NonFiction: Sylvia Browne's Book of Dreams (#9)

Another dream book. I am not kidding when I say that my dreams are crazy enough that I want to read every book I can that might help me to analyze them and figure out what exactly my sub-concious is trying to tell me.

A friend of mine saw this particular dream book on the seat of my car and his response was particularly amusing - "Why the hell are you reading Sylvia Browne?? She is CRAAAAZY!" And I have to agree, some of her ideas are definitely out there, and her writing does not hide the fact that she is a bit of a religious fanatic. My opinions on her level of craziness tended to vary - some of her statements I found a little hard to swallow (I can't think of any good examples off the top of my head) while she had other ideas that, while they didn't mesh entirely with my belief system, were at least feasible in the sense that they were things I had pondered. This would include things like reincarnation, visits from spirits, astral travel while we sleep, angels etc etc. I am not entirely sure where I stand on those issues, but they are not things that I necessarily discredit or disbelieve. If that makes sense.

A lot of her suggestions for dream analysis involved praying for God's/the Holy Spirit's intervention and help in clarifying the dream messages your spirit is sending you. She was very big on relaxation before sleep and wrapping yourself in "the white light of the Holy Spirit, the purple light of God and the green light of healing." Which seems a little extreme, and yet in my yoga class we are very big on healing energies and during relaxation we are encouraged to send energy to the parts of our body that are under stress or in pain and I always visualize that energy as green ... So either it is an interesting coincidence or maybe there is something to some of her theories. Sylvia would say there is no such thing as coincidence.

Sylvia also talks a lot about how everyone has a spirit guide who is always present when they dream and 2 angels who are omni-present. She says these are people we have chosen on The Other Side before we were reincarnated into this lifetime. In fact she firmly believes that we have all been reincarnated many times and that before we come to earth we plot out a life chart for ourselves with the goals we hope to accomplish this time around. Which ... I don't know.

She divides dreams into 5 categories: Prophetic, Release, Wish, Information & Problem Solving & Astral Visits. There is talk of archetypes and totems and symbolism and she suggests some possible interpretations of these but mostly emphasizes that YOUR definition/what rings true with YOU is more important than any dictionary of symbolism could ever be.

I liked that she used a lot of examples and that the dreams she included seemed to be less straightforward than the dreams from the last book I read. I didn't like that I felt like she was being all preachy and you must believe in God the way I believe in God. I also didn't like that my goal in reading this book was to understand my own dreams better, and, while I have a little more theory behind me now I still feel as confused as ever. I guess maybe there is something to the practice makes perfect speech. Maybe I really should just buy a dream journal and see if that helps.