Wendy Vargas – 5 The Edge of Dreaming discussion questions A dream has the power to unify the body, mind, and spirit. It provides you with insight into your own self and a means for self-exploration. In understanding your dreams, you will gain a better understanding and discovery of your true self. The mind cannot deal with chaos very well; in fact it will resist it and sometimes manufacture order, in which I think it is very important to the dreaming process. Then there is memory. Memory is vast! And I believe it occupies more of the brains resources then most people believe. And then there is the activity called dreaming. I think that to a certain extent, we dream all the time. Even while awake! But the process is functioning in our subconscious mind, out of view from our "window". If defined precisely, they may not be referred to as dreams technically, but the activity is very closely related. During certain cycles of brain activity while asleep, we can "view" these dreams with our conscious mind and record them in our
memory; this is why we sometimes remember them. Dreams can diagnose the causes of our physical ailments, point out the thoughts and emotions that we've tried to overlook and often make suggestions for improving our relationships with others. While dreaming, we can gain awareness about our entire being: physically, mentally, and spiritually. “Some people love to find meaning in their dreams,” said Hardie in the film. “I don’t think I do.” In The Edge of Dreaming, however, dreams force themselves into Hardie’s research on death, as death comes into her life. The death of George the horse (who in the ...
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memory; this is why we sometimes remember them. Dreams can diagnose the causes of our physical ailments, point out the thoughts and emotions that we've tried to overlook and often make suggestions for improving our relationships with others. While dreaming, we can gain awareness about our entire being: physically, mentally, and spiritually. “Some people love to find meaning in their dreams,” said Hardie in the film. “I don’t think I do.” In The Edge of Dreaming, however, dreams force themselves into Hardie’s research on death, as death comes into her life. The death of George the horse (who in the first dream asked Hardie if she was ready to start filming) was one amazing coincidence. But the second dream, with her late companion Arthur delivering the message that she, too, would soon be dead, shook her out of her rational skepticism. “Arthur was too real,” she said. And this happened, after all, in her 48th year. I believe that different dreams have their own different purposes. Some dreams can have a purpose; in this case the death of Hardie’s horse may have been a “goodbye” from him to Hardie. Although the second dream is kind of frightening to think about one’s death, we come to find out that she doesn’t die at the end. Maybe her dream was made to have another purpose, giving her a warning that if she does not take care of herself she will die. She said fear is like a mushroom- it grows in the dark. As I perceive it, one should not fear of dreams. Dreams are happening that cannot be explained, although there might be many opinions. Even though Hardie did not make any sense out of her dreams, or like she said she did not remember, she did not take notice until her second and third dream. That is when she sensed a fear of death. Fear persuades you to set easier goals and do less than you’re capable of. Fear triggers internal defense systems and fools you into thinking that you have perfectly good reasons not to change. Fear of failure or disappointment, reduces the number of available alternatives or keeps you from pursuing them. Fear of making mistakes, causes indecisiveness and confusion. It stops you from knowing what you really want. Fear keeps you from asking for help when you need it or benefiting from the emotional support offered to you. Fear keeps you from asserting yourself and persuades you to settle for what you must settle for instead of going after what you want.In the contrary, I believe that there is no separation between body, mind and spirit. The three exist in union; what happens to the body also happens to the mind and even to the spirit and vice versa. If something affects people emotionally, it will show up in the physical body. Stress is a perfect example; if people are stressed out about something, they will develop physical symptoms such as headache, upset stomach, high blood pressure, etc. By being conscious of this fact, they can develop a practice that will enhance and enrich both their body and their mind. When it comes to differences in things that can go either way, I am neutral. If someone were to give me a good argument about the separation of the body, mind and spirit then I would consider it. The movie made some good points on thinks about dreams and what not, but it did not really change any way of my thinking. In other words, it just made think of different possibilities that an opinion or statement can have. The development of brain-scanning techniques such as functional magnetic resonance imaging, which allows re- searchers to produce images that measure blood flow to different areas of the brain and thus activity in those areas, has been a boon to dream and sleep research in the past couple of decades. These tests allow scientists to see which parts of the brain are used during different stages of sleep and what effects injuries, mental illness and other impairments may have on normal function. For Hardie, she tried different ways in which her dream can be perceived for example going to a shaman. And then basing it of just pure science. The relationship between Hardie’s vision of a scarred landscape at the end of the film and her attempts to reconcile dreams with the real life is no such of lesson learned but to the fact that she has seen the affect that a dream can have. Is it an omen? You just cannot but your hand on it. I believe her dreams made her more aware of life and that now she will enjoy life more than she did before due to the fact that anything can happen.
