running from the dream self
I used to have a podcast. Which, besides being a true statement, is also the best way to stop any woman’s sexual interest in you in its tracts.
The podcast taught me a lot, but it never became what I wanted it to be and I got tired of it. But I am glad I did it because it was an idea that came to me from my dream self for a lack of a better word.
We all have two layers to everything we do. We have our functional self, and then we have the world of dreams. They intersect in very clear ways, but not at all points.
Most people I meet are led by their functional self. They work, they share things on Facebook, they go to the movies, they have completely acceptable friendships and adventures, they are moving, but they are generally moving in a circle. I am not arrogant or naive enough to think I am better than them. I’m sure in some ways I am not them. But functional people are sometimes cut off people. They forgot about the second part of their nature and its hard to be around someone who doesn’t know themselves well.
People who are led by their dreams are crazy. Not unstable or immature, but crazy. Their high’s are higher, their low’s are lower. Because dreams are crazy. Dreams are where we go to see the impossible. Dreams are where we go to reach beyond.
I know I have said it before but I just love this quote. I saw a documentary about voodoo recently. They had a quote from a historical voodoo figure who was comparing Christianity to voodoo. They said “you Christians go into church and worship god, we go into our ceremony and become god”.
I think that is also the world of the dream self. In our dream self, we are limitless.
Every time I am unhappy with myself, its because I am being untrue to my dream self. I was given an instruction that I ignored or delayed, or pretended like it mattered less.
Every artist I meet who is restless or depressed or hard to be around is usually that way because they are running from something their dream self gave them to do.
In the story of Jonah, God tells him to go preach to the people of Nineveh so they wouldn’t be destroyed. Jonah, being a wack bitch does the opposite and books passage on a boat in the opposite direction. Storms come, the sailors believe someone who is cursed must be on the ship, and Jonah knows he’s at fault and volunteers to be thrown overboard.
As the story goes, he is swallowed by a whale where he lives for three days and nights. Then he is spit back out on dry land.
I think we all journey far far out of our way sometimes to avoid the voice in ourselves. The reasons we do it for are as various as our faces.
We are scared, we view ourselves as incapable. The only good idea we have has been done before. It would take too much money. We are busy, other people would think us arrogant, we don’t want to look ridiculous.
These thoughts are all functional thoughts. They are probably true. And they are also not your problem.
To be an artist means to live in two worlds at the same time. To hear two sets of voices at the same time. To weigh the advice and choose well.
As a comic, being next on a lineup in a tough room, I know functionally this could not go well, and people could think less of me if I bomb. I also know my bliss is on the other side of that negativity.
I hope you find yours, wherever it goes and wherever it tells you to go.