Dreaming Lens: Did you know who this figure was? Were they silent or did they speak to you? Were they showing you something? Were you aware of what message they had for you? Did you have a sense of menace or ease?
Personal Focus: This image has its essence in anonymity and may, therefore, never be clearly known to you. As a Character Aspect, it is a figure from your unconscious mind that has the capacity to visit you in the dream state and deliver a message. The Dreaming Lens will tell you what the message is, or at least where to begin looking for it. However, if they closely resemble the commonly held visage of Death in your dream—the cloaked figure without a visible face that roams the world snatching the living into the world of the hereafter—you are definitely experiencing an archetypal dream.
Deciding whether this figure was a personal Character Aspect or the Archetype of Death should be based directly on your experience of the dream. If you had the sense that you were in the presence of Death within the context of the dream, your instinct is probably correct. If your dream portends a death, it is almost certain to be a symbolic one, such as dying to an old behavior or relationship in order to make way for something new.
More clarity about whether to consider this dream as archetypal can be discovered in the structure of the dream itself. Archetypal dreams are usually very simple in their imagery, often with just one setting and rarely containing any spoken words. If your dream was more typical with shifting perspectives, changes in location, and the exchange of words, then you are in the realm of the personal. If the dream feels archetypal, the message will reveal itself to you over time. And like all archetypal dreams, it connects to your journey toward integration of Self. If the dream feels personal, the Dreaming Lens should offer you clues as to what this hidden or cloaked figure is trying to express. If this is not obvious to you, your work will be to ruminate on what you can glean from the emotional residue of the dream. Eventually, your intuition will help you identify the true nature and intention of this figure and of the dream. [1]
The context of the dream will tell you what the message is, or at least where to begin looking for it. However, if in your dream the figure closely resembles the commonly held visage of death—the cloaked figure without a visible face that roams the world snatching the living into the world of the hereafter—then you are definitely experiencing an archetypal dream. [2]