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Glimpses of Ourselves - CUB IDENTITY
Glimpses of Ourslves
How Dreams Shape our reality
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By Neve Elizabeth
How do dreams impact our lives? What do they mean? These questions have been pondered for centuries, ages even. Ancient civilizations, the Greeks, Vikings, Egyptians- they all believed in dreams being divine gifts and messages from the Gods. But over time, why has the technicality of science dominated the once romantic vision of dreams? This question is almost just as complex.
Dreams offer us opportunities to turn inwards, reflect on certain situations, our inner feelings and subconscious. In the spiritual world, it is strongly believed that dreams are signs for us to interpret, to guide us on the journey of life. Despite most of our dreams being absurd and spectacularly nonsensical, if you look deeper, beyond the surface, you will be able to decipher things that can change the course of your path. While we are awake, we tend to get too distracted to not fully comprehend the signs screaming in our faces. But when we remove the distractions, and drift beyond our physical surroundings, things align in our minds and we can easily connect the dots.
One personal experience of mine happened quite recently, but also months ago. Sitting in my Uni flat with a friend, I suddenly got a surge of De Ja Vu wash over me, so overwhelmingly it made me question everything right there in that situation. Why did I get the feeling like I’ve done this before? Some people believe it’s a sign that you’re in the right place in your life, but depending on the situation others believe it’s a warning. As humans, we tend to live by the socially constructed mantras in our heads, more so than trusting our intuition or our gut feeling. There’s a reason for our stomach’s being the ‘second brain’ of the body. This phenomenon stopped me in my tracks, made me reflect on certain things, and finally clarity washes over me. This being said, these days most believe it’s just an odd feeling we get as humans. So how has our culture over time changed our views on dreams?
The Romantics in particular were deeply criticized for their brilliant imagination during the Revolution of the 18th century. Poets like Blake, philosophers like Rosseau, all fueled the fight against social confinement, and faced aggressive retaliation from those who saw imagination, dreams, threatening. Why do you think Buddhism, one of the oldest religious practices to date, has taken so long to make its place in the Western world?
Long story short, due to it allowing ourselves to break free from the chains we live in, crucially tying us to our social obligations through fear. The same people who ‘reward’ us violate us.
Sovereigns? State leaders? Their aim is to profit from our fears, so they remind us to be scared of not conforming to the lower standards we are expected to live in. You want to change the world? Travel to your hearts desires, live independently? That’s absurd. You’ll never make it in life unless you’re one of the millions of cogs in the social hierarchy machine. Or so they tell us.
How many people do you know who have dreamt of falling? Nearly everyone, I bet. Psychological research concludes this as a fear of being out of control not being dealt with in our physical reality, in any aspect of life. There’s so much depth to dreams and their meanings it’s ridiculous we don’t hear more about it. But if we learned to harness the knowledge within ourselves, our independence from profiting institutions threatens the only thing seen as important to a successfully functioning nation- money.
The basis of Buddhism, or spirituality, is to be deeply grateful for the things we have that are seen as ‘small’ or ‘insignificant’. When we flip our pessimism on its back and start to appreciate small details, our longing for more extravagant things, often materialistic things, dissipate, along with that extra wealth the rich tend to exploit us for. When we romanticize our lives, live how we want to, being truly content with ourselves, who would get plastic surgery? Who would buy that expensive health product to make their hair shinier? Who would be in rehab centres, relying on others to get their life on track? You start to question everything, which is everything they don’t want us doing.
Or perhaps dreams are simply something we experience as humans, our subconscious fantasies playing in our heads to entertain us while we sleep. But after the questions start to be asked, the belief that we are more than our physical being starts to resonate in us. So next time you dream something incredibly unrealistic, ask yourself what it could mean for you. It could alter the course of your life.
