Royce Fitts - How Dreams Shape Our Reality and Soul

     We all know that dreams have the power to transform our lives when we pay attention to them. Usually I’m referring to the dreams we have at night, but this also holds true for our daytime dreams. Now just imagine what can happen when we combine both daytime and nighttime dreams into our existence.

     My guest, Spiritual Counselor and Dreamworker Dr. Royce Fitts, had the chance to do this when he embarked on a journey of self-discovery by walking the Ridgeway Trail in England. He captured what he learned about himself in his book The Geography of Soul: Dreams, Reality and the Journey of a Lifetime. On this episode he shares his insights which can help anyone seeking a journey of personal transformation, including:

·      How to use dreams as a tool for personal growth

·      How the word he uses to describe his journey fit perfectly with his desired outcome

·      How nature helps us go within

·      What happens when we face our shadows

·      Why going it alone is sometimes the best answer

·      The role of curiosity

·      How a recurring dream can help us navigate through life

    Most of us probably won’t hike a 100-mile trail like Dr. Fitts did, but if you want travel vicariously with him to find out what it’s like and what it can teach you, don’t miss this enlightening episode of Dream Power Radio.

This is what Royce has to say about his work:

     I’m Royce Fitts, a Spiritual Counselor and Dream Worker with decades of experience as a clinical psychotherapist. I understand this beautiful tension that exists at the heart of a healer’s life. 

     Some of the hardest, most enriching and loving work we will ever do is to try, in the face of it all, to create meaning, beauty and healing in our personal lives and in the life of the larger world.     This is our calling.

     Open-hearted Spiritual Counseling and Dreamwork will unlock our greatest allies and deepest resources. This is about discovering and learning to express your heart’s deepest values. Although I am an ordained minister, my process is not about dogma, rigid religion and rules, nor shame-based god-talk.

If invited, I am honored to walk along your side as we explore your path and work toward your healing. Spiritual Counseling and Dreamwork is about deep, honest soul-searching for you to become your most authentic, healthy self. This is for you, your loved ones and for our beautiful, wounded world, for us to be “a light unto our courageous path.”

Website: https://www.roycefitts.com/

Chapters

• 2:12 Discovering the word "stravage"
• 6:14 Dreams guiding the decision to take a trip
• 10:46 Dreams as eternal dreams
• 15:51 The journey on the Ridgeway Trail in England
• 16:25 Dreams on the trail and their connection to nature
• 19:29 Facing internal shadows

Transcript

Announcer (00:00:04) - This is Dream Power Radio, the place where your dreams turn into reality. Here is your host, Debbie Spector Weisman.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:00:13) - Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to Dream Power Radio. I'm your host, Certified Dream Life Coach Debbie Spector Weisman. This is the place we talk about dreams, both daytime and nighttime dreams, and how you can use them to make the internal shift to a life you love and rediscover the truth of who you really are. What are dreams, really? Are they the stories we tell ourselves in the middle of the night? Are they desires yet unfulfilled and walk us during the day? The ancient Toltecs believed we live a dreaming world all the time. So maybe it's a combination of both. Our dreams are us. And yet when we leave them on the pillow or do nothing to turn them into the reality we want, we lose the possibility of what I like to refer to as our dream lives. But when we do take action, the most amazing things can happen, some even life changing.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:01:08) - This was the case for my guest, Dr. Royce Fitts. Royce is a spiritual counselor and dream worker who has spent years helping others deal with their personal traumas. When he was faced with his own dark night of the soul, he did something about it by setting out on a journey to rediscover himself. He writes about this in his new book, The Geography of the Soul: Dreams, reality, and the journey of a lifetime. And what he learned has profound meaning for all of us. Welcome to Dream Power Radio, Royce.

Royce Fitts (00:01:41) - I am so excited to be with you, Debbie, and to all your listeners. This is a dream come true to be with you, as well as to explore these themes and to explore dreams.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:01:54) - Oh, very much so. Royce, one of the things I love about this podcast is that I'm always learning something new, and from you I learned a new word that relates directly to your journey and what we're going to talk about. And that word -- and I hope I'm pronouncing it right—is stravage. So tell it what it means and how that word affected you.

Royce Fitts (00:02:15) - So first I'm going to tease you because you and a million other people want to say stra-vagge. And we want to make that end of the word a little smooth, a little French or so. It's actually a hard G. It's called stravage, and it's an old English/ Scottish word. And it actually comes out of the Latin word extravagant. So it, it has, as all of us do, it's evolved over time. And for most of us, it's disappeared. And my happy experience in discovering this word has just for me, it's like it's become one of my best friends.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:03:04) - Well, that is lovely. But what happened when you heard this word? Did it had sparked something inside you? Yeah.

Royce Fitts (00:03:12) - Well, I'm going to tell you just a tidbit of how I discovered this word. It's working with this very intelligent, well-read client who also had struggles in life. And at one point he came to me, and he said, Royce, I just got to be honest. I haven't been telling you the truth. In fact, it's like, okay. I took a breath. I realized that his stories were not necessarily fact based. We're also a part of his journey, his own spiritual, existential journey, and that he also, as these were, in a sense, his dreams. And when we did that, we shifted into some deeper, beautiful areas of his counseling. So fast forward a year or two later, I was getting ready to do what I now call my stravage, and I did not know this word, but I shared it with him as I did with all clients as I was preparing them, that I'm going to be leaving my practice at that time. And when I said what I was going to do, go to England, I could take a long hike and reflect on my life, he in his crippled state gets up out of his rocker chair, leans on his cane, grabs my hand and shakes it, and he says, you are going on a stravage.

Royce Fitts (00:04:47) - And I still get goose bumps. Debbie, right now it's like, what? What? What is that? And he proceeded to tell me that in the old world, especially in Scotland and in England, when the Scottish clients were demolished by the English oppressors, shall we say that they were told to stay put, their clan system was destroyed. But as we know, Scots, like all of us, have a soul and many of them refused to stay put, to stay in that little confine of where they were sentence, and they begin to defiantly wander with purpose as a way to express who they are. And that word inspired me about. Because, Debbie, you referred to a dark time in my life and it was like, what do I do? How do I reform, revitalize, rediscover who I am? And that word became an invitation for me to strive to wander defiantly with a sense of beauty and purpose.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:06:07) - Before you went on this trip, though, did your dreams also helped convince you that it was something to do?

Royce Fitts (00:06:14) - So my dream world has been near and dear to my conscious heart for many, many years in my practice as a psychotherapist and a spiritual counselor, and in my own personal life, I work deeply with dreams and understood dreams as a powerful invitation to explore how to live in the waking world with a sense of beauty and adventure. As you know, as the listeners know, dreams are weird and bizarre, sometimes embarrassing. And to take a breath and to be willing to set with the dream symbols, they begin to help us and guide us. And yes, so in answer to your question, dreams have been a part of my life, and as I worked on my own dreams, I began to realize I needed to do a waking dream and honor my sleeping dreams by taking this stravage into this part of England that I refer to in the book.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:07:29) - And you ask your readers to put themselves in your dreams. So why do you believe that your dreams have meanings to strangers who happen to pick up your book?

Royce Fitts (00:07:40) - Well, it is fun if someone gets curious about my dream. So, you know, that's the humorous way of looking at it. In my understanding of the dream world, I am very careful not to interpret other people's dreams, nor do I want them to interpret mine, because dreams are such an intimate and as I've mentioned, sometimes very outrageous movie in our heads. And many, many years ago, I met a wonderful man, Jeremy Taylor, who was exploring dreams from the projective standpoint. And in that sense, when we share a dream with others, just in a real quick nutshell, we listen to the dream with curiosity and openness and non-judgmental ness. And then we ask the dreamer if we can--and these are my words--to borrow the dream, let the dream become mine. And so in the projective process, we have a very gentle guideline or rule that says, if I talk about this other person's dream, I'm going to own it as mine. And so we use a phrase like, if this were my dream. That way the dreamer doesn't feel analyzed, and the dreamer gets to know me because I don't know what they mean by their dream.

Royce Fitts (00:09:08) - I know if I borrow the dream, I'm going to be exploring it in ways that lift up possible meanings for me. And then the dreamer gets to decide, yeah, Royce that feels on target or no Royce, that's way off target. And yet, in this communal conversation, we can explore the depths and magnitude of these dreams because they meet so many things. One dream can mean so many things. It builds intimacy and community as well as understanding the symbols that the dream is lifting up.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:09:48) - Yeah. There was I remember a time when I was at an event and we were asked, like a group of maybe a dozen dreamers, were asked to take a dream from the audience and help that sense of understanding of what it was. And being the newest dreamer of the bunch. I was like, number 12. And so I get down to where I can get something else that nobody else has stuck it out. And actually, did you know, I took one little part of it that well, maybe look at this part. See? 

Royce Fitts (00:10:26) - So, yeah, you had a whole group of dream cheerleaders with you.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:10:30) - Absolutely. And you also talk about the dreams that we have, that it's not just we have a one night and we'll get an understanding of it and that's it. We have a dream that can last stay with us for years and years and years. How do you feel about that?

Royce Fitts (00:10:46) - Yeah. Thank you for bringing that up. In in the book, I refer to several dreams in which that has occurred. My understanding about dreams is that when they happen, they can become an eternal dream for us. And one of it dreams I’ll share real quickly. I have theological background besides being a clinical psychotherapist, and when I was in one of my graduate schools, I had this dream. And it was while I was in counseling with my own counselor and working on issues and struggles and strains. And in the dream, I'm in this large auditorium, and it's very churchy and way up in the bleachers, and I stand up to speak because I feel like I had something to say.

Royce Fitts (00:11:38) - And so I start talking, but every time I talk, I start using profanities in this churchy location. And it was funny, and I was laughing and people around me and some of those were waking life professors at the time, and they were kind of laughing too. And it's like, oh, I'm sorry, sorry, sorry. Got to stop and try again. But I kept having these earthy words to say. Well, that dream was when I was in my 20s, probably mid-twenties. And now these many years later, as I carried that dream and it kind of formed and reformed with meaning, and it embedded itself in me, and it helped me understand how callings in life can shift and change, where at one point I thought I was supposed to be in this kind of rather conservative environment, that this dream was saying, no way. I've got to be more earthy, more in the flesh and blood of what life is about. Where human needs are, are sometimes challenging and traumatic and also joyous and funny.

Royce Fitts (00:12:58) - And so that dream helped me learn and remember that my calling, even though my theology changed a lot, my callings to focus on people's needs and to look for new ways to be with people in very earthy ways has come true more and more. For me, that was like 35 years, 40 years ago. I don't remember how many years ago.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:13:24) - I'd say the dream keeps going on and on.

Royce Fitts (00:13:28) – The gift that keeps on giving me.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:13:30) – How is your understanding of it now different from what it was when you were in your twenties?

Royce Fitts (00:13:35) - Oh, it is so different now and I'm so grateful you're inviting me to kind of reflect a bit in. In the dream world time doesn't matter. And so time as I view it kind of folds in upon itself. So past is present is future is present is past. All of this is kind of the same. And I'm so grateful for that dream that in some ways it was kind of an invitation to a future that I had no idea I would ever have as far as living out a calling, a kind of service to others, as well as healing in my soul.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:14:24) - Wow. Well, with that, we are going to take a short break. We are talking all about dreams and the journey of Doctor Royce Fitz, and we'll be right back. 

Announcer (00:15:43) - Welcome back to Dream Power Radio with your host, Debbie Spector Weisman.

Speaker 4 (00:15:49) - Yes. Welcome back to Dream Power Radio. I'm your host, Debbie Spector Weisman. And we're talking about dreams with Dr. Royce Fitts. Well, Royce, you went on this walk, this journey on the Ridgeway Trail in England, and you describe it so beautifully. The days that you spend walking in the fields and climbing and little towns and everything. It just so beautifully written. But you spent so much time alone in nature. What is it about nature that helps us find our soul?

Royce Fitts (00:16:25) - We can have hours of conversation about this.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:16:29) – Keep it short.

Royce Fitts (00:16:31) - Yeah. We'll reduce it to a few seconds. We are of nature. We don't just walk on top of nature or observe nature. We are of nature. And when we can deeply reflect on that, this is a time. This is when nature and you, nature and me, nature and us are aware of conversations. This kind of mystical appreciation and communion that we within nature can have. That is why I think in the larger world there is much more focus psychologically on the environment. And also in specific ways. Some of us may have heard of forest bathing, of becoming immersed within some beautiful setting and just be there. This is our natural state as humans, as life forms on this planet. And as we do that, there are chemicals and neurological responses within our body that seek to heal us. So I experienced that on the Ridgeway Trail. I experienced that on the prairies and the mountains and sometimes sitting on my back patio just feeling the sunshine.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:18:16) - Just a lovely image. Something that I’m curious about were the dreams that you had on the trail. Were they different in nature from the kind of dreams you usually have?

Royce Fitts (00:18:27) - I'm going to stutter because no. And yes. One of the dreams I had on the trail…It was kind of like a past life experience. And while I look at that kind of dream, metaphorically or perhaps literally, it's the I don't knows. I was so invited by the trail, by the by the nature scape, and by the people that I met on the trail. I felt in kind of a synchronistic harmony there. And as I walk, so I would, I would say that no. And that's because as I train and perhaps as we train ourselves to be attuned to the dream world, we also become more attuned to the natural world.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:19:21) - In many ways, you were forced to face your shadow side while you were on this journey. How did your dreams help you deal with it?

Royce Fitts (00:19:29) - So take a breath because our shadow sides are, are huge. And one of the things that stood out to me as I was doing this walk is my sense of aloneness in the world. And this walk, this striving, this kind of defiant wandering, confronted me in a beautiful, gentle way about my aloneness that all of us have to face.

Royce Fitts (00:20:01) - And when we can somehow allow that aloneness to help us love ourselves more and accept our space and place, then that can help us be more available to others. So this this mystery that happens when we embrace ourselves healthfully, we can be more open to others in connection. So that's a part of how I feel like I've faced some of my internal shadows now in a larger and very different and unusual way. After that stravage in England and my and some of my writing, I also felt called to be facing a shadow that for me is it is the journey into our military world. And in that world, I became an off the record counselor for our US military at various installations. I am not a pacifist. I am anti-military. And here all of this money, all of these resources and all of the goods and bads that we experience as citizens sometimes have been through our mighty military experience. And so in my conflicts, internal spiritual conflicts, it was like I need to face that shadow within me as well as within our nation, so that I can understand my yin and yang, my light and dark, as well as our nation's yin and yang, our light and dark.

Royce Fitts (00:21:54) - How can we be in all of this that we are? And what kind of dream does this invite us to have, both for ourselves, as people and as a nation, and within our own deep soul searching as to how we are going to traverse striving with our nation.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:22:17) - Did you feel this calling? I guess you would call it, to work with counseling people in the military? Was that sort of your way of facing your shadow head on?

Royce Fitts (00:22:28) - Yeah, exactly. It was a way,  because I had never done that. I as I said, I'm not a pacifist and I am anti-military and I'm from the Sixties. And, you know, the challenge of authority and all and the Vietnam experience and the wounding and the struggles that we've all had. And it was like, this is a biggie for me. So, yeah, it was a way for me to face my shadow because I benefit from my nation goods and the bads. You and I could have this wonderful conversation because there's this military umbrella that we live under.

Royce Fitts (00:23:09) - And as we know in our world, outside of our nation, it's such conflict and such suffering. So how do I hold this strange waking life dream? So yes, I had to face my own shadow.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:23:26) - And when you're counseling these soldiers, do you help them with their dreams?

Royce Fitts (00:23:31) - Oh, that's a great question. Oh. Thank you, I get goosebumps. So I'm an off the record counselor. Meaning it's very unique and very difficult to explain, but any soldier who comes to me knows they can talk to me off the record, as long as it's not dangerous to themselves or others, or it's not breaking some huge law or military regulation. Military people need to know that they have that freedom. And so I'm a walk around counselor that they know they can come to me. So as we visit and they get to know me, get to know this gray hair, long gray hair dude who's walking around who doesn't look military. And when they start trusting us, themselves and me together, they begin to share.

Royce Fitts (00:24:25) - And sometimes I'll ask them about their dreams. And they're the dreams of you. They're the dreams of me. They're very normal and bizarre because dreams are that way normal and bizarre. But then they can start looking at, oh, this dream may have-- not may, but does have wisdom and healing for them. And it's a dream may be calling them with new awareness to something they're not aware of, as well as helping them cope with wounds that they've had. So there are occasions that I am so honored that a military member will say, Hey Royce, I've had this crazy dream.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:25:08) - Which ends up not being so crazy when they work with it. 

Royce Fitts (00:25:14) - So well said, Debbie. They get to know that it's normal, you know, to have crazy dreams. Yeah.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:25:21) - Absolutely. So at the end of your stravage you had a recurring dream that has come to you from time to time. Tell us about the dream and why do you think it came again at that point?

Royce Fitts (00:25:33) - Well, so the dream to which I think you're referring is the prison dream.

Royce Fitts (00:25:39) - Yes. Debbie shakes her head. Yes. And you know that dream? I don't know how many times I've had it. Let's say five, maybe ten, maybe more, because I don't remember all of my dreams. The dream tends to come. When I'm under major life change. Except the dream is terrifying in the dream and it has different forms sometimes. But generally I'm in prison and I am terrified I'm going to be held. I'm going to go on trial. It's sort of like this could be a death sentence kind of episode in a dream, and I'm reaching out for help. I can't get any kind of help in this one dream. I'm wanting to talk to the attorney, and I can't get a hold of the attorney. And so I'm trapped in prison. Okay, so I'm recalling this dream at the end of the book when I actually unlocking myself into a new freedom. And it was like the dream was saying, Royce, what you were in is no longer true. And this is a hopeful reminder of how Royce, how I can free myself by taking a stravage, by opening my heart, taking great risks and leaving prison life behind. That dream is electrically charged.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:27:15) - Oh, it sounds. I tell you it, Royce. I can talk to you for hours. I've got a list of questions that I don’t have time for, but I do have time for this one. How can people find out about you and your work and your book?

Royce Fitts (00:27:29) - So Royce fitts.com ROYCEFITTS. Just go there and you'll find out way more about me than you'll ever want to know. And I offer spiritual counseling and dream work. And my understanding of spiritual counseling is that this is a soul-searching journey we're on. And what are our heart's deepest values? How do we honor this? And my belief is through deep, intimate conversation and looking at dreams, we are going to understand this and find this and help to create a beautiful, meaningful, not painless, beautiful and meaningful and joyous adventure of life. And so the book The Geography of the Soul, Debbie, as you so graciously pointed out, came out of this long hike I did in England and also a long life. And this is my invitation for us, all of us, to look at how we can create our own strength, not just by hiking, by going into our own deep, undiscovered country that's within us.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:28:46) - Oh, wonderful. Royce, thank you so much for being on Dream Power Radio today.

Royce Fitts (00:28:51) - You're welcome. Debbie. Thank you and thank your listeners. I thank them for giving us the time today. So blessings.

Debbie Spector Weisman (00:28:58) - We've been speaking about dream work and the journey of a lifetime with Dr. Royce Fitts. I hope you've enjoyed today's program. If so, please hit that subscribe button so you don't miss out on any future episodes. Until next time, this is Debbie Spector Weisman saying, sweet dreams everybody.

Announcer (00:29:15) - You've been listening to Dream Power Radio with your host, Debbie Specter Weitzman. For more information on Debbie or to sign up for her newsletter, go to Dream Power Radio.com. This has been Dream Power Radio.