Gray Circus
The Dream:
I was in a really nice green field. There are others in this field with me who are wandering around aimlessly. Then I saw the circus tents. There were circus tents inside a barrier. I found myself walking toward the circus tents trying to find a way to get inside the barrier. I saw one gate, then another, but whenever I’d approach the gate to try and get in to the circus the gate would disappear. The circus tents and people inside the barrier were black and white, and I was black and white as well. I felt like I belonged with the circus tents and what was going on in there, but no matter how I tried I just couldn’t get in. I couldn’t even make a door appear by willing it to appear.
End of Dream
This dream is a great example of variation of color in a dream. I find it fascinating the dream is a mixture of vivid color and grayscale. Dreams are usually only in color or only in black and white, so the fact that this dream is in both color and black and white suggests that the dream is making quite a statement. And that statement is all about light and the lack thereof.
Everyone’s been to the circus and it’s hard to imagine the scene without the sounds, the smells and the colors that go along with it. Those three things help to bring the circus alive, and without color the whole scene lacks life.
Color is such a part of our lives that its hard to imagine life without it. The circus in this dream is of course a metaphor, and the fact that the dreamer is also in black and white reveals that the dreamer is attracted to something that appears full of fun and of life but lacks color. And then there’s the entertainment aspect. Circuses exist for the purpose of entertainment, therefore the meaning of the circus metaphor has its roots in entertainment.
The dreamer is a cosplayer, a creative person who’s involved in making and wearing costumes of characters in comic books, video games and movies. When she told me the dream she equated the convention we were at to a circus. So we nailed the definition of the circus metaphor, and the reason the dreamer and the circus were both black and white in a color world, she’s in one world wanting to be apart of another.
But what about the world of color that the dreamer is a part of? It’s a field full of vivid green grass with people wandering aimlessly. The dream portrays the people who are in color as lifeless and without purpose. The dreamer wants no part of a life that is aimless and has no purpose so she is drawn to black and white entertainment. So we see that this dream is all about perception. The dreamer is standing in a place full of vibrant color and life but is drawn to lifeless, colorless, dark entertainment.
It’s easy to make assumptions at this point and think that because the dreamer has chosen fantasy as her choice of entertainment that this dream is telling her that she’s out of touch with real life and chooses to live in a fantasy. But the meaning of this dream is much deeper than that.
Remember that this dream is all about color, and color is all about light. Therefore, the deeper meaning of this dream is about the dreamer living in a world full of light but choosing to live in a world devoid of light. And what about the gate around the black and white circus and the dreamer not being able to find a way in? This simply means that something or someone is holding the dreamer back from submerging herself into a this dark entertainment and lifestyle that she’s drawn to.
EB