I’ve always been a big-time dreamer. I have vivid dreams pretty much every night, and lots of times I can remember them. For a long time, I didn’t realize that wasn’t the norm.
There was a period of my adult life when, for various reasons, I was repressing my natural creativity.
Maybe “repressing” is a strong word, but I definitely wasn’t following my calling to write and create. The vivid dreams, though, continued – and even got more movie-like.
It was during my late thirties when I started to crack open my vault of creativity and let it flow. As I go back through my Dream Journals and type up dreams from past years (it’s one of the “personal projects” I’ve been working on), it’s interesting how certain themes seem to weave through my dreamtime life.
Sometimes these dream themes are at the forefront of my consciousness. At other times, they remain steeped in mystery.
Last month I started a year-long course that’s focused on Hermetic magick and alchemy. We’re actively working with our dreams in our alchemical journals. Once again I’m noticing the way my dream life reflects not only my waking life, but what I’m working on creatively.
It’s not a matter of literally dreaming about the things I’m writing (not usually, anyway). It’s more like a feeling of resonance, an ephemeral thread of meaning that’s woven through my waking and dreaming lives. It’s hard to explain. If you’re familiar with the notion of synchronicity, you’ll have a sense of what I’m talking about.
Maybe an example will help.
Dreams often inspire me with strange-seeming images or phrases that then become part of my creative process. Last night in a dream I was described as “quarely brave.” I woke up and wondered what in the world that meant. Was it supposed to be “queerly?” I’m bisexual, so that’s considered queer, right? Kinda?
But no, the word was definitely “quarely.” I looked it up on my phone, and learned that it means “very much, a great deal” and is from the early 19th century. So I was rather brave. But why? Just now, I looked it up again on my laptop, and one of the meanings of “quare” is “remarkable or strange,” in Irish dialect. It’s also a dialectical variant of queer.
The synchronicity piece, in this case, is that my Mom was just looking up some genealogical research she’d done and reminded us (and herself) that some of her mother’s ancestors were from Ireland.
So I’m very brave, in a strange way, at least in my dreams. That’s how my Irish ancestors might have phrased it. Huh.
What does that have to do with my creative process? I’m not sure yet, other than using it as an example in this post. But it’s one of those snippets of things that gets stuck in my mind, tumbling over and over, like a piece of sea glass.
Dreams, magick, the books I read, Tarot cards, conversations, ancestors, the shows I watch. All of these things, and more, inspire my creative process.
At a time in my life when I didn’t identify myself as particularly creative, dreams were my mind’s canvas. The innate creativity that we each possess was determined to shine through.
Even if you don’t usually recall your dreams, they’re still there, underneath the surface. Notice the mood that pervades your space when you first wake up. Discover the threads of meaning.
Let the inspirations of your sacred sleep time become a living part of your waking creativity. Follow the magickal threads, and see where they lead you.
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