Dream on...

People are often dismissive of poets, artists, philosophers etc. "Dreamers!" they scoff. Write your poems and draw your paintings and build your castles in the sky. When the real world exerts its weight, your world will come crashing down.

I beg to differ. I get most of my best ideas on the edge of consciousness, before falling asleep or while waking up. When I was working on some particularly tough problems related to my thesis, a whole evening of racking my brains tended to draw a blank but on falling into an exhausted stupor, I would wake up the next day with the solution in my head. How wonderful this human mind is! Half of my poems were "written" in my head in that same state of semi-consciousness, sometimes while daydreaming, instead of regular night dreaming. Very often, I wake up with the distinct feeling that I grasped an important concept or thought of an interesting and original story or poem while I was asleep, but on coming fully awake the thought slips away from my grasp. If only I could record my thoughts as I dream! I count Kekule as being very lucky that he remembered his dream of the serpent biting its tail. My dreams vanish into mist on waking.

Or perhaps it's not those kinds of dreams that people are dismissive of. Perhaps it is the tendency to think in terms of what could be, instead of what is. That too, tends to go hand in hand with creativity. And that too, in my opinion is a good thing. As our friend Kirthi put it,

Dreams are like small ripples of water,
That build on each other into a gigantic yet ephemeral wave.
The moment they hit the rock of reality,
They shatter into a thousand droplets and disappear into oblivion.
But some waves continue to relentlessly lash the rock of reality,
Shaping it into a future form.
Such is the power of dreams:
An untiring desire to cut into reality and make it your own.

Sorry to be quoting you like this Kirthi, but it really is a beautiful poem!

By grounding yourself too deeply in reality, you only close your eyes to the possibilities. It's like walking through life wearing blinkers like a horse. A million improbables may sum up to a probable. If there's one thing I've learned in life, it is to not stop building castles in the sky. Somebody might just come up with the jet thrusters you need.

Break the vicious circle. Be creative. Be optimistic. Dare to dream.

Dream on, dream on, dream your dream come true...
Dream on, dream on, dream until your dream comes true...
- Aerosmith

Cheers,
Prashanth.