After I was married, I kept more of a consistent record. The other night out of curiosity, I pulled a couple of my old journals off the shelf and spent an hour reading. I feel grateful for what I have written but still wish I had recorded more . While flipping through the pages, I stumbled across this entry about a dream I had in July of 2009. It caught my eye because I've been thinking a lot about dreams lately and how they work in our lives. I've only had a handful of them through the years that have left a deep enough impression on me to capture them with my journal or retell them. I'm so thankful I wrote this one down because I forgot all about it.
I've been thinking about the interpretation of this one all day. I believe there's a powerful lesson to be learned from it and I take it like a warning to me as a daughter of Zion, just as the scripture found in Isaiah 3:16-24 proclaims.
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7-13-2009
I had a strange dream last night. I was looking around at a yard sale and found a old-fashioned vanity. It was slightly taller than me, with cabinet doors that opened to a large mirror on the inside. Make-up and perfume stacked in painted fancy bottles were arranged on the shelves and in the drawers. I gazed into the mirror at my reflection and to my horror watched it begin to age very rapidly and then crumble to dust. I turned away in disbelief, shaking my head at what I just saw. I looked back at my appearance in the mirror just to be certain I didn't imagine it. Again the horrible reflection aged within seconds and then crumbled to dust. "What is going on?! I thought, "This vanity is evil!" There were other women at the yard sale. I ran to some of them and asked if they would come and look at this and tell me if they saw the same thing. The small crowd of women gathered around as I opened the cabinet doors to show them the mirror inside. Sure enough, as I looked at my reflection, it crumbled again from rapid aging into dust.
"Did you see that?! Did you see what happened to my reflection?!" I said, pointing to the glass.
The women standing around me answered, "No, we didn't see anything strange." They all agreed with each other, "Yeah, nothing happened, it was just a normal reflection."
They all walked away irritated and gossiped among themselves that there was something wrong with me. I stood there alone by the vanity and found a looking glass faced-down on the table among the perfume and bottles. I wondered as I picked it up if it would do the same thing. When I turned it toward me, I witnessed my image decay again. Disgusted and utterly terrified, I threw the looking glass down on the ground like it was some sort of poisonous spider, "It's pure evil!!" I shouted. I awoke in a panic until I realized I had only been dreaming. I took a deep breath and tried to get back to sleep but couldn't help but think of all that happened. I thought to myself that there must be a moral to learn from it.
As I lay there pondering, I remembered some counsel in my patriarchal blessing;
"Now when you leave this life, you leave the vain things of this world, Alicia. But there are many things that you won't leave - you'll take them with you and they'll become your eternal possession. It's like storing up your treasures in heaven where moth nor rust doth decay. You'll take all of the personality. You'll take all of the truth. You'll take all of the knowledge. You'll take all of the character. You'll take all of the virtue and the understanding of these sacred things and your sacred relationship with God and His Son, Jesus Christ."
I thought about the words "leave the vain things of this world". Vain means "hollow, pointless, no purpose." It's interesting that it was a "vanity" in my dream.
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Reading this entry reminded me of a fireside I attended in college at the Salt Lake Tabernacle. I can't remember who spoke but I remember them saying that our physical appearance, no matter who we are will reach a peak and then go downhill. There is no investment of time or money, wardrobes, makeovers, fashion consultants, work out routines or diet, that will stop our physical bodies from deteriorating. Yes, some things may slow the process down but eventually we will all turn to dust. On the other hand, our spirit, the substance of who we really are doesn't have a limit of beauty. There's no peak that it reaches before it begins to drop out. Our soul will never grow old and actually has the potential to grow more beautiful and bright with every passing day, long after this life is over and into eternity. It cannot be faked or worn as a mask. It has nothing to do with appearances or the outward show. It's all about the sincere focus of the heart.
"Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal: But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal: For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light." - Matthew 6:19-22
I pray the Lord will help me recognize when I am getting caught up in the vain things of this world and save me from myself. I pray I will learn to focus more on those things that matter most and lay up treasures in heaven.
-Alicia
2 comments:
Wow Alicia
That was a pretty powerful dream, almost like you were having a "Dorian Gray" moment. I love the concept of journaling. My boss sent me to an "Anger Management" class once. Yes, and it is a long and ongoing story, of which I will tell you one day. But one thing that stood out to me in that class was the suggestion that we could journal our day to day interactions, and in doing so point out our feelings of either anger, frustration, hopelessness etc. So I did this for a year and then I stopped. I hid it from myself because I was really discouraged by it. I found it a few years after I had been baptized and I wondered if my feelings had changed. Many had changed for the better, especially my feelings of self worth, and compassion and understanding toward others. I still struggle with my boss, but I pray for her a lot, and ask Heavenly Father to show me "Who she is" God is good,
So now I try to write things down, most of my thoughts go to my blog in a restrained sort of way. But my best work has been recorded on yellow post-it notes of which some I still have. I have a worn out yellow pad, that has an ambitious list pertaining to my hopes of becoming self reliant, complete with 72 hour kits and this and that. I wrote it about a year after I was baptized and it is still relevant. I am a list maker.
xoxoxo
Ramona, I have never heard of Dorian Gray so I had to google it. You're right, it does sound like I was having a moment like that.
For some reason, I think I recall you telling me about your boss or maybe it was a post I read a while back. But I remember you working through it. I believe that writing things out is always a good way to work through things. Like you, I have done lots of writing on scraps of paper here and there. Some times I will write out my prayers in my journal.
I love to hear how the gospel changed your perspective on your true idenity and feelings of self worth.
Thanks for stopping by and leaving your comments here. I want to go check out that 1945 movie "Dorian Gray."
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