My dream last night

I had an incredibly vivid dream last night. This is the second time that I have posted about a dream that I had and I may keep them coming from time to time when I have one that really stands out. This was my first dream post, this is my second. I also used this picture of street art from Brazil on my last one as I felt the art was as crazy as dreams can be. Crazy and limitless in potential.

I actually had two dreams, but I have managed to forget one before being able to blog about it. The one I remember was incredibly real. I was so present in the dream, it wasn’t a lucid dream but I felt I was making the thoughts that I was thinking and not just being a passenger or an audience member to the dialogue.

I was at work in the hotel. Now our hotel has both temporary guests and permanent residents, the top four floors are owned by residents. This was also true in the dream, however the layout of the hotel differed slightly. I was made aware of this in the dream after some temporary guests were unable to get to their floor. It turned out that the guests got into the wrong elevator- the one dedicated to permanent residents- so their key card would not work. This is factually true, the keys wouldn’t work. However the guests would not have been able to access the elevator at all as they need a pass to get through a glass door. This door wasn’t in the dream and I asked myself why. This is what is so fascinating about dreams, they are a completely new world that we find ourselves in but don’t often realise until we wake. Sometimes we do realise whilst in the dream. We realise we are experiencing a reality that isn’t reality. Very Matrix like, and I imagine that I was pulling the face that DiCaprio’s character did in Inception.

I then remembered that I left my desk unattended to assist these guests. My run back to the front desk had me jumping over chairs and around tables that would not be there if I was to run in my real job. There was a kids party going on also, so it seems like my brain installed a restaurant or some kind of venue in the middle of the hotel for whatever reason. Whilst I was running I remember truly feeling like I was running. I could feel the plastic of the chairs I was pushing out the way. I could feel the world and it wasn’t hazy. I could hear the kids laughing as I was dodging them playing. It was all very present as were my senses.

Once I got back, this is when the dream really showed a dreams true potential. The weird section that can only really take place in a mind whilst asleep or under the influence of hallucinogens. Actually this is pretty tame for someone that has just taken mushrooms I would imagine, please let me know if you can confirm this. I would love to say I have tried them but I haven’t.

The automatic doors into the lobby from outside were swapped with one single, black door that resembled a door that should be on the front of a house. There were some loud bangs on this door. I couldn’t see outside, and it wasn’t too long before I realised what the bangs were. A guy burst in using a wheelbarrow. Of all things, a wheelbarrow. Immediately I knew it was a robbery and conveniently I had the till drawer right in front of me. To make the situation even more strange, he didn’t have a gun. He had a drill. This drill was held to my head and I handed him the money. He took the money, however he didn’t take the drill from my head. The dilemma here was that he kept shouting demands, however I could not understand what he was saying. He kept shouting louder and with increasing anger, not helping the fact that I couldn’t understand what he was saying. It was then that I decided to fight back and take the drill. I was able to grab it from his hands and he backed off slightly. He maintained eye contact and looked like he was still willing to fight.

And just like the end of an episode, it ended there.

I woke up and have no idea how the rest of this dream would play out. Did I wake up because my adrenaline was pumping? Does adrenaline flow during a dream? Maybe my brain was becoming too active to remain in a sleeping state. I don’t know. What I do know is dreams are too fascinating to not think about or speak of. It is another mystery in life that just begs for our curiosity and an increase in knowledge.

If I can remember a dream, I will easily spend the whole day thinking about it. Life is too short and there are too many mysteries. Our brain, the thing that tries to evaluate mysteries, contains many mysteries. We are a mystery trying to analyse itself, and that is incredible.

 

Are we more awake when dreaming?

I had a dream last night, thankfully a fun one. Often after waking up from such a dream I question the difference between reality and dreams. If I can smell and touch and run and feel, how different is it to being there in real life? I guess the only difference is we wake up and say ‘yeah, that wasn’t real’. But what if the day comes in which we wake from this one? It really isn’t much crazier to think.

In this dream I was at a festival called Lolapalooza, which is a real festival. So far my dream has fact checked with reality, a great start. It was set on a beach, the crowd pinned between the stage barriers and the crashing waves in warm temperatures. In the sea, a very long wooden float consisting of multiple floats to reach far out into the depths. On the horizon to the right (turning your head to 2 o’clock) a skyline of huge skyscrapers. To help with the scene, whilst I have my morning coffee I have created an incredibly realistic and in depth artists impression.

Paint can make anyone look like da Vinci.

So there I was, watching the Foo Fighters (a band I have always wanted to see) at a place I cannot even remember buying tickets for. Or flying to. Or how the hell I afforded it. Not that I care when Dave Grohl was in front of me, I was in awe. Suddenly, he ran through the crowds and straight onto the float (a logistical nightmare come to think of it) and right to the very end of it being the rock star that he is.

There are a few reasons as to why I believe I had this dream. One, I watched the Foo Fighters on YouTube last night performing, rather bizarrely, ‘Never gonna give you up’ with Rick Astley on vocals. Once again, how can I be expected to believe this life is real with these kind of mash ups happening?

Secondly, whilst looking through photos yesterday to add to my blog, I found a picture from a Cage the Elephant gig I attended a couple years back. The photo isn’t great so I won’t upload it. However I also watched them perform live on YouTube earlier this month, the gig was at Lollapalooza Chicago. Maybe that was the skyline I was looking at, as Chicago does have a great one. This is the shot that I am thinking about. I remember trying really hard to get Dave in the shot whilst he was walking out over the sea with the skyscrapers in the background, a little similar to this one.

Maybe I have a desire to see the Foo Fighters in Chicago, I certainly wouldn’t turn that offer down.

I find it incredibly fascinating that our dreams are mysterious and always alternating. They are begging for a little detective work to be done when we first open our eyes and realise we weren’t actually there at the time. It is crazy that I don’t know my own dreams, and that I have to figure out what was meant in the dream used by the same brain used to type this post. Am I sharing this headspace? It seems so considering how little I know myself at times.

The thing with dreams is, unless it is a lucid dream (a whole other world) it is only after waking that we know we were asleep. When we are awake we can look back and analyse. We can stop in our tracks and consider reality and question everything around us… If we really want to in this limited time we have to do so.

Too many people don’t. I know that there are things I don’t question because I don’t know they are there to question. I know there are things that I don’t know that I don’t know. When I look around, there are plenty of people that seem to not question life at all. That are born, go to school, then university, then get a career, then marry and have kids, pay bills and worship every Sunday until one Sunday doesn’t come. Of course there is beauty in such a life, as long as that life wasn’t carried out because it was seen as a life we are expected to live, a huge checklist that we have to tick off to be considered ‘normal’ and accepted. Sometimes I start getting deep into a topic and get strange looks. As if the universe and the infinite capabilities with it are odd things to think about. Do you ever get the strange look or eye rolling when you bring up something you are passionate about, such as the afterlife or the nature of dreams, as if reality TV is the only thing you could mention that would pass as acceptable conversation? I have, and when I receive strange looks I imagine that I am talking about the real world to a North Korean. Receiving a confused look doesn’t mean your question was a bad one, but that you are expecting an answer from someone that didn’t realise there was even such a question in the first place.

If you do feel weird for having a passion for something outside of supposed ‘normality’ keep feeling weird, for nature is weird and the moment we stop thinking nature is weird, we have stopped looking.

Featured image by Sabri Tuzcu on Unsplash

Dreams

After waking up today I looked for this photo. I have no idea what was in the mind of the street artist during this piece but it is one I remember more than most. Whether or not there is method to the apparent madness, I may never know.

I woke up, wide awake at 3am this morning and realised how many dreams I was having. My mind was incredibly active despite the fact that I have now forgotten most of what I was dreaming. It felt like a conveyor belt of different scenarios, a roller-coaster taking me through new scenes that my mind is conjuring up on the spot. Did you ever play video games in the 90’s/ early 00’s? The way city landscapes only appeared/ generated as you got closer to them? I guess we never know what we are getting into until we arrive.

I also felt like I discovered a whole new level of this thought machine we know so little about, like looking under a plank of wood and seeing a whole army of ants doing their own thing without our acknowledgement. When I woke it felt like I remembered something that I shouldn’t, like kids caught playing when they should be in bed. My brain was just farting out all kinds of weird, wacky, colorful situations that I have no option but to watch as I restore my energy. Although it has almost completely vanished from memory, I know it happened. Sometimes this reality terrifies me, other days it astounds me.

It is hard to believe that I am using my brain to analyse my brain and come to the conclusion that I do not know everything about it. Despite the fact that it is still me. It is pretty incredible that this is our reality.

Do you get so deep in thought about your own life experiences? I guess we all do to an extent. Maybe the art above is just a direct copy of what the artist was thinking just before his or her morning coffee. What is seemingly nonsensical during the day may make complete sense every night, we just forget about it most of the time.