Erin Faith C. Miranda - Dreaming: Cinema of the Subconscious

Erin Faith C. Miranda                                                                   Dreaming: Cinema of the Subconscious

STS

                  This documentary about dreams really got me hooked until its end credits. It was very interesting; filled with so much knowledge and information about dreams. It also included interview clips of Leonardo DiCaprio and the director of the blockbuster film where he starred, titled “Inception”. The documentary tackled issues concerning dreaming, which really got my interest since I was an avid fan of “dreams” and their meaning, the mechanism and situations that trigger, stop and control them.

                  Ever since I was a child, I’ve always been fascinated by dreaming. An instance when you could go into a magical world where nothing is impossible. I experienced falling, being chased, being killed, being betrayed, being famous, being bad and good, being massacred, almost everything. It was interesting to know that these dreams are collective dreams. Almost everyone has had these kinds of dreams on at least one point in their lives. Is it in our genes? Or collective experiences?

                  One thing that really got me is the sleep paralysis. It’s not a joke and it’s one of the few things in life you wouldn’t want to happen to you; not even once. It is terror and fear at its finest. And the reason why I know this is because I frequently experience it myself. Much frequent that I already know how to control it in my own little way. In sleep paralysis, you are awake; not dreaming. But you are paralyzed, you won’t be able to move anything except your eyes and your eyelid. No matter how hard you try to scream and move and breathe, the more you’ll feel a very heavy weight applying its pressure on you. And on top of that, you’ll have hallucinations; you’ll hear and see things that weren’t really there. From one night, it became days, weeks. I thought at first that I was being haunted by something. But when I did my own research and with the help of some friends who knew somebody who has the same experience, I figured out that it was just natural if you’re stressed or having irregular sleep and eating patterns, or if you slept on a full stomach. Because of this sleep paralysis, I learned to take care of myself and control it somehow when it happens. I just close my eyes, pray, short breaths, close my eyes as to not see anything that might scare me, and wait for it to stop. Luckily, it works.

                  Another thing that intrigued me is that of the shared dreams. Almost everything happened to me in a dream. I had collective dreams, I sleep walked twice in my life, I often sleep talk, I frequently experience sleep paralysis but not this shared dreaming. I mean, what’s the explanation behind this? How do two people enter/create the same dream subconsciously? Are they thinking of the same thing but consciously doesn’t know that they do? I would really like to know.

                  As of now, there weren’t really any concrete explanations about how dreams materialize and how to control it. This just goes to show that our brain has still so much mystery that we have to convey and figure out. If we discover these things, maybe we could use this to its full potentials and for the advancement of our society.