As Above, So Below

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Showing 91 posts tagged Dream

I fell asleep, and dreamed of a door opening.

Doors opening into rooms that opened onto doors that opened into rooms. We burst through, paneled, baize, flush, glazed, steel, re-inforced, safe doors, secret doors, double doors, trap doors. The forbidden door that can only be opened with a small silver key. The door that is no door in Rapunzel’s lonely tower.

You are the door in the rock that finally swings free when moonlight shines on it. You are the door at the top of the stairs that only appears in dreams. You are the door that sets the prisoner free. You are the carved low door into the Chapel of the Grail. You are the door at the edge of the world. You are the door that opens onto a sea of stars.

Open me. Wide. Narrow. Pass through me, and whatever lies on the other side, could not be reached except by this. This you. This now. This caught moment opening into a lifetime.

— Jeanette Winterson

Lucid Dreaming and Body Position

Restless and unable to take advantage of a little nap time recently, I resorted to dozing on my stomach. I rarely slumber in this position, but this time it did work — with the strange side effect of lucid dreaming. I was flying through the air while observing streets below me. I had surprisingly good control of the dream sequence and could easily change my elevation and movement. I sensed I could go deeper into the extent of this control, but was intimately aware of my sleeping form being paralyzed. So I “willed” myself out of the dream and back into physical autonomy.

I tossed and turned back on my stomach at least a couple more times with the same result, flying in the dream world yet trapped somewhere between waking and sleeping. I intentionally avoid this position because of the tendency to wake up with sleep paralysis. This experience, however, makes me wonder if body position can encourage certain dream themes or lucidity. My history of sleep paralysis with the added condition of insomnia undoubtedly contributed to this occurrence. I believe the dream took on a flying adventure as we envision soaring entities high above with their backs to the sky, limbs outstretched in a posture quite like the one I was laying in. Perhaps some related credence for embodied cognition?

free-parking:

Olafur Eliasson, The Weather Project

In this installation, The Weather Project, representations of the sun and sky dominate the expanse of the Turbine Hall. A fine mist permeates the space, as if creeping in from the environment outside. Throughout the day, the mist accumulates into faint, cloud-like formations, before dissipating across the space. A glance overhead, to see where the mist might escape, reveals that the ceiling of the Turbine Hall has disappeared, replaced by a reflection of the space below. At the far end of the hall is a giant semi-circular form made up of hundreds of mono-frequency lamps. The arc repeated in the mirror overhead produces a sphere of dazzling radiance linking the real space with the reflection. Generally used in street lighting, mono-frequency lamps emit light at such a narrow frequency that colours other than yellow and black are invisible, thus transforming the visual field around the sun into a vast duotone landscape. (via)

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