Jung, Dreams, not that Dreams

People dream, animals dream too. Maybe dreams is what we have in common with them.

I am reading Carl Jung’s book Man and His Symbol sort of chipping at it page by page during my class breaks or as the opportunity permit, not a good way to read though because of fragmentation. Anyway, the book got me thinking about dreams.

 Anyway, I am just sharing a dream (or is it?) that I had when I was in my twenties. Even today I could not forget the experience and though I always tell myself that  I was dreaming then,really, I could not tell.

I was lying on the bed and was listening to a song on the radio. The light was on.  I was staring at the ceiling and enjoying the music. I didn’t know how long I have been doing this. I closed my eyes. I could still hear the music. A little later, I felt my bladder full so I made an effort to stand up, and when I lifted my head, I felt something hit my forehead. I opened my eyes and was shocked to find out that my head hit the ceiling. When I opened my eyes, it was just a few inches away from the ceiling. I didn’t know if I was floating because I was so scared that I didn’t even attempt to take a second look at the ceiling or take a look down; I juts closed my eyes again and didn’t open them until morning.

The problem here was that I didn't feel falling asleep. I never was asleep; I was awake the whole time. 

Dreams are just dreams and most of the time I don’t pay attention to them. The simple explanation that I learned from school and from reading is that dreams are just mental phenomenon or brain activity that happens when we are sleeping. It’s a physiological thing: a way in which our mind processes experiences and impressions— a therapeutic purging activity of the mind.

But there is more to dreams…

Many if not most of our religious beliefs are revealed through dreams. Prophets, seers, mystics…I am not saying that the Bible is false or something but most of its stories especially from the Old Testament have dreamlike qualities in them. The Bible is full of stories about dreams and how God revealed his wills and commandments. Anyway, don’t wanna go in there…

I have experienced or maybe most of us have experienced dreams that foretold what would happen in the future. In fact, one explanation I heard (or read) why there’s this feeling of déjà vu is that somehow the seemingly-repeating events that are experienced came from dreams; déjà vu is re-experiencing these dreams. People do experience dreams that foretell, in part or in whole, what will happen in the future (prophetic or specific) it may be  as simple as meeting people, finding lost things, to big events like winning lotteries or painful experiences like losing something or someone. Of course, rationally, these things are explained as co-incidences or chances because it is difficult to accept how dreams, which are mere mental (or brain) activity could somehow violate the law of physics; Dreams are confined by matter (brain), space, and the sequence, as we experience it, of time.

Well, anyway my break is up…I'll come back to this when I have the time :-)