Writing about your Dreams

Sometimes I get tempted to write stories about the dreams I have while I'm asleep. People are generally fascinated by dreams, and I'm not much different, even though I abhor going along with the crowd. So, I want to write stories about my dreams, but even though I've been trying to do this since I was 15 I have to comment that I have met zero success. Unless I'm dreaming about the story I'm writing then for me ... writing about my dreams is an absolute dead end.

Why? Well, I'm glad you asked.

I think there's only one reason why it never works out. My dreams are very vivid and scatterbrained, meaning that they focus on the details rather than on a general plot guideline. So, I sit down to write and there's this idea in my head. I'd describe the idea as elusive and the idea never comes out on paper the way I want it to.

Once when I was a very little girl I had a dream that I was in this water, it was dark and I got the feeling I was in an ocean in a movie (not a real ocean) and I was desperately trying to climb onto this rock, because I was terrified of the water. Then once I got onto the rock, it started to move, and I realized that it wasn't really a rock, but it was a sea monster. I'm afraid of whales, just in case you were wondering. Now, that's a little interesting, but all on it's own it's nothing more than a fragment of a story - not even an idea for a story if you ask me. And your idea never has a chance to solidify before you've forgotten the most important parts of your dream, and you can't continue to write the story, because you don't remember your dream clearly.

It's just that lately, I have been brainstorming the details of my story 'Ghost Mist'. Maybe I've been thinking about it a little too hard, but I had a dream this afternoon about a black butterfly. This butterfly had about a 40 cm wingspan and it had no head. It was sort of built like a stingray, and had two brillantly orange tiger eyes. It also had two long arms that had little hooks on the ends of them - and naturally I was terrified of it, but it's eyes were so beautiful that I couldn't look away. It's weird ... but I think I'm going to try to find a role for this little guy in 'Ghost Mist'. Oddly enough, there's even a part for him. I'm trying to expand myself into a mindset where an animal could have a role in one of my stories too, so maybe he can hang out with a couple of my other animal characters.

I'm turning into a weirdo.

Anyway, if this works out, then it will be the first time I've ever had any success incorporating my dreams into my stories.