Methodical Suicide
12/18/81
I am watching a man slowly kill himself with a long knife. He is slowly pushing it up from beneath his rib cage toward his heart. It was extremely gruesome and horrifying to watch. He may have been wearing Japanese robes.
Associations
Masturbated the previous day.
Comments: Short and very intense. I almost did not diagram this dream because it seemed so short.
Sociomatrix Commentary
Dream Self: This is terrible, but it’s also fascinating. I’ve never seen someone commit hari kari before.
Man: I don’t like committing suicide, but it’s something I have to my robes are appropriate. I’m going to be honorable and proper about it. Going slowly means that I’m a man. But it is very painful and gruesome.
Long Knife: I would prefer to be left to do my work in solitude. I don’t like being used for this. I don’t like me very much.
Stomach: Do something to save me! Quick! Don’t just stand there! This fool is killing me and you’re just watching! The Japanese robes and any justification for this murder are bullshit. This is simply cruel and criminal!
Rib Cage: This is terrible! How selfish of him! Martyrdom is an ego trip!
Robes: He’s honorable. He’s doing it right.
Comments: Stomach and rib cage are redundant. You don’t always know until you get in touch with them. I figured I had left an important element out of the dream narrative. Sometimes I do (especially emotions).
Dream Commentary
If you could change this dream in any way that you wanted, as long as it respected the rights of all fellow dream group members, how would you change it?
Dream Self: I will go up and stop him if I can. I’ll get him to talk about what’s wrong. Then I’ll get him whatever help he needs.
Man: I feel useful, disgraced. The only thing left for me to do is die.
But if you want to try and help, I will listen.
Long Knife: Help him. Don’t let him use me like this.
Stomach: Your martyrdom is destructive to us, your internal organs. Help him.
Rib Cage: Help him; don’t just stand there. He doesn’t have to die.
Heart: Get involved; help him.
Japanese Robes I really don’t care what he does, as long as it is ritualistically, culturally, and ceremonially correct.
Dreamage
I am watching a man. He has on Japanese ceremonial robes. He’s holding a knife to his stomach. I realize that he is preparing to kill himself. I dash over to him and take away the knife. I sit him on the ground and I ask him what’s wrong. I listen as he tells me he is an outcast, that he has been dishonored, and the only way to keep his honor is to die courageously by his own hand. I tell him that there is a higher honor than that of his culture; he can gain honor of God and himself through service and devotion. He can find favor by answering to a higher law. I ask him to trust me and let me help him. He is unsure, but agrees to let me try.
Waking Commentary
If you were this dreamer and were dealing with his waking issues – money, relationships, fears, career choices, physical health, and spiritual development – would you do anything differently? If so, what?
Man: Stop martyring yourself. If you’re going to masturbate, don’t beat yourself over the head about it. It would be better to stop.
Long Knife: I am the kundalini energy raised in a self-destructive fashion. Stop masturbating.
Stomach: Get more in touch with the over all needs of your body instead of focusing on one addictive pattern. You can do this with deep breathing and meditation. Exercise and yoga will help. A good, loving woman would not be a bad idea either.
Rib Cage: Right.
Heart: Care more. Caring assumes response, not reaction. Addictions are reaction patterns. When you don’t feel like masturbating, that’s the time to build response patterns with meditation and breathing.
Japanese Robes: I don’t particularly care what you do.
Action Plan
Meditate within 24 hours after masturbating. Work toward once a day. When I do masturbate, feel as little guilt as I can. Accept my reactions while building more constructive responses.
Sociogram Commentary
None of these statements are taken as truth. For instance, Heart’s statement is only what life force as I perceive it might think about the situation. It does not represent the life force itself. The positive elements (body parts) are clearly the keys to changing this pattern. However, they have very little power. Only the Japanese robes are accepting. Only the body is thought well of. The dream self is rejected more than the man who commits suicide – a tacit statement about where the responsibility lies. Dream Self, the man and the knife all do not care for themselves. Perhaps the fact that the man cares very little about anything is why he commits suicide (placement in the center of the Dream Sociogram on the acceptance axis). There are no redeeming emotions. Strong rejection is always accompanied by strong non-acceptance. In this dream the accepting element is a key (Japanese Robe.) Those attitudes encourage this nightmare paradigm.
