Woke up this morning at 4 and wrote three chapters of my book because of a very vivid imagery that I witnessed in my dream. It was as though the gods had pity on me and presented me with a gift after a long break, thinking about how to tie up some loose ends. Anyone else here goes through this experience? Did you ever have to take the part that you wrote out because you didn't see it as a conscious decision? Just wondering.
I wrote a children's book based on a fairy I had a dream about. Use whatever it is that inspires you to create an awesome story
I've had dreams that I really should have immediately written up. They always fade so fast, and I most often remember them because I was awakened mid - dream because if had to get up and go somewhere. I don't understand taking it out because it's not a conscious decision. Why would that matter? If it's good and it came from your brain, why not embrace it?
I feel the same way, that it isn't my actual creativity that created that cool thing. that it was just a dream. Even so, I usually write my dreams down though I've been getting lazy with that lately. One of my book ideas actually started as a dream. It's probably fine though, nothing to worry about it. As long as you feel connected to it and want to write about it it'll work out.
I can't wrap my mind around that. It's not as if you rent out your brain like a cloud server, so that those ideas may have come from the last tenant. Who else's creativity is it, isn't it yours? Or if you're saying it's not creativity, then what is it? If it's not creativity, then how did it create? Creativity doesn't require a taskmaster. To be defined as creativity, the workings of your brain don't have to be directed by you saying something like, "Today at ten-sixteen sharp, I will figure out the plot of my novel." I'm not trying to be snarky here, I just can't begin to figure out what you mean. The brain that creates your dreams is the same organ as the brain that creates your novels. What's wrong with tying all of its creative work together?
Every story I've ever done serious work on either started as a dream or has integrated elements from dreams. I do dream a lot, however, (pretty much every night) and remember almost all of them. Sometimes it's just a character or image I find myself really interested in exploring, or maybe it will just show a character who already exists in a situation I've never thought of placing them in. And occasionally it's a full, cohesive story with multiple characters and a comprehensive setting that just travels fairly smoothly from beginning to end all on its own. There are a couple of short stories I'd like to make based on dreams that happened that way. (That's not to say I don't have nightmares. I have fairly awful nightmares pretty regularly. But when I don't, there's almost always something I see that I'll remember and want to work with.) Not that I'm copying ideas down verbatim. Even if I get a great concept, it might be months before I've worked it into something usable. But I would definitely say it's fine to use or adapt dream ideas. Judge them and use them based on their own merit and change them if you need to, just like any other idea. They're yours.
Usually my dreams vanish the second I wake up, so even if I tried to write them down I'm not sure I could. I don't think it ever happened to me that I've dreamed a solution to an ongoing novel.
My dreams always seem brilliant to me when I'm still in their thrall, to the point that I started keeping a pen and notepad beside the bed so I could jot down the my genius before it faded back to dream-world. Then I started looking at what I'd recorded, and realized that the brilliance was part of the dream. Most of my dream-ideas make no damn sense in the harsh light of day.
Its interesting how we all dream different. I remember my dreams every night, when I don't remember its odd for me. Though usually dreams are not book worthy, no matter how good or scary they are. They are generally just odd shit that you can't write about. Like one time I had a dream that I was trapped inside a house that wasn't mine in real life but i was just there randomly and this creepy looking skeleton creature was hiding in the bushes waiting for me but at the same time the house was also haunted by a goat. In my dreams i can fly so i attempted to run outside and start to do a breast stroke swim motion (thats how my flying starts) and I go all the way up to space. When i come back down its like a free fall tot he ground and I can feel it in my stomach. then my dream ends. lol
This is the part I was trying elaborate on when I asked if anyone ever developed their dreams and then thought "this doesn't fit the narrative. What was i thinking writing this down?"
My dream-stupidity goes a bit beyond not fitting the narrative. It's more like "Yeah, great idea, but how are they going to train a giraffe to fire an Uzi?"
That would be pretty funny..a giraffe with an Uzi lol. Mine are usually more like the same characters in my book doing things that I could relate to and use, but some other times, they are just there by name and face but doing some other crazy sh*t i know nothing about.
Mine often seem to have a core that can be used--the details are nonsense, but the characters and emotions and relationships sometimes have value. And they are sometimes an opening into the daydreaming cinema of my mind. I can have trouble getting to that place and mood, and recalling a dream can get me there. Once I'm there, I can alter the ridiculous bits.
