These Dreams . . .

Y'all, I had the most surreal experience several days ago.

In a book I was reading, the author described a recurring dream he had had . . . a recurring dream he said a lot of people have had . . . a recurring dream that I myself have had.

Eep . . . it freaked me out for a moment.

This led to an interesting discussion with my guy about dreams and what they might mean. (But then, do dreams “mean”? I’m not sure that’s an accurate verb there. Maybe they reflect? They signify? No, that’s still kind of “meaning”. Sorry . . . I’m going all Vocabulary Teacher here. Let me get back on track.)

So, here’s the recurring dream: There’s a door in my house that I haven’t noticed or paid attention to before. So, I open it and find a lovely room I didn’t know was there. And in that room, there’s a door or hallway that leads to another room. And there are more rooms . . . maybe stairs . . . maybe more hallways . . . but rooms and rooms and more beautiful rooms . . . some of them ballroom-size, for crying out loud. And I’m looking at all these rooms and getting so excited about what I can do with all this glorious space! And I can’t believe that I never bothered to open that door before and that these amazing spaces I’ve had access to have been wasted all this time.

The author of that book was implying that these dreams were about new aspects of faith that we discover and the possibilities they open up. Maybe. I don’t remember where in my life I was when I was having this dream so often, but yeah. New possibilities. Exciting opportunities I hadn’t been noticing or paying attention to. I’m guessing that’s what the dreams might have been about.

Another recurring dream I was having at about the same time: I open up my closet and find a whole new wardrobe of clothes. LOVELY clothes – stuff that I wouldn’t be fashion-smart enough to pick out for myself. But here they were: enough new outfits to dress me for several weeks. And I was so stinkin’ excited! Again – new possibilities, maybe? New “me’s” to show the world?

Hmmmm.

My guy said he thinks the emotions you are feeling in dreams are important, and I’m guessing he’s right. The fact that I was so excited about my new rooms and new clothes is probably telling. I wish I had been paying more attention to these dreams when I had them. I hope I wasn’t ignoring possibilities God was opening up for me at that time. Or maybe I was hoping for new things that weren’t really there? (I do remember thinking later about all the rooms and considering what a pain in the butt they would be to keep clean. But the clothes – dang, I really wanted them back when I woke up.)

Here’s another dream I had many, many times when I was younger: I’m driving up an overpass or a steep hill (I think sometimes it was climbing the first big ascent of a roller coaster). But I go up and up . . . and when I reach the crest of the hill and the car starts descending, I don’t. I keep going up. I gently rise out of the vehicle I’m in and start to slowly float away, watching the car continue down the slope, the earth and everything on it growing smaller and smaller. I feel like I’m leaving reality, evaporating into nothingness, and I’m scared. Scared enough to make myself wake up so it all goes away.

Multitudes of hmmmms on that one. Many ways to go there.

I don’t have many dreams these days, or if I do, I forget them when I wake up. I wish I wouldn’t. It seems part of my brain is doing business that it might be helpful to have the rest of my brain involved in.