I don’t often recall my dreams. In fact, I’m mostly uncertain what leads to the recollection of these things. I generally fall fast asleep, and before I know it, the alarm is going off to wake me to the new day. Sometimes, on a weekend, I’ll remain in bed without an alarm and that seems to be the best route to find myself experiencing the dream state.
Last night, though I went to bed at a fairly standard time of 10pm, and was likely asleep at 10:30 after some brief journaling, I found myself nearly wide awake at 3am. Deciding to go back to bed, I fell quickly back to sleep. It seems in the last three hours, my dreams were alive again.
For the most part, I don’t like dreaming. As a kid, most of my dreams were of the scary, nightmare’ish variety. I would dream of a world tied to reality in which I was trapped in some way. Recalling the steps at the Juneau Christian Center at such a size that I could only go down the concentric ring of stairs, but they were just tall enough and I with no tools could not ever climb out. It’s a feeling of entrapment that I could never shake. That sensation would sometimes come to me in consciousness, as recently as last Tuesday while receiving a massage. My brain begins processing things as enormous entities, dwarfing me and creating a sense of fear out of nothing. I perceive things to be a different engorged size which of course is both strange and terrifying, “for we were grasshoppers in our own sight” (Numbers 13:33) as even the people around me are recognized as terrifyingly large.
And then there was the memorable ongoing childhood nightmare of being trapped on a ferry (that had it’s own onboard dock) and throughout the vessel I was chased and continuously entrapped by a host of Cyclops. I’ll save that one for another day.
Last night, it was a dream of sex. I don’t know why they come about, and generally, I don’t particularly mind them at the time – there don’t seem to be consequences beyond my woken response of guilt & regret. Last night I think I recognized the woman initially as Rekann, but then eventually noticed that she was Helen. It was in a place small and rundown by time, reminiscent of a trailer like room just larger than my mother’s own bedroom through my childhood. I don’t often recall the acts themselves, more the circumstances surrounding them. My “suitor” preparing for the act, or other innocuous details of engagement (like her adjusting a piece of insulation on the wall which released a tarp which had somehow been connected to the outside of the residence).
Maybe this links into what I had written last night before bed. Maybe it’s some type of consideration of what the future would be. Guilt in engaging with another in a post marital state. If Heather were to pass on this mortal coil and I find myself alone, would it be okay for me to begin the courtship again? Frankly I have no clue.
I can’t tell if I would rather outlive Heather or if she ought to outlive me. I would like to save her the pain of having me die and leave her behind, but simultaneously, I don’t want to steal the joy she may have in subsequent years with our family and friends. Of course this is easily flipped to myself. Do I want to stick around years beyond her death? I recognize that I don’t really have any control over these things. When it’s our time, it’s our time… As I was just reading this morning “Thy will be done.”
There’s a mantra good to live by.
-cb
It’s Sunday, March 28th.
Big week. Last Tuesday I had the idea to look for distance photography courses, and came across Hallmark.edu which is an intensive 10-month program suited to provide folks with the skills necessary for a career in photography. My attention has been captured, and I have a new dream with all manners of energy pouring forward for it.
After pondering, talking and consulting, I’ve decided to apply. Now, this of course means that after applying comes acceptance, and after acceptance comes payment, and after payment means attendance. If you know me at all, you’ll know that I have made a concerted effort since my childhood to remain solvent. While I’ve done a lot of silly things and made a lot of rediculous mistakes, I’ve done OK for myself. But, even still, the tuition/fee of Hallmark rings at just shy of $60,000. That said, Heather and I will be leaving our employment income and pursuing school for 10 months, and our goal is to remain debt free.
So, now is when the rubber hits the road. I have around 3 months to execute something astounding; I will create a passive income to the tune of $1500-2500/month so that we can pursue the opportunity. I think it’s possible that I could liquify the assets that we have as well as receiving scholarships & grants in order to pay for tuition/fees. However, as we’ll be in a new place with no certain source of income, we will produce a business in the next three months that will finance our lifestyle.
It will be an amazing learning curve. We live in the USA, the greatest country in the world with the most amazing resources available to us. It will require radically altering our pursuits, but with the newfound motivation, my past experience, and the help of friends and mentors, it is absolutely achievable.
We’re still in the scoping stage to figure out how much money will be required to make the dream a reality. If everything goes to plan, orientation starts on September 8th with our departure on approximately August 25th.
January 15th, 2010. 5:49am.
I’ve been getting up early and enjoying some quiet time in early in the mornings. I generally aim to be in bed near 10pm (often 11 or midnight), and again up and moving as early as 5. I take my time, have an XS or some coffee, listen to CommuniKate, perhaps a CD, play on the computer, or even do some journaling. For some reason, there’s something mighty cathardic about being up before more of the world gets moving. At the moment all I can hear is the clock ticking away on the wall, and the quiet whisper of the cooling fan on my laptop. I bet if I could quiet my mind enough, I’d hear the refridgerator as well as the networked readynas spinning away.
Lately I’ve started another journey of sorts; Dream Nights were spectacular, and most exciting, I’ve picked up a few nuggets to translate to action. This has been my first week of 4 days off (and subsequently 3 days on) of building the business. It’s been a good experience of putting focused thought effort into coordinating and constructing my business, but there is still a long way to go. It’s given me some reflection time to notice what things I’m doing well, and not-so-well towards the end goals of financial and emotional independence.
I noticed that my self-talk was a bit out of line with the results I’m interested in. I carried self-defeating internal conversations on regarding the responses I might receive when talking with folks out in the world, or over the phone. I’m just at the beginning of that journey, but these realizations have been potent towards action and comfort in walking the quiet track of building myself and others in spite of a busy, and otherwise distracted world.
I’m starting to see the economy of Juneau take a turn. In my own recollection (and with the thanks of a facebook solicitation) I was able to count 44+ places that have gone out of business over the past couple decades – and I’m sure there are more to come. Morris Publishing just filed Chapter 11, and they’re the parent to the Juneau Empire and long-standing Capital City Weekly. Eeeks indeed.
Anyhow, onto my CD, and maybe a little World of Warcraft!
Rather than Timelining, Mr. 4-hr Workweek man recommends seeking excitement and creating a dreamline to help spur you to action. No holds barred, what would you do if there were no way you could fail? If you were 10 times smarter than the rest of the world?
Having (all paid for in cash)
Being
Doing
I’m sure there’s more to come, but this has been a good exercise to expand my thoughts on things that excite me. It’s as he says: happiness is found in excitement, despair in boredom.
Today at the Juneau Christian Center, Pastor Mike Rose talked about the Prophetic Process. It was a good talk that was undergirded by the developing “Hub” that the church is developing. They had a pretty significant back-story and were able to interlace snippets of prophetic speeches given from the church pulpit previously.
At any rate, the talk was summarized by the following outline: Proclamation –> Problem –> Push.
As much as I enjoyed the talk, and the vision for The Hub, I couldn’t help but realize that the most important thing that any one person in the room could do is to build a legitimate Amway business. If we were Diamonds, we could solve the “problem” of the financial needs by simply cutting a check. They have need of another 100k of funds, and so they have to go out for grants, take offerings, etc. Why not just have the resources to write a check and be done with it. It’s an amazing world that we live in, that through a bit of application towards a known working vehicle and you can achieve any of the dreams you might have had and now that’s done, it’s on to another exploration of newer venues.
I’m on a two day roll, and here’s the next question:
* If it weren’t for economic conditions and responsibilities, what would you do?
Economic conditions = current financial state. Economic Responsibilities = bills and the like. Responsibilities in general would suggest that I don’t need to worry much about the state of things that I’ve built for myself… Such as maintaining a residence, or following through on decisions I’ve made such as charity.
It’s an interesting question to ask because I think I’d gravitate towards changing a majority of my life – I like the idea of buying cool things that I’ve been waiting for, of travelling to all manner of places with very few plans. I like the idea of exploring and seeing the people of an area, much like the observing I do while hanging out in airports. Part of me wants to be involved, part wants to sit back and enjoy watching the magic of an unsuspecting people.
So, along this vein. If money were no object, and responsibilities were no longer an issue, I would not be going to work tomorrow. I would take the day off, finish the commitments I have given to others (namely photo processing), and then proceed to head out the road for a drive to see what there might be to find. Perhaps a hike, perhaps just communing with nature from the comfort of a car. Ooh, but before heading out, maybe I’d purchase an upgrade! 🙂
Part of the things I’d like to do without concerns is just to spend time with the people that I love and growing in our relationships together.
I expect that I would spend some time being relatively unproductive, until I decided that something more exciting would be in order. I’d like to do the taku lodge tour, and spend some time with Daniel or Matt up on the glacier or at least flying around in a helicopter.
Perhaps it just comes down to being free. Heather asked me today why I liked the song “Freedom” by The Goads. I don’t know that I have a clear articulation of it – I just know that it brings tears to my eyes to think about relaxing and being able to make choices without having my day dictated to me by a “superior”.
Long time no talk. I’m sitting here in bed next to my wife of a month, and enjoying some quiet time to reflect. Lately I’ve been working with Brad on a 90-day-eagle unit training set, and the first thing in the audio set is to articulate the dream. Today Heather & I had a chance to sit down and write and talk about the dreams of our hearts, and, I think it will take some practice & patience to get them inked in a way that they are real and understood.
Bill offered a “training” tonight, mostly focusing on the importance of the dream, and how to think of it to grow it within yourself. In the session, he rattled off a list of questions, which, while I won’t articulate them all in this post, I’ll start with answering them in this post and hopefully more. Read on for the goods.
The inking of the dream was suggested to be focused in Things, People & Feelings. Bill started in the things section with some prompts. Here’s the first one:
* What are 3-4 things that are really important to you?
Things that are important to me? Well, my family. As new as it is, treating Heather right and growing our relationship is of the utmost importance to me. I want to learn how to love her more and more every day and to remember to cherish her and our time together. Things that are important to me? Giving kids a chance in the world by building them up and not tearing them down. I am involved with big brothers big sisters because they helped me have a chance to stand on the shoulders of others as they tried to get a view over the wall. Helping others break cycles, learn from others, improve their lives is all important to me. Things that are important to me? Freedom. I used to call it security, but really, it’s more of a freedom issue. I kept multiple cars so in the case that one broke down, I could just take the other. I had multiple computers, or girls (as a youngster) because I wanted the freedom that it offered. Even now, as I’ve grown older, I realize that there is freedom in choosing one woman to be committed to, and for that, I’m excited.What things are important to me? Noticing and capturing life’s beauty all around us, in even the most “mundane” circumstances. The fact that you and I are animated is a miracle. Us humans can do all manners of things in the world, but creating life (not already existing) is something we have yet to achieve. I was created by a loving God, and while not everyone believes in God and what he does in their life, I know he doesn’t need them to exist. 🙂 Nonetheless, I want to show others, through His love in me, that they too are loved, and to always maintain an eye that while the outside may be tarnished, the inside is perfectly created by Him.
Last night, Bill mentioned (mostly in passing) that most people, if they were to plan their homes to match how they plan their lives, would live in nothing more than a cardboard box.
That, of course, leads to many questions about my dream pursuit:
-cb
I don’t really know when this was articulated; I found it in a steno notebook and had cut it out, for documenting, but there was no nearby date mentioned. Just pages after this, there is a note indicating “2005”, but that’s pretty vague and doesn’t give context for this posting. At any rate, here it is:
Dreams
What could be? Without resource limitations; without mental barriers. With a team of World Wide Special Forces, what will we accomplish?
Another batch of notes from my “Dream” notebook…
===
From The Dream Giver:
p. 18 “One thing Ordinary did know for sure: He didn’t want to repeat his Father’s mistake. He wouldn’t waste another day waiting for his Dream to see possible. He would find a way to pursue it.” (-And neither should I.)
Further…
p. .19 “my Big Dream is too important and too wonderful to miss.”
God has given me a Big Dream. He gave it to me even before I was Born. It is my role in this life to identify and actualize my innate Dream. My Dream is what I do best and what I most love to do. It makes me sad to think that so many nobodies are missing something so Big!
I am different from most people. I will pursue my dream no matter what.