Consider dreams- those fanciful stories that arrive, without our bidding, while we sleep. I have been noticing and pondering my dreams for 25 years now, and the longer I study them, the more I am amazed. After all these years they continue to surprise me with their creativity, and with the way they evoke things which had been going on beneath the surface of my consciousness in useful and surprising ways. As my teacher Rev. Dr. Jeremy Taylor was fond of asking “Who writes this stuff?” – because it is surely not our conscious mind, and yet here they are, showing us night after night a prolific creativity outside the light of conscious control.
We humans often think that what we see, hear, feel, and think with our waking mind is all there is. Our dreams hint that even our own psyches hold mysteries we have yet to uncover, parts of ourselves that our conscious, waking minds are not really paying attention to, parts of ourselves that are still emerging, still in formation. There are many theories about what dreams are, and I believe dreams probably have multiple purposes? One role of dreams is as a reservoir of creativity. Dreams help us process our lives without using the rational mind, or in a way that is complementary to the relational mind.
Paying attention to dreams can be a fruitful spiritual practice. Even if you haven’t remembered a dream in years, you might find that you remember a snippet of a dream here or there just because you read this column. If you wake up in the morning with the sense that you have had a dream, be still, don’t fully wake, just allow your conscious mind to go back inside the dream and review it, revisit it. Notice the landscape, notice the colors and how you feel. Have you been to this place before? Have you felt this way before? Jot down a couple of key words once you have revisited your dream.
Just remembering a dream with your conscious mind now and then, letting it accompany you back into waking can offer some insights or new feeling tones or colors to some aspect of your life. Once you are fully awake, think back over the dream and notice if any parts peak your attention, and invite those into your waking day. I once dreamed I had an armful of oranges, and when I woke I was inspired to draw with my orange pencil. I noticed how much that beautiful bright color was missing in our long dark winter, and how just having orange in my life seemed to cheer me up. Another time, when my son was young, I dreamed of a female lion, and happened to have a little figure of one that I put on my desk. It made me think of all the ways I was like a mother lion, fiercely protective of my son. It made me feel powerful at a time I was struggling with the chores and challenges of motherhood.
More details may come back to you in the simple act of writing the dream down. You could keep dreams in your regular journal if you already have a journaling practice or create a special journal just for dreams. Some folks start the day with their cup of coffee at the computer capturing dreams from the night before in a digital journal. Sometimes as we turn our dreams over in our waking minds insights are revealed, but other important insights may be hidden from our conscious minds, and so sharing our dream with an understanding friend can be fruitful.
When I first started exploring my dreams back in seminary, I wrote in my class notebook “I am concerned that my subconscious will not have exciting new messages for me, only things I already know.” But the more I pay attention, I find there really is something new and radically different to be found in dreams, an invitation to use the non-rational part of our minds. Our dreams are a fresh well we can draw from when we are ready to be surprised, when need reassurance that we are more than our thinking minds.
