WHAT TO DO WITH DREAMS

I had a dream last night. Tiny droplets of water formed on the ceiling, just above my head. Then slowly, they ran together and started to drop, a steady stream at first, slowly, one, by, one, falling into my hair, as I watched them accelerate towards me in and then out of focus.

Things like this give me a dreadful feeling - like a heavy stone in the pit of my stomach, a sickly worry that imagines it’s my fault as well as my responsibility. I was quickly thinking about what to do (I don’t think I own a bucket, and who knows what I’ll find in the loft) when suddenly without warning, the plaster gaped wide open,  and a torrent of cold rainwater came crashing through the ceiling.

I woke up with a start.

The real ceiling was fine. I was fine. Everything was fine! Except.. it’s left me with that dreadful feeling. It really feels as though something, somewhere’s about to happen, and I’m not going to like it. Drips precede the torrent.

Well. Here’s my rationalisation this morning: I think dreams can come from three places, and there might be ways to tell which is most likely.

If a dream is from God, it’s often a clear warning - He’s good enough to be clear and not cryptic. At the moment, if it’s that, it’s not clear at all - just a feeling. So without any further confirmation or evidence (and I’m not closing myself off to that), I am ruling that out for now.

It’s also possible for the enemy, the old adversary, to manipulate our influences and cause us nightmares. The feeling is what he wants me to carry into the day, if it’s that. Unsettled, nervous, fearful. To the dark side these thoughts lead. So I’m kicking them out.

That leaves cheese dreams. Or, in this case I guess, just reading the news about flooding in the North, moments before going to bed. This the most likely reason for dreaming about being flooded, I reckon.

If I’m wrong, if something is about to happen, I don’t think I can do anything to stop it. At least, I don’t have the tools. And in that situation, adding worry to the pile of things, won’t change any of them.

If I’m being manipulated into fear by my emotions, I can grab hold of them and choose to believe something else about today.

And if, I’ve been tricked by my own brain attempting to regenerate my thoughts into a weirdly coherent jigsaw puzzle, then what’s happening is actually just chemical reactions. And they’re only scary when you have to write them out in a science exam.

So, basically, everything’s absolutely fine. Right?