I awoke from this dream gasping as if I had been holding my breath for a long time but I wondered if
my breathlessness was just from the intensity of my anger. I had been down all day, unclear about
the exact reason for my depression but suspecting that it might be associated with feeling that I was
becoming a burden to Darchelle. Anger at her, redirected at myself, could have triggered the depression
and inspired the dream.
A year later I had
another dream which gave me insight into this one, which appears to be about my
rejection of Christianity, and of the self-condemnation which I incorporated into my faith right
from the start. This interpretation is supported by
a
dream ten years ago in which a man in light blue killed me. That dream depicted my adoption of
Christianity as an act of self-destruction. This dream depicts my rejection of Christianity as an
act of self-defense.
In this dream I am considering asking Ellen to have sex with me when the man in light blue shows up.
I think of Ellen as a Christian in belief and practice; asking her for sex represents returning
to the beliefs and lifestyle I adopted when I became a Seventh Day Adventist 40 years ago. The man
in light blue, striding with authority into the heart of the house, represents a part of me that
once believed Adventism to be the only true belief about God, and still suspects that might be the
case. I find him threatening because if Adventism is true, I am condemned. I can only feel safe by
suppressing that belief, so I kill him. The sheep shears refer to gardening; I maintained a large
garden during the years when I was most active in the church and gardening for me was an activity
which was free of any involvement with God, and therefore free from self-condemnation. Using shears
to kill the men represents my choice to accept rather than condemn myself, thus making a return to
my former beliefs unlikely, symbolized by Ellen hiding under a blanket.