Dreams are a funny thing. They can make you laugh, they can make you cry. They can fill your heart with joy and peace as well as crush it. They can inspire a thousand stories or they can inspire a myriad of fears. Dreams are a funny thing like that.
All of my stories are inspired by dreams that I have had, all of them, even the ones that I will never put to paper. I get to experience a fragment of the life of that my characters lead and I let my imagination do the rest because soon after waking the fine details fade. The Moonstones novels were based off of a series of dreams that I had where, from the few details I can remember after waking, I lived in the life of Sephira, Alissa, Jonah and Lilly. As Sephira all I remember is the impression of her rape and murder as I lived through them in the dream experiencing the horror of it. As Alissa, I experienced her wedding ceremony and the night after with her husband and the flavor of her world as she grew up world. As Jonah, I got my gleanings of the world that these characters all live in as well as his deeply profound commitment to Alissa. As Lilly, I got the Impression of the politics and business practices that dictate the path that society takes in this world.
For the novel, Sanguine Whispers, I had a dream where I was the victim of the serial killer who is the villain in the story. That, coupled with the song “Jar of Hearts” by Christina Perri, led me to create that story. Alexis, the psychic detective (she is a medium who gets readings by touching objects) who is helping the police to track the killer down, was another character from yet another dream that I had. In the dream, as her, I was curious because I couldn’t get readings off of the items left behind at the murder scene almost as if the spirits of the victims were cut off.
Even the stories that I have that don’t initiate by dream usually have dreams that follow where I get details and impressions that influence the story. This may make it sound like I have dozens and dozens of dreams but I don’t. I am someone who doesn’t often dream or, if I do, I don’t tend to remember them other than a few details and impressions, just enough information for me work with. The few dreams that I have tend to be very vivid and sometimes it is hard to distinguish them from the real world upon my awakening. Whenever I dream, I tend to wake up the next day in a slump of depression and continue to stay that way the rest of the day. You would think that this would be an undesirable thing yet when I go to bed the next night I find myself hoping and praying to have yet another dream just so that I can once again escape. I wish for this even though I know that once again the next day I will suffer even more for my reality is a painful one for me to bear and these dreams are my only reprieve from my real life. Don’t get me wrong though, my life isn’t horrible, I have a lot of great people and things in it but despite all of the good there is one thing that always eats at my soul and that is what my dreams tend give me relief from.
What is it that plagues me in my life so? Well, if you have read all of my blog posts on this blog then you should already know. When I was thinking about this post last night before heading to bed I wished for yet another dream, another escape. I had dreams the previous three nights and due to that my depression was really acting up. I was planning to just come right out and spill my deepest heartfelt secrets about myself to the world through this post. Fortunately, or unfortunately depending on how you look at it, I didn’t have a dream last night which has given me a bit of a clearer head and state of mind for writing this. I probably shouldn’t really be worried about that since no one reads more blog anyway.
Now (and I don’t know what I am going to do this nobody ever reads this but I am going to do it anyway) I have a question for all of you, my non-existent readers. Do dreams influence your writing? If so, how?
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