Tuesday, April 22, 2008

In my dreams I never fall

I realized today I have no idea what I look like in my dreams. Several theories (mostly touted out by the same people who believe that your dreams can predict your life, but also a few reputable non-crackpots) espouse that the way you appear in your dreams is your "true self"; that is, a blend of what you would like to look like with what you believe you look like.
Thus I am somewhat at a loss, having no idea what my "true self" looks like.
The current most accepted theory of dreams is that they serve as a dual problem-solving, memory-filing process. I realize few dreams resemble the days that produce them, but it is more a matter of association and connections, then true representation. Memory storage is hopelessly complex. That is why people typically cannot remember anything from before their fifth birthday or so; it's "stored" in a different memory framework, much akin to a computor trying to read a .jpg file with windows music player.

My dreams always follow one of two patterns: One, I am saving people or have a mission to save someone, two I'm lost and terrified. The strangest dream I ever had included me running through a maze that had no roof, only darkness above, which was filled with Samurai and russian peasants. The samurai would kill the peasants when they found them, and I was trying to save them, but I kept getting caught and beheaded, but it never killed me.
Crazy.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting thoughts. I have no idea what I look like in my dreams either. Would I have to have a dream where I look in the mirror or would I have to dream in the third person, so that I can look at "me"?
lol, mapa

Miss Ernst said...

I'm not sure, but I've always thought that I would just "know" what I look like in my dreams. In the same way that I never see anyone I know in my dreams, I just know it's them, even if they look completely different.

Does anyone else get that?