of such a circle--not wannabes, or fakers, but the people who really do know and are accepted by the real thing. There's no real way to tell the two apart, if there really is any difference, and I feel rather like a hypocrite. Here I am trying to give meaning to my dreams, and wishing they meant something to some of the older cultures, and writing about said cultures and wishing I could be part of them if not exactly one of them, while on the other hand I question if such a thing could happen in the first place. When I meet someone who has a native name and seems to know what they're talking about, then learn they are in fact the same as I am, I always feel annoyed and cheated. Is this prejudice on my part? A legitimate concern for authenticity? Or what?

I just am frustrated because in this day and age of people taking on any old names they want, claiming to be in contact with spirit guides and copying and pasting all the relevant info they themselves like and leaving out the rest, usurping other people's paths as their own without actual study and faith and devotion, it's just too easy to be sucked in by fakes and thus earn the disapproval and disgust of the real things. Every time I visit Indian Hills, a native-run store in Petoskey, for example, even though they don't say anything and are relatively friendly I just get this feeling of...irritation from the owners. Like, look at all these white people in our store, buying our beads, reading our books, listening to our music...they try to be like us, to BE us, but they never will be. They're wannabes. They'll never be able to fully understand us. We will gratefully take their money and do business with them, but our worlds will always be separate ones.

(I have no way of knowing if they REALLY feel that way, but I do know I'm not the only one who's gotten that "feeling" from them. My mom remarked on the same thing, unprompted, one day. That there is just something about them that seems to hold us in disapproval or, at best, that they just tolerate us.)

How many times have I been tempted to go up to those people and start asking them questions about their culture? Maybe part of me IS just a wannabe, seeking a path, and would probably reject that path too once it grows tiresome. But I can honestly state that I DO respect their culture and their beliefs, and really AM interested in knowing more, even if I'm not allowed to. This is the reason why their seeming disapproval bothers me so much, because I want to talk to them and know them better but feel I'd be best off not bothering them lest I irritate them more. So I don't even talk to them, aside to smile and say "No thanks" when asked if I need any assistance. Who knows, I probably project an appearance of "I don't like you" as much as they do to me.

Sorry this entry started out about dreams and ended up being about the differences between white and native culture, but that's kind of just the path it took! :/ I think they tie together anyway. Underneath both is the ages-old feeling of wanting to belong to something bigger than myself, and I guess dreams are what prompted this thinking today. Aside from some of the older beliefs (women being evil and unclean during that time of the month, for example), and my perpetual avoidance of strict ritual (I like ritual, but when it becomes ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to belief, it bothers me--what's wrong with just believing, and offering your own personal rituals as you see fit?), I think I would very much like some of the native paths. You've seen the stress I place on dreams, and on nature, and I find that there in great amounts. Oh, sure, I've always loved the Egyptian gods and such, and would like to believe they exist, and even feel close to a few of them; but the belief system just doesn't feel as close to me. Remember all my talk of spirits living in the trees and the rocks and the lakes? Guess where that comes from. Even if I don't think I took it from that faith; the two just kind of match. I started writing Manitou Island without much understanding at all of the Ojibwa and Algonquin cultures, but some of the themes seem to ring true to me even when I wrote out of ignorance. I could be wrong and maybe the themes only appeared AFTER I read up on the subject, but I can't tell. For all I know the ideas were there all along but I just didn't know how to put them into words until I read about other people who already had.

Am I still making sense? :/ If you're still reading this and still understand it, then please let me know because I really can't tell; for all I know I really AM blithering.

In the end, I think the total topic of this entry is really, here is a path I feel it would be nice to follow, but like all paths there are obstacles, and I feel I would be rejected flat out. And there are some beliefs, like in Jesus and such (even if I have NO clue what to think of Him--to me Jesus is the popular Guy surrounded by a legion of followers, Somebody who is good and friendly yet unable to even see me because I am the one standing way off to the side unnoticed), that I just don't feel I can give up no matter what path I follow. I could always pick and choose, but I do not want to be one of those Chinese menu believers who give the New Age movement a bad name. Basically, I just want a path that fits what I already believe, and that clarifies what I'm not clear on yet. This path is one of the closest I've seen so far, but it's still much different in many aspects, and again, there are just so many things I don't know about it and can never know as I'm not a part of that world.

Which is why I wish I knew who to ask, somebody really in the know and not just a faker, somebody with a LOT of patience, but I don't know anyone like that and even if I did, I would hate pestering them. Judging by the length of this entry and the way I ramble, you can see how I can go on and on if something puzzles or confuses me. And this entry here was just the TIP of the iceberg.

Well, I believe I'm done for now; this entry took a totally different turn from what I had expected. Still wish I had that interpretation, but I guess it's lost forever. My bad, putting things off as always. I don't really expect thoughts on any of this blither so I'll be going...tar...

(not proofread)