Dream of a Sufi Wayfarer | Journey to Find Water

1.
The Sufi Path takes the Wayfarer
beyond the world of forms into the formless,
beyond the mind into the heart.  

- Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee, The Call and the Echo

2.

Below is a wonderful dream shared today by a seeker of Sacred Path, a friend of heart and one of our regular visitor of this space. Since the dream was mostly triggered by what was shared here and what  your contributions were, I felt from within a need to share this. If observed carefully, one could see that there is an invisible golden thread between what have been discussed in the post titled: The Sufi's Spiritual Course and in its comments and what is revealed in the dream. By God's Will, this particular dream may reveal meanings on many different levels to each individual who will read it. May the Real show us all as they really are.

Dreams are connection from the unseen, invisible realm and the realm of visible form. This is a very important dream and testifies the importance and validity of dreamwork in group, or circle, which is a guarded practice of the Sufi mystics. It also symbolizes that the journey is often done as a group, in togetherness. It sometime happens like this: a seed is planted in the heart of a member of the circle, a question is given birth in someone's mind and the answer is conveyed in someone else's dream without one knowing anything about the other. There are many ways by which such transmission and communication occur. Sufi dreamwork in group is a very real testimony of such process. 

With permission, I am sharing the dream in unedited form directly from the dreamer's email. Bismillah.

"Last night, late into the night I read your blog, and the comments that people have left about the last post on Sufism. I wondered.

I went to bed and fell into a deep sleep. I had a dream. Remember how you used to say to me to pay attention to dreams? I did that: I wrote down my dream, and remembered it here, as much as possible, and captured it in some words, as best as a hunter can catch a deer, with an arrow, and a bow, after many hours of hunting it down.

The post I read was about Sufism, and the stages of becoming an initiate: I struggled with the words, but instead of keep on struggling with meanings, I imagined a river, and that’s where my dream begins...

3.
The Dream

It’s a long, long and a very hot summer. The people are very thirsty and they are dying in huge numbers of draught and the crops are failing. The animals are dying, and the plants are dying, and the sun keeps beating relentlessly on the surface of the earth: it cares not about all the people dying of starvation and heat exhaustion, and the sun dust in the peoples’ mouths. The wise men of the people gather together and decide that they need to send a group of warriors on a dangerous expedition and a mission: to find water and bring water to the people. No matter what happens to them: a matter of life or death.

The bravest warriors are given an arrow and a bow and they make a solemn vow that they will return, bringing water to the nation. Then they set off, with the taste of dust in their mouths and the sun beating relentlessly on their heads and backs. There is no time to waste. They keep walking miles, and more miles, days and nights and never stop walking: the lives and the deaths of their nation depends on their journey, and they start to drop out, one by one:

Some warriors are getting too tired, and they sling their bow and arrow, and stop and take a break, thus jeopardising the mission, and are left behind.

Some warriors are becoming full of doubts that they will ever find the water, and they also sit down, and abandon their mission, thus breaking their vows. And betraying the nation. they bury their weapons deep into the sand dunes and then pick up some other trade and become common farmers, that mission clearly they realised is not for them.

A third small group of warriors keep going: they want to find the source of water, and they know that somewhere far, far away, there is an underground river, it’s a matter of patience and perseverance, and wisdom, it’s only a matter of time,...

They lose their dearest friends and dearest co-travelers on their way, the journey gets harder by the day, and by the week, and by the year, and many years would pass and they keep walking... they are now so, so tired and so few of them remain, but they still keep walking...

 And one day when only a few are still alive, and still able to drag their very tired, and weak skeletons on their two feet, they discover the underground river: they follow to begin with a small stream, just barely visible and they follow a small lizard that takes them to the mouth of the river: the strong sound of the water and the river banging against the walls of an underground cave captures their ears and they slowly descend into the bowls of the earth. It’s getting dark, and very cold: the lizard has taken them to the underground cave where the river of all rivers begins... and where the rivers all meet and flow into the sea. The warriors are thirsty and they start drinking, and suddenly realise that they can’t swim: there were no rivers in their nation and during their lifetime, so there was no need for them to be able to swim, and that’s when most of the left warriors also give up: they are too afraid to continue: if they do carry on, they will drown, and that’s what they fear most: lives are precious after many days of suffering and pain, and these few are lucky: they have survived.

They have a dilemma: they can either stay here on the shores of the river, and never return. That would mean death for their nations, who are expecting them: and waiting for some news!

Or they can ask the fish to teach them how to swim, and then they can cross the river and they can return to their starving nation: and give them the good news, and bring them some few drops of water: precious and very, very valuable.

All soldiers (warriors) get around the fire and decide what they should do: stay or learn something and return to their homes with some special knowledge and some precious water... all warriors decide to stay except one. He decides to speak to the river, and ask the fish to teach him to swim. When he starts speaking to the river, and the fish, all the others think that he has gone mad, and they attack him treacherously one night when he is fast asleep, and they kill him.

That night, the desire to take some water back home to the nation that is dying, is dead, too. the only warrior who still has a desire to learn and change is dead, and the mission, after many endless years of traveling and suffering, has failed. the knowledge how to swim is still alive though, and the fish is still waiting for the wise warrior to come to its shores and she will teach him.

When I woke up from the dream I discovered the pillow I had been sleeping was drenched with tears, and that I must have been crying while I slept...

There was no sign of a fish..."   

- A. S. E. may the Real Guide always guide your heart

4.
Meanings

Click here to read the post on the meanings - the inherent symbolism of the metaphors of the dream. Whats very interesting about this dream is its unfolding of events which is very similar to famous sufi writing, Conference of the Birds by Fariduddin Attar, only in a very concise form with added subtlety in it.

You are welcome to share your own insight, if there is anything special revealed / inspired to you regarding this above dream. You may either write in the comment or email me to mysticsaint @ gmail dot com.

    The beauty of the heart
    is the lasting beauty:
    its lips give to drink
    of the water of life.

    Truly it is the water,
    that which pours,
    and the one who drinks.

    All three become one when
    your talisman is shattered.
    That oneness you can't know
    by reasoning.

    - Rumi, Mathnawi


# Sharing of Spiritual Dreams Series:
1) The Beloved's ways are beyond this heart
2) Initiation isn't about suffering, but stepping up
3) Dream of Bawa Muhaiyaddeen and soul's calling out
4) Dream of Secret Garden and of Unfathomable Recognition

. Interpretation of dreams in Islamic Wisdom Tradition
. When Dreams Begin Our Quest | Sohbet with Noor-Malika Chishti