The other day I took an hour for my lunch break and found myself wandering to the local dog park. No one was there when I got there. I sat down on a bench and started to soak up the sun. It was not too long before an older man brought his dog Gus to the park, and sat on the bench beside me. I had been daydreaming. I was dreaming of the ocean, soaring above it with wings, dipping my toes in the water and then soaring up towards the sun.
In order to have a conversation with this man, I snapped out of my day dream, only to discover that he is a professor at the local university, and teaches a course in the interpretation of dreams. I was immediately amused at our conversation, and asked what his class entailed.
He has his student keep a dream log, and asks them to log every time they have a dream. The next thing he stated baffled me. He said that many students go the entire semester and are only able to document a handful of dreams.
I am fortunate enough that I have always been a vivid dreamer, eyes open, or eyes closed. It is a belief held close to my heart that we have the choice to dream, and to embrace our dreams, and even to create our dreams. Dreams are wonderful things, good and bad, because there is something to be learned from every one of them. It is through dreams that we can explore unknown territories of the heart and soul, happiness, sadness, truth, fantasy and reality.
What are your favorite dreams? What dreams have you created, and what dreams have you let go? What do your dreams tell you about you?
Most of all, what can you learn from your dreams? Can you inscribe them in your heart, hold the good ones near, and nurture them? Can you take the hard dreams and explore what emotions you need to process, what anger or resentments you need to let go?
Most of all, I encourage you to dream, because dreams create possibilities beyond our imagination.