With the release of one of the most-anticipated films of the summer, perhaps even of the year, there is much buzz about Inception’s true plot and meaning. I’m not going to talk about the movie or spoil it, but I would like to express some thoughts that the film incepted in me. One thing that I will say is that the majority of the movie takes place in an action-packed dream—which we could all infer from the previews. Ok. Now, what I started to think about from this movie is the nature of dreams that can either be completely out of this world or can be mistaken for reality. When you dream, you are either completely aware that you are having a dream, or completely convinced it is real, right? I think we all can relate to the point that we sometimes believe our dreams are real, or even remember dreams that were so real that we may include them into our memories. Regardless, this movie made me think, what if we actually lived our dreams, literally? Dreams that could be so real, or so not, but actually remember them and have a concept of self within them. Almost as if you are never actually asleep—you are constantly living. There’s a part of me that thinks this would be awesome! How much fun would it be to know you are “alive” in your dreams and can wake up and have those memories from those dreams? For instance, if you arbitrarily have a dream about flying, running so fast, breathing underwater, or simply having an adventure, wouldn’t you absolutely love living that? Even more, what if you could share these dreams with someone else? Regardless, being much more attuned to your dreams would grant those imaginings more power in your life story, and it would be incredible. On the other hand, there are dreams that I would rather not live, like the occasional nightmare. That would be a major nuisance of living the dream. However, an even bigger frustration is the fact that you are never really asleep. Constantly living must be exhausting. Even though you may be asleep, you may never be able to differentiate the period between the dream and reality, and thus enter a constant life reel, where there’s no space to process. There’s no space to mark what’s real and what’s not, except the simple fact of knowing when you are dreaming and when you are in reality–which could become a very complex feeling. Also, the fact that living in your dreams is purely living in your imagination takes you off of your ground to a place that you cannot have. What you are really doing when you are having these dreams is lying down, doing nothing. As tempting as it may be to dream all day, it’s not worth missing out on what is real—your life. After watching Inception and having sporadic feelings of jealousy toward the dreamer characters, I’ve come to realize that I would never want that—I prefer the milieu of my life.
