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Dreams
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| From 2BlogI |
I rarely write about these, though feel obliged when they are so telling. I had another double bill of movie like dreams. I won’t bore you with the detail but I challenge any of these new ‘memory’ apps to account for them. What is my head up to? It’s very probably because I am, after six or seven years of not having done so, thinking about storytelling: character, plot and narrative arcs. Where’s that in a mini series such as ‘The Borgias’. Some of these series, however often there is a murder or sex act after a while become as interesting as standing at a bus stop and starting to recognise the same faces every day.
Nabakov said something about ‘loving a memory to make it real’.
Can an App love something as abstract as a memory? It strikes me that memories can never be digitised, that as the construct, at that moment, of a chemical process, that they will be forever analogue. Can you digitise a chemical process?
Memory is not a photograph, or recording, not even something you have written down, rather a memory is what your brain at that moment chooses to construct for you drawing upon sources in various, and differing corners and recesses of your brain. It takes very little to alter this mix. Nothing you recall can ever be the way you remember it before, far from being frozen in time, as a digital form would do, it erupts like gas from a swamp.
In my early teens I had one of those ‘Five Year Diaries’ that offer four or five lines per day. After five years you have what you did on that day for five years. It took a long while for me to move on from these. What I did was try to write something about that day that would provide recall of some kind. I don’t need the video of the day. Or an assortment of photographs. All it takes is a phrase, a place, person or event. Something you ate or saw on TV. Oh dear. I just saw that I thought my new girlfriend’s breath was bad. She read this by chance a few years later. Together for five years we finally left each other in tatters a decade later. I can see where we were standing. Her Dad had come to pick her up. Neither of us could drive. She was 16, I was nearly 18. Do I need a gadget to replace my mind’s eye?
Teenagers and technology
Fig.1. Letters from Iwa Jima. Clint Eastwood directed Movie.
In one of those bizarre, magic ways the brain works, last nigmt I watched the Clint Eastwood film ‘Letters from Iwo Jima’ then stayed up reading in bed (quest for a very specific paper/set of papers on teenagers/young adults, health, presription medication) while waiting for my own teenagers to come in from a concert in Brighton.
Fig.2. Last minute reading for H809 TMA01
I stumbled upon ‘Teenagers and Technology’ by Chris Davies and Rebecca Eynon.
After a chapter of this I did a One Click on Amazon and kept on reading through the next couple of chapters.
I kept reading once they got home.
My mind constructed a dream in which instead of bagging letters home from soldiers, I found myself, Japanese of course, constructing, editing and reassembling some kind of scroll or poster. I could ‘re-enter’ this dream but frankly don’t see the point – it seems self-evident. I’ll be cutting and pasting my final thoughts, possibly literally on a 6ft length of backing wall paper (I like to get away from a keyboard and screen from time to time). Reinforced by a Business School module, B822 Creativity Innovation and Change I found that ‘working with dreams’ and ‘keeping a dream diary’ are some of the tools that can be used.
If I wish to I could re-enter this dream over the next few months as a short cut to my subconscious.
We’ll see.
I’m not sure how you’d come up with a Harvard Reference for a dream.
Fig.3. fMRI scan – not mine, though they did me a few years ago
Perhaps in 20 years time when we can where an fMRI scanner like a pair of headphones a set of colourised images of the activity across different parts of the brain could be offered.
Dream on 🙂
The Digital Brain – envisaged at the Design Museum
Fig. 1. A mash-up in Picasa of a 3D laser generated image generated at the Design Museum during their ‘Digital Crystal’ exhibition.
The image exists and is transformed by the presence of the observer in front of a Kinex device making this a one-off and an expression or interpretation of that exact moment.
‘Working with dreams’ and ‘Keeping a dream journal’ are taught creative problem solving techniques at the Open University Business School. I did B822 ‘Creativity, Innovation and Change’ in 2012 (Henry et al 2010). I have the problem solving toolkit. I even got a hardback copy of VanGundy’s book on creative problem solving.
Using your unconscious isn’t difficult. Just go to bed early with a ‘work’ related book and be prepared to write it down when you stir.
I woke soon after 4.00am.
I’d nodded off between 9.30 and 11.30 so feel I’ve had my sleep.
Virtual bodies for first year medical students to work on, an automated mash-up of your ‘lifelog’ to stimulate new thinking and the traditional class, lecture and university as a hub for millions – for every student you have in a lecture hall you have 1000 online.
Making it happen is another matter.
I’m writing letters and with far greater consideration working on a topic or too for research.
“Nights through dreams tell the myths forgotten by the day.” — C.G. Jung (Memories, Dreams, Reflections)
How to work with a dream or metaphorical image:
- Enter the dream
- Study the dream
- Become the images
- Integrate the viewpoints
- Rework the dream
Appreciating, reflecting, looking forward and emerging
REFERENCE
Glouberman, D. (1989) Life Choices and Life Changes Through Imagework, London, Unwin, pp. 232-6
Henry, J., Mayle, D., Bell, R., Carlisle, Y. Managing Problems Creatively (3rd edn) 2010. The Open University.
Isaacson, W. (2011) Steve Jobs. Little Brown.
VanGundy, A.B. (1988) Techniques of structured problem solving (2nd edn), New York: Van Nostran Reinhold.
Working with dreams : e-learning and the unconscious
Fig. 1. A mash-up in Picasa of a 3D laser generated image generated at the Design Museum during their ‘Digital Crystal’ exhibition.
The image exists and is transformed by the presence of the observer in front of a Kinex device making this a one-off and an expression or interpretation of that exact moment.
‘Working with dreams’ and ‘Keeping a dream journal’ are taught creative problem solving techniques at the Open University Business School. I did B822 ‘Creativity, Innovation and Change’ in 2012 (Henry et al 2010). I have the problem solving toolkit. I even got a hardback copy of VanGundy’s book on creative problem solving.
Using your unconscious isn’t difficult.
Just go to bed early with a ‘work’ related book and be prepared to write it down when you stir.
I woke soon after 4.00am. I’d nodded off between 9.30 and 11.30 so feel I’ve had my sleep.
Virtual bodies for first year medical students to work on, an automated mash-up of your ‘lifelog’ to stimulate new thinking and the traditional class, lecture and university as a hub for millions – for every student you have in a lecture hall you have 1000 online.
Making it happen is quite another matter. So I’m writing letters and with far greater consideration working on a topic or too for research.
“Nights through dreams tell the myths forgotten by the day.” — C.G. Jung (Memories, Dreams, Reflections)
How to work with a dream or metaphorical image:
- Entering the dream
- Studying the dream
- Becoming the images
- Integrating the viewpoints
- Reworking the dream
Appreciating, reflecting, looking forward and emerging
REFERENCE
Glouberman, D. (1989) Life Choices and Life Changes Through Imagework, London, Unwin, pp. 232-6
Henry, J., Mayle, D., Bell, R., Carlisle, Y. Managing Problems Creatively (3rd edn) 2010. The Open University.
Isaacson, W. (2011) Steve Jobs. Little Brown.
VanGundy, A.B. (1988) Techniques of structured problem solving (2nd edn), New York: Van Nostran Reinhold.
Related articles
- The Universal Traveler & Creativity (cinnamonpink.typepad.com)
- Sweating Your Way to Creativity (creativityland.ca)
- Review / Think Like a Programmer: An Introduction to Creative Problem Solving (compscigail.blogspot.com)
- Thinking about how I think makes me think that I think too much. (lifehardcore.wordpress.com)
- Back to Basics: What is Dreamwork? (allthesnoozethatsfittoprint.wordpress.com)
Creative Technique: Working with Dreams and/or Keeping a Dream Diary
This from B822 Creativity, Innovation and Change which ended in April.
Several reasons why as a technique it is out of the reach if most of us and impractical as a management tool.
a) What good is it ‘dreaming up’ something at random.
b) That has nothing to do with the course.
I found myself giving a presentation to an eager group in a crowded boardroom. I don’t know why.
‘and Jonathan is going to give you the criteria’.
And up I step, in a two piece suit with the manner of Montgomery addressing the troops – effusive, informed, consided and persuasive.
It went something like this:
“We human are blessed with an innate ability to float in water, though not necessarily fully clothed, or carrying a backpack and rifle.”
Laughter.
“We should encourage swimming for a number of reasons: for the love of it, as a life skill, as a competitive sport and for fitness’.
At which point I am full conscious, which from a dream state meant ‘I lost it’.
Why this dream?
I am reading a good deal on the First World War and I am swimming four or more times a week again after a long, slow easing back into the sport over the lt five months. I even got papers through yesterday which I only opened late in the evening before going to bed to say that I had passed the ASA Level 3 module on Sports Psychology (which makes 10// modules down on that ‘Front’.
Working with dreams
This from B822 Creativity, Innovation and Change which ended in April.
Several reasons why as a technique it is out of the reach if most of us and impractical as a management tool.
a) What good is it ‘dreaming up’ something at random.
b) That has nothing to do with the course.
I found myself giving a presentation to an eager group in a crowded boardroom. I don’t know why.
‘and Jonathan is going to give you the criteria’.
And up I step, in a two piece suit with the manner of Montgomery addressing the troops – effusive, informed, considered and persuasive.
It went something like this:
“We human are blessed with an innate ability to float in water, though not necessarily fully clothed, or carrying a backpack and rifle.”
Laughter.
“We should encourage swimming for a number of reasons: for the love of it, as a life skill, as a competitive sport and for fitness’.
At which point I am full conscious, which from a dream state meant ‘I lost it’.
Why this dream?
I am reading a good deal on the First World War and I am swimming four or more times a week again after a long, slow easing back into the sport over the lt five months. I even got papers through yesterday which I only opened late in the evening before going to bed to say that I had passed the ASA Level 3 module on Sports Psychology (which makes 10/11 Â modules down on that ‘Front’.
Creative Problem Solving: Keeping a Dream Diary & Working with Dreams
The lack of control over where your head goes and what it reveals should understandably go with a note of considerable caution. There often is no such thing as an innocent dream. It sometimes throws me when what is apparent in the dream: its people, actions and events can once analysed tell you something you can’t accept or dislike about yourself or others.
Context is everything.
- What bothers you as you fall asleep?
- What’s on your mind?
A film you have just watched could very well fill your head; I’m still enjoying the afterglow of ‘500 days of summer’: troubled because its truth but delighted in the outcome.
It is less the dream diary, but a diary that can help you put your subconscious to work.
Should you write-up your troubled day, and should you care not only to bring work home with you but also take it to bed, then indeed, the issue that is strangling your budget, or losing you business friends could be resolved in a dream. Once you have that dream in the conscious arena you can even rework it like a TV producer changing the protagonists and outcomes.
I dreamt I was in a court of sorts (I can see it in my mind’s eye but will neither describe it or attempt to draw it unless some detail needs bringing out).
I presume I was a prosecuting solicitor.
Two trials cut together one after the other (have dreams always been film literate?). The second case is a rape; he is ‘cock sure’ thankfully there is no murder involved. He deserves to receive the severest punishment. The previous case with a different barrister had gone off like a damp squib; perhaps it wasn’t as serious a case but I felt the person had got off lightly and I blamed the barrister for not following my instructions suitably closely. In this second trial I have a word-perfect summing up which I might expect this new barrister to follow. On the contrary, I find this person launch in more like a hack journalist/columnist than a prosecuting lawyer. I worry that the defendant will get off lightly; however, it soon dawns on me that this person is using my argument but not the script and like a stand-up comic (though with professionalism and the hint of a smile of confidence) they will deliver a knock-out blow: they have taken what I can provide and made it better.
Does this solve my problem?
It doesn’t answer something specific. If the photocopier is broken and never gets fixed I don’t think I’d turn to my ‘dream spirits’ for the answer.
Does it even suggest to you that this approach has legs?
Me, I’m the defence solicitor, not the barrister. I may not solve the ‘problem’ the defendant, though I make my contribution.
Nor have I had to resort to a set of 27 questions to reach this point (see below).
I do not imagine sitting with a bunch of colleagues interpreting their dreams would be appropriate or suitable; they ate too random, and so are we. But I do recommend this approach for personal problem resolution, but be warned, you may try to get your dreams to set out your next career move only to discover that in your heart you hate your job and sector and wish instead to teach English to Japanese school-girls.
Creative Problem Solving: Keeping a Dream Diary and Working with Dreams
Other people’s dreams are a bore.
So don’t read this unless you too are interested in using dreams or guided imagery to interpret and solve issues.
I woke with two dreams and lost one; they are after all like the proverbial ‘fart in the wind’: difficult to hold on to.
As I think about the dream I can recall I’ve decided it reveals too much about my character … and is irrelevant to problem solving at work!
CONCLUSION
If you want to use a technique that is like chasing guinea-pigs around the garden do so. I’d keep it to yourself though or at least work with the insights offered rather than the content, feelings, images and actions of the dream itself.
Working with dreams and imagery; was this the Steve Jobs way?
I was once Dracula in ‘The Dracula Spectacula’. My teeth were privately made, gratis, from dentine. I bit throw my gum on the last night and gurgled the songs.
There’s a warning on this activity, that the techniques may draw up uncomfortable events from your past. This also highlights a major problem with such techniques: they can throw up the unexpected. I like to think I have ample experience ‘working with dream’s ; I have used them to develop story-lines and ideas, even to some degree for personal cogniscence so it felt like an obvious one to give a try.
Context is vital, picking the right activity or game for the people you are working with. How well do you know them?
It also makes me realise that I’d like to be in a working environment with the kind of colleagues and friends where I could employ such techniques.
I feel like a big fail; there are two activities suggested for problem solving, or creativity, innovation and change: keeping a dream diary and this, which offers ways to explore a dream’s meanings and to re-enter and work with this environment created by your subconscious.
There’s plenty troubling me at the moment but I find repeatedly that holding onto a dream is like chasing autumn leaves in a stiff breeze.
Take this morning; just a few moments awake I recall I had been dreaming and that it had been a ‘good one’: vivid but apparently not memorable enough. I tried all the tips in the book to recover or return to the dream: you have to place yourself exactly as you were as you had the dream. I still can’t get it; I feel like MacBeth clutching at the dagger; it is always just out of reach.
By way of example I have a snippet of a dream from a few days ago: returning to the campsite after some kind of trip or activity in the woods I find my tent has gone: everything has been removed, as if I had never been there. The plot is bare. Why should I be thinking this as I return to work after a two week break?
The ‘activity’ is then to work with and develop your feelings about this moment, been to re-enter the dream, not simply to see what happens next but to change or influence the outcome. This then MAY offer a solution or at least an understanding of your feelings so that you can deal with them.
How to work with a dream or metaphorical image:
* Entering the dream
* Studying the dream
* Becoming the images
* Integrating the viewpoints
* Reworking the dream
* Appreciating, reflecting, looking forward and emerging
P.S. I just returned to work and couldn’t have entered a more friendly environment, my desk as I’d left it.
P.P.S. I realise why I am ‘losing’ my dreams: stress. I’m waking up with a jolt, some unpleasant thought in the back of my mind.
Steve Jobs was hugely influenced by Zen Budhism; this I understand would play to the importance of intuition. Intuition alone is not enough; this for Jobs was also the product of intense effort to get his head around an issue; he immersed himself in it until, to paraphrase the historian E.H.Carr he could ‘hear it speak’.
20 LIFE LESSONS FROM STEVE JOBS
http://mashable.com/2011/12/18/steve-jobs-20-life-lessons/
REFERENCE
Glouberman, D. (1989) Life Choices and Life Changes Through Imagework, London, Unwin, pp. 232-6
Isaacson, W. (2011) Steve Jobs. Little Brown.
Creative Problem Solving Techniques Library ‘Working with dreams and imagery’
There’s a warning on this activity, that the techniques may draw up uncomfortable events from your past.
This also highlights a major problem with such techniques:they can throw up the unexpected.
I like to think I have ample experience ‘working with dreams’ ; I have used them to develop story-lines and ideas, even to some degree for personal cognisance so it felt like an obvious one to give a try.
Context is vital, picking the right activity or game for the people you are working with.
How well do you know them?
It also makes me realise that I’d like to be in a working environment with the kind of colleagues and friends where I could employ such techniques.
I feel like a big fail; there are two activities suggested for problem solving, or creativity, innovation and change: keeping a dream diary and this, which offers ways to explore a dream’s meanings and to re-enter and work with this environment created by your subconscious.
There’s plenty troubling me at the moment but I find repeatedly that holding onto a dream is like chasing autumn leaves in a stiff breeze.
Take this morning; just a few moments awake I recall I had been dreaming and that it had been a ‘good one’: vivid but apparently not memorable enough. I tried all the tips in the book to recover or return to the dream: you have to place yourself exactly as you were as you had the dream. I still can’t get it; I feel like MacBeth clutching at the dagger; it is always just out of reach.
By way of example I have a snippet of a dream from a few days ago: returning to the campsite after some kind of trip or activity in the woods I find my tent has gone: everything has been removed, as if I had never been there. The plot is bare. Why should I be thinking this as I return to work after a two week break?
The ‘activity’ is then to work with and develop your feelings about this moment, been to re-enter the dream, not simply to see what happens next but to change or influence the outcome. This then MAY offer a solution or at least an understanding of your feelings so that you can deal with them.
How to work with a dream or metaphorical image:
- Entering the dream
- Studying the dream
- Becoming the images
- Integrating the viewpoints
- Reworking the dream
Appreciating, reflecting, looking forward and emerging
P.S. I just returned to work and couldn’t have entered a more friendly environment, my desk as I’d left it.
P.P.S. I realise why I am ‘losing’ my dreams: stress. I’m waking up with a jolt, some unpleasant thought in the back of my mind.
Steve Jobs was hugely influenced by Zen Buddhism; this I understand would play to the importance of intuition. Intuition alone is not enough; this for Jobs was also the product of intense effort to get his head around an issue; he immersed himself in it until, to paraphrase the historian E.H.Carr he could ‘hear it speak’.
20 LIFE LESSONS FROM STEVE JOBS
http://mashable.com/2011/12/18/steve-jobs-20-life-lessons/
REFERENCE
Glouberman, D. (1989) Life Choices and Life Changes Through Imagework, London, Unwin, pp. 232-6
Isaacson, W. (2011) Steve Jobs. Little Brown.
Mind Bursts 