Dream Work as Shamanic Archeology of the Mind

Whoever makes us, makes our dreams. Call our source whatever you like, it is also the source of our dreams. For that reason there is no limit to what we can learn from our dreams; the list of dream-inspired art, inventions, and spiritual guidance is endless. One thread in the tapestry of dreams tracks our heritage and family history. We each contain the best gifts and worst faults of our “biological team” as part of our unconscious starting point in life. Scientists pass along their best discoveries, failed experiments and unresolved dilemmas in technical journals. Families bequeath this same information through biology instead of books.

Barbara had a dream called “Charlie-Brave Boy” in which a puppy named Charlie returned to her and she “took it up into her arms” feeling filled with love. This marked the return of a lost part of her mind-body energy that disappeared during a trauma shortly after her birth. While her father, a naval officer, held his beloved infant in his arms a doctor used dry ice to burn a large birthmark from her upper arm. The burning or “singeing” of the skin (which appeared in the dream as people “singing” in church) and the smell of her burning flesh (in the dream she was surrounded by “pews”) activated traumas he had acquired in witnessing the violent death and burning flesh of his sailors during enemy attacks. He passed out cold. You might have too.

In primal cultures around the world, traditional shamans travel to the invisible realms, often using the drum beat as the vehicle of vibratory travel, to retrieve lost parts of a person’s soul. Dreams perform this function for all of us, whenever we are ready for the reintegration. The consciousness that Barbara had lost during this traumatic medical procedure returned to her six decades later in the form of a puppy in the present dream. She felt great love (for her own prodigal self now returning) and while the energy returned and she “took it up into her arms,” she cradled her dream puppy in those same arms. At the very moment that Barbara was initially being traumatized as an infant–her father’s already-existing war trauma was being re-activated. The old shamans would say soul fragments of both made the journey together to the invisible realms.

The next time Barbara’s father was singed was at his own cremation only a handful of years later. Barbara witnessed the spreading of his ashes from a rooftop and suffered a second undigestible, or traumatic, experience in her young life. Both father-linked traumas were being healed by the same modern dream. “Every dream comes in the interest of health and wholeness” says dream worker Jeremy Taylor.

But were those the only traumas involved? Barbara’s family line has included naval captains and war heroes for many generations. This same dream triggered her memory (or association) of a beloved family story: her great grandfather was once taken too ill to captain his own ship through a terrible storm, so he put his first mate in charge. The interim captain, had to lash Barbara’s willful-child of a grandmother to the mast to keep her from falling overboard while he guided the ship through troubled waters. The story lived on since grandmother remained “a real piece of work,” (in Barbara’s words) and quite a handful all her life; the grandchildren cherished this image of grandma lashed to the mast.

Dream symbols are multidimensional vessels of condensed meaning; each image carries many layers of meaning. This story from Barbara’s outer life–which can also be interpreted as if a “waking dream”– evokes ancient mythic themes and also hints at the terror and trauma that may have continued for many generations within this one family… possibly part of why grandma was such a handful. The mythic component in this story re-images Ulysses having himself lashed to the mast so he could hear the Sirens’ call but be restrained from being able to follow it. His crew, with wax in their ears navigated past the danger without his help.

This is essentially what trauma does for us. indigestible or destabilizing experience which would misdirect and endanger the ship of the psyche, can be lashed to the mast of the unconscious where it can no longer directly influence our waking choices and behavior. This is done by the psyche at considerable cost, as losing the guidance of a ship’s captain suggests, but it helps us avoid madness from hearing our own Sirens’ call.

Barbara’s father experienced a reactivation of his existing war-time trauma while Barbara was receiving her first medical trauma in his arms. Like the passing of a baton in a relay race, the undigested burdens of the father may be passed to the next generation. How many generations has this baton been passed within this one family? History, said Shakespeare, is the story of the death of fathers. What ancient forces still operate beneath our “modern” consciousness?

I once worked with a delightful, educated, mother of three who suffered terrible waves of negative thoughts and images. At that time I was practicing mind/body treatments that involved two or three of my staff palm-healing the client (akin to Reike or Therapeutic Touch) while we all worked on their dream’s interpretation. Much of everyone’s unconscious content is mapped across the physical body and the results of this mind/body double intervention were as dramatic in this case as in most others. Almost invariably, the client attained profound insights and also got up from the massage table looking genuinely transformed, enriched and tranquil. We even installed a mirror so clients could witness the visible transformation in themselves. In this case, the results were the same, except, each session she returned buzzing with invisible energies and dark thoughts. We accelerated to two and then, briefly, three sessions a week with no resolution.

Her condition was so atypical that I finally asked her if there was some terrible secret we really ought to know about. Did she have a drug or drinking problem? Was she engaging in some dangerous or high stress activity that could account for her uniquely rapid recurrence of symptoms. Since she knew of no such source of stress and negativity, I asked her to request a dream to explore the topic. The next session she brought the following dream:

“I am the caretaker of an old stone church (she was an actively religious person). As I am weeding the lawn things begin looking better and better. However, when I begin watering the flower beds next to the building the water washes away the earth to reveal a growing pit or cavern which has been concealing a 14th century grave yard with corpses strewn all about.”

We lowered the intensity and frequency of the sessions lest the energy flow of the dream work plus group palm healing (the water in the dream that helps most people to flower?) too rapidly unearth ancient destructive forces. We proceeded with a measured “weeding” of her present life issues and carefully avoided digging up too many old skeletons: her treatment progressed much more successfully.There are many possible interpretations for any dream, many of which simultaneously true. If you believe in reincarnation, you might conclude that she had a past life issue and depth work was permeating a psychic boundary that was the interface between two lives of a single soul. Alternatively, you might wonder if she was still wrestling with some dark issues and “death energies” that had originated in the 14th century? Was this the result of her personal family inheritance, passed down through so many generations? Or was her current church involvement touching upon some ancient collective shadow accruing to the institution?

Whether our dreams lead to the healing joy of soul retrieval as imaged by Barbara’s prodigal puppy–or to ominous warnings when to step lightly and avoid trespassing where even angels dare not tread… our dreams are the witness to and the archival record of our psychic inheritance. This makes dreams the ideal map for exploring the archaic strata of the psyche.

Posted by on September 15th, 2011 | No Comments Posted in History

The Archeologist – The Value of Treasure

“History no longer shall be a dull book. It shall walk incarnate in every just and wise man. You shall not tell me by languages and titles a catalog of the volumes you have read. You shall make me feel what periods you have lived. A man shall be the Temple of Fame. He shall walk, as the poets have described that goddess, in a robe painted all over with wonderful events and experiences….He shall be the priest of Pan, and bring with him into humble cottages the blessing of the morning stars, and all the recorded benefits of heaven and earth.” – Emerson

The archeologist whose business it is to bring to light by pick and spade the relics of bygone ages, is often accused of devoting his energies to work which is of no material profit to mankind at the present day. Archeology is an unapplied science and apart from its connection with what is called culture, the critic is inclined to judge it as a pleasant and worthless amusement. There is nothing, the critic tells us, of pertinent value to be learned from the past which will be of use to the ordinary person of the present time and though the h can offer acceptable information to the painter, to the theologian, to the philologist, and indeed to most of the followers of the arts and sciences, he has nothing to give to the ordinary person.

In some directions the imputation is unanswerable and when the interests of modern times clash with those of the past, as, for example, in Egypt where a beneficial reservoir has destroyed the remains of early days, there can be no question that the recording of the threatened information and the minimizing of the destruction, is all that the value of the archeologist’s work entitles him to ask for. The critic, however, usually overlooks some of the chief reasons that archeology can give for even this much consideration, reasons which constitute its modern usefulness; and I therefore propose to point out to him three or four of the many claims which it may make upon the attention of the layman.

In the first place it is necessary to define the meaning of the term Archeology. It is the study of the facts of ancient history and ancient lore. The word is applied to the study of all ancient documents and objects which may be classed as antiquities which the evidence has to be excavated or otherwise discovered. The age at which an object becomes an antiquity, however, is quite undefined, though practically it may be reckoned at a hundred years, and ancient history is the tale of any period which is not modern. Thus he does not necessarily deal solely with the remote ages.

Every chronicler of the events of the less recent times who goes to the original documents for his facts, as true historians must do during at least a part of their studies, is an archeologist and, conversely, every archeologist who in the course of his work states a series of historical facts, becomes an historian. Archeology and history are inseparable and nothing is more detrimental to a noble science than the attitude of certain so-called archeologists who devote their entire time to the study of a sequence of objects without proper consideration for the history which those objects reveal. Antiquities are the relics of human mental energy. Tey can no more be classified without reference to the minds which produced them than geological specimens can be discussed without regard to the earth. There is only one thing worse than the attitude of the archeologist who does not study the story of the periods with which he is dealing, or construct, if only in his thoughts, living history out of the objects discovered by him. That is the attitude of the historian who has not familiarized himself with the actual relics left by the people of whom he writes, or has not, when possible, visited their lands. There are many archeologists who do not care a snap of the fingers for history, surprising as this may appear. There are many historians who take no interest in manners and customs. The influence of either is pernicious.

It is to be understood, therefore, that in using the word Archeology I include History. I refer to history supplemented by the study of the arts, crafts, manners, and customs of the period under consideration.

As a first argument the value of archeology in providing a precedent for important occurrences may be considered. It is the structure of ancient history, and it is the voice of history which tells us that a Cretan is always a Cretan, and a Jew always a Jew. History may well take her place as a definite asset of statecraft, and the law of Precedent may be regarded as a fundamental factor in international politics. What has happened before may happen again. It is by his hand that directs our attention to the affairs and circumstances of olden times, and warns us of the possibilities of their recurrence. It may be said that the statesman who has ranged in the front of his mind the proven characteristics of the people with whom he is dealing has a perquisite of the utmost importance.

Posted by on September 15th, 2011 | No Comments Posted in Archeology

Archaeology For Mystery Writers

Since the end of WW II, a number of scientific tests used in archaeology for dating and the discovery of fakes and forgeries can be useful for mystery writers.

The most famous of these is Radiocarbon dating. Carbon has two stable isotopes, C12 and C13, and an unstable isotope, C14, created by cosmic ray impact on Nitrogen14 in the upper atmosphere. In 1949, Willard Libby at the University of Chicago, developed Radiocarbon dating, based on the ratio of the stable carbon atom, C12 to the unstable carbon isotope, C14, testing it against wood from an ancient Egyptian royal barge of known age.

Every living thing ingests carbon in the form of CO2 during its lifetime in order to stay alive. At death, the amount of stable carbon in the organism remains the same, but the unstable isotope, C14, begins to disintegrate at a steady rate, which had a half-life, Libby estimated, of 556860 years. Half-life means that in 5568 years, half of the C14 will be gone, and in another 5568 years, half of that half will be gone, etc., etc. The represents a standard deviation, which means that there are two chances out of three that the date falls within the 120-year range.

Are you with me so far?

Libby was wrong about the half-life. In 1962, the half-life was recalculated at 5730 years. But, because so many dates had already been published, published dates still used Libby’s half-life, and raw dates were published as BP xxxx yyy, with BP meaning not Before Present, but Before Physics, or 1950, when Libby first published his research. Dates were then recalculated using the new half-life.

Are you still with me?

Soon it was discovered that the production of C14 in the atmosphere is not constant, but varies with changes in the earth’s magnetic field, and is also affected by temperature changes, volcanism, and the introduction of CO2 into the atmosphere from industrialization. In order to correct for this, Radiocarbon dates were calibrated using reliable known dates, such as tree-rings, at first using Bristle-cone Pines, the oldest living trees, and then other material, such as deep sea cores, lake sediment varves, coral samples and cave deposits. These are plotted on a curve, but there are wiggles in the curve, so a single Radiocarbon date could give several calendar dates.

Still with me? Give up? Perhaps the most reliable method is to ask someone at the lab what the date really is.

There are other lab techniques that archaeologists use to discover date and place of manufacture, and uncover fakes, such as other radiometric techniques, neutron activation, thermo-luminescence, obsidian hydration, and others, but trust me, we won’t get into them now.

One of the earliest and most famous instances of the use of more advanced scientific techniques is the exposure of the Piltdown forgery.

After acceptance of Darwin’s theory of evolution by the scientific community, archaeologists searched everywhere for a ‘missing link’, envisioned as a flawed creature, half-way between an ape and a human–primitive, dull-witted, half erect–and unable to cope with the modern industrial world of the nineteenth century.

Lo and behold, he was found in England, primitive jaw and all, near a hedgerow in Piltdown in East Sussex in 1912, in the gravel pit of an ancient river deposit.

In 1912, Charles Dawson, a solicitor and archaeology aficionado, brought fragments of a thick human skull, fossilized teeth of extinct species of elephant and hippopotamus, and some crude flint tools that he had recovered from the gravel pit to the Keeper of Geology at the Natural History Museum in London. All were coated with a chocolate brown patina, as would be expected if the material had been buried for a long time.

Excavation of the site, sponsored by the Natural History Museum, revealed a fragment of an ape-like jawbone with two worn teeth, more fossilized ancient animal teeth from the early Ice Age, some flint tools, and a carved, pointed bone tool, all with the identical brown patina.

Sir Arthur Smith Woodward, Keeper of Geology, presented this evidence for what he called Eoanthropius, the Dawn Man, at the meeting of the Geological Society of London in December. With a skull similar to modern man, but smaller, and the jaw of a chimpanzee, at last the missing link had been found.

There were some skeptics, but they were quieted in 1915, when Dawson, forging a head, found another skull fragment and a molar tooth in the same gravel beds two miles from the original excavation.

As time went on, and more evidence of ancient hominids was uncovered, Piltdown Man began to be regarded as an isolated anomaly, if not an outright forgery.

Bit by bit, the forgery was exposed, starting with the teeth. The size of the roots of the teeth and the flat wear on the teeth in the apelike jaw were more human than apelike. New x-rays of the jaw from a different angle revealed longer roots on the teeth, like those of apes. Using new technology, the wear on the teeth were reexamined, this time under a Scanning Electron Microscope. The teeth had been filed to imitate characteristically human wear.

A new technique for dating fossils, fluorine analysis, based on the fact that over time, buried bone absorbs fluorine from the soil, was applied to the jaw, the brain case, and the animal teeth in 1953. Results of new tests indicated that the fossilized ancient animal teeth, the jaw, and the cranium were from different time periods, and from different burial sites. The cranium was from a Neolithic cemetery, the jaw from a modern orangutan, the fossilized ice-age animal teeth had different geographic origins and dated to from different glaciations.

All the evidence from the Piltdown gravels had the same dark brown patina. When Dawson died, his wife donated the apparatus from his scientific laboratory to the British Museum. Among these implements was the pot used to dye the Piltdown finds to give them their brown patina.

One interesting side effect of exposure of Piltdown man is the field day it granted Creationists, not only presenting them with the opportunity to challenge legitimate Paleolithic finds, but also inspiring them to create hoaxes of their own.

Posted by on September 15th, 2011 | No Comments Posted in Archeology
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