Do you get your ideas in dreams?

[TomMazanec]

I keep dreaming SF stuff. Last night I dreamed about a girl who was "handicapped" because her brain could not process information "beamed" into it, so even though her IQ was 180 she was considered "retarded". But a secret organization recruited her because beaming knowledge reduces creativity, which they wanted.
A few nights ago I dreamed I was at a newsstand where the papers came from different AH timelines...the one I looked at had just had a limited nuclear exchange.
The week before there was that war between humans and uplifted animals...you get the idea.
My sole paid article (not saying what until I reach 100, if even then) came to me in a dream.
I still get shivers remembering a dream of a huge red moon (like in the early Earth Time-Life illustration) looming on the horizon and filling half the sky, and my mother screaming "Don't look at it it will drive you insane!". And that was fifty-odd years ago.
Even earlier was where my living room became a Wells time machine like time warp. And it is as vivid as when I woke up, although my recent dreams tend to fade.
What SF dreams have you had?

 

[Droflet]

Hmm, not ideas exactly, but occasionally images. I've done some decent writing out of my images.

 

[tinkerdan]

Most of my dreams seem to involve some sort of endless loop of frustration.
Maths dreams where I'm trying to solve some equation whose variable keep shifting--think maths for dyslexics.
Handfuls of money that keep changing denominations every time I look away.
Endless rooms that keep going and when I turn around the room I came from is gone and something new is there.
Book shops with exciting books that change every time I try to show someone what I find.
People that try to help me find things--my car--my way home--my shirt--my pants--etc; only they keep vanishing or getting way ahead of me.
Narrow spaces in a house that has endless rooms that eventually I get trapped in because the walls get too close together or doorways are too small.
Malls that are under ground where no matter how hard I try to go up, I keep getting diverted farther down.
Parking lots that have endless cars--none of them are mine and I can't for the life of me figure out where I left my car.
Highways that seem to have no exits or the exits that exist are exceedingly difficult to navigate and usually land me going in the wrong direction.
Massive highways with 16 lanes that loop upward so high that if you drove off the edge it might take all day to crash to earth.
Endless deserts or mudflats--usually I end up in a house that has a three or four story deck built off of it where I watch the mud flow by.

I've worked management jobs for everything from Hotel restaurant, retail, engineering documentation control and IT and customer support:
So it seems common for me to be dreaming of working at a restaurant on the west coast--trying to figure out how I'm going to get to the east coast for my IT-technical and engineering support job since I seem to be working both jobs.
Or worse yet working a combination restaurant IT engineering job in a vast building and I'm trying to find my desk while also trying to give everyone in the restaurant their breaks during a massive rush and trying to understand why I don't have my usual game plan for the day on my clipboard--with all the employee names and how I plan to swap out for things like breaks and who needs breaks and who doesn't; so I can get back to my desk and field all the important tech calls coming in.

Then there are the ones where I'm going to college, but have skipped some or most of my classes and I need to remember where they are so I can do the end-term exams and or try to convince the prof that I deserve a passing grade.

Oh then; having been married three times.
I suddenly realize I'm in the wrong house with the wrong person and I'm trying to figure out how I can fix this without someone getting hurt.
-------------
I subscribe to the notion that dreams are a pure form of solipsism because everything is you. However the waking mind and the unconscious conspire to deflect us from understanding this and try to attribute faces and names(People we know)to the various characters that show up.

As writers we have to give the characters challenges and frustrations; so it is easy to see where we might try to cherry pick parts of dreams to throw at our characters.

Oddly enough there are enough strange things that have happened around me in reality that I can usually cherry pick those and make them work.

 

[Don]

Allow me to regale you with one of my recent dreams, which readers ought to relate to, one way or another:

Theme: Anxiety over my role as Head Usher.

Setting: Hollywood sound stages.

Characters:
Trump
A seven foot tall secret service man.
A secret service man of average height.

Plot:

My role as Head Usher is to lead Trump's procession to a dais, where he'll give a speech. Trump's immediately behind me. I pull a scuba diver's hookah hood from my suit pocket and think about wearing it. Trump strongly disapproves and sort of leaves my sight.

Now, I'm playing catch up, trying in vain to reclaim my position at the head of the procession. I leave one sound stage and enter another, where a secret service man of average height grabs me and throws me against the wall. Another seven foot tall secret service man, who is obviously in command tells the first, "He's OK. He's the Head Usher."

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

My first trilogy emerged from a dream I had, but nothing since has begun that way.

 

[Guttersnipe]

I used to have dreams that I was able to recall entirely, and some were even lucid. Some "segments" of them could be used for a story. Now I just dream about mundane things. My dreams then and now, however, were and are almost never coherent like a story should be. Sometimes I'll dream that someone else has a great idea and I get envious, but when I awaken, I realize how bad they are.

 

[reiver33]

Occasionally dreams, but it’s hard to retain the fine detail. More so from daytime migraines and the attendant medication, resulting in a semi-surreal stupor, but one that can slide into directed dreaming.

Several of my stories have come from these residual ‘dream’ scenes.

 

[Eli Grey]

Most of my dreams seem to involve some sort of endless loop of frustration.
Maths dreams where I'm trying to solve some equation whose variable keep shifting--think maths for dyslexics.
Handfuls of money that keep changing denominations every time I look away.
Endless rooms that keep going and when I turn around the room I came from is gone and something new is there.
Book shops with exciting books that change every time I try to show someone what I find.
People that try to help me find things--my car--my way home--my shirt--my pants--etc; only they keep vanishing or getting way ahead of me.
Narrow spaces in a house that has endless rooms that eventually I get trapped in because the walls get too close together or doorways are too small.
Malls that are under ground where no matter how hard I try to go up, I keep getting diverted farther down.
Parking lots that have endless cars--none of them are mine and I can't for the life of me figure out where I left my car.
Highways that seem to have no exits or the exits that exist are exceedingly difficult to navigate and usually land me going in the wrong direction.
Massive highways with 16 lanes that loop upward so high that if you drove off the edge it might take all day to crash to earth.
Endless deserts or mudflats--usually I end up in a house that has a three or four story deck built off of it where I watch the mud flow by.

I've worked management jobs for everything from Hotel restaurant, retail, engineering documentation control and IT and customer support:
So it seems common for me to be dreaming of working at a restaurant on the west coast--trying to figure out how I'm going to get to the east coast for my IT-technical and engineering support job since I seem to be working both jobs.
Or worse yet working a combination restaurant IT engineering job in a vast building and I'm trying to find my desk while also trying to give everyone in the restaurant their breaks during a massive rush and trying to understand why I don't have my usual game plan for the day on my clipboard--with all the employee names and how I plan to swap out for things like breaks and who needs breaks and who doesn't; so I can get back to my desk and field all the important tech calls coming in.

Then there are the ones where I'm going to college, but have skipped some or most of my classes and I need to remember where they are so I can do the end-term exams and or try to convince the prof that I deserve a passing grade.

Oh then; having been married three times.
I suddenly realize I'm in the wrong house with the wrong person and I'm trying to figure out how I can fix this without someone getting hurt.
-------------
I subscribe to the notion that dreams are a pure form of solipsism because everything is you. However the waking mind and the unconscious conspire to deflect us from understanding this and try to attribute faces and names(People we know)to the various characters that show up.

As writers we have to give the characters challenges and frustrations; so it is easy to see where we might try to cherry pick parts of dreams to throw at our characters.

Oddly enough there are enough strange things that have happened around me in reality that I can usually cherry pick those and make them work.

I have these types of dreams too. Loops. Things I want to stay the same keep changing.

 

[Eli Grey]

I seriously think I am clairvoyant. I will think about something and then moments later or later that day, something related to that thing will happen or will show up on my radar. It's fascinating but sometimes unsettling.

As for dreams, it's when I suddenly wake from a dream that my brain starts spitting out images of things and ideas for my fantasy series or my other projects. I woke up with a character walking around a field of giant round boulders and it made sense that he did. It's now being implemented into my fantasy series. Or, I'll wake up and it's like a part of my brain was making connections to plot threads or making sense of the ideas I use in my world. Everything will just click and I'll lay up for hours working out the kinks of those ideas. It's like the pieces that connect the ideas were there in my head all along, or like they're being stored there by someone or something otherworldly because out in the great vastness of space, the world I think I'm creating is being explained to me by some supernatural being.

Recently while falling asleep I had an image of Peter Jackson's Frodo and Sam on their mission to get the ring to Mordor. But they weren't traversing any middle-earth landscape. The concept was that once they left The Shire, as Gandalf had warned, they shifted into another dimension/world and they suddenly found themselves in a modern day city. It was night and there was heavy rain and tons of neon lights everywhere. The story played out as it has been written but seeing frodo and sam in a city like Bladerunner full of neon lights caught in the heavy rain just blew me away. I've been thinking about that too since the image came into my mind.

The thing is, they're never in any real danger when they're in this city. They're to meet Gandalf there and he'd lead them to a portal of sorts back to middle earth from that point on, it'd have the atmosphere of the world in the film 9.

 

[Guttersnipe]

I actually dreamed what might be called "stories" last night. It was broken into distinct segments. One was about "cheebles" which were plastic-like orange balls. Everyone was using them for something, but no one could tell me their function. In another one, there was a haunted cottage. I wish I could remember all the details.

 

[mosaix]

Not dreams as such but that period between not quite being awake and not quite asleep.

Sometimes I’ll get an idea for the 75 or 300. I know I should sit up and write it down but I convince myself I’ll remember it - but come the morning I never can.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Not dreams as such but that period between not quite being awake and not quite asleep.

Sometimes I’ll get an idea for the 75 or 300. I know I should sit up and write it down but I convince myself I’ll remember it - but come the morning I never can.

This has happened to me. In fact a lot of the stories I have written either came to me just before or after sleep. Except that knowing I probably will forget if I don't write them down I do get out of bed and do it.

 

[mosaix]

This has happened to me. In fact a lot of the stories I have written either came to me just before or after sleep. Except that knowing I probably will forget if I don't write them down I do get out of bed and do it.

I’m just too warm and comfortable to sit up. Must just do it next time.

 

[cornelius]

Some details in my books stem from my dreams, most notably the dream one of the main characters has at the very beginning. And would you believe it, the character's name is Cornelius.

 

[Pyan]

Cornelius! Welcome back! 6 years is too long...

 

[Timebender]

I seriously think I am clairvoyant. I will think about something and then moments later or later that day, something related to that thing will happen or will show up on my radar. It's fascinating but sometimes unsettling.

As for dreams, it's when I suddenly wake from a dream that my brain starts spitting out images of things and ideas for my fantasy series or my other projects. I woke up with a character walking around a field of giant round boulders and it made sense that he did. It's now being implemented into my fantasy series. Or, I'll wake up and it's like a part of my brain was making connections to plot threads or making sense of the ideas I use in my world. Everything will just click and I'll lay up for hours working out the kinks of those ideas. It's like the pieces that connect the ideas were there in my head all along, or like they're being stored there by someone or something otherworldly because out in the great vastness of space, the world I think I'm creating is being explained to me by some supernatural being.

Recently while falling asleep I had an image of Peter Jackson's Frodo and Sam on their mission to get the ring to Mordor. But they weren't traversing any middle-earth landscape. The concept was that once they left The Shire, as Gandalf had warned, they shifted into another dimension/world and they suddenly found themselves in a modern day city. It was night and there was heavy rain and tons of neon lights everywhere. The story played out as it has been written but seeing frodo and sam in a city like Bladerunner full of neon lights caught in the heavy rain just blew me away. I've been thinking about that too since the image came into my mind.

The thing is, they're never in any real danger when they're in this city. They're to meet Gandalf there and he'd lead them to a portal of sorts back to middle earth from that point on, it'd have the atmosphere of the world in the film 9.

That sounds like a fanfic I'd definitely be into!