Whilst going into nostalgia, I remember polite words of my mother not to reveal my dreams to any stranger and instructed me to share same with her, quoting some Hadiths for dream and its Tabeer. She also told me about day dreaming, but my inquisitiveness to probe, what are dreams, its value, worrying about weird dreams and recurring dreams haunted me to seek philosophical/ logical / scientific explanation.
You cannot discount that in todays financial turmoil one has a right of "day dreaming" hundreds of billions of US dollars, whilst the ground realities are different, but every sane or insane within his or her rights likes to dream as saying goes "If wishes were horses all fools may ride". There is no regulatory regime or prudential regulation. Dreaming is like free market of Chicago Boys or Alan Green Span.
My curiosity about dreams compelled me to read the Sigmund Freuds theory and the best seller of Robert Mass "tapping the power of dreams."
Human being dreams, and so do, scientist believe, most mammals and some birds. On the most basic level, a dream is the experience you have of envisioned images, sounds, or other sensations while you sleep. They are an internal mental process. But dreams are actually much more than that.
Sigmund Freuds theory was that your dreams are an expression of what you are repressing during the time you are awake. Carl Jung believed that dreams provide messages about "Lost" or "neglected" parts of ourselves that need to be reintegrated. Many dreams simply come from pre-occupation with the days activities, which may be the case with our political masters. But some offer rich, symbolic expressions - an interface between the conscious and unconscious that can fill in the gaps of our self-knowledge and provide information and insight.
Robert Moss writes in his book "The three only things", dreams are open vistas of possibility that take us beyond our everyday self limiting beliefs and behaviours, which may be true with our financial wizards who made a hat rick of "over my dead body". We must carefully examine the clues in the dream that may help you to manifest juicy vision. We are almost in the spider web of IMF.
A stock broker, who went bankrupt recently shared his dream quote "I saw dream dinning, dancing and talking, in a casino, but when its time to go, I look for my purse gone, as I searched, I saw a gushing spring bisecting the room and pursue is floating on the gushing water but I cant get it." I told him that your purse is a symbol of by gone wealth and resources, a casino represents transition and spring connotes emotion. This dream echoes and amplifies whats going on in your waking life.
Everyone dreams every night, even if we dont remember our dreams explained my daughter in-law who is Neurologist/ Geriatric specialist in US. She stated that one speculative possibility is that dreaming allows you the opportunity to practice things you may or may not ever do, like fighting a predator, becoming Bill Gates, Mithal, Waren Buffet. I also learnt that three or four times a night you have a period of sleep that lasts approximately 90 minutes called REM - Rapid Eye Movement.
It is during REM sleep your brain is more active, and story like dreams rich in action, complexity and emotion. I was also told that researchers at US Universitys still do not know as to why we dream, but they believe that good sleep improves memory and learning both. What a piece of advise, to our ruling junta not to go back on promises and agreements and so sleep tight with sedatives to recall memory and improve learning. Scientists have long debated whether dreams have any meaning, but believe that understanding dreams may provide meaningful clues to feelings, thoughts, behaviours, motives and values. Nobel Laureate and scientist Wolfang Pauls admitted that dream is his "secret laboratory" so has many of my friends poets and poetess, who term this as "Amad".
Dreamers dictionary for the 21st century divides dream into eight categories :
-- Processing
-- Venting (Nightmares)
-- Integration
-- Breakdown/ break through
-- Recurring
-- Precognitive
-- Prophetic
-- Wish fulfilment.
The most common are recurring and venting dreams.
Robert Moss gives an example of predictive dream in his book. One of the biggest oil discoveries in the history resulted from dream of a retired British Colonel Official living in, Kuwait in 1937. Colonel Dicksons dream revealed a specific location near an unusual sidr tree in Burqan Hills. The Kuwait oil company had been drilling dry holes far away, was persuaded to move a rig to the location identified from the dream and hit a Gusher. We, all Muslims have a firm believe in the dream of Bibi Hajra as water gushed, now known as Zam Zam.
Processing dreams can be used to diagnose and solve physical and emotional problems. Moss in his book says that some of our dreamscapes are living dioramas of what is going on inside our body.
According to Moss ancient Greek physician Galen used to diagnose through dreams, patients complaint. A friend of mine is said to be alerted of problem when her dead father appeared in dream with a doctor and shouted, get to doctor at once. You have breast cancer, she acted on dream and believes her life was saved.
I personally lost my call phone and gave hope, but later found the cell phone in the zipped packet of my brief case. I believe that my body triggered the memory in dream to alleviate my anxiety. Some intellectuals believe that dreams are a physical prism through which reality some how gets refracted - as oppose to be reflected. Our politicians may ponder on this believe and may see reality refracting as they block the true reflection.
We, all can recall strange dreams but interpreting and understanding may be tricky, as most dreams are intensely personal. Even if it does not initially makes sense to us, we may contemplate the dream, meditate on it, marinate in it. We, can explore our dreams, with sincere dream groups or with real friends, as we are often blind to our own issues and associations, but some one else can see things objectively.
I strongly recommend to all to read Robert Moss Book "The three only things" - tapping power of dreams, coincidence and imagination. I am willing to gift voluntarily to our politicians, so that they see the ground realities instead of Rhetorics and sharing dreams of billions of dollars and retreating from promises and agreements. I seriously suspect physiological disorders and would recommend to continue the treatment, so that they may discontinue using phrase of "Over my dead body", Gorgeous etc.
As Islam teaches respect for all genders and have drawn parameters of decency. I can hope better sense may prevail and we may translate our dreams to our advantage to save our beloved Pakistan. It is only humble suggestion to be taken in good spirit not as criticism. Pakistan is also a dream come true of Iqbal.
