Carrying the Secret Life

This season is the psyche’s time to honor the depths, the inner realm where forgotten selves, lost causes, and abandoned truths continue to live, waiting for the ripeness of time to enter the world. ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ Dream Musings with Rebecca CARRYING THE SECRET LIFE Special News: Rebecca is the Featured Guest on the Joseph Campbell Foundation’s “Podcast with a Thousand Faces.” Available December 9th - Listen to it HERE! My friend, Julia Mossbridge, described my study to DALL-E and asked it to create an image of me “working with soul.” This is what it gave back . . . What a solstice gift for me! “In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.” ~ Albert Camus The idea of “carrying the secret life” - which I link to the great story of The Virgin Birth from Christianity - is the dominant story playing out in the public sphere in much of the Western world in December. The deep meaning of “the secret life” or “carrying a secret” which is crucial to the Christian myth of the birth of Jesus, is that of Mary arriving pregnant with a new life hidden inside of her which will, in time, overthrow the kingdoms of this world. The ancient solstice rituals of olde England and much of Europe depict the struggle between the forces of darkness and light, where the vanquished sun will rise again to overthrow the bitter cold and dark of the winter kingdom. The tiny seeds planted in the dark earth carry the secret life that will bring forth food for the coming season. And our own human tendency is to turn inward in the cold, dark months when winter invites seclusion, retreat, hibernation, cozying-up, dreaming. It teaches us to inhabit our interior spaces, to see with night vision, to listen for the still small voice beneath the noise; to plant our visions and guard them patiently until they are strong enough to be shared. In Jungian terms, this is the psyche’s seasonal gesture toward the depths, the inner realm where forgotten selves, lost causes, and abandoned truths continue to live, waiting for the ripeness of time to enter the world. In this sense, we are all carrying the secret life, waiting for the new birth. Here is one of my dreams that shows the theme of Carrying the Secret Life. My Dream: The Bubble-Catchers I am in an old colonial city, something like Havana, waiting for the airport bus. When a delay is announced, I seize the chance to wander into the “old city” to visit friends. Only when I arrive do I see that much of the city has been pushed underwater. The buildings tilt sharply, as if some giant hand pressed down one end of the land, sending the district beneath the sea. Only the highest corners of buildings remain above water. I climb into a one-person taxi-boat with a back window that lets me look into this submerged world. The scene is eerie but stunning: sunlight pours down through darkening water like golden dust, illuminating rows of old apartments. Colors are muted, dreamlike, otherworldly. The underwater city is still inhabited. Tens of thousands of residents have refused evacuation. They remain defiantly in their homes, or in the beautiful, abandoned apartments, continuing to make art, hold meetings, and live their lives. Their district is now called the “rebel zone.” The sinking of the city was an act of tyranny meant to break them. It failed. The rebels have mastered underwater living. Rooms are sealed and oxygen smuggled in. Only one danger remains: the streams of escaping bubbles that rise whenever someone moves from place to place. A large spill of bubbles will attract the “enforcers” who patrol above. Thus emerges the lowly yet essential profession of The Bubble-Catchers: city youth who capture the rising bubbles in large jars and harvest them in underground terrariums full of ferns where the carbon dioxide turns back into oxygen, which is then sold for pennies back to the grateful residents. As my taxi drifts through the gloom, a Bubble-Catcher swims by holding a delicate jar full of bubbles. He flashes a closed-mouth, conspiratorial grin at me - a grin of triumph. Though he may seem small or marginalized, he knows he carries the most precious thing there is. ~  CONTACT REBECCA  Finding Meaning in the Hidden City Dreams often reveal the psychological weather of the culture before the waking world consciously recognizes it, and “The Bubble-Catchers” captures a zeitgeist that we hardly dare speak about - the sense that we are all holding our collective breath and wondering what comes next. My dream takes place in Havana – a city I have actually been to and walked through, doing an end-run around American travel restrictions to join a Canadian-registered cultural trip to Cuba back in the 1980s. Then, the residents of Havana still held regular emergency drills in the event of a military attack from the United States, and the weight of the oppressive “hand” (both the U.S. embargo and the controlling politics of the island nation) that forced so many of its residents into an underground black market for survival was very much felt.   And yet the joy and aliveness of the Cuban people was apparent everywhere. The rebel nation living under the shadow of the giant was doing quite well in its own clever, innovative and industrious ways. Today, whether you are on the far right or the far left, the feeling is that the world is under attack and that one lives submerged for safety’s sake; fearful of revealing one’s genuine position through the visible trail of bubbles – the exhalations and exclamations of social media posts that expose one to vicious attacks of the digital patrollers! We all feel the need for our Bubble-Catchers. In what ways do the images from this dream reverberate in some part of your life right now? The Submerged City: Collective descent and inner exile Cities going underwater appear in dreams during periods when the old conscious structures - our beliefs, identities, institutions - are either collapsing or sinking under their own weight. It mirrors a collective mood: the sense that “the world as we know it” is tilting, listing into deeper waters. This dream acknowledges something many feel today: the surface world is unstable, and the deeper world is quietly reorganizing itself. Underwater - in the unconscious - life continues, but differently… creatively… secretly. This is the psyche’s way of saying: “Even in oppression, something in us remains unconquerable, imaginative, and in defiant communion with others.” The Rebel Zone: Where the soul refuses compliance The underwater city is declared forbidden, yet it teems with life, art, and political imagination. This is a classic Jungian tableau of the autonomous soul - that part of the psyche that refuses to bend to collective pressure, social conditioning, or internalized tyranny. Every person has a rebel zone in them! An interior district where we refuse to evacuate our own values, creativity, and truth - even when the world around us plunges them into unconsciousness. The Bubble-Catchers: Protectors of spirit In Jung’s language, the youthful Bubble-Catcher represents the puer aeternus, the divine child archetype, who carries renewal in its most fragile form. His job is to preserve the breath of life, the oxygen of consciousness, even under conditions of extreme psychic pressure. Psychologically, these figures appear when the inner life is under threat by outer demands of the collective worldview and the Self must organize protection around the smallest sparks of hope. The conspiratorial grin of the puer is crucial for it says, “Do not underestimate small acts of salvaging soul; Saving a single bubble matters.” In a culture that often privileges spectacle, dominance, and noise, the Bubble-Catchers represent the quiet, faithful acts that keep human life breathable: caregiving, small kindnesses, quiet creativity, shared resistance, whispered truth, conspiratorial smiles. The Precious Jar The jar of oxygen is a symbolic vas hermeticum—the vessel of transformation used by the alchemists. It contains Spirit, breath, life-force. That the jar is fragile mirrors the truth of inner work: Consciousness is always a delicate achievement, easily broken. Yet the deeper message is empowering: You never lose spirit when you have activated the archetype of the puer for everything is salvaged, saved, recycled, and returned to be used for the Soul’s secret purpose! To swim through dangerous waters with a jar of breath - carrying the gift of life - is to embody a spiritual vocation. It is the dream’s answer to the question: “What does resistance look like now?” How to Work with Your Own Bubble-Catcher If you have ever felt that you were holding your breath, either fearful of breathing in the toxicity of our current climate, or too anxious to exhale and relax, some exercises around supporting and cheering on your own Bubble-Catcher might help! Remember, your Bubble-Catcher is here to protect your spirit under pressure. Inside the oxygen jars live your dreams, imagination, and inner truth. Accepting the gift of the oxygen jar will help you harvest meaning and breathe freely again. Exercise #1. Exploring the Underwater City Sketch the tilted buildings, the golden light, the drifting bubbles. Ask: What part of my life feels submerged? What remains defiantly alive beneath the surface? Identify Your Rebel Zone: List any activities, relationships, or inner values that feel “forbidden” by outer demands but are deeply true to your soul. What deserves oxygen this winter? Exercise #2. Meet your Bubble-Catcher Free-write a dialogue with the child who carries the jar. Questions might include: What bubbles am I meant to protect? Where does my breath escape unnoticed? What small acts of soul-maintenance are essential right now? Exercise #3. Protect Your Oxygen Choose one idea, practice, or relationship that feels like breath. Make it conscious. Protect it deliberately. Practice it daily. Exercise #4. A Solstice Gift Do something small and sacred in honor of those who “carry the oxygen” in dark times: light a candle for quiet resistors, restore a neglected creative corner, write a letter to someone who keeps you breathing, sit in the dark and breathe slowly, knowing you are part of a lineage of underwater rebels and dreamers. Let’s close with the full quote from Camus, in honor of rebels everywhere who carry the secret new life inside themselves. In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer. And that makes me happy. For it says that no matter how hard the world pushes against me, within me, there’s something stronger – something better, pushing right back. ― Albert Camus Have a dream that you want to explore? I am extending my free 30-minute Dream Dialogue to anyone who wants one. It has been so satisfying to engage with dreams over the past year that I’m continuing the offer through the whole of next year! FREE DREAM DIALOGUE click here AN IDEA ~ Forward this email to a friend who might like a free Dream Dialogue. Perhaps they’ll see it as the sign they’ve been waiting for! Next month - in honor of The New Year “Soul & the Shared Dream” Special News: Rebecca is the Featured Guest on the Joseph Campbell Foundation’s “Podcast with a Thousand Faces.” Available December 9th - Listen to it HERE!  CONTACT REBECCA  WorkingWithSoul.com Rebecca Armstrong, 1072 E 700 N, La Porte, United States Powered by Squarespace Unsubscribe