or  strange  to  try doing  so. I  have  been sharing dreams
with   others  for  some  time  and  feel  I  have benefited
greatly  from  it. I  have also found  that there is  an art to
telling,  listening  to  and  working on  dreams which  can
make it an easier and more valuable experience.
      First, let me share some  thoughts about  how dreams
seem  to  work.  In the process of growing up we learn to
consciously focus our attention so that we are better able
to deal  with  and manipulate the world around us. This  is
a  valuable  ability,  but   it  is also  a  dangerous  one. For
focusing  on  one  thing  means ignoring others. And  as a
consequence,  many   of  us lose   touch  with   the larger
picture, as well as with our real feelings and the realities
of  our  inner world.  Our lives become  a  series of parts
that    we   can   focus   on   one   at   a   time—our  work,
relationships,     spiritual    growth,     sexuality,    artistic
expression,  taking  out  the  garbage,  etc.—but it can all
feel very unconnected, fragmented and without a center.
     At  night, when  we sleep and can forget about dealing
with   the  world, our dreams   point  to  parts  of  our life
situation   that  we  have  overlooked  and  reveal  the way
various aspects  of  our  lives  are interwoven.  We could
say  that dreams  are drawingattention  to  our  conscious
"blind spots"  in  an effort  to  expand our awareness. Yet,
when  we  first  look  at  our dreams,  we  may still be too
close to these "blind spots" to see them clearly. We need
some   distance,   need   to    view    them   from   another
perspective.  This  is  the  biggest  advantage to sharing a
dream   with  others;   other  people  can  offer us  varied
perspectives on our dream and how it might relate to our
life situation.
     Many  people  have  a  very negative  image of  what it
means  to  interpret a  dream.   Perhaps  you   visualize  a
patient lying   on   a  couch  while  the therapist  tells  the
person  what  the  dream  means. You  may  anticipate  an
abstract,  intellectual  process  of pulling the dream apart
and tacking  a  meaning  on  each image.  I  would  like to
suggest  that there  is  an  alternative to this approach and
rather   than  "analyzing"  or  "interpreting"  a   dream,   we
can  begin  to  explore  other  ways  of  "working  on"  the
dream.
     What I'm proposing is  a  cooperative process wherein

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