Date: 12-12-2018

I dreamt I had to take care of a horse. She was a white mare, not too big. This was something I had ‘inherited’ from my relation with my ex. I had to find a place for her to graze. I don’t know why or how, but the place I had kept her would become unavailable. I had to look for another place.

The new place I had found for her was in front of the school on the other side of the busy road to which the street my parents lived on was a side road. That school was situated with a large green patch of grass in front of it. But when I arrived there, it turned out there was another horse there. A big white stallion. And I mean big. It was a big hulk of pure muscle. And this stallion looked at my little mare and I could see he was interested in her.

My brother and D were now also present. The stallion walked up to our little white mare and they sniffed each others’ noses. My brother and I were making jokes that this huge horse must have a monster ding-dong, and I revered to it as a ‘tampeloeris’ which is old Dutch Amsterdam slang for penis. My brother laughed so hard because it’s a funny word people rarely use any more.

After a while my brother and D left, and I was alone on the field with these two animals, and I found myself talking to the stallion like I sometimes do to animals, trees, stars, etc. Like they are real people, I will just talk to them about the things I worry about, like they are wise gurus that can advice me. And for some reason, this stallion took a liking to me because of my blatant honesty about myself to it. And in the dream this meant I could switch horses. And as soon as this spiritual transference had taken place I was besties with this stallion. He kneeled and allowed me to sit on its back. The white mare would remain in the field where we found the stallion.

And riding this big stallion was so incredibly cool! I didn’t know a thing about riding a horse, but I managed quite well. If I wanted it to go left I stroked its left cheek, and asked nicely to take a left. The same for going right, stroking his right cheek, asking nicely to go right. To stop I just said: “Ho..!”  And he understood me well enough each time for the things I wanted. And it was such a treat to ride this magnificent beast. I towered about 13 feet above the ground.

But since I had traded this horse for my previous horse, it meant in this dream that all things agreed upon with the mare now applied to this horse. One such thing was that the mare had been entered into a competition, but the competition was for its jockey and less so about the horse itself. Showing up on a different horse was fine. The competition would’ve been a challenge on old horse of my ex, but not this hunk of muscles. It would even be a lot of fun to compete on this mighty piece of raw force. I looked forward to it.

I had to prepare for this competition. One of the challenges of the competition was to have the horse jump while the jockey held something heavy he/she was not allowed to drop. So the horse had to carry me + heavy object, and I just had to carry the heavy object. To me in hindsight that sounds like it was more a competition for the horse, but this 4 horsepower stallion would do this with ease.

Because my stallion could carry so much I decided to challenge myself. I was going to carry a trunk weighing 25 kilos, carrying it in a jute back. The trunk I had in mind laid in my sister’s yard. This was agreed upon with her earlier, before I had the stallion, but when I came there her plans for the trunk had changed. The trunk was supposed to be cut into smaller pieces, and I could take some pieces but not all. I didn’t understand what she had in mind. Confused I asked her if I could take another trunk (she had a few) and she was fine with that. I got what I wanted; a heavy trunk to carry. I thought to myself I should tame my autistic side, and just accept this wasn’t my stuff and my sister was free to do with it as she pleased.

My next stop was the veterinarian in Amersfoort. I was short one last item which I absolutely needed to compete in the competition; the liver of another animal. And this vet was the supplier for this competition, somehow. So I navigated my stallion through the traffic. For the most this went well, except for a few occasions. The animal got a little nervous due to the busy traffic, and a few times it almost went wrong, but in a fun way. I would try and have it wait for a car, but in its nervousness and playfulness it would just decide to continue on through someone’s front yard. But it made me laugh. Every time it didn’t go as planned all parties on the road just had to let us pass because this thing was the biggest thing on the road. There was no negotiating with it. Every time I just shrugged my shoulders and said: “Woops!”

We arrived at the veterinarian office. It had a port that led to a courtyard. I had to leave the stallion alone there for a moment as I went inside. He didn’t like that, didn’t allow me to tie it off either. I didn’t force it. There was no where he could go anyway. The courtyard was closed off. Inside I saw my mother sitting on the waiting bench near the service counter. She was with Pedro; a pet dog we used to care for a decade ago, who has since passed. In the dream Pedro was ill. I didn’t know. My mother looked sad and had a defeated demeanour. The second she saw me she was surprised to see me here, and my unexpected appearance here was uncomfortable for her as I had seen her in that state.

The hallway where she sat was quite dark by the way. The light in the hallway came from the service counter. That’s where I had to request a liver to pick up. Mom was doing her thing again, complete pretence, like I haven’t stayed away from her for the past 3 years. ‘Keeping up appearances’. “Hey, what are you doing here then? How are you?” But she added her signature disdain by asking me if I was able to live on my own. Not “are you enjoying living on yourself” or something, but “am I succeeding”. And regretfully I played the game, bragging about how well I was doing.

She then started giving me tips on how to request the liver at the desk, making it seem I might not get one if I didn’t ask right. With this in the back of my mind I went to the desk, and I felt a little insecure because of what mom had said to me. A woman came, and I said: “I need a liver for the jockey competition.” “Okay. Let me get it for you.” Said the lady. That was it. No tricks needed. My mother had made me nervous for no reason at all. 

I don’t recall actually being handed a liver but after having been at the desk I was done there and went outside again to the courtyard. There I saw my horse was fooling around and misbehaving. I could see it in its eyes. I wanted to grab him, and he allowed me to come close just to run off again as I almost reached him. This continued on for a few minutes as I talked to it and tried to cease his play. In the midst of this cat and mouse game, he even walked straight against a wall with his head, but he walked away unscathed. Eventually I sweet talked him back to me.

But then I noticed Pedro was also outside in the courtyard. He was clearly lost and scared. I think he was afraid of being alone outside in the vicinity of this huge horse. But I called out his name and he recognised me and came to me. I was someone he knew. The moment I got him softly by his collar he seemed to feel relieved and less scared. I petted him. He returned to his old self instead of this nervously shivering wreck.

Why was Pedro outside this courtyard? Dream logic; mom had forgotten him while simultaneously still being inside the veterinarian office. The solution? I had to bring Pedro back home to them. I did not feel like going back to the house. This was also when I realised my regret for having talked to mom at all. She might now think things are all fine again and invite me in. I didn’t like the prospects of having to decline that offer or worse; feel obligated to enter and have tea, and participate in her game of pretence. But I couldn’t leave Pedro there all alone. He deserved it for me to help him get home. I was going to try and bring him there but make it seem like I was in a hurry, to escape any confrontation with mom.

That’s where the dream ended somewhere; me walking the street with a small black dog on a leash in one hand, and the reins of this huge muscular white stallion in the other hand.

Analysis 25-02-2024:

It was fun to read back this dream. I had forgotten all about it, and reading this account again helped me get a few impressions back. I recall how fun it was to traverse the traffic on the back of this meat tank. It was amazing.

The account with my mother in the dream was typical. I think it showed me how I so easily fall for her games and participate against my wishes. I couldn’t yet stand up to her the way I wanted.

The stallion is something I got indirectly from my prior relationship. Pedro is something from the past. I think both animals are a representation of me. I think the end is me going into the future with these two sides of me. A side from the past that is scared and nervous. The stallion the side of me that is playful and above all strong. I let go of a good version of myself from my past relationship and got back something stronger and better. I left the mare behind at a place where I grew up. I brought Pedro, the nervous dog, back there too. It’s interesting to realise what this dream could’ve meant.

The competition perhaps showed me how I enjoyed taking on the challenges of live with my new self. Though I wonder what the trunk and liver (especially the liver) meant in this. I got the trunk from my sister? And a liver from the vet? I hope some day I can figure out what that meant. Right now, I haven’t a clue.

Date: 09-06-2017

This was an interesting dream. I was in the ‘Rijksmuseum’ (a famous Dutch museum, I’ve never visited), but in the dream this place had nothing to do with the actual ‘Rijksmuseum’ as it is in real life. In this dream it was a sort of VIP place where famous people and ‘collectors’ could meet. I was with someone; a renowned and highly skilled collector. I was his pupil and he my teacher. The collectors brought the things they had collected to that museum so that famous/important people could view them or even take some with them. The head administrator of the museum was there too when I came to visit with my teacher, and he was present while I was looking around. The head administrator looked like a very classy waiter. Everything he did – every move he made – he did so from the highest form of etiquette; extremely polite and aware. He and I talked, and in that conversation I tried to do my best to be as polite and classy as I could. But I stood in his shadow. Compared to him I felt like I was trash, but still he was so incredibly nice and polite to me, despite my shortcomings of applying his level of etiquette to our interaction. In our conversation I painted myself as not belonging there. “I’m just a simple collector, nothing more. I stand in the shadow of everyone here.” But he disagreed! “On the contrary. The collectors are famous among the famous. Each has a role to play.” His comment was uplifting. I felt a little less out of place.

After our conversation I browsed around in the museum, when I unexpectedly encountered my mother there. She was there with my dad, and they had found things from their past in the museum. That was one of the things people could do there. There was a kind of photo archive, and you were allowed to check whether it held any photos of your past. You were allowed to take them if you found them. My mom had a photo in her hand. She asked me: “Have a look. Do you recognise it?” I recognised the place in the photo immediately. This was the little square in front of the garage door. But now things got a little more interesting. This was an obvious old photo. It was in colour, but the technology for personal colour photography was in its infancy when this photo was taken. But despite that, the garage on the photo looked as it did after my dad had put a second floor on it. It should’ve shown the garage with a flat roof. The photo was taken from ground level, as if the camera was on the ground itself, and it was taken from the side of the neighbours’ house facing the direction of the garage. The garage door was the old one, with vertical green and white stripes. On the picture there were clothing racks in front of that garage door, and on those racks hung all kinds of dress up clothing (cowboy, Indian, police officer, etc.). Dad, looking like he did in the 80s (beard, moustache, sideburns, which I know from old photos, haha), stood near the racks and was playing dress up with a couple of other people I didn’t know.

He was wearing cowboy clothing. This was all the way in the background of the photo. But very near the camera was a tiny little mouse. In the dream I recognised it as one of their house pets, that they supposedly used to have (which they didn’t in real life as far as I know). In the dream it was known to me they had this mouse from stories they told us, like the stories and pictures of dogs my parents used to have before we were born. I exclaimed excitedly: “Hey!! Isn’t that…?” “Yes.” My mother replied, adding: “We only just got him back then.” But then the photo became animated like it was a video. I looked at the video. On the video you could see the little mouse was scared and it looked around. Its innocence in world affairs couldn’t have been more evident. Then my very young looking mother entered the frame of the photo. She petted the little mouse, and gave it a soft loving kiss on its little head. I could see she really loved this little creature. It was an interesting peek into a past before my time. The collector now stood next to me, while I was watching the photo/video. He was done with whatever he had planned to do, and said: “We have to move on. Are you ready?” I handed the photo back to mom and said goodbye. Dad was there too somewhere but I didn’t speak to him. I woke up just after following the collector on his way out.

Analysis:

On the Chinese calender I am a mouse according to the date of my birth. I was born in 1984. I know this through my brother’s Chinese girlfriend. The photo/video my mom showed me was taken in the 80s. I am pretty confident to say that little mouse was me.

It showed my mother when she was young. Maybe she was different back then. This dream showed me my mother wasn’t always who she eventually became. She plainly loved me when I was small, fragile, and innocent, and she didn’t play any games. Her love for me was real and pure. Untainted.

Dad was playing dress up. I recall that from the photo as it started to play like a video that my dad was showing off to those other people. That was kind of how he was back then. I take after him in that regard. I love being in the spotlight and getting the attention with humorous and witty comments.

Dress up is in fact dressing up and pretending to be someone or something you are not. And that might be something interesting. My mom has told us (children) that dad didn’t want any children. She was the one that really wanted to have kids. I think it was a wish he did not want to take from her. But when my mom revealed this, things did fall in to place some more. It made sense. Our dad wasn’t a typical dad. He was there on important moments, like graduations and birthdays, but often absent in the smaller less obvious moments. Maybe this dream depicted him playing his dad role but maybe it was something he felt didn’t come natural to him.

The collector who had me under his wing was a kind and wise old man. I think this was a depiction of my guide, or one of them. I think this guide is helping me to let go of my past. The museum was perhaps a place where you could look back at your life to help you progress spiritually.

Date: 05-04-2017

Dream inception again last night. A dream within a dream. It started like this. I was in my childhood bedroom on my bunk bed. My mother told me she was going shopping in the city centre. I remained in bed. Outside the house I had constructed some kind of security system, with various sensors. It allowed me to register whether someone was entering our property, and I had set up triggers for sounds to play when someone would. From here I fell asleep on my childhood bed, and had another dream.

This dream was truly bizarre. I dreamt I was part of a team of specialists that were going to travel to another dimension to look into a prehistoric animal that had gone extinct in our dimension but not theirs. We wanted to find out if this animal belonged in the clade of the dinosaurs or whether it was something else altogether. But we had to be really careful in that other dimension, as the people in that dimension had become ‘unstable’ due to a genetic experiment.

We travelled to the other dimension by means unknown. As we arrived there, people were out on the streets in daytime, walking around like the zombies from ‘The Walking Dead’ series. But they weren’t zombies. They were people, but they were utterly stupid, though some seemed quite normal. But what made them so dangerous was that when they were startled or got scared, or something unexpected happened near them, they could explode. I don’t mean they would get mad, I mean their body would actually expand followed by an explosion. And not some whimsy firecracker, no; they exploded like dynamite. It was loud, violent, and very dangerous as it was easily lethal for anyone around.

As we had arrived we had arrived in a mass of these zombies. We mimicked their behaviour as to not scare them. They made the same sounds as the zombies from the afore mentioned series, and they drooled, but otherwise looked like completely normal people to us. But they were so utterly stupid. They would walk around together in groups, and when one passed a parked car, it would point to it and exclaim: “CARRRRRRR. CARRRRRR.” And the others in the group would confirm this statement: “YES. CARRR. CARRRRR.” That’s how they walked around and acted.

We just mimicked their behaviour as we moved about, until we arrived at a square where there was a podium. On the stage was someone who was clearly leaps smarter than the crowd of zombies that had gathered in front of the stage. This fellow was apparently teaching them the alphabet. He had a microphone, and to his left and right stood a stack of stage speakers, and behind him was a large screen where all the letters of the alphabet were being projected on. He walked around with a pointing stick, and touched the letter D, stating through the microphone: “The letter D.” The zombie people – who were not even looking at him or the screen, but were instead just wondering around aimlessly – would repeat: “DEEEE. DEEEE. DEEEE.”

It turned out the guy who was giving this reading lesson was also our contact in this dimension. He was going to help us. Apparently it was illegal for us to come there. He had found us a place where we could spend the night. It was a student dorm flat, so the people inside that building were on average a bit smarter than those we had encountered outside on the street. But even though they were smarter, there was still the danger of them exploding on sudden events. The guy ended his lesson and got off stage. He came to us, greeted us, and gave us tips and instructions on where we would go and how best to behave. He would take the lead, and we all continued our imbecilic routine.

Part of it was actually quite funny, if it wasn’t for the danger of exploding people. We arrived at the dorm flat where we (a group of 6 to 8, I’m not sure exactly) were going to spend the night in one big room. The room was L shaped, and had two entry doors on the inside of the L shape, that both gave access to the same hallway. We had brought with us 4 “traps” that we had to put down on the ground. Each trap would emit a V shape with lasers, and if someone entered the opening of that V shape two things would happen:
1. The device would start beeping
2. The person inside the V shape would be frozen in place

But of course these devices were not made for this dimension, and it was possible that if one of them went off we actually had to run for our lives because of an imminent explosion that could follow. It was truly illogical to have brought those devices, but that’s what happened. So we went to sleep, and of course the students of this dorm curiously came looking at us. They were the cutest looking girls! We struck up a conversation with them, but they weren’t very bright at all. Compared to us, they were like children, and they reasoned like children in many ways. But in this realm they were the smarter ones. In the land of the blind… I guess.

And, yes, of course sometimes one of them would wonder into those fancy traps despite our warnings to stay clear of them. As they got stuck in the beam, they seemed to go into some kind of epileptic seizure, making sounds like they were being electrocuted, looking all frightened. When that happened one of us would rush to the device to quickly switch it off, or turn it away from them. And as soon as we did that, it seemed like they instantly completely had forgotten it happened. Like *having terrifying seizure* CLICK device off “Hey who are you, what do you study?” Like nothing happened! Truly bizarre.

But after a while they left and most of our group couldn’t sleep, including me. We wanted to go outside and satisfy our curiosity about this dimension, but two of our party were asleep. We didn’t want to wake them, so we decided to place all four traps in such a way they had the largest possible range, so that anyone trapped in them would be as far away from our sleeping comrades as possible. I set them up, and found them to be complicated devices with many switches, dials, and buttons. But I succeeded.

Now we proceeded outside. It was now truly nighttime and this world was even scarier than it had been during the day. There were monsters everywhere, dinosaurs the size of houses, that kind of world. But they left all the zombie people alone. Didn’t touch them, didn’t trample them, didn’t even look at them. I thought to myself that because of natural selection the big animals had learned not to try and eat them, cause they would explode in their bellies.

We arrived at some shopping centre, and wondered around. Going inside any of the shops was too dangerous though. We were slowly getting used to how utterly different this world was from ours when we were all shocked by what sounded like an enormous explosion in the not too far distance. We looked into the direction of where the sound emanated from, and saw a huge fireball rise from the student dorm flat where we were staying. That’s where two of our team members and our stuff was at. We panicked.

Now what? It didn’t take long for the sound of approaching sirens to be heard. Not just that, the emergency alarm also started sounding. This situation was beginning to get very dangerous. People panicked on the streets. Everyone could blow up at any time. A small contingent of soldiers with super weapons was deployed on the street by the authorities. They were a bit like “the Ginyu Force” of Dragon Ball Z; a small group of special warriors. They had been tasked to come to this region because the authorities had been informed of our illegal presence in their dimension and in response had tasked their best team to find us.

The authorities were apparently people that were about as smart as us, though undoubtedly corrupt to the core as most their countrymen were barely smart enough to properly wipe their own asses. This specialised team of soldiers started following us. Each of them looked differently, with their own capabilities and unique weapons. They were about as strong and smart as us, and we both had fancy weapons. I recall one of them had a kind of freeze ray weapon. But my weapon was very sweet too. It was a big weapon with two settings; one continuous blue energy beam, and the second firing small orange plasma balls in bursts of four like an energy machine gun.

I fired away at them. While we were battling them it turned out we had been betrayed by one of my house mates in our dimension! That’s how the authority knew about us, despite us being so stealthy and careful. We didn’t want to do so much damage to the infrastructure of this dimension. We came here for research, not to fight. We wanted to get home now. To get home we had to go to a specific spot, where a portal would open which would lead back to our own dimension. We succeeded and I woke up, back in my childhood bunk bed.

Mom had returned from shopping, and she told me some of the sensors of my security system had worked, cause on her return she had heard a sound come from the bushes. What I had done was rig a sound sensor to trigger a sound if it detected sound above a certain decibel level. When it did it would play the sound of a growling dog. It was supposed to scare unknowing people away, but the way my mom related her account of this back to me, made me realise it wasn’t scary at all, but perhaps only slightly comedic.

She said: “Yeah, and then I took a few steps onto the driveway, and I heard a tiny dog in the bushes.” And just after she had said this, I heard my brother mimic the sound on the other side of the door, where in the door crack he made a soft repeating growling noise, as to drive the point home in a comedic way how utterly ineffective my idea was. Grrrr… Grrrr… Grrrr… That little jackass, haha! He kept repeating to make the sound. Grrrr… Grrrr… Grrrr… Until I slowly woke up in my own bed, and heard the sound still. It was my wife snoring softly.

When my brother heard this, it made him laugh. It was quite funny.

Date: 04-12-2016

Introduction:

Last night I had a very rare and special dream experience. In the dream, I didn’t think it was a dream, because I recalled what I had dreamt earlier that night in this very dream. So this dream wasn’t lucid, but it was very vivid. I thought this was real. The memories of this dream were very sharp when I woke up.

Seasonal Spider:

This took place during day time at the little square in front of the garage of my parents’ house. A voice from above was speaking to me. I was standing near the part of the house where the exhaust of the extractor hood above the stove exited the wall. I was facing into the direction of the road. On the driveway were small pools of water, teeming with life. Spiders, grasshoppers, crickets, butterflies, dragonflies, and frogs. Mostly frogs. The whole focus of this aspect of the dream was on the frogs. The voice had control over what happened in this small ecosystem I saw. It was a calm and kind voice.

The voice spoke to me and said: “Look at what is happening in your family. It is like the seasons of the year.” And while the voice was explaining I saw in fast forward the life cycle of the frogs, from frogs going into the water, mating, eggs, tadpoles, and little frogs crawling on land and growing into mature frogs that would move back to the water and start mating again. It was in fast forward, yet I could see every detail of it. It happened in one smooth motion. Woosh! And again. And again. The whole cycle, in one second. Woosh. Woosh. Woosh.

The voice meanwhile continued to explain to me the dynamic in our family, and used the cycles of the frogs as an analogue: “You see it? These are cycles. They repeat, again and again and again. What is happening now, is part of something that has been going on for a long time. Right now, you are just in a season of that ongoing cycle. It is something that has happened many times before.” And I understood exactly what the voice meant. I replied to the voice: “But I don’t want this. I want to part from these seasons. That’s what I am trying to do now; to part with it.”

While I said it, and had continued to observe the repeating cycles of the frogs in front of me, I now simultaneously began seeing events from our own family history happen parallel to the frog cycles. Woosh! Woosh! I saw how my own mother had in the past tried to distance herself from her family too, and yet returned every time. I saw this happen multiple times in the dream, and in real life I had lived through one such attempt myself, but that wasn’t the first time she had tried. She tried it before. Yet, she returned every time.

But it wasn’t just her cycle of return. I also saw an uncle of ours (her younger brother) who did the same, and a cousin on our father’s side of the family who too did the same, and many more examples. Our families had been going through these cycles for the longest of times. And finally I also saw my own conduct in this metaphor. It was like I was being shown a multi dimensional holographic power point presentation. I saw how I myself kept coming back, though very infrequently and with much time in between visits. But I would still occasionally pop up at their door. It showed me I was not trying to break the cycle at all, but was just doing what everyone else was doing who was stuck in these cycles.

As I realised this, I looked at the house. It turned into an ominous house again, as I had seen it in previous dreams. It turned blackish, the walls showed cracks, there was tar pouring out of these cracks, and black smoke filled the rooms of the house. The voice continued: “Look over here. This house is like a spiderweb. Every season the web hosts a new spider.” I again immediately understood what the voice was trying to explain to me, and replied: “And in the current season that spider is my mother.” After having said this I immediately woke up, and wasn’t able to fall asleep again. I typed this experience out right after I was awake. The memories were very sharp.

Analysis:

I think the message in this dream to me is quite clear. If I want to break free of these cycles, I have to stop trying to walk the middle ground. Only then will I truly break free from this cycle. The way I handle it now is the way every individual in this family of ours has handled it. They all came back and endured more drama.

Though it is a very complex situation, its breakdown is actually quite simple. None of us want to carry all this pain that was passed onto us by the generation that came before us. Our parents before us didn’t want to either, and they got it from their parents, who got it from their parents, and so on and so forth. If I want to break free, I need to want to leave it all behind.

The words “this house is like a spiderweb and every season the web hosts a new spider” really hit the bullseye. It made things so much more clear to me. My mother is just fulfilling a role. Her mother came before her. Every family that works this way has someone that performs this role.

I don’t think my mother wants this role, but in order for her to be able to part with that role I need to remove myself from the web.

There are no winners in this conflicts. There are only our individual choices, and how those choices affect the others that involve those choices.

Date: 03-01-2016

I recall a short but telling dream I had last night. My brother and I were celebrating New Year’s Eve at our parents’ house. I was standing alone on the little square in front of their garage. But I had my own place now since a little while and I suddenly realised in the dream: “Why aren’t we celebrating this over at my place, without the restricting rules and disapproving oversight of our parents?” I wanted to suggest this to my brother, who was inside the house. I walked around the house to the front door. As I stood before it, the door opened, and out walked my sister, her husband, my brother, and his girlfriend. My sister was crying, her husband visibly sad, my brother looked like he had been crying, but his girlfriend seemed mostly fine. She was calm and comforted him. I hadn’t seen my parents. In the dream it was a given they were inside the house. They remained inside the house throughout this short dream. The door closed and the five of us stood outside on the driveway. After my brother and sister, and their spouses had exited the house all its windows turned dark black, like the shaded glass of a limousine. I could no longer see what happened inside. I asked: “What happened?” My sister answered: “We have confronted mom and dad with the past. This had to stop. Things could no longer continue as they did. All three their children were damaged by all the things they had swept under the carpet, and what little we had uncovered they were trying with great effort to bury again.” My brother confirmed it: “Things were getting out of hand. Something had to be done. This needed to be said.” None of them felt like celebrating New Year with me now, though. They all wanted to processes what had happened. I was glad they had not involved me into this.

Analysis 17-02-2024:

I write this analysis in the far future. In the rear view mirror things can become so much more clear. You should know that the Christmas that preceded this New Year’s Eve was the one where I received a Christmas card from my parents, which on opening the envelope turned out to have come with an appendix. As I took the card out of the envelope, this appendix fell to the ground out between the card. This appendix was the catalyst for a lot of conversations about the past between me and my siblings.

The Christmas card was generic, though my mother had misspelled my name again, as she also did on the envelope. She insists that the spelling of my name is the way she spells it, with two capital letters in one word, even though official government documents do not spell my name like that. But apart from the card there was this appendix, which I picked up from the floor and folded open. It was a letter that opened with the line: “To all our children.” Intuitively I folded up the letter again, and put it in a drawer.

It was apparently a letter they wrote to all of us. Any Christmas card that comes with an appendix containing what I predicted this appendix would contain is a Christmas card that illustrates a complete and utter disregard by its sender of what Christmas is supposed to stand for. I was going to read it some time later when I felt like it. I didn’t feel like consenting to their influence over my life at this moment. Later through my sister and brother I found out that I was spot on about what I predicted was the content of the letter, as they had received an identical version themselves through similar means.

But I never quite thoroughly inquired about it. To explain how I approached this I need to give you a little backstory. Many years ago, my own mother had tried to part with her own family for what I think amounts to months, or perhaps even up to two years. During that time period, her oldest sister had sent her a letter, with the approval of her other family members. In that letter they excused all their shitty behaviour of them to her, and that letter concluded with the statement that the things they couldn’t excuse away in any specific way were just “inherent to life”.

I remember vividly how insulted and deeply hurt my mother was by that specific last statement in the letter. Things just happened? It added insult to injury of what had already transpired between them and her so far, and that is a long story going back decades into her past. She would bring this subject up time and again during tea and dinner, and would always touch upon that statement. “It’s just inherent to life.” As her pain subsided over time we would still joke about this sometimes, amongst ourselves, like when someone accidentally dropped a spoon on her toes, we’d say: “Oh, it’s inherent to life.” Mocking the statement, which was clearly just her family’s way of stating they weren’t going to take any responsibility for their behaviour, and trying to package that in a thoughtful sounding way. But now back to the letter me and my siblings received.

I inquired to my brother about the letter, asking if he had received it, and if so whether he had read it. He had. The letter had been sitting on his desk in their house when he came home from work one day. I told him I hadn’t read it. He asked if I was going to. At the time, I wasn’t sure so I said I didn’t know. He said if I wouldn’t read it I wouldn’t miss out on anything I didn’t already knew. I asked him this witty question: “Let me guess. It explains their shitty behaviour, and the rest is just “inherent to life“?” making air quotes with my fingers as I said that last part. My brother’s facial expression changed, and he laughed. Yup. That was it.

Many years later the subject came up between me and my sister. Hers was handed to her by our mom, together with a Christmas card. She too confirmed that my similarities with the letter our mom received from her family were there and that this was indeed the purport of their letter. The letter illustrated just how utterly blind for their own conduct our parents were, specifically our mother in this case. If I ever wanted to make a case for how she is to me what her family is to her, this letter would be exhibit number one.

Though I intended to read their letter at some point, I never did. For months I would sometimes come across it again, opening the drawer, reminding me of its existence. One time the letter had fallen out of the back end of the drawer and I found it laying on the ground below the cabin. Every time I saw it again I contemplated whether I was going to read it, or postpone again. I chose to postpone every time.

Then, after a few years I would move out of the student dorm, and into a house with my wife. When I moved my stuff, I could somehow no longer find the letter. I have no idea what happened to it. When moving, I had looked for it to no avail. It was gone.

Maybe it did move and is somewhere with the stuff I have in the attic, still boxed up, but I still haven’t found it. Maybe it is for the best that I never read it. All it could do now is make me angry. Maybe I will find it again when it no longer has this power over me, and I can finally laugh at it. In a way, this letter can perhaps be seen as something hilarious.

Date: 20-06-2015

This was such a weird dream. I was with a group of people. Generic students. I didn’t know them, but I did know our leader. It was GJM; a biology teacher from the university. Our task was to look for certain items. The location shifted while we were searching. It was sometimes my student dorm house, but also a large square castle. It was a very forested area. In the area where we were searching were also other people. I recall seeing an old pupil of mine from when I was a teacher myself. She was with a girlfriend. Her presence had no baring on the story, it was just another familiar face.

GJM gave me a little wooden box painted black. In this box was a little device, which looked like an ankle bracelet for someone on house arrest. Putting this ankle bracelet on would give its wearer the ability to fly. He gave it to me and assigned me the task to look for “the keys”, of which there were seven in total. We needed these keys to start the engines of our spacecraft. With an obvious lack of skill I tried to fly, but I stumbled through the air, untrained, going from wall to wall, tower to tower, tree to tree.

I was trying to impress my former pupil, but she wasn’t really paying attention to me. And after observing her for a while I realised that she and her friend too were looking for items, and so was everyone there who was not with our group. But they had no idea what these items were for; they were just collecting them for the fun of it. We on the other hand really needed these items in order to get back to our home planet. Finding the seven keys now became a serious necessity, and not some fun quest. I already had found six of them. Only one to go.

I went inside the building and was suddenly completely naked, as if I only just realised I hadn’t worn any clothes all this time. Somewhere in the building a door opened, and I rushed away, flying into the staircase. I didn’t want anyone to see me, cause I had no way of explaining what I was doing in any sensible way. “Yeah, I’m flying here naked, looking for keys to start the spaceship of my biology teacher.” Nobody would understand this. I flew to my own room in the dorm house, where I was going to get dressed. I saw my door, but as I flew close the door of my neighbour, VB, opened.

But it wasn’t her who opened the door. Instead in the open door stood a completely naked T (my friend from the university) and he was drying himself with a towel. Apparently he had taken a shower in our bathroom, which he had stated was one of the best showers he’d ever had, some time ago in the real world. I entered my room, which was now a really tiny room instead of the spacious studio it actually is. It only had one table, and three chairs. T entered behind me and sat down on one of the chairs. I was uncomfortable because both of us were in the nude. I’m a little shy.

Then an even older friend of mine entered; a guy I knew from high school, JC. And JC reminisced about our joke routines: “Hey, do you remember our jokes about ‘Hennie’?” We laughed and laughed, until I suddenly realised I was neglecting my very important quest to look for the seven keys. I looked at my key chain, and counted the number of keys I had found. Were there six or seven keys? For some reason I had great difficulty with counting the keys. Sometimes I counted six, and sometimes I counted seven. I was unable to get a sure count, so I flew to GJM to help me count.

Somehow I was no longer naked, as if being in my room had corrected this automatically. Or maybe I had put on clothes but just don’t remember doing it. But I flew through the hallway looking for a way out of the house. Outside I found GJM and he helped me to count the keys, which somehow was a difficult task even for him. But he counted seven! I was relieved, cause if he had counted six I thought maybe he would be disappointed in me. I didn’t want that, but wanted him to be proud of me.

But then we looked at some kind of metal box. It might’ve been brass or some alloy containing copper. It looked a big like a padlock, but it had several key holes. The holes were numbered, 1 to 7, but also another: The “M” key. “We’re still one short.” Said GJM. “Now what?” I asked concerned. “Oh, wait a second.” GJM replied, who took out his own keys from his pocket: “The M key, I have one of those myself.” He took it off the ring and handed it to me with his signature big smile: “Here it is!” Now we had all the keys to open the box. The dream ended here.

Date: 19-06-2015

Last night I had a very intense dream. Many details have escaped me, but certain things stand out very clearly. This might’ve been the most powerful creature I have ever encountered in the dream realm.

This dream started on an enormous ship, out at sea. It was not just any ship, but was able to fly and go to space. Nobody on board knew this, but the purpose of this ship was to give people the ability to get off Earth if an emergency would arise. For now it functioning as a ship at sea. The sea was fierce and wild. Dark clouds hung high in the sky above the waters, and giant waves played with the ship like it was a mere toy. I am unsure whether it was twilight or daytime with very dark clouds. It felt like something big was coming. Something was going to happen. The waters of the sea were clear. D was there, as was my brother M, and his girlfriend YL, and my friend T. with his girlfriend S. And T was in danger. He wanted to get away, away from the danger, what ever it was. D wanted to get away too, but not because of the danger, but from the crowd. The ship was really crowded. She longed for me to take her some place quiet and peaceful. I too longed for that, but right now T was doing something stupid. He had found some kind of escape pod and had taken a seat in the craft, and had plunged it into the water.

It was a really high tech craft. The way it looked reminded me of some of those deep sea submersibles, with a thick spherical bowl-like window. It also kinda looked like one of those flying cars from The Jetsons cartoon. But the thing is; this craft was meant to fly. It couldn’t travel through water. The engines got wet so they didn’t work, and so the craft just floated there, and the ship kept sailing on. At first I considered this was his problem. He had set this in motion so the consequences should be his to carry too. But still part of me was worried about him. I just wanted to check on him. D would rather not see me go, but she did not want me to go because she was worried about me. I thought to myself how different she is from my ex-girlfriend, cause my ex wouldn’t have wanted me to go because she saw me as her property. I told D how lucky I thought I was to have her, but that I did want to check on T and that she didn’t have to worry about me: “I just want to make sure that the path he has chosen now is safe.” I told her while holding her hands. I looked at M, and he smiled. He understood my reasons, and said: “Go. But try to let go of it.” I think he meant my feeling of responsibility towards T.

I could fly, so I levitated and went into the direction of T, who was now a blip on the horizon in the far distance, on what was now a quiet calm sea. M flew with me, but simultaneously also stayed behind with the rest. It was like he could see what I saw. As I flew and gained speed I tried to see the bottom of the sea, cause the water was just so very clear. In the reflection of the water I saw the stars in the sky. Maybe a morning sky, where the last stars slowly disappear in the ever brighter blue hue of the daytime sky. But I couldn’t see the bottom, cause it was way too far below the level of the water. The deeper I peered the darker it was down there. Pitch black dark. It had an ominous feel. I arrived at T, and stopped flying. I landed into the water, and it was a bit scary to be in the water to be honest. T was hurt; a deep cut ran across his belly. He had the pod opened up, like the bowl window was on hinges and would open up like the trunk of a car. I put my left hand on his wound and healed it. But T was determined to stay in the pod and leave. I tried to help him get the engines started, just like one would push a car, but I pushed from under the water upwards. I now got help from other beings. These beings were path-seers and healers, just like myself in this dream. Together we pushed the craft up and out of the water, and the engines fired up. It worked. The craft was hovering.

Now all the path-seers and healers went their own way, and so did I. I returned to the ship where D and the rest was. But while flying towards the vessel, I saw Angels flying high in the sky, rushing towards the location where T was. I looked over my shoulder and saw how T had not taken off yet, and was still hovering just above the water surface. The water was now dead calm and flat like the surface of a mirror. And in the deepest of the deep of the sea, I saw movement. Something was moving in the deep, and it was big. Very big indeed. But I couldn’t see it well, as it was incredibly deep still. Occasionally flashes of light accompanied the movement, though, and that gave me brief moments of seeing part of what creeped down below. It looked like a giant squid. Not just big or large; giant. Enormous. The size of skyscrapers. It was huge. Beyond any conceivable animal measure. Considering how deep this thing still was, it added to the suspense of how big it was whole. And we were about to find out as it seemed to be moving upwards towards T in his pod. I looked up at where the Angels were now, and estimated how long it would take them to reach T, then looked back at the progress the squid was making. I estimated the Angels would not make it in time. I had to go back.

Now I had wings on my back. They were made of golden feathers. In my haste I had flown all the way to the ship, but performed a tight turn and made an 180 like I was a fighter jet, while asking M for his assistance. He accompanied me, and together we flew towards where the beast would surface. And it had partially surfaced, and with one large long tentacle it had gripped the pod. Its mantle towered above the water surface, with its fins sticking upwards into the air. It was so terrifyingly big. Its eyes were above the water and it had such a menacing look. The first Angels had come close and started firing beams of light from their bodies onto the monster. They were able to prevent the beast from attempting to bring the pod with T in it to its beak and swallow it, but that’s all they accomplished. This fight had clearly only just started and the beast wasn’t going to give up. M and I increased our speed, and we were accompanied by more Angels. But we were still not going fast enough, and it looked like the Angels in the distance were losing the battle. We had to go faster. Then I got the idea to put my hands against my body and fire beams of energy from my palms, creating a sort of afterburner effect. It rocketed me at an incredible speed towards the battle, and the monster now took notice of me.

It was a weird feel. I knew the monster had noticed me, even before it would turn to me. It was like there was a spiritual element to this. It turned its huge body towards me, and I now stared into its enormous eyes. Its gaze was almost numbing. I could sense it was not afraid of me. It moved one of its tentacles up into the sky, readying it to strike me with it and kill me. As his tentacle moved, lighting bolts accompanied the movement. It was like one of those volcano eruptions where the pillar above the mount would spark lightning. This squid was so enormous that when it moved it would ionise the particles in the air. Lightning bolts and the sound of thunder accompanied his every move. This was what I saw when it was all the way in the deep, those flashes of light. As its tentacle came down I evaded its attack by continuing my flight under the surface of the water. There I saw in the clear waters that what we saw at the surface was only a fraction of the total of this monster. It was so big, so terribly big. I had to do something, but what? I was accompanied by a few strong warrior Angels. They telepathically asked me if I could help them. They were shooting beams of energy from their bodies; some from their hands, some from their eyes, some from their hearts. They all had a different method and colour of energy. I somehow felt it was my responsibility to defeat this monster, even though I wasn’t really an Angel (this was what I thought in the dream).

But I was able to shoot energy from my hands, as I had demonstrated earlier when I used to propel me forward faster. I tried to turn this ‘life energy’ into a weapon, and while flying shot a beam of energy from my left hand onto this monster. But it didn’t do enough. I wanted to fire a barrage of these attacks but the one beam just didn’t have the power I had imagined they would. They did impact it, and I sensed it felt pain, but it wasn’t enough to deter it. The Angels and I surfaced now. There the beak of the monster was now visible, surrounded by a row of giant tentacles that swung through the airs while lighting and the sound of thunder occasionally jolted from its limbs. And this animal was mad at me. Very mad. The warrior Angels came together to discuss a battle plan. I joined them. They were unable to beat this thing. But I had an idea. I suggested we would catch the energy from the lightning bolts and add that to the energy of our own attacks. They thought that was a great plan. “Good! You’re catching on!” They said. We were going to use its own force against itself. They got to work immediately, but while they did the animal had put its focus on me a second time. Its numbing gaze was calm yet furious. Its beak pointed towards me, and we could feel a build up of energy in the beast. It was determined to kill me. Its beak opened and it unleashed its attack.

An incredible blow followed and I was hit by whatever attack this was. And it kept coming. I was stuck in some kind of beam, and completely disorientated. This attack was depleting my strength and I truly felt the life flow out of me. I was dying. But the Angels now started cheering me on: “You don’t have to be afraid, Willem!” And their cheering worked. I felt wanted and supported. I was no longer afraid. While I was stuck in this attack that had its focus on me like I was in a large laser beam, I thought about D and my new home, and all the new friends I had made in the student dorm. I didn’t want to give them up. This new found will strengthened me, and I turned my wings on my back towards the beast. These wings started blocking the effects of the attack. Better still, I started to absorb this energy so I could use it in an attack. The beam stopped, and the animal focussed on T in the pod again. If he couldn’t kill me, he would kill him instead. With great speed I rushed back to the battle and fired everything I had in an attempt to get it to fire on me a second time. But it didn’t fall for it. Then I got the idea. What if instead of firing from just my hands, I discharge energy from my whole body?

I gave that a try, gathered my strength and tried to build up to another attack. The air around me started to vibrate and hum, the water vibrated, and ripples in the water oscillated from my position. It became louder and louder, and the monster took notice. It let go of the pod, and tried to flee by diving back into the deep. But my attack wasn’t ready yet, so I fired it off prematurely. My attack was made of sound that could be seen as light, and it hit the beast on its mantle. Had I been able to charge up to full power this attack would have vaporised this monster. But though not at full strength; this attack was the most powerful blow yet dealt to this creature, and its colossal body was pushed backwards violently. It experienced a lot of pain, and was now very frightened. But it survived the attack and continued its retreat into the deep waters down below. It disappeared completely into the darkness. We had defeated it. All the Angels looked at me for a few seconds, after which they looked upwards into the sky, and flew straight up. And I felt a strong urge to follow them, but I couldn’t do it somehow. My wings were suddenly gone now too.

But then I recalled D, who was on the ship, with my other friends. I grabbed T from the pod and flew back to the ship, where I put him on the deck and rushed to D to hug her. She cried and said: “Please don’t do that again.” I felt guilty for wanting to go with the Angels. I would’ve left her behind. It wasn’t because I didn’t love her any more, but because the feeling of brotherhood I felt from the Angels was so beautiful, that I had simply forgotten about the world around me. I promised D I would not leave her behind again, and kissed her on the forehead. T now started to cry. He regretted his decisions. He had planned to leave his girlfriend S behind when he decided to get into that pod. When he saw me with D, it reminded him of what he and S had together.

Date: 15-06-2015

This afternoon I had taken a nap on my bed and I had this dream. There was a party at my parents’ place, and I had gone there too. It was really busy. There were partying people throughout the whole house. I browsed around a bit, not really engaging with anyone there, when I realised that of course my mom and dad would be here too, and I had recently told them I didn’t want any contact with them for a while. I didn’t look forward to the prospects of running into either of them.

On the hallway on the first floor I pushed myself through a crowd of people, who all were like: “Hey, Willem! How are you doing? It’s Willem! Look everyone, Willem is here!” Whatever stealth I was hoping to apply was not going to work. And there she was, my mom. She had heard everyone say my name and come looking for me. She wanted to give me a piece of her mind about me not wanting to have contact with her and dad. I remained calm and simply replied to all her accusations with: “It’s better this way. Just let me be at peace.”

But she continued to berate me with baseless accusations for the soul purpose of getting me to feel guilty, and I fell for it and began defending my decision to her, which in hindsight I knew was pointless. It’s always pointless to get drawn into a discussion with her, cause she doesn’t play by the rules. Engaging with her means you enter into her game. And that’s what I did. I played her game. But these endless ‘you this and that, no you this and that‘ type of discussion I knew all too well, and she lost at her own game. I won this round, and left.

I went to “my room” which in this dream was the little attic above the kitchen. Though in the dream this space was actually quite large. It was as big as my student dorm studio, but with a sloped ceiling. I sat down on the bed to gather my thoughts, which was a big mattress on the ground in the left side corner of the room. But my mom had followed me to my room and she wasn’t finished with me yet, and started round two of her game. Meanwhile I had started gathering my stuff as I wanted to leave. I was going to leave to my student dorm, haha. Dream logic.

But while I was gathering stuff I spoke to her again, and our discussion became ever more heated. The things that came forth from my mouth were ever more foul, as she was able to anger me more and more. I let her get under my skin. I said things I knew in the moment I would later regret, but again I won the discussion. Talked her right into a corner. She walked out, angry at her second defeat, and pushed her way through the masses of people on the stairs on her way down. I followed her as I was on my way out now.

Suddenly mid stairs she stopped and turned around, and amidst all these people she played the victim card, looked at me all angry, and said in a whiny voice: “Why do you have to turn every thing in to a role playing game!?” With an obvious forced calm voice I replied to her: “To make you see you are a bitch of the same calibre as your own mother!” I was so incredibly mad at her in this dream. She is the one to create role playing games. She just tried to get everyone to side against me, but I didn’t care in that moment what people thought of me. I just wanted to tell her this to her face.

After I said this she looked at me shocked and with disbelieve I had just said this out loud, then looked away as if thinking to herself, like her gears were moving to process what I had said. She looked frightened by whatever passed in her mind. I walked back up the stairs and ascended the stairs to the attic, where I knew from a previous dream I could exit through the window, and I left.

Analysis 26-02-2024:

This dream showed me clearly I was struggling to break the old dynamic between me and my parents, particularly my mom. I had only recently left the house and I really felt like I had escaped some kind of cult that was still pulling on me. Her grip on me was through her ability to get under my skin once I engaged with her. I knew intuitively I needed to just remove her ability to try and get me to engage, so that she couldn’t get under my skin. I wonder if I am now at a point where I will be able to restrain myself from engaging. In honesty, I actually doubt it. I still harbour a lot of anger towards her, but that is in a future where many more things have happened since. But when I had this dream, it was somehow liberating because I won the discussions, but it also showed me that these ‘wins’ don’t come with rewards. “Play stupid games, win stupid prices.” I think that was the lesson of this dream. It doesn’t help anyone to win from her in the games she plays. It is much better to just not play. Many dreams would follow that showed me how much I struggle with that still.

Date: 12-06-2015 

Last night I had many dreams. I’ve forgotten plenty, but was able to write down what’s below. I think there was a phase where I went astral again. The cinematic dreams followed after. They involved an online friend of mine, who lived not too far from me, the next town over. His name is TR. In this dream I was still living in the house with my parents, but I rented out a place that looks just like the interior of my student dorm room, and I had all my stuff from that place with me. TR asked me via app to come to him. He was going to travel to Barneveld, to a school there. The school space was rented out by the organisation of a photo competition, for the award ceremony of the winning photos. TR had competed in it, but he had used a photo I took, and that photo won a price. He wanted to do the honourable thing and make sure I receive that price myself. He suggested I took the bus to him, after which we would go to Barneveld from his house by car.

But in this dream I suddenly recalled having loads of money, or having had loads of money some time ago, with which I had bought me a Porsche sports car. I also had gotten my drivers license in that dream too. The Porsche had been waiting for me in the garage all that time, I never really used it much. I went to the garage, and found it a total mess. There was garage junk everywhere, and indeed my Porsche was under it all. There was junk next to, on top of, and even inside the otherwise pristine looking silver sports car. Though it was also covered under a thin layer of dust. But the car was there, and I was excited. I had a Porsche! But I had no idea how to drive it any more. I had forgotten all about it, including how to operate it. I got it to start though, which was very cool. It sat low by the ground, and its engine roared with a low sounding hum. It reminded me of the sound of a sports car of a friend of mine, though this car was in tip top condition, even inside.

But then my dad came into the garage, through the big garage door. He had heard the roaring of the engine of my car, and he wanted to have a word with me. We got into some kind of argument. It was his opinion I couldn’t just ignore him, and he defended his position that he thought he had the right to occasionally belittle me, and when I shunned him he no longer could. He said that, but I think he understood how bad that all sounded, so he added to it that he thought it was “not done” to not visit your dad on father’s day and his birthday, which I hadn’t done this year since living on my own. I was so done with this discussion, and he revealed what this was actually about. He wanted control over me. But as I sighed I suddenly remembered how to operate the car, and confidently looked him in the eye and calmly but angrily said: “Here, I got this for your birthday.” while flipping him off with my middle finger and speeding away in the car. The engine was so loud! It was epic.

This was a victory for me. I stood up to him, but mostly also against the nonsense and hierarchy of the old ways in that household. I drove to the school in Barneveld. The drive to the school was very joyful. It was truly a treat to drive this car. I arrived at the school. My ex was there too. We didn’t talk, but we met eyes a few times. I was always occupied whenever she tried to get my attention, and every time she would see her chance, something would happen so she couldn’t reach me. It was as if the distance I had created between us had manifested itself into her not being able to reach me. I could tell she was impressed by the car, and also was happy for me for winning the price. I think we eventually did talk, and we were nice to each other. But both of us said some very direct things to the other. We both needed closure.