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SABOTAGE

Dreams of sabotage and resistance. An awful lot of pop psychology focuses on overcoming or sidestepping resistance and self-sabotage, but my dreams insist it's sometimes justified--when the conscious mind is up to something disastrous, and won't listen. So don't jump to judgment before you've heard all sides--and that may take some follow-up dreams. Asking your dreams to introduce you to saboteurs often works, though you may get more than you bargained for--you may find yourself in the saboteur's shoes, confronting a dream-figure who's the conscious you--a person you find appalling! Educational... if a bit hard to take.

Sabotage-negotiation dreams of this sort are proof that the "I" figure in a dream doesn't have to be the conscious ego. Apparently that's just a convention, like first- or third-person narration in novels; when the situation requires it, other arrangements are quite possible.

RELATED TOPICS: personality integration - multiple personality disorder - outcasts - Jungian Shadows - revolution - topdogs and nagging - dream incubation - I'm Just Not Myself Today! - See also the full INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

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ALL-GENIUS CLASS: by Wayan; dreamed 2007/5/2, a dream warning it took a decade to spot
Our gifted class is on a field trip. Our teacher happily explains we're going to wreck a freeway,
tying up traffic for months, to protest crappy gifted programs...
CAUTION: SLOWEST DREAM INTERPRETATION EVER
THE ANTI-SABOTEUR: by Wayan; 2013/7/19, a diagnostic dreamlet
This giant life-coach says my friends and I aren't self-sabotaging as we suspected;
we just lack certain tools and opportunities. And we're aiming high...
ASTRALNAUT: by Wayan; 1994/7/30, a reverse ghost dream.
I have amnesia. Plus, I'm dead. But I have this great NASA job! Only there's a saboteur...
CAUTION: SNOTTY ABOUT CHRISTIANS AGAIN
AUTISTIC THUNDER: by Wayan; 2018/2/12, a predictive shamanic dream
DREAM: a concert by autistics admits my bandmate Mike but locks me out! I summon thunder & quakes till they open up...
AWAKE: I called it metaphor--till it happened. I was sitting silent in our band's recording session and Mike asked me to leave...
CAUTION: AUTISM & APPARENT E.S.P.
BAST SABOTAGE: by Wayan; 1995/1/22, a dream on dreams.
In old Egypt, a part of me sabotages my audience with Bast, the Cat Goddess. Why?
BETRAYING DREAMS: by Wayan; 1987/11/6, a dream about dreamwork.
As I hike across the tundra to win a bet with God, I realize I've been subtly betraying my dreams...
BLIND ANCESTORS: by Wayan; 2007/8/6, a nightmare poem about all of us
While we’re at work, Blind Ancestors come smash up our homes...
and we all see zombie vandal relatives as normal...
BONK VERONICA: by Wayan; 1997/4/1, 9-page dream-comic on body image
The world's first all-bulemic band, Veronica and the Vomits, provokes a riot at our local punk club. So I go to
Anorexic Bootcamp where models learn self-defense under fire, as calories and fat jokes whiz by...
CAUTION: BARF, HORNY ANOREXIC, FOOD FIGHT
BUTTERFLY HABITAT: by Wayan; 2000/3/3, a dream on the price of memory.
'You always hurt the one you love', but this girl seems unaware she's proving it's true for ecology too...
BYE-BYE, OLD FILM!: by Wayan; 1981/1/24, a psychic dream, with a 2015/5/22 follow-up.
My friends destroy all my old films and give me a 'new' one--but it's from 1900! Then I wake to find...
CARTWRIGHT'S HARLEQUIN: by Rosalind Cartwright, 1927? to 2020/12/5? Lifelong recurring dream
All her life, Cartwright dreamed of a figure disguised in a harlequin costume; she never saw his face.
He always drove her to self-sabotage. But near her death, she dreamt she gave a lecture, and he...
CAT REPELS DINOSAURS: by Wayan, 1984/8/12, a film-inspired surreal dream
DAY: I thorn-puncture my hands while gardening, and write stupid poetry about it...
EVE: I watch Little Darlings, a teen sex farce that turns weirdly serious...
DREAM: a Mysterious Pussy guards us librarians from stinky alien dinosaurs...
CAUTION: SEXUAL INNUENDO???
CHANGE THE CORE PROGRAM: by Wayan; 1995/6/28, a dream of sudden progress.
I meet a tragic heroine--great heart, rotten luck. But I open her magic sword and find a bad chip...
CLAY MAN: by Wayan; 1980/6/1, a golem dream .
I fight a clay golem of resistance, until inspiration hits, and I do what it may have had in mind all along...
DAD SMASHES COPCAR: by Wayan, 1977/5/26, a warning dream physically enforced the next day
My dad drives recklessly, hits a copcar hard, smashing our front end. I wake
knowing it says "Kay's a batterer. Leave her or I'LL be smashed." That day...
CAUTION: NIGHTMARE, BATTERING ISSUES
DANCE RESISTANCE: by Wayan; 1994/4/11, a dream of sabotage--or is it?.
I encounter a powerful psychic force stopping me from dancing... or is that what it's after?
DIRECT ACTION SAVES THE SHIP: by Alder; 2006/11/5; a dream-fable with instant replay.
A bomb's planted on our ship! But when a teen finds it, rather than fetch a responsible adult...
DISSECTING PESSIMISM: by Wayan; 1997/4/14, a stubbornly educational nightmare .
A serial killer stalks our office, and our bosses deny it. When we defend ourselves, things turn weird...
CAUTION: VIOLENCE
DONNA'S FALLOUT: by Wayan, 1972/2/6, 2/26, 2/29 & 3/4: sonnets & watercolors of 4 sex dreams.
When I was 17, an older girl pushed booze at me and came on to me... in front of my parents and teachers!
For months, I had ambivalent sex dreams trying to process what Donna taught me--not all of it negative...
CAUTION: WEIRD SEX; ADULTS BEHAVE BADLY
DON'T WANT HIM TO SOAR: by Wayan; 1991/4/18, a dream of sabotage.
In a parallel world, a visionary's building the first plane only now. I'm his assistant. But I don't WANT...
DRAMATIC PARASITES: by Wayan; 1995/6/28, a dream on fear of success.
I project I'll make a lot more money soon. Good, now I can support all my lazy friends! Wait...
THE DREAMSUIT: by Wayan; 1992/7/12, a dream on unconscious programming.
An experimental helmet knocks me out. I'm groggy, miserable, till I learn what it did to others...
EMADRO: by Wayan; 1983/6/4, a wild dream on clinging--and letting go.
An elephant sinks in the North Sea, and the Oracle Mink says a wizard did it. Can old Lady Gandalf help?
ENVY'S BAND: by Wayan, 2016/1/10, a dream on ambition rebelling against niceness
I meet Envy, that pushy, ambitious rock singer from the Scott Pilgrim books.
She's kind of sabotaging herself--but then don't I go too far the other way?
ESCAPE BY INTUITION: by Wayan; 2010/1/11; four dreams of breaking through
I must see a community as a whole, and intuit my way out of a sealed room, and spot details, and join a trio in bed...
CAUTION: NUDITY IN LAST DREAM
THE FEARFUL INSECT by Nancy Price; 1948, an episodic circular nightmare unified by a leitmotif
A bug with a horse-skull face reappears all through this nightmare of betrayal. I only know I feared it...
FIVE HOUNDS, FIVE DEFENSES: by Wayan; 2015/9/18, an explicit advisory dream
Five agents hound me. Literal hounds--in trenchcoats. They stand for my five worst life-troubles. Luckily,
they can't cooperate--they're from rival agencies! And the dream spells out what works against each one...
FOLLOWING THE ELEPHANTS: by John Goldhammer; 1990s, a ten-year series of short dreams.
Dream-elephants slowly bring John to terms with the early loss of his dad--and lead him out of a cult he’s outgrown..
THE FOUNT OF CANADIAN WISDOM: by Wayan; 1982/11/17; a dream-poem on miracles. Stupid miracles.
A Jungian figure dispenses Wisdom. Overwhelmed, annoyed, I try to shut him up
by manifesting money out of nowhere. But nothing shuts up the Fount of...
FRACTURE SPEEDS MARRIAGE: by Wayan; 2001/1/1, a dream of advice on health and romance.
A baseball star got her leg broken. It stalls her career,
but helps her marriage. Did she need a "break"? Do I?
FULL REASON: by Wayan; 1980/5/28, a dream on patience.
At a benefit for Rock Psychiatrists, the Spirit of the Convention explains why I can't go on stage yet...
GANDHI RUNS: by Wayan; 1997/8/1, a fusion dream.
Gandhi and I must run barefoot across a burning racetrack miles wide... the Ascetic Desert?
HEADING FOR A FALL: by Wayan; 1993/11/2, a dream of drastic shortcuts.
I crash my car on the way to therapy. I ask my dream why. And it tells me! Deliberate, but not suicidal...
HER STINGY DAD: by Wayan; 1998/7/29, a dreamtale on parental ambition-stunting
A single dad loves his daughter, but is so pathologically cheap he's teaching her an unintended lesson...
CAUTION: CHILD NEGLECT
HIJACK! The Christmas Special: by Wayan; 2012/4/13, a trapped-in-bad-TV dream.
I'm stuck on a jet full of cartoons. We get hijacked by a kid who just wants
pilot practice, and then a talking cactus counter-hijacks us...
CAUTION: THE F-WORD
HORTA'S EGGS: by Wayan; 1984/1/17, a dream of re-evaluation.
I fight to save a nest of 50,000 eggs that'll hatch... psychics!
But my friends want to exterminate them! Who's wrong here?
HOT WATER KNOB: by Wayan, 1987/10/5, a punning predictive dream
DREAM: my car has a fuel leak. Luckily, I carry around a crystal hot-water knob--
for beauty, not car repair. But I screw it in & stop the leak, fixing my 'drive'...
NEXT EVENING: turn on the TV news, and there's my hot water knob...
HYDROGEN INITIATION: by Wayan; 1981/1/6, a shamanic nightmare.
I'm an initiate in a Sung Dynasty monastery. But I have no idea how far the hazing can go...
CAUTION: DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME
THE HYPOTHALAMUS: by Georges Perec; October 1971, a dream of embarrassment. Dream #95
I learn my book A Void, supposedly written without the letter E, has lots of them--
crawling with errors. But at least I can spy on the neighbors...
I LET RATS: by Wayan; 1994/4/22, a nightmare on appeasement.
A bold rat comes right up to me. I don't want to provoke it, so I stay quiet. And let the rats...
CAUTION: UGH!
KUBLA KHAN: by Samuel Coleridge; summer 1797, an interrupted dream-poem
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree (at least till that visitor from Porlock barged in)
CAUTION: POET ON PAIN MEDS
LBJ OR WOODROW?: by Lyndon Baines Johnson; July-Sept 1955 and Feb-Mar 1968, recurring paralysis dreams
From the neck up I was me; from the neck down, Woodrow Wilson in his old age, paralyzed.
My presidential aides divided up my duties, and ignored me...
LBJ SHACKLED: by Lyndon Baines Johnson; c.1962, a nightmare foreseeing his presidency
I started to get up from my chair, but I couldn't move. I looked down at my legs
and saw they were manacled to the chair with a heavy chain...
LBJ'S RIVER NIGHTMARE: by Lyndon Baines Johnson; Feb-Mar 1968, a nightmare on political paralysis
I was trapped in a river, trying to swim to shore. But I was in a powerful eddy. No matter which way I swam...
LBJ'S STAMPEDE: by Lyndon Baines Johnson; 1913-14?, a childhood nightmare anticipating a presidency
As a boy I dreamt I was trapped in a wooden chair, paralyzed, as a stampede
rushed toward me, just as my grandmother was paralyzed and chair-bound...
LASERBOMB: by Wayan, 1995/7/3, a dream on paralysis.
I'm on Mars. The terraforming is going well. Then saboteurs set off a laserbomb in the street near me...
CAUTION: TERRORISM
THE LOST DUTCHMAN BURNS: by Wayan; 2011/11/17, a smelly dream censoring itself for safety reasons!
I smell smoke. I know I'm dreaming; did my sleeping body scent smoke in my home, and insert it in my dream to warn me?
But the dream sees my worry, and erases the scent to clarify it's symbolic smoke! Now I can finish my nightmare in peace...
MARTIAN AIRLOCK and JAGUAR MASK: by Wayan, 2015/6/22, twin shamanic near-nightmares
Jaguar Mask: a were-jaguar stuck in human form asks me to sew a new jaguar face on."But won't it hurt?...
Martian Airlock: I'm suitless on Mars. Freezing, choking, I dive into an airlock & slam the switch--but it's sabotaged...
MARVIN, CRASH: by Rick Veitch; Feb 1974; a predictive/warning dream
My "friends" pull me away from the girl of my dreams, push booze & pot at me,
and won't even try to climb the rope to success. But Marvin saves Evel Knievel
from a motorcycle crash. Sounds good--until, ten years later, I hear how Marvin died...
CAUTION: GRIM AFTERMATH
MENTOR: by Wayan; 2001/6/13, six advisory dreamlets.
I meet a shapeshifting mentor who warns of coming war (9/11?). Then a sentient book, "The Art of War," gets intimately involved...
CAUTION: ELECTRODES, LIBROPHILIA
MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN: by Wayan; 1992/9/5-6, a literary/diagnostic dream.
I'm in a tribe of post-Crash kids with psychic powers, trying to keep nukes from rising again...
CAUTION: CHILD SOLDIERS
MOM DRIVES: by Frances R. Storey, 1994?, a warning dream--but of the future, or now?
I'm back in the suburbs, but decades have passed. My mom's really old & blind.
Yet I insist she should drive the car, not me. She pulls out in front of a huge truck...
MOM IN THE DRIVER'S SEAT: by a patient of Peter O'Connor; 1985 or before, a therapy-guiding initial dream.
My mom's driving me to work. A nearby car has young people in it--I'd rather be with them.
My mom seems to be dawdling; I'll be late meeting my colleague! I'm furious...
A MUSLIM CHEETAH: by Wayan, 2004/12/2, a dream of fundamental ambivalence
A cheetah is a saboteur for a violent Islamic group. I'm attracted, but tear into her;
"You plant bombs in the name of a rulebook meant for apes not cats!"
CAUTION: NUDE CHEETAH; CRITIQUES HOLY BOOKS
MY LIPS ARE SEALED: by Wayan, 1989/6/3, a moody, psychic, epic, two-part dream.
I'm a Romantic poet who defeats the curse of the fountain, to marry; but when our daughter's grown,
a new curse strikes me mute, paralyzed. And I mistake this for old age!
Then, in real life, my dad wakes up from a nap paralyzed...
MY MOTHER'S CLOSET: by Rachel Hadas, c. 2000;
a dream-poem provoking a 2008/9/16 dream by Chris Wayan
I was in my mother's closet, trying on her outfits, and trapped in Hamlet, too...
MY SPLEEN: by Ned, as told by Gayle Delaney, 1979 or before, a diagnostic dream-pun
DAY: I write, exploring my jealousy toward my wife, though I know she's not cheating on me.
DREAM: Doctors remove my spleen and wake it up! Now my spleen is out to do me in...
A NEVADAN ASS: by Wayan, 2007/5/17, a dream-poem on sabotage in art AND love
DREAM: on a Nevada ranch, I'm a were-horse into mares--when I'm human. And when I'm a stallion?
Why, cowgirls! Always date the wrong species--just to be sure of rejection.
NEXT DAY: I let a class of commercial artists critique my dream-comix. Just to be sure of rejection...
CAUTION: FURRYPHILIA, SELF-SABOTAGE
PAUL AND THE DISCIPLES OF JESUS: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/7/17, an indignant channeled dream
Jesus's disciples kvetch that Paul, who never knew Jesus, twisted his clean simplicity into a religion...
CAUTION: JARGON, HERESY (on one side or other)
PIANO-PLAYING JANE: by Jane, 1972-3?, recurring frustration dreams
When I try to play the piano in public I get sabotaged. At last I see a child who says she can't play while she's in pain...
PISSING MEMORIES: by Wayan; 1999/5/20, a dream on self-sabotage.
I desperately need to pee, but my bladder's full of two kinds of emotional trauma, and each blocks the other!
CAUTION: BATHROOM PSYCHOLOGY
SABOTAGED BOAT: by C. G. "Chinese" Gordon; c.1861-4, a recurrent warning dream
I recognized the saboteur. If I had neglected that dream warning we all would likely have drowned...
SABOTEUR: by Chris Wayan; dreamed 1991/4/18 & 5/12, dreamsong 2012 (MP3 + lyrics)
I dreamed I got to meet my inner saboteur. Educational! But in the next dream I BECAME my saboteur.
I wasn't out to crash myself--just stay low, never soar. Since success is wicked...
SELF-MADE GIRLS: by Wayan; 2000/2/15, a public dream.
Two souls coalesce from bars of light into human beings by the power of words. Words like stupid, ugly...
SEXUAL VERSUS SOCIAL SHYNESS: by Wayan; 2022/6/7, an advisory dream
I meet two women: I lose my usual shyness around playful, sexy Lujenda, but I feel
surprisingly shy around her brilliant cousin Lumina! I may have unfinished business...
SHE TOOK MY BALL: by Matt, 1994 or earlier, as told by Gayle Delaney; a sex-advice dream
After moving in with Gemina, Matt suddenly had erectile dysfunction. He asked
his dreams why. He dreamt he was a kid being bullied by his big sister Cindy...
SHRIEK ADOPTION: by Wayan; dreamed 2015/8/23, a dream-poem exposing self-sabotage
A man adopts two orphaned, talented musical griffins. But their previous guardians were
so traditionalist & stifling that the cubs want to BURN all their instruments...
SHROPSHIRE: by Wayan; 1985/1/6, a predictive warning dream
DREAM: chased by a sniper, I trick him into blowing himself up. Then, in the Watchtower,
I know every name & address in Shropshire, but must hide them till all the snipers are caught...
NEXT DAY: at work I run across a book with every name and address in 17th-century Shropshire...
CAUTION: FATAL EXPLOSION
SIPHONIAN QUARTET: by Wayan; 2010/4/10, four baffling parallel-world dreams
1: Purple squid saboteurs flood our cliffhouse. 2: My oyster-ranching girlfriend has a snobby aunt.
3: I wake in a stranger's bondage fantasy--ugh! 4: Shepherds on the sea-floor watch for gliderwolves...
CAUTION: EMBARRASSING BONDAGE DREAM
SURPRISE THAT PENIS: by Wayan; 1986/2/18, a subtly psychic dream.
I hijack a Lacewing Chopper to install a new rubber-band engine, but the motor becomes a talkative penis, and...
CAUTION: ONE WEIRD WEENIE
TAMALPAIS: by Anna Halprin, 1979, a dream inspiring annual healing ceremonies
A murderer was stalking Mt Tam. I dreamed I met the murderous spirit; only
by allying with small dancers from inside the mountain could we defeat it...
CAUTION: NEW AGE
TELEKINETIC KIDS: by Wayan; 2017/9/8, a warning and exploratory dream
A black separatist commune hides two little girls who are psychokinetic.
They fear I'll expose them. But I've spent my whole life passing too...
CAUTION: PARAPSYCHOLOGY, RACIAL SEPARATISTS
VIEWPOINT: by Wayan; 1991/6/9, a dream on pastlife amnesia.
I ask to see my past lives, and dream of a viewpoint where I can--but this Mormon ranger...
VOR: by Wayan; 1984/3/27, an indescribable dream
Am I King Kong? No, it's a city of midgets! I leave and find I'm gay. Gay bugs come out of the closet too,
storming the fundamentalist flies of Heaven. And then Vor, the purple alien, does something peculiar...
CAUTION: LOOKS DOWN ON HOMOPHOBIC MIDGETS
WAX WALL, PUMA COMA: by Wayan; 2022/8/8, 3 surreal genderbent time-bent dreams
I'm a demon girl out to sabotage a pirate radio station by climbing a tall
wall of glowing wax, carrying a comatose mountain lioness on my back!
YOGA SAINT: by Wayan; 2010/12/4, an incubated, disturbing diagnostic dream
I dream I meet my headaches! An ascetic yogi who punishes jokers, flirts and cynics for worldliness...


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