Dream Interpretation: Dreaming in Lisboa, on East Coast
By Ion Saliu, Dreamer At-Large
I lived the first oneiric event during the night between 17 and 18 of May 2003. The theme was Lisboa—the capital of Portugal. The name of the city appeared as in the original language. I was playing…golf in Lisboa! I have never played golf in my life; I don't think I'll ever want to play golf! I'd better walk in the woods and meditate (woods is not meant to be a pun!). I thought the dream was influenced by my reading of an email from the computer programmer who wrote MARKOV (freeware at the FTP Download site). He is a Portuguese system engineer who worked at a university. I thought the clear dream tried to tell me something about my employment. My reaction was: “I know! I know…”
May 21 is a religious holiday for my native Christian Orthodox belief: Saints Constantine and Helen. My mother's name is Elena (Helen) and she always celebrates May 21, a joint operation with my father. They also celebrate jointly August 15, Saint Mary's Day . My father's name is Marin—they say the male homologue of Mary. It made me think of my parents and how much I miss them.
It appears to be history, rather than legend. Constantine was a Roman general who fought a rival general for the throne of the empire (322 WEB). Helen, Constantine's mother, was already a Christian, by all accounts. She most likely urged her son to convert to Christianity. Constantine allegedly had a dream before a crucial battle. He dreamed of a cross of light and the Latin caption “In hoc signo vinces”: “You'll be victorious under this sign”. Constantine won the battle and became Emperor of the Roman Empire. He also proclaimed Christianity the official religion of the Romans. Days before that act, those who were Christians were killed. After Constantine's dream, those who were not Christians were killed. Shows you how powerful dreams are!
The night between 21 and 22 of May 2003 (3 WE) gave me another “Lisboa” dream. It was a clearer and a more impressive dream. Clearly, it required special attention from my awaken ego. I came across another attention-getting signal on May 22, 2003. There is a “Quote of the Day' section on MyMSN.com page. The quote of the day was:
Søren Kierkegaard is the founder of existentialism. The philosophical current is better known through the works of two famous French writers/philosophers: Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus. They won the Nobel Prize for literature. Strangely, there are no Nobel Prizes for philosophy or mathematics! The best news is there is no Nobel Prize for religion, either.
The quotation made me interpret the dream seriously. I did it for hours. Probably the interpretation is not complete. The sheets of my paperwork look like word puzzles: Anagrams and the like. Here is the description of my dream.
I wrote last year that dreaming is a specialized function of the FearSurvival system. Probably the animals dream, too. It's dreaming when we resemble our ancestors most. Our nocturnal images are most of the time as uncorrelated, incoherent, illogical, and mindless as the nocturnal images the quadrupeds probably experience.
Humans possess an extraordinary device: a mental operating system (MOS). Even during sleeping there is a sub-kernel of the MOS still active. Those (humans) with a special interest in dreaming can turn on a larger portion of the MOS kernel during sleep. Such persons experience more coherent dreams. They "live" the dreams. Some call the phenomenon "lucid dreaming". It is more accurate to call the experience "clear dreaming". The dreams are not lucid, they are clearer than usually. Nobody but nobody can interpret your dreams. It's only you who has the key to all those strange symbols.
I wrote LISBOA on a blank sheet of paper. The first word I recreated was part of my name: SALI. No doubt, the dream was a strong message addressed to my self. Such a goal was stressed by the name SALAZAR. It starts with SAL, another reference to my name.
Then I wrote ABSOL and SOLI. I made the association: My foundation is absolutely solid. I think of the students in my dream. They were happy to meet me and greet me. In real life, the educational institutions are one of the top categories of visitors to my website. They express high regards for my ideas. Cornel in my dream is a reference to Cornell University, on the U.S. East coast. I participated recently in a roulette thread in some math newsgroups. I replied to a poster who signed with a cornell.edu address.
I was so happy when I had the chance to respond to students or educators personally. Impossible to respond now. One of my recently closed emails received 835 messages in one week. I had a hard time deleting them...
I anagrammed also BOA. Well, there are dangers in my life (like snakes!). I need think of an OASI: Find my oasis. Also, I need think of that place, where I am my own BOS(s). I must be the only one who can or may interfere with my ideas.
The Salazar and democracy chapter of my dream is somehow strange. The Portuguese dictator died a few decades ago. I think it meant three things. One, relative to the first letters of my name. Second, the word ZAR. It means dice in Romanian, alea in Latin. Aleatoric events are the main topic of theory of probability. Therefore, it leads to an association with gambling. Again, a clear message to my self. Taking gambling seriously is also implied by Cornel(l). Atlantic City is also located on the East Coast. The third association word is SALAR. My salary, that is income, is somehow a serious problem. Take care of it, self!
Well, somehow a humoristic word association from Salazar: RAS. Again in Romanian, it means shaven. I shaved my head the other day!
This dream offers the best method or technique of dream interpreting, in my opinion. Most dreams are not important. A dream is a random playback of altered past images more often than not. The real past images (motion pictures of sort) represent a tiny percentage in the random payback. Most images are the creation of the awaken segment of the MOS. The MOS kernel attempts to fill in the blanks. The coherence of the images in motion is direct proportionate with the size of the awaken MOS segment.
The clear dreams are more coherent; sometimes very close to the reality coherence. Therefore, I categorize clear dreams as important dreams.
An important dream is an unusually stronger message broadcast from the depths of the Fear_Survival system.
The Fear-Survival system decided that a change must be made. Major concerns of current life must be the centerpieces of interpreting a dream. If proper measures are not taken, the FearSurvival system reacts negatively. I realize I did not take the best measures after my dream of May 2002. I couldn't sleep well for weeks following the dream. I'll get the perfect sleep from now on... for a random while…
“I dream therefore I am afraid
I am afraid therefore I think
I think therefore I hope
I hope therefore I am
I am therefore I dream.”
(Tladouque, “Steps to Maya Pyramid”).
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