h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My mouth is still hurting, one wisdom tooth out and two fillings later. I'm sick of taking painkillers too. Sigh. I'm having trouble with my latest animation. Some days the light sparkles with possibilities and other days it's like dragging myself through a thick, foggy daze. It's one of those daze today. Well, surely after a restful weekend something will spring back to life in my head. I'm annoyed 'cos I haven't really remembered my dreams over the past few weeks. I usually have no problem with this. I like the psychological soul searching that dreams encourage. I feel stranded, out on a limb - blindfolded without memory of my dreams. Ggggggrrrrr ... perhaps it's time for some lavender oil on my pillow.

Try meditating on your lower consciousness before falling asleep each night - it helps when trying to retain dreams. Trust me. (Even though I'm not a doctor!)

Hmmm...I shall try that. I assume that by 'lower consiousness' you mean the deeper, hidden levels? I discovered this weekend that changing the position of my bed jolted my sleeping mind significantly. Dreams of intergalactic, interspecies conferences and computer games downloadable from the necks of small children, not to mention talking to the animals... Do you have lucid dreams? Often?

Generally I don't trust doctors anyway!

Your dreams sound vaguely eXistnZal (not that I liked it - started well - went downhill) Lucid dreaming. Yes I do. Well I used to. More so as a child than now. Interesting that. Any tips for reconnecting with that childhood innocence? I had one vividly lucid dream recently in which I was dying and there was no escape and I thought to myself - of course, this is just a dream and if I want to I can change it. So I did, but I still ended up dying. Still some issues to deal with I think, before the return of the innocence.

Hmmm...tips for lucid dreaming: One is to ask yourself the question, 'Am I dreaming?' throughout the day, whenever you can (without tripping yourself out) and especially before you go to bed. Apparently the more you ask this, the more the questions seeps into your subconscious until it eventually begins presenting itself in your dreams. Another thing you can do is to choose a specific object that perhaps you have recognised occuring in a number of your dreams, such as the moon, and remind yourself often that this is the symbol you associate with the knowledge that you are dreaming. Eventually it also should sink into the subconscious and when it appears in a dream you will recognise that you are in a dream. I should think that if you made constant affirmations of this connection, the moon would indeed start to appear in your dreams on a regular basis. As for the symbolism of dying, it often represents a part of our self that is passing away, and indeed heralds the beginning of a new phase/self/way of thinking/experience ... whatever...

I tried it last night and it didn't work - but today has felt strangely dream like throughout. Tell me. When you ask yourself if you're dreaming while you think you're awake, andyou tell yourself you're not, how do you know that it's not a dream?
Oh. And what do you dream of?

Actually, I started wondering deeply about that when I started asking myself if I was dreaming, when I was awake...but am I really? What makes it any more real? Whoosh, a whole new avenue of possibilities down that road! Methinks there's significant personal power to be gained in actually realising that this 'reality' is potentially dreamlike, in that we do have a given amount of control and the ability to manifest things within it. I am exploring these issues at the moment. As for it not having worked with your dreams last night, well, you gotta give it some time Mr Tickle. Good things come to those who wait You need to do it for quite a while to get the thought into your subconscious so that it will filtrate through to your dreams. I only started it a few days ago. I haven't had any lucid dreams recently, but I am beginning to recall my dreams more often and more clearly, which is a step in the right direction. What do I dream about? All sorts of crazy and boring dreams. I awoke at 3am this morning from a dream about a baby sanctuary...in an abandoned city building there were lots of babies lying on the floor and a lone woman caring for them. Her financial sponsor turned out to be a very strange man who got the money to fund this charitable venture from dealing in arms and drugs with the Middle East. Hmmm...still working on that one!

Oh...did you mean what do you dream of in lucid dreams? Well...anything. Surely you know that though.

Yes I do know that - no - I meant what do you (as in you) dream of? Do you dream of you? Do you dream of places? Is it all very real inside your head at night - or is that the way you can tell the difference between waking and sleeping? Or rather between living and dreaming. Maybe I also meant fantasies, ambitions, all connotations of the 'dream' word.