...but I'm not the only one. Some people say they never dream when they sleep, and I've read that isn't true: Everyone dreams many times every night (the average dream lasting only 3-5 seconds) but we remember so few (or none) of our dreams because they're sent straight to our short-term memories. Unless you do something like write the dream down or share it with a friend to transfer the information to your long-term memory, that dream is gone and you may never remember having it at all.
I've done a lot of thinking and even a little writing about dreams over the years--what dreams mean, why I always have the same ones, how to avoid really scary ones...I wonder if this is a topic that is interesting to you? I've heard that it's really fun for us to talk about our own dreams but it isn't all that fun for everyone else listening? I'm not sure anyone really wants to know about my recent dream regarding my neighbor in the buff drinking coffee in his backyard or the one where I'm sorting through tornado rubble in only a towel. :)
I have a couple of recurring dreams, meaning dreams I have had several times throughout my lifetime, and I have to say they are mostly bad, or at least very uncomfortable. I often dream that I am still in high school and I have a volleyball game or track meet to go to and I'm not ready. I've either forgotten my uniform or shoes or I can't remember going to any practices beforehand to train. I haven't played high school sports for 20 years...why would this keep showing up in my subconscious? Another dream I've had a lot (although not in quite a while, now that I think of it) is that my teeth are really chalky and they're crumbling out of my mouth, or they're all loose and if you tapped one they'd all fall out in a sort of domino effect.
I've read that you're likely to have nightmares if the room you are sleeping in is very warm and if you sleep with your arms above your head...I wonder what conditions make for more pleasant dreams? Do you think that what you have in your head right before you fall asleep will come out in your dreams, or do the littlest things from earlier in the day somehow pop up? Do you think you can control your dreams? I have a friend who is into "astral travel," which is, very simply, being able to will yourself to go places in your dreams. She said she could think about checking in on her cousin before she fell asleep and then she'd dream something about her cousin that would let her know how she was doing. She also told me that if you ever see yourself in your dreams, like you're looking down at yourself from above (in video games isn't that the third-person view?) instead of seeing the dream through your own eyes (like first-person in video games?) that you have astral traveled without even trying. Interesting...
There are various books and websites that offer interpretations of dreams and the elements involved. You may or may not find these valid, but you considering dreams and what they might be saying could probably spark numerous writing ideas. Take a look at some of these and see what you think: Dream Dictionary Dream Bible Psychologists World
I hope you've also done some thinking about how dreaming can play into the writing process. Please post a thoughtful comment (a few sentences or so) on this post answering one or more of the following:
...a recurring dream you have
...the worst dream you've ever had
...the best dream you've ever had (PG-13 or tamer :) )
...what you think causes dreams
...books you've read about dreams or dreaming
...if you think dreams are symbolic or have deeper meaning
...what you found in the dream interpretation books/sites
...if you think astral travel or lucid dreaming is possible
...your daydreams or your dream day chart
...your dreams for your future
...if you think dreams could inspire writing for you
...something else connected to dreams?
I've had a recurring dream about moving in with Judah and us missing our alarm to wake up for school, we get stuck in traffic and end up late to school but when we get there its empty because it was a day off
ReplyDeleteI often have dreams of things I find disturbing. Oftentimes, my dreams are horribly vivid and morbid. I know some of it is because I often have intrusive thoughts and disturbing fears, so they pop up in my dreams. I also heard that creative people have more vivid dreams, and I think that is a factor in my vivid dreams
ReplyDeleteAs a sleep deprived minimum wage high school student, a decent rest each night is rare and precious. Every night I go to bed, I try to clear my head of any worries. The best way of doing this, in my opinion, is to be wrapped in a blanket burrito. Perhaps a blanket burrito is a Gen Z kid's dream catcher. If I sleep in such a way, with a pillow pet to cuddle with, I usually sleep like a baby. I also have never had a nightmare in a blanket burrito. Maybe this is the very solution our corrupt society needs to heal its wounds.
ReplyDeleteI wrote about how I cannot remember the most vivid and emotional dreams. It is strange how those dreams influenced behavior and persuaded the way I viewed certain situations yet two weeks later, I do not remember them.
ReplyDeleteThere was a dream I had one night where me and my mom were driving in now whats my car and we witnessed a plane crash in front of our eyes. And we got out of the car and saw a dust cloud that was very visual.
ReplyDeleteMy dreams have always been really weird. Like, I'm in theater and have never had the one where I forget all my lines. My dreams are almost exclusively in first person except for a few odd ones in middle school but that was a weird time anyway. In elementary school, I used to have dreams every night that consisted of a few seconds of the next day from my perspective. And it wasn't ever something important, either. It was like me sitting at my desk or walking through the hallway or opening a door. And I sometimes remembered other dreams that accompanied these, but usually these were the only ones I remembered.
ReplyDeleteI recently noticed how somewhat often dreams occur in the Harry Potter novels. Sometimes it's something completely random like McGonagall playing the bagpipes. Sometimes, it sort of showed the reader what he was thinking or worried about. I remember in the first book, he had a dream about Draco laughing at him and then Draco turned to Snape. Dreams were also used extensively in the fifth book with (kind of a spoiler alert) Harry saw what Voldemort was doing in dreams. I don't know where this is going, but I thought that was interesting.
ReplyDeleteOne recurring dream that I am always having is that there is as bad guy just chasing me for hours and I have all these super powers and I'll just fly and fight this guy until I wake up and they always scare me.
ReplyDeleteI had this dream once where I was brutally murdered by this little girl who I thought was my little sister and each time I died I would restart the dream and she would kill me a different way. I could not run away, my legs felt like they were weighed down. I don't know what kind of issues would cause a dream like that but I wish I could stop them.
ReplyDeleteMy dreams have been super weird lately and I kinda think its because of this weird week. also I keep dreaming about all of the things that ive very worried about lately
ReplyDeleteOne odd dream I had was quite a few years ago i was really into Steven Universe which is a cartoon and I dreamt I went to comicon and met the creator of the show Rebecca Sugar. I dreamt that I met her and told her how much the show meant to me and she explained that she had dealt with so many mental health issues and self esteem issues and that she worries that the show at this point isn't doing enough and that she wants to do more. When I woke up I was confused because she had never expressed this in real life. A year later she said the exact same thing a comicon and announced cartoon networks partnership with dove to do a body positive self esteem project.
ReplyDeleteI usually will not have recurring dreams but I will have dreams over and over again with the same person always being there. Recently I have had dreams several nights in a row about an old friend that I hadn't talked to in a very long time..and then last night they said something to me over facebook out of the blue.
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