Dreams Are Strange Things

My thoughts on dreams

A friend once asked me, “What are your dreams like?” I paused, perplexed by the question. It seems odd to desire an overview of something so vast. It seems strange to sum up precious memories and subconscious activity in but a few words. How liberating and respectful to your other worlds to keep silent in this situation.

The idea of dreaming is difficult to wrap your mind around. By day we live a routine of socializing and learning from the surrounding events and objects. By night we take what we have learned and shatter it to analyze and alter. Wholesome facts twisted and manipulated and disassembled to our desire. To ones seeking stability, a black reality tormented with lashings of pain and uncertainty. To ones seeking refuge from routine, a fruitful universe boasting adventure and wild fantasies.   

I envy those who have achieved such a high understanding of their night worlds to the point of the ability to alter them; wielding superior lucidity to their advantage and fulfillment. As they slash to the heart of the center of learning itself, we scramble for meaning. One can only imagine the mighty grip they must have of themselves, a gentle iron squeeze. In their personal universe ability to do precisely as they wish whenever they wish. The ability to swim on land and walk on water theirs to cherish.

For us who merely marvel at the superior sleepers, nights and dreams are an enticing question mark. The possible outcomes leave us on our toes constantly. One night we are living under the law and staring at the sky, a longing gleam twinkling. The next night a chase in the forest escaping death or perhaps something worse. We could be shoved into a street of yellow and orange. An intersection with spacious leaves landing on the pavement; a blanket of autumn. The possibilities are limitless, with the exception of manipulation.

Do they reflect deeper meaning to life and its wonder? That may be gained from a later perception of fragments of uncovered remembrance. Meditate upon the other worlds, learn what you may. But most of all let them be. Do not limit what is. Time will reveal what it wants to, all we can do is absorb and revel in its beauty.

Reviews

[TLK]

Straight out of the gate with good grammar, sentence construction, vocabulary, and a developing writing style. You are one dinosaur-legged man-chicken, chasing after some kind of... living grain. Hmm.

Lots of really arresting lines here, tending towards literary fiction: "It seems odd to desire an overview of something so vast" and "How liberating and respectful to your other worlds to keep silent in this situation", from the first paragraph, are both very assured lines that shine with thought and therefore precision of meaning.

As a Psychologist, I find your explanation of dreaming ("By night we take what we have learned and shatter it to analyze and alter") very compelling. It is heartening to assume that dreams are useful. Even the ones where I'm sitting in a sink, watching wasps sting the soap.
The idea of dreams complementing you with the opposite is so excellent that I wish it were true. It reminds me of Schopenhauer, who thought that love was an elemental and evolutionary force designed to bring together complementary hereditary features, so that the resulting babies were successful. (e.g. someone with a big nose goes for someone with a small nose, so the baby has a normal nose). It's hard to take him too seriously, tho', because he was an a*****e: http://www.philosophicalmisadventures.com/?p=21

Some excellent wordplay, too. I must pick out "a gentle iron squeeze".
I love how it starts as dialogue and psychological monologue, then starts to become an eductional treatise on the philosophy of sleep. By the end it is so pervaded by dream-like logic it is becoming a prose poem (which we always need more of, in my opinion).
This is a really assured piece of writing that only leaves me wanting more.

I must share my knowledge of an excellent series of dreams. A Philosophy teacher I work with regularly has dreams which are so vivid and long-lasting he wakes up mentally exhausted. They detail him living an entirely separate life, one that he does not even need or want. “I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke. Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man?”

I would also recommend reading Lovecraft. Many of his stories feel like someone is slipping from the real world into a nightmare, and I think his brand of horror would really enrich your imagery. And also, he's just excellent and terrifying. Like a bouncing giggly baby made of spider legs.