to be seen...

“She avoided eye contact the way people avoid eye contact when they can’t stand to be seen.” -Author, Lisa Lutz

There are many ways we avoid being seen, ways we can’t stand to be seen. Our dreams know this about us and show us way we try hide, we end up in a bathroom or we get up and leave a person or situation…we're always leaving...the felt or unfelt feeling in that moment that can seem unbearable. 

We cannot bear to be seen because we cannot bear what being seen might ask of us; it can be physically painful to be seen. Often the only feeling we know in that moment is shame, the belief that we are somehow not worthy of being seen...that something is terribly bad or wrong about who we are. 

Our dreams want to help us heal this...because it’s a lie. Whether we had the most wonderful of lives or the most horrific, all of us carry wounds which need to be healed. The dreams know that we all have experienced some deep hurt…some deep wounding and it happened at a time we were very vulnerable and tender. And so we came to believe that it was our fault and we learned to hide from others and from ourselves. 

We learned to hide in myriad ways…some through caretaking, being overly responsible, highly controlling and highly achieving. This was how we felt we could make our world safe.  It looks like we’re involved and present in the world but we aren’t. We have become masters of not being seen.

If we work with our dreams they will slowly and kindly teach us how see again with the fresh clear eyes of soul…how to be seen again…how to feel again. It may be pain or loss. It may be an anger that needs to be felt.  It will also by joy and love. We will feel...and we will heal.  We will learn to raise our eyes and meet…even welcome…the gaze of another.

Image: Agoraphobia Kid by CindyyanX

Mary Jo Heyen is a Natural Dreamwork Practitioner working with clients throughout the country and abroad in person, phone or Skype. Learn more about her work with dreams at www.maryjoheyen.com or  www.thenaturaldream.com