This dream centers around a specific animal, which is actually a marine mammal. An interesting aside I found out is that dolphins and whales are thought to share a common ancestor with the hippopotamus. All three are seen as animals that bring emotional revitalization. Probably because of their association with water, and water’s association with the element which promotes the clarity of emotional balance.

Fossils discovered in Pakistan over 40 years ago confirm the fact that dolphins transitioned from being land mammals to sea mammals probably due to a rapidly changing environment which necessitated adaptation to an aquatic lifestyle.

In this dream I see the dolphin as an animal totem for this dreamer. Animal totems are often seen as helpers, or a sacred spirit guides, that symbolically represent an aspect of one’s self, as well as a guardian who might have come into one’s dreams or real life environment, temporarily or for a longer period, to assist one through certain life situations.

My First Nations mentors taught me that dolphin’s are “Keepers of the Sacred Breath.” We can live without water or food, but we cannot live without breath. Breathing exercises help us to relax, re-center, and can revitalize us. Gram Twylah suggested that dolphin energy can also help us enter the dreamtime by using the rhythm of the breath.

THE DREAM:

I am with my mother and some other people. Something is bothering me and I go outside to swim. The water is more like liquid clay and is grayish bluish and white. As I stand in the water I noticed dolphins are swimming and I wonder if they will come near me.

One of the dolphins comes right up to me and looks me in the eye and a grab on to his fin and go for a ride. I am loving  swimming with the dolphins.

My mother comes out and begins to Yell at me to not swim with the dolphins because they are dangerous. I get out of the water and I tell my mother she doesn’t understand about dolphins. She walks away and when she does, I continue telling her that I have been on a trip to swim with dolphins before. She is not listening to me.

I look in the water and the second dolphin is waiting for me.

THE DECODING:

I am with my mother and some other people. Something is bothering me and I go outside to swim. The water is more like liquid clay and is grayish bluish and white. As I stand in the water I noticed dolphins are swimming and I wonder if they will come near me.

As I have said many times, everyone in the dream is who they are, representing the issues they have brought into your life (good, dense or indifferent), but also an aspect of the Self. In this case the dreamer is dealing with remembrances of her mother, as well as how she may or may not have learned how to nurture herself, based on that mothering relationship.

There are other unnamed people there, which I believe represent other aspects of herself, whose voices she hasn’t learned are there to help her. She is bothered by this lack of relationship with herself and how to nurture or mother herself in more positive ways. She goes outside for a swim. Swimming in dreams means trying to navigate emotions, and can also include the need to revitalize and renew one’s feelings about something.

Instead of clear water it is like liquid clay. Those emotions are hard to access or navigate, she may or may not have the confidence to give to herself what might not have been given to her as a child. Clay in dreams indicates difficulty. The difficulties center around the colors–gray, blue and white.

On the Wisdom wheels those colors have to do with a variety of truths which need to be faced. Gray has to do with assessing how one does not honor one’s self. Blue has to do with being in servitude to the past or an old story, and needing to learn how to release that story to better serve the self. And white, has to do with both creating appropriate boundaries as well as learning to release what nolonger serves (like childhood hurts and losses) and attract that which could (new ways of navigating one’s life with more joy).

While standing in those emotions, she sees a dolphin and wonders if it will approach her. Dolphins indicate joy, playfulness, movement and clarity but the also are symbols of resurrection, rebirth, intellect and fierce protection. This is the path she is trying to approach-playfulness without protection; spontaneous emotions not always navigated with intellect. That can be done externally with others for a time, but eventually needs to be embraced internally as the ultimate source that will bring balance and self-love.

One of the dolphins comes right up to me and looks me in the eye and I grab on to his fin and go for a ride. I am loving  swimming with the dolphins.

Eyes can appear in many ways in the dreamtime, and signify many things. When something looks you straight in the eye, it is purposefully trying to get your attention. Likewise, eyes are the ‘windows to the soul’, so this spirit guide is making a soul connection to impart its wisdom.

The dreamer is ready to take in that lesson as she grabs the dolphin’s fin and goes for a ride. I would ask the dreamer if the water content changed? Was this just a ride for fun, or a ride to learn to embrace something that is needed to recognize a more fully actualized self? She admits she enjoys swimming with the dolphin, but is she addressing the deeper issues of self-nurturance or just a momentary release from how those emotions impact? That would bring more information as a decoder in assisting the dreamer.

My mother comes out and begins to Yell at me to not swim with the dolphins because they are dangerous. I get out of the water and I tell my mother she doesn’t understand about dolphins. She walks away and when she does, I continue telling her that I have been on a trip to swim with dolphins before. She is not listening to me.

Now the issue comes back. Mother yelling (the dreamer’s capitalization), showing that relationship was possibly contentious and not nurturing. It could also denote the fear and/or dangerous feelings experienced as a child. The dreamer steps back from the emotions (both her own as child, and her current as adult), and argues that there is still a need to understand emotional flow, joy, buoyancy, and natural playfulness while still feeling protected.

The image of Mother walking away is a clear indication that mother didn’t listen to the dreamer as a child or instill a sense of safety. That said, the dreamer has been with dolphins before showing that as an adult she is trying to self care in ways that bring her what she didn’t receive when young. She in the “mother now” and she has to learn to uplift her “inner child” now. Is she listening to what her inner child needs of her?

I look in the water and the second dolphin is waiting for me.

This is a great part to the dream. It shows me the dreamer is willing to try again, no matter what it takes. The joy and love and clarity and rebirth that dolphin represents, is always there waiting for her to partake and learn more fully about herself and her needs. It shows her stamina and desire for self-growth.

Thank you dreamer for sharing your dream.