I finished the first part of the book "The Sleep Revolution" this past week...
The last chapter of the section was about Dreams... it was by far the most inspirational to me.
Here are a few of the favourite quotes from that chapter.
"The dream is a little door in the innermost and most secret recesses of the soul." -Carl Jung
A Jungian analyst Pittman McGehee told Arianna Huffington,
"Carl Jung saw the unconscious as a wellspring of creativity and conduit for the divine. He called the dream a 'voice of God.' If one pays attention to one's dreams, one can use the dream for a vehicle for transformation."
"God has given you dreams to show you your inner state." -Rumi
Adrianna shared the story of how Larry Page had a dream. He woke up and and was thinking, what if we could download the whole web, and just keep the links and... he grabbed a pen and started writing. Sometimes it is imperative to wake up and stop dreaming... and he turned it into Google.
"When a really great dream shows up, grab it!"
I know that I have had the wrong mindset on sleep, and this book has got me onside for doing some long overdue changes. I've always said that I don't need as much sleep as most people... WRONG! For years Shirley has told me we cannot have TV running all night... or even have a TV in the bedroom. So for over two weeks now we have shut off the TV in the bedroom... and I'm trying to sleep seven hours. Not easy for me... but I'm really trying to do it... and doing much better.
And last night was the first time for a long time that I have had dreams. I can't remember how long... but I seldom have had any dreams... and last night I had at least three or four dreams.
In my first dream I was driving my car... and apparently too fast. The man beside the road motioned me to stop... but he wasn't in a police uniform, so I just kept on driving and beetled out of town, hoping to avoid any flashing red and blue lights. It seemed like I was successful. The shot above happened at least six years ago, when I was not as lucky... that was south of Bellingham.
My second dream involved food. We had sampled some very tasty meat substitute. Shirley sourced the product, but it was not available unless one bought a 20-day package that included a variety of other products we had not yet sampled. That didm't make any sense.
Next dream happened in the Loma Linda Market. There were some super sized fruits for sale for only one dollar each. What a deal! We bought a single pear that was over 10" high for $1.00. As I was walking out I noticed a very attractive cordless phone on the counter in a charger. No one was around at the time so I picked it up. As I started to leave, a lady came out and saw me with the phone and asked if I would like a bag for it. None of that makes any sense to me... I wouldn't steal anything.
Then there was another dream... we were driving around and saw a new subdivision going in. The roads were done, but housing had not started yet. As we were leaving I noticed outside the subdivision some lifts of lumber and 2 x 4's on a flat wide spot beside the road... it wasn't in the new subdivision. Thought nothing of it at the time.
A week later we came back and someone had taken all the lumber and made the most creative idea of a house I have ever seen. Walls were not made using normal framing methods with a bottom plate and double top plate with studs on 16" centres. The studs were nailed together on the flat and not making a solid vertical wall, but they fanned out in a very pretty pattern. I don't remember seeing a square room in the whole building. The structure had no concrete foundation... and there was no roof yet. It was craziest kind of structure I've ever seen. It was like someone who had no experience in construction said, "I'm going to build a place without those boring straight walls." I wish I could have a picture of the structure I saw in my dream. It was like nothing I have ever seen before. Wild stuff! There is no way anyone in this part of the world could ever get a permit to do that kind of thing, let alone pass any inspections!
Then we drove further where the subdivision was and they had just started to build houses already. Same old boring stuff that we are used to seeing. Concrete foundations and square, plumb walls with standard windows and doors. After seeing that creative house, this seemed so disappointing to me.
As I started to wake up I found myself thinking about retaining walls. My sleep and my dreams were over. I was in the real world again.. looking forward what my next night of dreams might yield. Is there a way that one might influence what he dreams about?
The author of the Sleep Revolution book suggests:
"In what area of your life would you like to receive guidance? What question would you like answered? Word your question carefully and precisely, write it down, and focus on it as you drift off to sleep."
Some may see this as getting very close to how prayer works. I know that to pray about things I want guidance in allows me to...
"Let go and let God."
It's really great that you can remember these dreams so vividly, Pa. Fun to read through. I especially liked the construction one.
ReplyDeleteSo here's the on I had just this morning before I woke up: There were four birds. Two were normal (but big normal) birds, one a bald eagle and one a hawk. They were in the air fighting. Along came two even bigger birds--not anything you'd be able to identify, but something mythological like a dragon bird or something. But not really scary. The bigger birds each came and took a side with the eagle and the hawk--it was obvious that the eagle was old, and being picked on by by the hawk. The big bird with the eagle put its wings around it in the air and flew it over to the side of a road (which remarkably looked like right by our mailbox) where it landed next to an even older bird, and the two of them touched beaks. It seemed that the eagle was coming to say goodbye as the older bird looked REALLY old. And to add to the weirdness, a parade of Native Americans were marching by, chanting.
Have you ever watched Longmire? It's a sheriff/Native American/small town show set in Wyoming. Pretty dark stuff, lots of NA supernatural imagery and concepts. I've really liked most of it--I think you can find it on Netflix, down here anyway. All that is to say, the dream had a very Longmire feel to it.
OK, where's Freud for that one? Really interesting stuff. I immediately got up and went to find Alan (who's been up for awhile, I slept in!) to tell him so that I wouldn't forget.