stuck in limbo

ok, so I have a dream to report from last week that I haven't entered yet, but first, I want to talk about what happened last night.

I was sort of having a fitful time falling asleep (due to some coffee I had had too close to bed), so I was having a number of short snippets of dreams divided by a time of semi-awareness/awakeness. Well anyway, one of these dreams was relatively insignificant and not worth relaying to you due to its boring content... except for the fact that it led to a strange condition. I will now try to describe it.

So as I said, the dream itself was rather boring. I dreamed I was in an airplane that had just taken off, and I was a bit apprehensive about it since the plane was shakier than it should be. (I think this represents all the stress I've had lately with booking hostels, flights, trains, and buses for my travel break coming up.) Anyway, I look out the window of the plane and notice that there are those green highway signs up in the sky... just sort of suspended in the air. The signs themselves are pretty conventional--they tell you how far away cities are--but what is not normal is the fact that nothing is really holding them up. I checked to see if there was some long pole beneath it or a string tied above it that suspended from something (not that that would make a whole lot of sense), but there were no supports.

It was at this point that I became aware that I was dreaming because I knew that it was impossible for these signs to just float up there. I think I was only able to recognize this as a dream and not to just go along with it as usual because something in the real world started making noise and that noise pulled me back into the more counscious and waking state. I decided that this noise--since it didn't correspond with my dream--must be happening in the real world, and I began to think that perhaps someone was stealing the bike that was parked directly under my slight ajar bathroom window! But the thing was, I found myself stuck in the dream world... there was a span of time in which I had decided to get up to investigate, but I physically couldn't! It was the strangest sensation. I literally couldn't bring myself to get out of bed even though I wanted to. It felt like I was paralyzed. Then I realized that perhaps I should start small, and first willed my toes to wiggle (because that's how they check to see if you're paralyzed, right?) . So yeah... after a few seconds of really working at it, I finally was aware that my toes were moving, and I started to leave the dream world. Little by little, I regained control over my body--first the toes, then my feet, then my legs, and finally my arms. I then was fully in the waking world and was able to get up and go to look out the window. (Luckily, I did not see anyone there because I'm not sure what I would have done if I had.)

Yeah, so what the heck was that all about?? What a strange transition period it is between waking and dreaming! In my experience, it was a rather helpless state in which at least part of my normal consciousness had returned, but my brain had not yet woken up and taken control of my CNS and my body. This if anything seems to be evidence that your counsciousness is not necessarily directly affiliated with your brain... or at least not with the normal, everyday-functioning part. The two seem to be able to act independently of each other. Interesting. I think I will able to take this somewhere and develop this upon further reflection.

Dreaming 101

The concept of the dream is fascinating.
Some people argue that dreams exhibit your innermost desires,
some go all psycho-analytical and would argue that dreams delve into and reveal the subcounscious,
some people consider a dream to be associated with a big goal or an innovation,
some people think dreams are completely random,
some beleive dreams are prophetic,
some believe dreams are just plain crazy
some people don't think they dream at all.

I read somewhere that the inability to distinguish dreams from reality is a sign of madness. If so, what does this say about dreaming? Should the world of dreams be separated and segregated from the 'real world' or the waking world? That seems like a dangerous thing to me.

Of course it's fun to think about the idea that our dreaming and waking lives are possibly mixed up or not what they seem. For instance, are you dreaming now as you read this or am I dreaming now as I type this? Is life all just one big dream? Why do even the most far-fetched and ridiculous dreams seem to make sense at the time and only gradually become laughable when relayed to a third party? Why is it that sometimes I have dreams within my dreams? Why is it ok to dream at night but not during the day?

What is lost between sleeping and waking and how can we explain this loss?

hmm well I started this blog to examine these questions and hopefully to give me a place to post both my dreams and different ideas and quotes associated with dreaming. Perhaps I'll even post some art every now and then... or pictures of my dream world. If you have something to contribute, please do.