Dreams

Everyone dreams. Or, so I have heard and read. Some probably do not accept that as fact. No matter. Science can most likely prove it yet, cannot prove the value, meaning or purpose of dreams. There are many a group or school of thought about it but nothing as tangible as “this is your liver, this is what your liver does for you and this is how it does it”.

Good old black and white.

Depending on who you ask, your dreams are very meaningful things. They can tell you about your life. What you have left undone and that which you have accomplished. Got trauma? Got fear? Got love?  Your dreams can let you know.

Someone out there has given just about everything a meaning when it occurs in a dream. Going up, going down. Oranges, apples. Dressed, undressed. Teeth in, teeth falling out. Each and everything is trying to tell you something about you. If, of course, you choose to believe that group. I could find no definition for a talking giraffe or a nude Barbara Walters.

Others are more mechanical about it. It is just the brain sorting and storing memories. Classifying and filing events and things learned from the day. A way the body protects its sleep time, providing an outlet for emotions that might otherwise wake us up. Again, what do you choose to believe?

I hear of people dreaming about other people they know. I have heard of dreams that included me! It is fairly uncommon for me to dream about people I know. If I do and, am able to recall it, it is usually quite out of context for that person. I have come to realize I am a better person in others dreams than I am to them awake. I am worthy in their dreams, unlike their day-to-day lives. I am who they expected me to be, want me to be in their dreams.

There are also those ‘dreams’ that are more like fantasies. The things you think about when awake. The great big day dreams about what the future will be like. Those visions created out of hope and want. Something to live for, strive for, succeed for.  What happens when you wake up from those dreams?

You can wake up from a real dream and whatever emotion it was creating in you will quickly disappear. Replaced by the needs of the day. Getting ready for this or that. Rushing or lounging.  Making crazy wonderful love. Pondering why you are alone.

What is to be done with, about the other kind? The thing about those waking dreams is how easy it is to access them. Review, refine, relive at any moment that you need some motivation or inspiration to go on. They are very much like the air you breath that gives strength enough to take just one more step. No need to sleep. Like a shot of life, reason or purpose. You just flash that vision through your mind and you can go on.

What happens when, wide awake, you find yourself wide-eyed and without a dream anymore? When the thing that was all you had to keep trying for is no longer there? Day dreams are usually to big and amazing to really come true but, just to try to get close. That is enough to keep trying. If you can just hold on long enough, keep at it one more day, not give up on it.

What happens when the act of breathing, the real physical act of breathing becomes a chore, no longer meaningful in any way? Can one dream really be that important? Can anything really be that important?

For me the answer must take into account how many times I have had that crushing experience already. Everyone is more devastating than the last. Like the spider that tried over and over again to rebuild its web across a walkway. Each time the web is smaller, weaker, more shabby than the last. Each time it is less and less effective at providing for the spider until, the spider dies of hunger. It dies trying to rebuild its web in the same place.

For me the answer is yes. Yes, one dream can be that important. One dream can mean everything. When there is only so much hope, so much energy, so much spirit left that only one more dream can be supported, that last dream means everything.

Trying to live without it, is like the spider trying to live without the web. Impossible.

A V