The author Tom Fletcher shared this dream on his website… ‘My wife and I and our child (I don’t have any children) snuck into an empty mansion. It was a museum, but on this occasion it was closed. It was full of works of art that were not supposed to be there. It was very dark everywhere; unnaturally dark. Before long we were very lost and very afraid. There seemed to be people living in the mansion even though nobody was supposed to be. We never saw them. Only heard them. From the top of a huge stairwell we looked down and saw something coming up the stairs. It was a very large creature, humanoid, but very tall and hunched over. It had a devil’s head. It saw us and smiled. It had quite human features but it was totally inhuman. We ran away but it chased us. It chased us into a corridor with a red carpet. At the end of the corridor was a lift. We ran for the lift and pressed the button. We had to wait for the lift to arrive and for the doors to open. I turned around. The creature was walking quite slowly down the corridor. It was as if it knew that the lift would not arrive in time. The lift arrived and we got inside. The door started to close. I laughed at the creature because we were escaping. Then it stopped the door from closing with its hand and pushed it open. Oh no! I had forgotten that lift doors could be opened again! It got in the lift with us.’ Here is my analysis…
In a dream, any building usually represents your own self. Buildings have insides and outsides, and so do people. Dreaming of a mansion suggests that you have the opportunity increase your self awareness and expand your sense of self. The fact that the mansion is a museum shows that you have a need to explore your own past and how your identity has developed. For some reason, you have closed yourself off from your past and feel that should not be exploring and revisiting it. The works of art that are not supposed to be there represent all the great creative ideas that you have had in the past but have not given yourself permission to create. This is echoed in your wife who symbolises your creative and instinctive self and the child who is an artistic labour of love that you would like to create and develop further. Some of these creative ideas seem very dark and you are scared of how powerful your artistic statements could be. You are also being challenged in tangibly articulating your ideas and are becoming lost in your own concepts. The other people living in the museum mansion are your own possible selves, the artist who you truly want to be. You never see your work you would like to create appear in reality but only hear the inner voices of your ideas. The stairwell is your progression as an artist and you know you have the opportunity to do something that is creatively huge. You realise that your artistic career has been a steady upward progression and required some effort to attain your current level. The creature coming up the stairs is your own massive creative instincts. You are afraid of your own talent because you are scared that it will take over your life. You are often modest about the art you make and keep a low profile. Although you recognise this part of yourself, you find it difficult to reconcile yourself with its ambition and drive. You lack confidence in your undoubted abilities and keep running away from them. The corridor is an opportunity to develop unrealised talents and the red carpet is your passionate desire for other people to recognise your creative genius. You try to avoid using your talents by choosing a safer more anonymous career. You wait for your career to become more satisfying and open up some progressive opportunities for you. Your creative self knows that a conventional career will not give the artistic fulfilment that you really need and that however much you suppress your talents, they will always be with you. They are part of who you are. You think you have escaped the obligation to share your talents with the world by choosing a safe job and closing yourself off from your creative instincts. A hand represents the power to shape and direct your future and your creative self instinctively wants to guide what you create with your life. There is no escaping from your undoubted talents and now is the time to create some real work that shows the magnificence of who you really are. Use your job as a stable foundation and turn your brilliant ideas into art. Creature sounds a lot like creator and even more like create your. You have phenomenal artistic instincts so use your creature to create your art. …and here is Tom’s response…
No way. Ian Wallace. Thank you. I cannot believe you have interpreted my dream. I can’t quite express a) how surprised and gratified I am that this has reached you and that you have put the time in to interpret it, and b) how uncannily accurate so much of the interpretation is. I suppose you would not be surprised at how accurate it is, as you know exactly what you are doing, but I know little about dream interpretation, and so the accuracy is, to me, incredible and fantastic. So much of this is true. Not regarding any talent I may or may not have – I probably don’t have it – but the total dilemma I have of a safe job vs creating and the really quite formidable prospect of making something, or some things, that I really want to make. Whether or not I am talented I think it is fair to say that I am very ambitious. I am not just saying this, but this interpretation has really helped. Thank you.