I am recently retired from the decorative concrete industry having achieved a certain level of acclaim and material benefit. The world of dreams may seem like a curious interest for someone who has spent the majority of his life working with something as dense as concrete, however concrete is pliable for a period of time. In that short window of time the craftsman is charged with using the resources available to him to bring about the desired outcome. In life too, it behooves us to use our resources to the best of our abilities. Dreams offer us great value provided we receive their wisdom.
As a child I received attention from adults due to my ability to draw. I loved drawing and working with color. I was able to accurately reproduce what I saw with my physical eyes. As a junior in high school I took a two-hour art class. I soon discovered there were other good artists, some of whom were more imaginative than me. As I mentioned my strength was drawing what I saw in front of me. In preparing us for a career in art the teacher assigned us project and due dates. I knew my best art came when the spirit moved me. Now I was facing arbitrary subject matter and deadline dictates. It felt forced. I was not inspired. I was intimidated. My imagination went on strike. For years I had allowed my creativity to be dependent upon an outside source. Now I felt so inadequate that I dropped the class after the first few weeks. I gave up on my childhood dream of being an artist because I didn't think I had the imagination to keep us with the other students.
Even so, I became a successful artist in the unlikely field of decorative concrete. I learned to transform functional concrete into beautiful and colorful countertops, driveways, sidewalks, pool decks and even city streets. There was a particular moment, however when I made a quantum leap in the way I saw creativity and how I regarded my imagination. This took place one morning during my decorative contractor days in a meeting where the homeowners and I were determining the colors and textures for the exterior concrete work on their new home. The owners asked me to design something totally new and unique for them, something different from any work I had done in the past. Their request brought me the same feelings of anxiety and intimidation I felt in my high school art class. They were not the cause of my anxiety. They simply wanted their home to be distinctive. Nonetheless for a moment I felt something akin to panic. It was an occasion for me to redress my lesson about creativity that I was not willing to face in high school.
I breathed deeply and made an effort to gather myself so I could offer them something, anything. Surprisingly clear images from a recent dream came to me, almost out of nowhere. It was as if I were watching a romantic travel movie or documentary. I was on horseback in the dream. I was enjoying the beautiful view from high on a bluff overlooking the river valley below. It was like seeing the old west before power lines and highways. I could immediately see the dream images as being the answer to the unique design they desired. I held my breath as I shared my quick sketch to them. What a moment it was when they smiled excitedly signaling their approval. It was exactly what they wanted, something unique.
Years later I studied dreams in earnest and I still record them and interpret them. I investigated various methods and also joined an international organization dedicated to bringing people who cared about dreams together. While the members hold a wide variety of views about where dreams come from and their relevance to the everyday life, all are fascinated with them. The method for understanding dreams I find most helpful suggests that the dreamer view the dream as a custom produced movie designed expressly to aid the dreamer in understanding his/her previous day's experiences. In other words, dreams are symbolic and come from the inner part of our whole mind that is inherent within each of us. One guiding principle is that each person, place and thing in the dream represent a part or aspect of the dreamer. The key to understanding dreams is to study the meaning of these universal symbols. At the time I received the driveway dream I didn't know how to interpret it. I just knew It was a momentous occasion to have this experience of "miraculous inspiration". I realized at the time that dreams had significance. I came to see that I had resources available to me that I had shut out before. I believe this is universally true - that we have much more creative mind substance available to us than we acknowledge.
If I were to have that dream today I would say interpret it from the conventional way, which is to say that during the previous day or so that I was using my will (horse) to appreciate how my conscious life experiences (river) flowed through my subconscious existence (prairie). The short interpretation would be that during that time I was using my will to combine my everyday experiences with my inner thinking to bring about what I wanted. If fact, I was creating a new business at the time born from the knowledge gained from my contracting experience.
That particular dream served an inspirational function for me because I didn't have to interpret it - I saw immediately how I use it. It seemed so obvious to me that this dream WAS the driveway. The experience also caused me to reflect on the wondrous nature of dreams and the expansiveness of our minds. Of all the dreams I may have had rattling around in my subconscious mind on that day, this one leapt forward to say, "Here I am!" The dream also shows me that the interpretive style I have chosen to adopt for dream interpretation is accurate, in this case some years later when I have the advantage of historical perspective for confirmation.
That dream experience forever changed how I view creativity and the importance of dreams. We all have inner resources available to us. The inner mind, the place where dreams come from, can objectively reveal the truth, when we are open to receiving it. I encourage everyone to be open to receiving from the inner self. The inspiration may come from a gut feeling, a hunch or coincidence, synchronicity, deja vu or a partly remembered dream. Inspiration often comes as we draw, doodle or work in the garden, anytime the busy conscious mind is relaxed or taking a break. The inspirational nugget may be a solution to a problem or an idea for a new creation. To cultivate the ability and practice of receiving from that inner part of ourselves, to trust it and to be willing to act upon it is what is important. Happy dreaming everyone!
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