Dream Check

11/24/14

Dreams....

Dreams are fascinating. All kinds of interesting realities become explorable.

The most fascinating thing to me, though, is the complete buy-in we have to them. So rare is it to stop and think of even the most complete absurdities. A working fridge and freezer that doesn't have doors? Completely normal. Raining indoors? I buy it. A world entirely of shades of yellow? I might stop to admire the scenery, but I won't wonder at it.

And then, on the flip side, completely normal things have made me realize I was dreaming. Towels I put in the dirty laundry before going to sleep back on the towel rack? Wow, wow, wow, I must be dreaming. It's such a strange and amazing amount of clear-headedness in a world running on preconceived assumptions.

Not too long ago, I started practicing habits to learn to check if I am dreaming. These are your classic dream checks:

• Check your watch. Check it again. Is it the same time?
• Read something. Read it again. Was it the same content?
• Ask yourself if you are dreaming regularly. Are you dreaming?

Amazingly, I started doing these dream checks shortly into practicing them. Hilariously, I didn't do them seriously and decided I wasn't dreaming in the dream. I checked my watch twice but didn't actually pay attention to the time. I wouldn't pay attention to the content I was reading. I'd ask myself the dreaming question, and would say, "Of course I'm not dreaming."

But I was dreaming. And in retrospect it was so obvious.

And even when I finally did have a lucid dream (which I really should blog about, I have it written down in my journal and everything...), I was still easily duped and convinced by nonsensical things.

"You should clean up the mess you just made."

"But I'm dreaming, it's not even real"

"You should still clean it up."

"Fair enough."

That conversation actually happened in a dream. It prevented me from having a walk in what I was expecting to be an amazing and strange dream world. I woke up before I could go on that walk....

Clearly, I had to take these questions seriously in the waking world to have any hope of taking anything seriously in the dream world.

Something to consider for anyone else out there interested in practicing lucid dreaming.

....

Oh, yeah, that's not the end of the post.

Not long after that failed dream check inside a dream, it ocurred to me, I do the same thing in the waking world. I run on preconceived notions that could, in fact, be utterly ridiculous. They simply live unnoticed in my skull. Even when I stop to consider if I'm wrong, I don't take those considerations seriously. Problems that bubble to the surface just get reburied under my assumptions and incorrect models.

So, enter the metaphorical dream check:

• Am I dreaming? Am I assuming things not demonstrated?
• Do I understand the people who I disagree with?
• Am I in a bubble reinforcing my beliefs?
• Have I heard what the people I disagree with believe from them?

My applications of this have been incredibly useful, and I noticed that I accidentally did these dream checks in the past when I changed my mind on seriously held beliefs. Even when dream checking reveals I'm not dreaming, I feel I find deeper insight into the human condition.

That's a big thing I've been learning when applying this technique. The people I disagree with are people. They aren't monsters. Most of them aren't malicious. They see different things than me. They interpret evidence differently. They hold different philosophies.

They're trying. Just like I'm trying. Who am I to say I've done a better job?

No one. I have to argue my case. My side. And hope it stands to the scrutiny of criticism. And I've found the most thorough way to do that is to speak my case openly and take all criticism seriously.

Dream check all of it.

And I've found that that is super exhausting. Super time intensive. I can't do it for everything. No one can. So I develop a network of trusted sources. People to trust on various issues (and in some cases, only trustworthy on specific types of issues).

This, too, is also useful. But it can fail the bubble dream check. And so, from time to time, I pick something I see some source talk about, and I seriously dive into it. I reassess my network of sources. I dream check, and I try to prepare for the reassessment of my entire model of reality in case it becomes necessary.

Thankfully, so far, only little edits all over the place have been necessary.

Or am I dreaming?