Last night I dreamt that I was in some kind of group workshop and the leader announced that he wanted someone to do a standup comic routine. With little hesitation, he asked me if I would do it. With even less hesitation, I declined, because that is my automatic reaction to playing such a role. I explained that I am not good at performing lines as an actor, let alone taking on the challenge of delivering them in the context of a routine where it is incumbent upon me to make people laugh. The leader accepted my response but then proposed that I could just try it once and see what happens. I was intrigued that he had singled me out for this role, and his presenting it to me as simply an experiment made it more acceptable and even attractive to me. I was already aware that my fear reaction was based on my having suffered attacks from my inner critic when performing in my actual waking life, and this was an opportunity to outgrow the habitual identification imprinted in me. So, I accepted.
In the next segment of the dream, I looked into a mirror and saw the round face of a young Chinese man instead of my usual narrow and older Caucasian face. At first this shocked me a little, but then it struck me that this was part of my transformation from my previous experience of stepping out of my habitual comfort zone. This showed me that I was now empowered to change my reality.
In the day preceding this dream I had watched an excellent Ted talk about how our brain hallucinates our conscious reality explaining the brain basis of consciousness and self: https://www.ted.com/talks/anil_seth_how_your_brain_hallucinates_your_conscious_reality?utm_source=newsletter_weekly_2017-07-22&utm_campaign=newsletter_weekly&utm_medium=email&utm_content=talk_of_the_week_button.
I highly recommend it. I believe that this talk stimulated my subconscious mind to produce my dream. This mind-blowing scientific presentation explains and demonstrates both how our brain is constantly hallucinating and how our perception of the world we live in and ourselves is created by pre-determined pathways formed in our brains. While it may seem disconcerting or disappointing to discover that our experience of life may be illusory and limited, the science also demonstrates that we have the potential to re-create our reality.