OtherThanThat

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Okay. I admit it. I can be a teensy bit stubborn.

While I prefer to think of it as my being of the “educational variety” – meaning that I best absorb information slowly over a period of time – the truth is that sometimes holding on to old ideas just feels easier than letting go and trusting that there’s a net to catch me. This being the case, it probably shouldn’t be a surprise that the Universe opts to pepper (and occasionally hammer) me with things that are on the short list of things to absorb.

Case-in-point, the last few years have been a steady bass line on the general musical theme of things happening for a reason. Over the last couple of weeks that bass line has gone up tempo. There’s a post I’ve had percolating for a while about the tectonic shift in my life back in 2011 that began the journey, but that’s going to have to wait a while longer in the interest of my getting this one committed to digital bits while I’m motivated.

This one is about premonitions and dreams.

As I sat sipping my coffee and perusing the New York Times this morning, this article caught my eye. I’ve always been one who firmly believed that within our dreams lie moments of truth and guidance. The trick is remembering them. The other trick is interpretation.

Setting pen to paper the moment I awake serves as an amazing catalyst to remembering my dreams. Led to this practice after reading Julia Cameron’s book The Artist’s Way, my “morning pages” began as a sloppy scrawl of miserable musings. Eventually the looped comments about how stupid it was to be writing down things I couldn’t even read because the writing was so messy gave way to flashes of memory of dreams that had come the night before.

What began as a trickle gave way to a stronger current of dream state meandering ranging from the mundane (sitting and having coffee with a long-lost friend talking about seemingly nothing at all) to the surreal (action-packed film clips of flying, fighting off terrorists and leading groups of survivors from earthquake shattered buildings). I began to look forward to these writing stints, to see what the excavation process would unearth from my subconscious.

And then there’s interpretation.

I’m a pretty literal person and so found myself going to these dreams hoping for direct answers as though the universe might answer my plea for clarity or understanding about something that was on my mind.

No such luck.

Certainly there were some instances where a dream had pretty direct correlation to something going on in my life, but for the most part, the ephemeral experiences in this alternate world were occasionally parables. More often they were obscure metaphors.

The truth is that when it comes to interpreting anything, whether dreams or even conversations and experiences in waking hours, most people see and hear what they want to see and hear. Or as my father often said, there are three sides to every story. I may well interpret something as leading to a result that I desire, when the truth is that the lesson that lies underneath is something far greater.

In the months leading up to my decision to shift my career and make the move to Vegas, my dreams were sprinkled liberally with images of literal tectonic shifts and Mercurial changes. In the days and months since that time, the drastic shift parts of changed, evolving to more steady and consistent streams. Over the last several weeks however, the dreams have gone dark, almost a white noise sort of hum. The last time I had that experience was just before my major changes in 2011. It was as though my subconscious was trying to cushion things for me since the day-to-day decisions I was making were so monumental that it didn’t want to muddy the waters.

I know, however, that in that dream state clarity resides and so a fresh notebook by the bedside, a renewed effort to morning pages will begin tomorrow. Once the complaining scrawls give way to recollection I’ll be sure to share.