Q56 : Neil Gaiman
You know what happens when you dream of falling? Sometimes you wake up. Sometimes the fall kills you. And sometimes, when you fall, you fly.
~Neil Gaiman
Did you ever try to turn yourself upside-down when you were a kid? No, I’m not talking about hanging from something. Maybe I should explain.
When I was younger, I always thought it would be neat if I could change my perception of gravity and make myself float. Sometime I would just lay still on my bed for periods of time with my eyes closed. Without actually moving, I would gently rock the perception of my weight back and forth. It would always start directly below me, and it was fairly easy to swing it up even with the horizontal. I’d just lay there, working it like a pendulum. I could never make a complete circle though. The closest I could ever come was 45 degrees above the horizontal - and maybe hold it there for a second or two.
I thought about this quote for a while before I decided how to approach it. The friend who first told me about it said it reminded her of me and the way I perceive the world. I had to consider it for a while, but I find that in many ways I can agree.
What does it mean to me to dream? Personally, I believe dreaming is a way of directly approaching/acknowledging things that we may otherwise not want to address, or realize that need to be addressed. Dreaming is also what allows us to make it from day to day - that gives us purpose beyond the motions that make up our lives.
To dream of falling? I can remember one dream were I was standing on the circular edge of one of the tall silver houses like the Jetsons lived in. There were two guys with the typical old-fashioned sci-fi gun with the big round knob on the end. I wind up going off the edge and falling towards the clouds below me - and then I wake.
There was another night when I had just been thrown out of a castle. I remembered I had been there previously in another dream, but not all of what had happened. This time, the monsters had had enough of dealing with me so they kicked me out. I was standing on the edge of a *tall* cliff face, looking down at a sea of pine trees. I remember thinking that since I was in a dream and pretty much done with it, I’d just jump and the fall would make me wake up. Yeah, didn’t work.
As to flying - I’ve never flown in a dream, but I could sure jump hella high. When I was on the way down, it was always as if I was floating. And there have been numerous dreams where I basically hovered from place to place, usually with my legs folded up underneath me
The first fall can happen when I don’t realize what I’m getting in to. When I suddenly realize that enough is enough - and I pull back. The second fall happens when I won’t listen - when I refuse to acknowledge what is obvious if I would allow myself to hear. The third fall … that one only happens when I throw myself off the edge, knowing full well I don’t know what I’m doing, or how things will work out. I may not have flown, but I’ve certainly been carried a long way.
Originally published at The Silent Tower. You can comment here or there.