Dreams to Reality

Some believe that dreams are telling.  Some follow their non-waking state and try to discover ways to assist their trials and/or tribulations in their waking life.   When we go to bed each night we take with us all of our thoughts and manifest them in ways that may reveal some insight and or an answer to our troubles, or in this case, our writing.  I'll use myself as an example.  I had an interesting dream the other day.  Someone had broken into my house.  The interesting part was that I knew about it.  In the dream, I 'acted' surprised and extremely upset at the manner in which my house was broken into.  The act of being broken 'into' wasn't what stirred my attention as much as the 'feeling' I had toward this act.  I felt frustrated, discovered, vulnerable, hopeless and angry.  So was my dream a peek into my reality about my writing struggles?  Perhaps.

Writer's often 'feel' all the things I described in my dream.  It is a daily struggle to allow the words, process and experience to flow out instead of them being coerced out of your head.  When you feel like you are literally trying to break into your own mind, you may end up becoming paralyzed with your own efforts.  The process must be trusted and every writer will and must go through this 'break in' with themselves at some point.  The idea here is to watch for those slightly open doors, those moments of instant thought that spring on like a grasshopper on a leaf.  There are ways to try to record these nuances of everyday 'moments'.  Here are some "Writer's Slum" tips I've compiled that have helped me along the way:

1.  Keep 3 or 4 index cards sporadically in odd places in the house along with a pen or pencil in order to jot down a random thought or idea.

2. Apply "Writer's Slum" Tip #1 to your car as well.

3.  If you own an iPhone (I don't) or a Google phone (I do) or any other phone with downloadable apps, search for a "Voice Recorder" app and use is when you don't have access to pen and paper.  I've done this several times and it's worked wonders.

4.  As soon as you wake up, try to record whatever it is that you remember about your dreams from the night before.  If not, don't worry, they'll come to you at random moments but just be prepared to record them.

5.   Allow yourself to take breaks in the form of writing something on your blog (if you have one), write a letter to a friend (even if you never send it), write down a grocery list, etc.  The idea here is to get you out of your stuck mind and more in a free mind.

Try it out!  Perhaps you'll find new ways to adjust your style and you can share them here.  Whatever the case, simply stop slumming it and start slamming it!