Dr. Jung offers several insights:
“It is interesting to consider the teaching function provided by dreams. They can provide guidance for us as we confront difficult issues. They can also “inoculate” us by portraying very scary situations that we are able successfully confront in the dream, thereby encouraging us to confront the challenge in the real world which is much less scary. We will be just facing another person rather than a bear or fearsome monster. These people in our life are just as frightened as we are. They are likely to view us as menacing bears, especially if we are in a leadership role.”
Mitch asks a question:
“So, you think members of my organization might see me as a strong, and potentially harmful bear?”
Dr. Jung responds:
“Hard to say. However, you might keep this possibility in mind when working with folks in your organization. Especially those who do not know you well and see you only from a distance. In general, the farther down an employee is on the organization chart, the more likely they are to let myths, assumptions, hopes and fears cloud their perception of their organization’s leader. This leader becomes very wise or very stupid, very brave or a coward, and a visionary or someone stuck in the past. It is often all good or all bad – what psychologists call “splitting,” especially when the organization is filled with a great deal of anxiety.”
Mitch comes in:
“Perhaps, like what occurred when our newspapers were receiving fewer advertising revenues and fewer subscriptions during COVID. I think people in my organization were likely to see me as the potential savior or somehow as that damned fool that got us into trouble in the first place. However, they were seeing me, I suspect that it was partially true but mostly inaccurate.”
Dr. Jung:
“Yes, that’s probably the state of things: some validity and some distortion. Do you have a second dream to report?”
Mitch picked up another of his transcripts:
“It is a long one! I was journeying through a strange city and then through a village located by a large dam. I was joined on this journey be Frank (as a young man) and our four boys (who were still young). We were walking together through the city. It had grown dark and around each street corner there was menacing group of men holding knives and pitch forks. We walked faster and faster and soon were running. I was holding my two sons and Frank was holding his. After several minutes, complete with racing up a dead-ended street and then threading our way back through the crow of “hoodlums,” we were transported magically from the city to a pleasant village. It looked like something out of an old Disney movie such as Sleeping Beauty or Pinocchio.
Everything seemed perfectly fine, until I noticed that there was a large damn located just outside the village. There was crack in the dam and water was beginning to leak through the crack. I called out to Frank (who was breathing heavily and exhausted like me from carrying our boys to safety in the city. Frank and I both picked up our sons once again and began to run out of the village. Behind me, I saw the walls of the dam begin to break apart. A large volume of water was now plunging down the walls of the dam and moving toward the village and towards us. I woke up in a sweat. I didn’t go back to sleep for another half hour, fearing that I would be returning to the flooded village.”
