I think dreams are fascinating. I’ve had some terrifying or downright depressing dreams, but I’ve also had the most wonderful, life-affirming dreams. When you dream you can experience such pure emotions. When your imagination really lets loose you can have the most bizarrely entertaining or kickass experiences.
A couple of months, almost a year ago, I was in a very depressed mood. I was just feeling so blank and tired all of the time. But one night I had a really amazing dream where I felt like God was talking to me. I don’t remember what exactly was said, but I was like given instructions and I followed them even though I didn’t really see the point to them (it was strange, it involved dancing on a log ^^;). It was a short experience, but vivid. I felt soft, cool, lightness envelop me and I felt so loved. Like everything was going to be okay. This was big a comfort to me and helped me out of my isolation. I just really appreciated how God seemed to come through for me when I really needed it.
I’ve been reading a little about lgbt people’s experiences, and it’s interesting to me how some people didn’t really know they were gay for a long time, sometimes after marriage and having kids. Looking back on my own experiences, I can sort of see why that would be. I think there were crushes on girls that I’ve had but just sort of put out of my mind. It was there but I didn’t really acknowledge it or think about what it was. If it weren’t for some dreams that I’ve had, maybe I would be one of those people who don’t realize they’re gay until later in life.
At first, it was very disconcerting. Often in my dreams I’m not physically myself. My POV switches around a lot or I’m like…some other character or person. But I started having dreams where I was a guy, and I would make out (or go further) with a girl. These experiences were like…hazy, but I had this idea of what was going on. During the dream I would feel really uncomfortable and kind of sick, but for some reason I’d keep going. I was so confused when I would wake up. Did I want to be a guy? I didn’t think so…it felt so wrong but why did it keep happening? I think that because I still felt like homosexuality was wrong my subconscious was sort of trying to reconcile my attraction with those beliefs. Sort of like I thought that I could make out with girls if I was a guy.
After I started considering the idea that I liked girls, I had some dreams where I was myself and would flirt and be affectionate with girls. I stopped having dreams where I was a guy. These new dreams were very nice, but sadly don’t happen very often.
I’m writing about this now because I had another one of these dreams last night. But it was much too short 
. I was in like a car, maybe a cab, and a girl was sitting next to me. She smiled and we kissed…it was all so sweet and tender. She was so soft. In all of those other dreams I’ve had it’s been sort of hazy, but this was so vivid. When I woke up I could still feel those lips on mine. I felt like I was falling in love. This is why I love dreams so much…how special it is to be able to feel love like that even when it’s not been in your waking life. You can trigger lust with porn, but you can’t really replicate love. Agh. I’m a bit (romantic)love-starved I guess.
I feel like I haven’t experienced a whole lot. I guess I’m young though, so there’s plenty of time. Dreams give me a taste of what is out there, and I’m excited to experience these things.
To whoever reads this, please share your favorite dreams :]
July 23, 2008 at 11:00 pm
To start with – there’s clearly a part of my brain that, without my knowing, snuck out one night and started reading Boy’s Own Adventure Magazines from the 50s, because that’s the best way of describing a lot of my dreams. Plus, I’m a complete fantasy geek, so throw in a whole lot of mythic elements, magic, different worlds and weirdness as a matter of course. I also experience exactly the same POV/gender switch that you describe (including the romantic stuff), with the further development that often in my dreams, I’m not only a totally different person, but I know I look different, answer to a different name, have whole made-up sets of memories, families, friends – it’s pretty awesome.
With that in mind, one of my favourite dreams ever involved fighting in a slave rebellion on a floating space-station. Near the end, I fell off a moving platform, out through the sort of protective force-bubble that was surrounding the works and into the universe, where I had an epiphany: my vision drew back, and I realised that the entire cosmos existed in the eye of a giant seal. As in, marine mammal. It was pretty amazing. Quite recently, I dreamed about jumping between two alternate universe-versions of the same day, trying to figure out which one was better while getting constantly confused as to which elements had changed while I’d been in the other one. And about a year ago, I had a fantastically real dream (when I was, in real life, very worried) where I fell out of a car crash into this gorgeous park, crawled under a tree and coughed up all the gunk that had been bothering me – and under the tree was another version of me, and another version of my husband, dressed in white and glowing a bit, who told me I’d come to the tree of peace, and that everything would be all right. I woke up feeling more refreshed and happier than in days, and – if memory serves, ‘coz I wrote about it the next night – three exceptionally good and unexpected things happened to me that day. Which made me smile.
Oh, and BTW – if you want to read a brilliant series of books set in a kind of dreamworld, I recommend the Tad Williams Otherland quartet. Each book is big enough to stun a small dog, but totally worth it.
July 28, 2008 at 9:07 pm
@fozmeadows: haha dreams are so trippy. And thanks, I’ll check out those books.