Dreaming of the Simurgh : what can this symbol evoke?

Thirty birds for one

The Persian poet Attar, in the twelfth century, tells in The Conference of the Birds the journey of all the world's birds setting out to find their king, the Simurgh. The road is long, most give up or die ; thirty arrive. And there they understand : in Persian, si morgh means "thirty birds". What they sought at the end of the world was themselves, arrived at the end. This narrative describes with remarkable precision what analytical psychology calls individuation : the goal is not an object to reach but a state to become, and it reveals itself only after the journey. It cannot be obtained earlier by taking a shortcut. The Simurgh in dreams almost always denotes that kind of quest — the one whose end cannot be described in advance.

Dreaming of an immense, distant bird

Dreamers rarely describe an identified creature. They describe an outsized winged presence, glimpsed very high or very far, often without hostility : something superior that does not threaten. This configuration is characteristic of images of the Self as Jung describes them — figures that impress without crushing, and that leave the dreamer in place. Their appearance frequently accompanies turning points : a long-matured decision, the end of a period, a moment when one perceives a direction without being able to formulate it. What to remember is what happens next : the bird moves away, comes closer, or waits. Waiting is the most demanding variant : it returns the decision to the dreamer.

Distance and context change the reading

• The bird glimpsed far off, almost out of sight — evokes a still abstract goal, of which one knows only that it exists.
• A journey undertaken to reach it — points to a long commitment whose end will not be seen before it has been travelled.
• Companions giving up along the way — reflects the growing solitude of certain undertakings, where one loses those who set out together.
• Discovering the bird is a reflection — matches the ending of Attar's tale : what was sought outside reveals itself within.
• An immense feather found on the ground — concerns a sign left by what one seeks : proof that it exists, without the encounter.

A psychological reading, not a ready-made box

Analytical psychology places great solar birds among images of the Self, that centre larger than the ego and which the ego cannot manufacture. It stresses a point that illuminates Attar's tale : such images appear at the end of a work, never in place of it. Other readings see above all a figure of the ideal, with the risk that an ideal set too high discourages rather than guides.