Ye all which it inherit, shall dissolve. And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff. As dreams are made on, and our little life. Is rounded with a sleep. Sir, I am vex’d; Prospero, The Tempest
More experimentation, poetic creativity.
I’ve long admired this video - The Illogical Of A Dream Had Taken Over Completely. I added my own “voice” to it and the Goldberg Variations of Bach.
I’ve long pondered the meaning of sleep and by default, “dreams”. I’ve written previously about the possible reasons we do sleep (not at all solved, settled) and will try to find that post (so much gets buried) but here are a few thoughts the role of dreaming might play.
Dreams might be the true home of consciousness. Our lives but temporary holidays and when we die, we just don’t wake up but we are still there in the dream, active in the dream life.
Dreams the materialist would say are our brains practicing. Testing out reality in a safe playing field. It’s why there is illogic in dreams. It’s space for brains to “get it right” while not dying at the same time. By dreams we learn.
Dreams might be how we deal with the emotional conflict of our real lives. Letting off steam. Release. A mental bowel movement. Psychologists espouse this theory.
Years ago, I went through a very disturbing but creative period of my life. I was living downtown Toronto. Teaching. Eking out a living. Running long every day.
I started having these weird episodes where I would be doing something and then all of a sudden I was startled, I knew I was in the middle of something I’d already dreamt. A “deja vu” of a dream. This mental glitch and jolt only lasted for a moment. Then, it was gone. I could not remember it.
This kept happening. All of a sudden, I knew what I was experiencing was a scene, an episode from a dream prior. I became better at remembering these instances, eventually recording many over a year period in a huge notebook. Along with these descriptions, I wrote about the research into this “lucid remembering” and how so many others have experienced the same. Wordsworth was the most notable in this instance. He experienced himself in his prior dream and cautioned - “Don’t speak of these things.”
It’s a scary thing. Having such a strong feeling that you have dreamed a future moment in time. Scary because it begs the reality of determinism, that the future is fixed, planned, knowable. All contrary to our beliefs. For good reason too - and maybe that is why we have such a hard time remembering our dreams … dreams can foretell a future that we aren’t supposed to know.
There are some Tibetan monks who undergo strict practice and training in lucid dreaming. Through practice, they become very good at lucid dreaming and holding the line between the waking and the dream world. Much like Borges and his Dreamtigers. The monks do this because they believe the afterlife is a dream world and this ability will help them immensely once in the dream world. It will help them keep grounded once there.
Dreams, the stuff life is made of … Next post, will have to write a few words about John Berryman - writing this made me think of his Dream Songs and Henry.
Why?
Why do we awake from sleep?
Why not rest in dream's soft keep
And let heaven fill?
With creatures less despised?
Why do all things slowly rot?
Why live if only then to die?
Why are some fools and others not?
Why don't real men cry?
Why am I me - not him?
Why's the sun bright, not dim?
Why doesn't nothing exist?
Why can't we resist,
The clock's consistent commands?
Why is one plus one two - not three?
Why does shit happen - to me?
Why is fire hot, not cold?
Why is it we grow old
And celebrate our own demise?
Enfin. Why not?
Life The Illogical Dream