You are the Dreamer

God grant me the serenity

To accept the things I cannot change,

The courage to change the things I can,

And the wisdom to know the difference.

–Reinhold Niebuhr

Last Sunday I shared how using Life is a But a Dream as a mantra the night before led me to a receptive state so that my inner guidance could communicate with me about stopping my habit of drinking soda. Then a few nights later, after having stayed away from sodas but thinking I could still drink IZZE drinks (carbonated natural fruit drinks), guess what? I dreamed I was drinking one of these then read the label; it said SODA in big letters on the front of the bottle. I poured out the rest in my dream and woke with chagrin. No more fooling myself; if I want this inner help, I need to follow it!

So here’s a technique many use, called the “15 times technique”. Write out a positive affirmation fifteen times every day. Let’s try this with our weekly Life Metaphor:

“Life is But a Dream”

Life is but a dream

Life IS but a Dream

LIFE is but a dream

Life is but a DREAM

Life is but a dream

Life is BUT a dream

Life is but A dream

LIFE IS BUT A DREAM

life is but a dream

Life Is But A Dream

LIFE… is but a DREAM

life IS BUT a dream

Life is but a Dream

Life… is… but… a… Dream!

What does this statement evoke, for you?  For me, it opens a realm of unlimited freedom and possibility. As in a nightly dream, all things are possible in your waking dream as well.  As some nightly dreams recur–but can change as we alter our awareness—our daily life reveals patterns of thought and behavior that we  can also change by becoming more aware or mindful of our recurring attitudes and habitual behavior.

 

As YOU are the DREAMER of your own life, you have the license and the responsibility to change or improve what you can. So, take stock of where your current waking dream is taking you.  Where would you like it to lead?  Dream it and it can BE!

I welcome your comments and stories!

Change Your Dream, Change Your Life

So, what is your current dream-life about? What story does it tell? Who are you in your current story? Who are others? What messages does your dream express? If you were to interpret this dream, what might you learn?

One consideration based on the metaphor Life is a Dream is to ask, Where is this dream leading to; how might this dream story end?

A common dream technique (mentioned in The Art of Spiritual Dreaming, by Harold Klemp) is to wake up from a dream and if you don’t like where it was going or how it ended, go back to sleep to finish it better, or simply use your imagination or journaling to alter the ending of your dream more to your satisfaction. This may help you to feel better throughout your day rather than carrying around tense feelings from your dream.

But think about this: if you can change how a nightly dream develops or ends, you can do this with your waking dream, too!  Simply reflect on a situation in your day to day life that is not going as you would like and apply your imagination to creatively envision how you could handle the situation differently and better.  You can also use internal dialogue with someone you are having an issue with, changing how you might normally interact with or speak to that person.

If you can DREAM or envision a more positive outcome, you can act consciously to bring that about, or at very least you can learn to respond better to how the situation needs to be. It is important that you are empowered with this approach; you can take the responsibility to alter your own attitude or behavior in a manner that allows the outer situation to change. For remember, you are the Dreamer!

Have you had an experience in your life where you have been able to change the outcome of a ‘stuck’ or a habitual situation? Standing back from your life-dream to reflect upon what is happening, as if “life is but a dream” you can interpret, can offer you the distance to apply a more mindful solution; your “recurring dream” can thus be resolved!

Recognizing that your waking consciousness is only qualitatively different from your dreamstate helps to strengthen the link between your conscious and sub-conscious awareness, so you can become more receptive and accepting of important messages coming to you from within. 

I invite your comments and stories!

Life Is…But a Dream

Row, Row, Row Your Boat

Gently Down the Stream

Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily

Life is But a Dream

This verse, with such a lilting melody that English speaking children have heard and sung since childhood, carries a profound truth. Is our waking reality any more substantial than a nightly dream or daydream? Our everyday reality as we perceive it has a quality of projection to it, so that the coherence we perceive is constructed rather than real; it is a mapping of our experience according to conceptual systems that we develop through socialization and language acquisition processes. Language sorts our perceptions according to cultural categories and habitual experience. Even our sense of Self, of who we are as persons over a life course, is constructed by the brain or Mind, weaving together disconnected moments as a seamless stream of consciousness, even though with multiple threads of attention and attitudes—including archetypal MULTIPLICITY–our sense of self could more accurately be described as diverse and disjoint or multiplex.

So, Life IS but a Dream! Such potentials open up with this awareness, so long as we learn to recognize how bound we can become to fixed ideas and habitual, self-limiting behaviors and beliefs.  Since life is a dream, we can change our life by altering our perceptions and attitudes. We might just as well MANIFEST that which we intend to realize, being cause via our mindful choices rather than the effect of our responses to others’ choices, for instance.

Since Life is But a Dream, then you might just as well dream deeply and dream BIG.

How is your life like a Dream? Is it a “dream come true”?  Would you change anything about your life if you could? How might you choose to alter your waking dream life?

You can work on little things as well as big things in modifying any fixed elements or patterns you have established by recognizing these and choosing to implement changes. For example, last week while in a contemplative, “receptive” mode at night, I had an impulse that told me I could “save nine years” of life by no longer drinking soda drinks. It was a very clear impression, so I made an inner agreement and have not imbibed a soda since, nor do I intend to any more. This one slight adjustment to patterns I have established in this life-dream scenario could make a big difference down the road.

Since life is but a dream and YOU are the Dreamer, this opens opportunities for LUCID awareness that empowers you to create the life you choose to live in every aspect, moment by moment as well as on the largest canvas.

Good Dreaming to you!