Friday 8 October 2010

Push the Button...


...and then what happens?

I have no idea!

Do you experience that, too? Periods during which you can hardly remember any dreams when you wake up in the morning, whereas at other times, your sleep seems to be filled to the brim with colourful images, intense feelings and scenes that you can recall in great detail the next morning.

Lately, I am undergoing a "dreamless" phase, and I must admit I miss my dreams; usually, they are of the kind that leave me either amused because the story is so absurd, or deep in thought because I am trying to decipher the message my subconsciousness is transmitting to myself (if there is a message in there, which I am by no means sure of).

This morning, when I woke up, I knew exactly what I had been "looking at" just before opening my eyes: a button.

A black round push button, a bit like a door bell, and it was set in a black square of the same material. The material was not plastic, although it was smooth and shiny; it had a bakelite look to it (yes, I am old enough to remember telephones, light switches and other things made of bakelite).

In the dream, I did not know what the button was for, nor could I see whether it was mounted to a wall or on a door or a machine of some sort. In fact, it seemed to be invisibly suspended in mid-air, at eye height for me. There was no sound, and no clues at all as to the button's function.

I did not push it, but not because I was scared of the possible effects this could have; instead, what I felt while I was looking at the button was a mild sense of curiosity.

And then I woke up.

Possible interpretations are wide and varied, and your guess is as good as mine!

(Thanks to whoever uploaded this picture to the internet in the first place - it was not easy to find a photo showing what I saw in my dream, but this comes as close as I managed to find.)

8 comments:

  1. I doubt that anybody's guess is as good as yours in terms of what it means because you (or your subconscious) is probably creating the metaphors. The phrase that comes to my mind is "He (she, they) really know how to push my buttons." I have no idea if that resonates with anything. But I do love dreams. I seldom worry about interpreting them. I usually find that it takes some effort to build up a habit of remembering them.

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  2. Hmmm my interpretation rather goes along the lines of "new things can happen, new doors can open, if only I press the right button".
    Is it actually possible to build up a habit of remembering dreams? I have never made the effort; either I do remember a dream or I don't. Writing about dreams has apparently done something in my brain, as I do remember last night's dream: I met Tony Curtis at a banquet where we both were guests :-D

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  3. I think it's nice to remember details of one's dreams. I can't remember anything about the dreams I've had in the last few weeks - if I dreamed at all. Don't know if that's a good sign or not.

    Gagea

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  4. Gagea, I don't think it is either good or bad, it is just what it is; sometimes we do remember, sometimes we don't.
    It really is interesting, though, that since I wrote this blog about NOT remembering my dreams, I DO remember them again :-)
    Last night, it was a rather complex story about me discovering an old cemetery, and I went to the nearby town, trying to talk to the people there to find out whether there were any vampires about (vampires?! I've never been much interested in that kind of story!). Since the human inhabitants were not interested in talking to me, I interviewed the lizards, the cat and the sheep.
    Now what does that mean - people do not give me the time of the day, but I can talk to animals?

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  5. That's awesome!! I think we'd all be surprised to learn what animals had to say if we could actually talk to them! As to the dream about the button, your guess sounds like it's probably the right one. The reason I say that is exactly the same reason Bagman gave. You know more about what's going on in your life, what you've been thinking most about, whether consciously or subconsciously, and how much it's bothering or affecting you. If I had to guess, I'd say it probably has more to do with new beginnings. What would happen if you pushed that button? Would an elevator door open somewhere? Where would it bring you? And, who else would be there? ;) I read an article recently about dreams, because truth be told, dreams completely amaze me. Anyway, I read that the dreams we remember most, of course, are the ones we have closer to waking, and they are also the dreams that are longest. I'd always thought that when a person dreamt, the dream only lasted minutes, but the article went on to say that the final dream a person has actually could potentially last an hour and a half!! Crazy stuff there!

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  6. Yes, Mel, I usually remember those close-to-waking-up dreams best, and in the case of cemetery one, I know it lasted for about 45 minutes. I had woken up and looked at the alarm clock on my bedside table and decided to try and sleep a little longer; when I fell asleep again, I had that dream, and when I woke up after that, I saw on the alarm clock how much time had passed.
    It would be interesting also to know what animals dream of, wouldn't it?

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  7. My dreams usually involve people and situations and, as I've mentioned before, are rarely pleasant. I've given up years ago ever trying to find a cause or an interpretation of my dreams.

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    1. Still strikes me as odd that you should have such unpleasant dreams when your life, from what I can tell by the things you write about on your blog(s), seems to be going the way you chose it to go. But some things simply can't be explained so easily, and your dreams are one of them :-)

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