(And) I think, now, we can safely say we've lost the hearth - Stephen Fry
I can't recall the last time I had a dream like that. Actually, 'tis more accurate it be called a nightmare. There I was running for dear life in a mall of shadows, the darkness hiding a beast whose form was not known to me, and to know is to be overcome with madness and death (classic Lovecraft).
Yet things took a bizarre turn when I had to defend myself and my friends in a finale of sorts... By playing a video game match, and each time we lost, the beast cometh to consume one of us. And I was the last one standing before I jolted awake, unwilling to behold the form of the monstrosity lest I lose my sanity, at least that's what I suspect would've happened if things played out like a Lovecraft novel.
Now here's the part that amuses me somewhat. Having studied to some degree the nature of human dreams, it's interesting to take a step back and understand that the brain doesn't generate these images with any semblance of intent to create a story. The brain simply activates neurons at random during the REM stages of sleep and synthesises a sensation based of those signals, and we the person would perceive those signals in the form of flashing images more often than not.
Dreams become what they are when we impart a narrative to them. Some people have more talent in giving their dreams meaning than others, that is why you have people who can effortlessly recall their dreams where others might struggle. I don't know this for sure, but I suspect it isn't dependent on one's ability to remember, but one's ability to ascribe a story to the chaos that they saw in their heads while asleep.
I suppose I happen to fall to the former group, as I'd usually have no problems reciting my dreams whenever they do occur.
Which interestingly made me think back to an idea I had heard from Stephen Fry regarding narratives. To paraphrase his sentiment, the practice of gathering around the hearth to tell stories is a dying art. Increasingly we see individuals within families and communities preferring solitude and shunning the dining table conversations.
In a way, what was valuable about the hearth in the past was that people tend to form ideas and narratives around things they did no understand. Of lightning and rain, sun and moon, such complexities of nature that men did not understand then. Once in a while you'd get some pretty interesting and creative interpretations of these things, hence the folk tales, the myths, the household stories, and going a bit further, of moralities and philosophies, and the eternal struggle of good and evil.
We've lost a bit of that, as people of our modern times are more eager to be fed a narrative than to construct one themselves. This becomes scary because people in power today are where they are in part because of their ability to construct powerful narratives, good and bad.
The orators of our world today wield the ideas of the public to the direction of their fancy, think Donald Trump and his commitment to telling the tale of a failing nation that needs his aid. Think Ellen DeGeneres, whose ceaseless seeking of feel-good stories in the most unexpected places is hoping to instil a sense of hope and kindness into her viewers. Think the countless vloggers of YouTube, each trying to put their stories out into the world hoping that their viewers derive some sort of meaning from them.
The power of narratives is still here, and is still ever a powerful influence. Yet people are surrendering their own voices to others without even realising.
That includes myself...
I suppose ultimately this is why I ponder these things. I prefer reticence for as long as I can remember. Yet day by day I wish to break away from the silence to develop my own voice beyond the trappings of this digital page. I wish to speak, and I wish to speak in such a way that people will listen.
This is my hope in finding that voice, that I may be able to construct meaningful and good narratives for the betterment of others.
Until then.
