The Dreamer's Breath

The Dreamer's Breath is a technique I encourage all dreamers to use to keep their emotional bodies clear and unconstricted. For a more in-depth discussion of it, consult The Woman's Book of Dreams. Here it is in brief:

Emotional attachment and investment in the external world literally sucks your personal energy well dry. In order to have all your energy available to you, you must call it back. You must visualize that you pull every emotional fiber back into your body so that your energy is ever present.

The technique for doing this is breathing. Each day -- preferably at night just before bed, but any time will do -- sit quietly and breathe. As you do so, allow every single memory of the past twenty-four hours to present itself to you, as if you were watching a movie. Picture by picture, frame by frame, stop the action. Scan your emotions connected to the frozen picture in front of you. Give thanks for the experience, for it has made you the person that you are. Then deeply inhale, pulling all your emotional energy back from the picture.

Next, intentionally exhale all attachments and release them into the picture. The picture will become sepia toned or black and white and lose dimension. It will look like a photograph. That's when you know you're successful. The memory of the experience isn't lost, but the emotional energy is now feeding you. It is no longer sapping your energetic reservoir. If the picture is still color or three dimensional, breathe again until it changes. Then allow the movie to go on to the next scene.

It sounds as I'm asking you to disconnect or disengage from life. I'm asking quite the opposite. I'm giving you a technique to make sure all your energy is available to you all the time so that you can fully engage, deeply and meaningfully connect. If a high percentage of your emotional energy is tied up in keeping your history alive, it's virtually impossible for your full attention to be present to each moment as it unfolds before you.

The energies that you magnetize in dreaming will be energies that match the emotional climate you carry into the dream.

The Results of the Dreamer's Breath

I have seen this technique literally work miracles in the lives of my sister dreamers and my clients. I can really, however, only speak of my own experience.

After years of applying the Gratitude Principle to my life, I've found that I practice the breathing technique almost constantly. When a client leaves my room, I pull my energy back. When I leave a dear friend, I pull my energy back while I drive away. When I have an argument, I pull my energy back immediately. The results are astounding. My need to be right in an argument dissolves, because my need to be present to the dynamic is more profound. My need to hold onto my friend's approval dissolves, because my need to experience truth and freedom is greater. My need for my clients to "heal" or "become spiritual" dissolves, because my only prayer is one of gratitude. At the end of the day, I have little left to do. Sometimes something historical will come up when I sit to contemplate. Sometimes my screen is blank. I like the blank times.

Then comes dreamtime. I move into the Weave -- free to travel to the places my soul longs to experience. I go into sleep knowing that I will magnetize goodness and beauty, because my essential self travels tonight unburdened by fears, unhampered by emotional bondage. I bring back visions, information, powers which cycle into my mundanity, reinforcing the cycle of freedom and availability to the waking present.

The emotional path of the dreamer is powerful and profound. It effects every aspect of life, every dimension, every definition of reality.