The Roots of
Healing Dreamwork in Welsh Mythology
Nicholas Brink is a
clinical psychologist. He is Past President of the American
Association for the Study of Mental Imagery. He is book review
editor for the journal Imagination, Cognition and Personality
and author of Grendel and His Mother: Healing the Trauma of
Childhood Through Dreams, Imagery and Hypnosis.
Elizabeth Jeffries has
been to Wales four times, and is on the Board of Directors of the
St. David's Society of Pittsburgh, promoting awareness and
appreciation of Welsh cultural heritage in Western Pennsylvania
for the last 6 years.
Abstract
The ancient Welsh myth of Pwyll,
Prince of Dyfed (1), when examined as a dream of our ancestors
portrays several aspects of personal development for both men and
women: development of one’s assertive/masculine side,
understanding of one’s masculinity, femininity, the anxiety of
childbirth and the birth of one’s spirituality.
Whereas at the IASD Copenhagen conference
I presented two Danish myths that showed the process of therapy
for two classes of emotional problems, i.e. dealing with childhood
trauma (2) and dealing with addictions, this myth is more
concerned with personal development and the attainment of
spirituality. The study of Pwyll will rely upon four if not all
five of Clara Hill’s (3) levels of insight or understanding.
According to Clara Hill dreams can reflect experiences of waking
life, parts of self, the dream experience itself, spiritual issues
and relationship issues.
In that myths are very central to the
spiritual values of a culture, interpreting the myth necessarily
involves the spiritual level. The first part of the myth/dream of
Pwyll’s journey into the other world describes the development of
the masculine part of one’s self with all its spiritual
implications. The second part of the dream of Pwyll meeting the
princess Rhiannon deals with relationship issues in a man’s
understanding of woman. The third part, the birth of Pryderi is of
the anxieties of childbirth, an experience of waking life and an
example of the type of dream presented by Alan Siegel (4) in his
book Dream Wisdom of childbirth anxieties. At a deeper level,
because of the godlike magic of this child, the anxieties are
likely related to the responsibilities of becoming a god. The
fourth part of the magical childbirth of Pryderi and his godlike
strength is at the level of both the parts of self and spiritual
issues as we attain a personal ultimate spiritual experience. The
experience of the dream/myth itself is what we are attempting to
create in this workshop.
This workshop will function as a dream
group with the story of Pwyll, Prince of Dyred being the
dream/myth to be studied. It is my belief that we each gain much
in personal growth by experiencing the myths of every culture when
we examine and understand them as myth/dreams of the culture. This
understanding is greatly facilitated by a dream group. In using
the ideas of Jean Gebser (5), that human consciousness is in the
process of changing from or going beyond our current rational/perspectival
consciousness way of thinking to the transparent/perspectival way
of thinking. In his book the Ever-Present Origin at this
newly developing level of consciousness we are now capable to
understanding ancient myth more transparently.
References
1.
The Mabinogion,
Translated by Gwyn Jones and Thomas Jones, Everyman’s Library,
Rutland, VT, 1991.
2.
Brink, N. E., Grendel
and His Mother: Healing the Traumas of Childhood Through Dreams,
Imagery and Hypnosis, Baywood Publishing, Amityville, NY 2002.
3.
Hill, C. & Rochlen, A,
The Hill Cognitive-Experiential Model of Dream Interpretation, in
Cognitive Therapy and Dreams, Rosner, R., Lyddon, W., & Freeman,
A. (eds), Springer Publishing, N.Y., N.Y. 2004.
4.
Siegel, A., Dream
Wisdom: Uncovering Life’s Answers in Your Dreams, Celestial Arts,
Berkeley, CA, 2002.
5.
Gebser, J., The
Ever-Present Origin, Translated by Barstad N. & Mickunas, A., Ohio
University Press, Athens, OH 1985.
