I reviewed this dream during the night and again the next day but did not write it down until
several days later after I had forgotten a few details, though hopefully not so many that I can't
make sense of it. Initially no meaning jumps out at me but after several wrong turns, I think I've
worked it out. I don't know anyone named Kevin, which suggests that he represents a part of myself.
The symbol of a man dressed in light blue links this dream to
several others which address my
relationship to Christianity. In them, a person dressed in light blue clothing represents the part
of myself that initially adopted and continues to be attracted by that belief system. In this dream
he is injured and uses that injury as justification for requesting money from me. I at first put
him off but then, apparently feeling that he is either dishonest or unworthy, I am indignant and
argue that he should be ashamed of himself.
I suspect that the money symbolizes belief or faith in the Christian God, and thus this dream would
be depicting the tension and ambivalence I still feel about Christianity. To give money to the man
in light blue would be to recommit to my Christian beliefs which he represents. You are dying, he
tells me, and God offers comfort, love and eternal life. I consider accommodating his request, but
then I remember what happened the last time I believed. Christianity offered me salvation and goodness
but gave me condemnation and guilt.
Before I became a Christian I struggled with feelings of self-criticism and anger at myself,
feelings which I incorporated into my Christian belief by projecting them onto God. After living
for almost 40 years with the fear that God would ultimately condemn me to hell because I wasn't good
enough, I finally recognized that I was the one judging myself as bad and worthy of condemnation,
and that it was my choice to do that, to live that way. Or not. Over a period of several years,
around the time I realized I had ALS and met Darchelle, I chose to let go of my self-condemnation
and the Christian belief system of which it was a part. I consented for the most part to accept
myself, to see myself as good enough and decline to condemn myself any longer. God did not do
likewise. Because self-condemnation had been a fundamental part of that belief system, supported by
my understanding of the Bible and Ellen White's writings as well as by my emotional experience, I
have not been able to believe that God would love me and save me as I am. I may be good enough for
myself, my wife, my family and my friends but I still cannot (or will not?) see myself as good
enough for God. Since I could not be good enough for God, I have had to get rid of Him. I no
longer believe, for the most part.
BTW, both rooms in the dream feel like porches, part of the house but not really
in the
house, suggesting that while I am still alive (in the house) I am not all the way inside (referring
perhaps to being disabled) any longer.