David Blum's long-awaited book, "Appointment with the Wise Old Dog: A Bridge to the Transformative Power of Dreams," provides the necessary, comprehensive complement to his highly regarded 1998 documentary. The film, "Appointment with the Wise Old Dog: Dream Images in a Time of Crisis," crystallized his inner work as it related to his cancer experience. A private link of the entire DVD is included with the book.
In contrast to the DVD, this book contains the foundational work comprised of forty-three dream paintings and commentaries derived from a lifetime of numinous archetypal dreams so that Blum's cancer experience turns out to be only a part of his whole life's story, a coda to his thirty-five-year inner journey.
The primary sources of David's Blum's commentaries, his diaries and dream journals, date from his seventeenth to his sixty-fourth year. This crucible into which he poured his most intimate confessions contains the living spontaneity of his original experiences remarkably intact. By re-entering the dream state and allowing the images to speak to him, Blum gently leads the reader into his world of color, form, music and the mapping of his soul.
The language, unhampered by jargon or weighty terminology, always remains accessible to the lay reader drawn to inner transformation. This work resonates with the musician, the artist, the theologian, the psychologist and the patient - whether facing a terminal illness or not. It offers the rare potential to communicate our shared capacity to explore multiple levels of meaning, acting as a springboard into one's own inner experience. Anyone interested in the power of dreams, the transformative effect of symbols and archetypes, or faced with any existential crisis will find this book inspirational.
The author, an internationally recognized musician and writer brings rich musical depth to the material. One of America's musical icons, Yo-Yo Ma, Blum's friend and colleague, has expressed a profound appreciation for the work in his endorsements of both the DVD and the book.
By his inspired Foreword, Murray Stein offers the reader, concerned with humanity's inner spiritual life, an individual template for experiencing Blum's extraordinary contribution to Depth Psychology.
