Do you have recurring dreams? What subconscious messages can you decipher from recurring elements of those?

I lived in this little A-Frame in Downtown Bentonville from the time I was 21 o 31. I’ve had a recurring dream about revisiting this house maybe twice per year since I sold it and moved in 2015. In this dream I have returned to the house after a long time away. The first part of the dream I explore the rooms, sometimes I see things I’d forgotten or items I left behind. I always behold these reminders in tenderness and regard. Next I settle in just a little bit. The house is messy, but I don’t try to tidy up–the task seems overwhelming and I know in the back of my mind that my time is limited. I get comfortable, consider where and how I will sleep–usually on the floor and how I’ll make the kids comfortable. Then inevitably the dream shifts as I realize that I’d forgotten that I don’t actually have a right to live here anymore. I’ve sold the house and the owners must be out of town or too busy to notice that I’m squatting. I get a little panicked at this point as I don’t want to be discovered. I don’t want to be embarrassed trying to live in my former house. I gather the kids and a few things and I start to pack the car up. I’m in a hurry now and desperate to depart. Sometimes in the dream the new owners are literally in the driveway as I’m leaving or they are opening the front door as I’m leaving out the back. We never make contact–somehow I narrowly escape. This is an excerpt from my journal in November of 2022 ,when I’d had this same dream once more. This time the visit was overnight and into the next morning. I spent quite a bit of time combing through my former possessions that are just strewn about–mostly upstairs. I leave in the morning after I realize I don’t belong here and well in advance of any would-be harassment from the new owners.

THE A-FRAME DREAM

I am willing to visit the old A-frame house; knowing that my time here is personal and intimate, but short.  I will take the time to explore it again–the rooms, the hallways, the closets.  I will recall how I made this into a living space, a home, and how I ultimately escaped it becoming my prison.  I will review the contents–the things I had inadvertently left behind and forgotten about.  I will gather the things I wish to keep; I will discard again those things I still wish to leave behind and forget.  Then I will pack my vehicle, I will stand in the yard and remember.  I will depart before it’s too late; before I am discovered here in this old compartment;  before I am found out to be visiting and trying to inhabit my old world–the one that no longer exists in real life.  I will allow myself to be chased out.  I will not defend my desire to stay.  I know that this is not where I am supposed to be.  I know that I do not belong here and that’s okay.  I didn’t plan to make this my home.  I was a little confused at first, but it became evident quickly that I had left this place for a reason and that I am not meant to return to it.  This was merely a visit.  A return to a familiar space, a sensory dive into what I once beheld daily.  The dream never shows me where I am to go next, it is merely that pit stop in my experience.  I now depart to complete the story.  I’m headed up the road. I turn at the 2-way stop.  I’ve had my rest and I drive onward into what awaits, what is before me and not what is behind.  Let go. Let’s go.