What Would Aragorn Do?: Part One – A Return to Bree

Back in January of 2023, I drove through and stayed the night in Ashland, OR. The picture in the thumbnail is one I took at a pub restaurant in the downtown area.

I sent it to Lee and told him I felt like Aragorn hanging out at the Prancing Pony in Bree.

And three and a half years later, I was back in Bree (Ashland).

There are several interesting ideas and stories I still want to share from the International Association for the Study of Dreams (IASD) conference last week in Ashland, OR.

But I’ll start with a story and a dream that cut across several days of the conference.

When I signed up to attend the conference in late March of 2026, I also started capturing some of my nightly dreams in a journal.

I used to do this regularly when I was seeing a Jungian therapist after my divorce. I’ve always loved dreams and found them fascinating, but that two-year period really cemented the power they hold to heal, inform, inspire, and help move us toward the life we want.

This dream was the first one I recorded after setting the intention to remember and write them down.

The journal entry is dated March 28, 2026, so it likely occurred in the wee hours of that morning.

And yes, it can certainly be interpreted as a Freudian-type dream (sexual), but if you’ve studied dreams, you know there are often multiple layers of meaning waiting to be discovered.

This is one of those dreams.

The kind that stays with you.

Here it is in a nutshell.

I find myself at a conference of some sort.

It seems to be a reunion because there are people there whom I have known in the past.

One of those people is one of the great loves of my life—a girlfriend from long ago.

She and many of the people around her are excited that the two of us have been brought together and are meeting again after so many years.

We embrace in a hug.

A massive one.

Body to body, tightly pressed against one another, and all the old chemistry is still there.

It is an intense feeling of nostalgia, love, desire, attraction, and unity.

Powerful stuff.

However, she does not quite look the way she used to.

She seems taller, slimmer, and her hair is much longer and fuller—almost to the point of ridiculousness.

She informs me that she is now married, but suggests that if I have time in the next week, we should meet up in Las Vegas.

We embrace once again, and she exclaims:

“Wow, it’s exactly like it used to be. So much chemistry.”

We separate, but she leans in and whispers:

“If you come in the next three days…”

The implication seems clear. She would be willing to have an affair if I did.

I had been reluctant to say yes to the original suggestion of meeting in Las Vegas.

But now—and take it for what it’s worth, as this is a dream—I became more interested.

The chemical reaction was powerful.

Enough said.

But then I pull away and ask:

“What’s up with your hair?”

She says she can no longer wear it the way she used to.

Visuals of her from the last twenty years appear before me, and I see how her hair has changed over those periods.

At that point, I begin to wonder if she might be an impostor.

That suddenly seems possible.

And I become even more reluctant to make any commitment to meet up with her in Las Vegas.

Then it is time for us to leave.

All the conference attendees board a small jet airplane, one that probably seats around sixty people.

It is very windy.

We seem to be perched on a tower of a castle, inside a circular building on a ramp that points upward, as if we are inside a turret.

The pilot gets clearance for takeoff and begins accelerating around the circular ramp, lifting us toward the top of the tower.

It becomes clear that we are going to launch off the top of the turret.

This creates great anxiety in me.

Earlier in the dream I had witnessed another plane taking off this way, and it had dropped many feet before finally ascending into the sky.

I brace myself for the same experience.

And then I wake up.

Weird, wild stuff.

That was the dream.

Now, back to the IASD conference.

On the first day of the event, I attended a workshop by Dr. Kelly Sullivan Walden.

The goal of the workshop was to learn how to decode dream messages and turn those insights into inspired action.

She teaches people how to awaken their dreams and consciously create the lives they desire.

I can dig it.

We eventually broke into partner work, and I needed a dream to bring to the exercise.

I was unprepared for this.

So I quickly opened my dream journal on my phone and scrolled until I landed on a dream.

The one above.

We were then asked to enact part of the dream and walk around the room greeting other participants.

One participant I had noticed from across the room immediately caught my attention because of her beauty.

When she passed by, acknowledged me and my dream enactment, and smiled, I felt my heart expand with almost the same feeling that had appeared in the dream.

Dr. Sullivan Walden gave us a method for decoding dreams on our own.

She calls it JET SET.

J – Just the facts. Describe the basic narrative of the dream as simply as possible.

E – Energy/Emotion. How did you feel in the dream and upon awakening?

T – Title. What would be the title or subtitle if this dream were a movie?

I found it very interesting that the dream I had somewhat randomly selected contained a jet airplane.

After the workshop, I mentioned this to her.

Her advice?

Pay attention to that synchronicity.

It is often pointing toward something important.

No doubt.

And I did.

A couple of days later, I attended another workshop called Dreams as Living Landscapes, led by two fantastic facilitators, Amanda Lux and Jamie Fenix Foster.

I was actually on my way to a different workshop.

But when I arrived, the conference room doors were closed and locked.

So I popped into this one as a backup option.

Funny how things seem to work out exactly as they are supposed to, right?

The facilitators asked for volunteers to share a dream.

Normally I let others go first.

But as they explained their process for “re-entering a dream,” I felt moved to raise my hand.

Four other participants and I were selected.

We went to the front of the room and each shared our dreams.

When it was my turn, the facilitators asked:

“What would you like to know about this dream?”

“Anything anybody has to offer,” I replied.

I added that I was beginning to suspect it was an important dream.

Maybe it had something to do with my recent “Am I still following my North Star?” inquiries with Radagast (Gemini AI) and Gandalf (ChatGPT).

And yes, I was also curious to know where the jet airplane was going after takeoff.

We then did a guided meditation led by the facilitators.

I found myself in outer space.

To my left stood the Inner Shaman I had encountered years ago while studying my personal myths.

He motioned for me to follow him.

We floated like ghosts toward a large white castle.

He left me at the marble-like steps leading to the front doors.

I climbed the ten or so stairs.

As I approached, small blue creatures—perhaps EBEs?—opened the two doors and motioned for me to enter.

Inside, it looked remarkably like the pub in Bree.

The Prancing Pony.

People were gathered everywhere, feasting, drinking, laughing, and carrying on.

In a corner, beneath a subtle spotlight, sat a man.

It was Aragorn.

And he had some words of wisdom for me that were profound.

Unfortunately, what happened next will need to be saved for tomorrow’s post.

My time to write is up, and I need to rehearse for an open mic I’m playing tonight.

Some good parts are about to be revealed.

So be sure to read the next article that follows.