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Scary dreams

May 17,  2009  - Dale

All of us have dreams. Some dreams are pleasant, some are scary. Most we don’t remember. Some we remember vividly. Sometimes we try to make sense of our dreams, or others try to tell us what they mean – one has to be careful who one tells one’s dreams to!

I heard of a man once who had a scary dream. He dreamt about trees. Actually one particular tree. A huge tree – tall and wide. A beautiful tree that provided shade and shelter. One of his friends thought the dream was about him. He was a very powerful man who provided work and shelter for many people. He had become rich and powerful, and was starting to get big ideas about himself.  Some might have thought that the old saying, “He was a self-made man who worshipped his creator” applied to him.

If the friend’s theory about the dream was true – it was very flattering at first. What you might expect from a rich and powerful man.

But the dream was a scary dream, because something like an angel appeared in the dream and ordered all the branches to be lopped off and the trunk cut down until there was only a stump. Instead of a shady shelter there was now only a ring-barked stump standing in the sun.

Was it one of those anxiety dreams? The sort all of us have in some form or other? It might have been. But for this man the dream came true. He went mad. He couldn’t do his job. Others had to take over and he spent months living virtually like an animal.

But there was a twist to the story as I heard it.  The angel character in the dream implied that the man’s problem was his way of understanding his world. He later agreed with his friend’s theory that he acted as though he was some kind of god.

But he didn’t agree with this at first. Before he went mad he became harder to live with – always skiting about how great he was and what a great job he had done.

The story as I heard it had a happy ending. The man had moments of sanity while he was in his crazy state. He finally worked out that there really was a God who had made everything and who ruled over everyone – especially rich and powerful people like himself.  Actually according to the dream this is what the angel character had implied.

He came to his senses, as they say. He gave thanks to God. And he sent a letter to everyone who worked for him explaining his dream and acknowledging his hubris. He even described his madness and praised God. That’s how I came to hear the story.

Dale