Dreams & Writing

[CheekyAless]

Have you had a dream that has encouraged you to write about it or include or base a book around?
I have heard some authors in interviews say that they have started off with a dream and then expanded it and added more detail to create a great story.
Have you ever had a truly detailed, adventurous dream that has given you an idea to write a book?

Please share your dreams!

[PhormlessPhorm]

!! This is a really good idea. I usually keep a dream journal for guidance purposes and insights into my life but this would be another good way to use dream material. Here's one I just re-recorded that could be an interesting start.
11/9/10
Very strange trip to India. I am two men. I am experiencing it first then I go to what happened before, that is I go into the past. I am on a plane to India. I stop in Afghanistan and almost pass out in the airport. I have second thoughts about India for a moment because it is dirty. When I make it to India I am in a pool of water. In the water are two pods which are the men I will become. I am simultaneously alive as these two men and being born in the pods. After I look at people passing by. I recall shouting at a French woman.

6/26/13 I am currently re-recording some of my dreams and this dream is very interesting in light of an interview with John C. Lilly that I just revisited. He talks about Alternity which is “a space in which you’re in touch with many alternate realities, all simultaneously.” Another thing that struck me from this article was the way he views religion as operating systems that one can plug into but then discard. It reminds me of a dream journal entry I just looked at that just said, “Create your own religion,” at the top of it.

The first entry is the dream and I could use the them of Alternity!

[tuttifrutti56]

It has happened a lot of time.The most ambitious people get their inspiration from their dreams.

[suzy1124]

Great thread Cheeky!....very thought-provoking...

[CheekyAless]

Thanks for sharing!
I often have a lot of dreams (mainly anxiety) but I have not had one that I feel would be a good story line for a book. How some authors have such adventurous dreams they can make a good story I don't know!!

[colleenmclain]

Nice question, I have had dreams that have become works, but also I have dreams about my current works. Sometimes, in drifting away to sleep one of my characters will wake me and say something like, "you know I'd never say that," or "I'm not going down that road, take me sailing instead." Like my children they always get their way.

[jlpuckett93]

Whenever I have a strange or thought-provoking dream, I write down everything I can remember about it. Some of them have been truly disturbing, and these are the ones I have written about. Try to find something honest and raw in those dreams and why your subconscious may have invented them and then cast these ideas onto another character in a different situation. It makes for some really interesting stories.

[deanfromaustralia]

I keep a note book beside my bed for this very purpose. My current project has come about because of a remarkably vivid nightmare that stuck with me after I woke. In an effort to understand it - which I still don't - the seeds for a story took root. My publisher released a short story earlier this year which I wrote based on another, less violent, dream.

I have an over active imagination for sure.

[Enigma]

All my novels are based on dreams, and then I dream about my novels. It's how the books get written.

[Zannie]

I use to have a dreamthat everyone I new was hunted and eventually eaten by a Crocodile. This was before I became the hunted. The dream would finish with my legs jiggling outside the crocodiles jaw. Do you think it would make a good story?

*knew

[vortexkd]

My first ever long story was based on a dream, though the final product didn't resemble the dream much at all. But after that I've only had daydreams expand into ideas and then into stories, which is kind of different.

[vortexkd]

Have you ever had a lucid dream -- a dream in which you knew you were dreaming?

I have! It's lots of fun, but i tend to wake up really quickly because..well for lack of a better explanation, my dream tends to fall apart. This is probably because I realise I'm dreaming usually only when I'm in a tight spot (in the dream). But it's still really fun!

[bric418]

Every night i have a dream to write about. I try to get them written down when i can.

[Eve-Hanlon]

Thanks for sharing!
I often have a lot of dreams (mainly anxiety) but I have not had one that I feel would be a good story line for a book. How some authors have such adventurous dreams they can make a good story I don't know!!

Hi. I don't know how others have adventurous dreams, but I know certain crystals help you dream. I use amethyst, smoky quartz or blue kyanite. I've not used them to try for a dream to inspire a book, but... you could try it.

[emmy grace]

Dreams have worked as great inspirations for short stories, probably because the dreams I have are either very serine and peaceful or absolutely crazy and unrealistically adventurous. I would like to point out that most of the time I hear mention of dreams it is not the dream a person had while asleep, it is their dream of what to accomplish, who to become, adventurous to go on. I think the best dreams for inspiration would be the dreams you have while you are awake rather than asleep. Of course remember the word's of Disney's Cinderella, "a dream is a wish your heart makes... "