Dream 297

'Searching'

I was with PS at some kind of party or festival. We were trying to find a drug dealer and wandering around asking people if they knew anyone who sold cannabis in large quantities. This part of the dream went on for what seemed like ages (the whole dream seemed very long), but I can recall very little of it, which is unfortunate, as it turned out to be a very significant dream, for reasons given below.

At one point, we were in what appeared to be a man's toilet block, which was entirely tiled in white tiles. PS was standing, leaning against the wall adjacent to the entrance. I saw ED1, standing at either the wash basin, a hand dryer or a urinal. I approached him and asked if he knew any drug dealers, but he did not.

PS and I continued searching.

The scene changed and I was sitting at a long dressing table, between AP and RR (two girls from my hometown and high school). We were applying eyes shadow. I had a palette of eye shadow, which opened up with many layers, like pages of a book. There were about 6 pans of different coloured eyeshadow per layer. I decided to wear each shade on a different eye, not realising the absurdity of this decision, given that I only have two eyes and I had around 30 different eye shadows! I noticed that in AP's makeup bag she had a Sleek palette and the shades (of which there was about 8) were much better than the ones I had (although I had more shades) - her's were vivid and interesting colours, whereas mine were more muted, even the glittery ones. There was some further conversation, which I do not recall. 

I then sat behind the girls. There was further conversation. I read a news article online about Jennifer Ellison having a baby with a drug addict, catching HIV and being on benefits (none of this is true, although she did recently have a third child with her husband and I probably read this story in the news quite recently). The computer which I had been using to access the news was then closer to RR, who began to pour a cup of coffee/tea over the keyboard, laughing. I told her not to do this as it would destroy the computer, and she said she could fix it and then did so. There was more conversation, which I cannot recall

What is significant about this dream is the fact that I had some anxiety about why a friend of mine, close to PS, had recently deleted me from Facebook, for no apparent reason that I could think of. The thought had played on my mind and troubled me, but I wasn't in a position to ask this person why they had done so. When I woke up, very suddenly from this dream, I had the answer in my mind - my dream had led me to a conclusion I would never have even thought of when awake. The person had deleted me because I had written a Facebook status which seemed insensitive to an event in their personal life. The status wasn't in any way about them, but it mentioned a current affairs topic which was tangentially linked to a similar experience they had themselves many years ago, but which they did not know I was aware of and I would never have thought of/remembered at the time I made the comments because it wasn't at the forefront of my mind. The event happened long before I met my friend, was communicated to me about 3 years ago by a third-party and has never been discussed between my friend and I, hence why I forgot all about it. I would certainly never made a link between my opinion as expressed on social networking (some months ago), based on a contemporary news article and this friend's personal life. I then realised that this person had not fallen out with me as such - they were just not wanting to be reminded of something and did not like the way I expressed myself on social networking, so deleted me from their friends list, which is fine. As they didn't know I had once been made aware of their previous experience, they wouldn't have assumed I was being cruel to them or insensitive to their situation - they just didn't want to read my views on a similar event because they didn't agree with what I was saying. They also didn't realise that I myself have personal experience of the same thing, as I hadn't told them, which might have put my comments into some form of perspective and made them aware that I was empathetic and considerate towards them, I just had not had an opportunity to show this. This dream was significant, because it was a perfect illustration of Freud's 'Wish Fulfilment Theory' (i.e. my desire to know why my friend had deleted me from their social network and wanting to know I wasn't to blame) and comparable with his own 'Irma's Injection' dream. Click on the links to read my previous articles on these topics, which provide a fascinating insight into Freudian dream interpretation. 

After I woke from the dream (which was obviously presenting me with a symbolic 'search' for something) I felt elated. This was not because I felt absolved (because I had appeared somewhat insensitive, even if inadvertently, in the expression of a legitimate point of view, shared by many, especially those who have the same academic and professional background as myself and therefore evaluate the topic in question in a non-emotive and more rational way than a layman might) but rather because I was stunned by the power of my subconscious mind in trying to find an answer which was inaccessible to my waking conscious. It also clarified and cemented the notion that dreams perform a vital psychological function, compressing and organising memories and resolving subconscious conflicts or waking anxieties.