How “Inception” Gets It Wrong About Dreaming (and Waking)

The movie “Inception” shines a light on a persistent human fear: that of being deceived while we are in a vulnerable, dreaming state. This is not a new story. As far back as Ancient Greece, people have worried about being misled by “false dreams.” In fact, that very thing showed up 2,500 years ago in…

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Dick Cavett on the Mystery of Dreams

I love it when public figures talk about their dreams. They are the great leveler, because for all of our differences, everyone dreams. Everyone also has bad dreams on occasion, and I am fascinated by how we make sense of them for ourselves. What a treat, then, to find not one but two thoughtful posts…

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Dream Your Way To Success

Just like dressing for success puts our best foot forward, dreaming for success can help us achieve our biggest goals this year. Last year I shared 10 great tips for having big winter dreams. But more important than having big dreams is knowing how to work with all the dreams we have. Here’s how to…

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Dreams in Spiritual Mentoring

Dreams have been a reliable source of healing, divine contact, and prophecy throughout the world’s religions. Recently, I have had the opportunity to create a class for seminary students on using dreams in spiritual direction. I am pretty excited about teaching this semester, and have pulled together tons of great material for it. Here is…

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A View of the Earth from Space

I pay particular attention to the dreams I have when I am away from home. Particularly on overseas or extended journeys, it seems to me that our dreams take on a different character. As our lives are unmoored from habit and routine, our dreams are likewise free to roam, and often show us startling pictures…

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Dreamwork for Yogis

I think everyone who practices yoga should also work with their dreams. As spiritual practices go, the two are very complimentary — one emphasizes body and breath, while the other emphasizes psyche and emotions. And something that is not widely talked about in spiritual circles is that cross-training in more than one discipline really does…

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Dreaming of the Divine

Most people know when their dreams hand them a big helping of insight to chew on. A 32 year-old woman has a recurring dream of being lost and hungry at summer camp. A 54 year-old man dreams that he rides into work on a white horse, but nobody sees him because they’re all watching movies.…

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Obama’s Fellowship of the Dream

This was a great election cycle for dreamworkers. For the first time that I am aware of, dreams were part of the public conversation about who each of the candidates were and what they stood for. Sheila Heti from Toronto set up blogs for people to share their dreams about the candidates, and contributions came…

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Listening at the Gate of Dreams

Everyone dreams, whether we remember them or not. Many of us do remember our dreams, and think about them until they slowly fade away like a radio signal as we drive out of range. Sometimes a vivid dream comes like a bolt of lightning, and we reverberate from the shock of it for days, weeks,…

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