dreaming awake things

i rarely have dreams anymore. my mind still makes pictures and stories, but they aren't dreams. they're like... memories, or what-ifs. waking thoughts while asleep.

most of them happen outside the garage. just standing there, looking out at the woods. then my dad will say something, and i'll respond, or i'll watch a bird soar overhead, or i'll watch my hens forage around the property. it's so real, it could be real, is it real? did that happen? or was i sleeping?

it feels like i don't sleep. i just slip from consciousness to another consciousness. like i close my eyes and drift off, and i wake up in a universe only very slightly off from this one. just a few millimeters to the left, a bit askew, not squared to ours.

wake up after waking up after being awake.

sometimes i have nightmares. even those tend to be realistic enough to confuse me. to make me fear the waking world for a time.

i wish i could lucid dream. i find myself aware of my state of consciousness often, during dreams. in the back of my mind something tickles. in the back of my mind someone laughs, or gasps, or screams, "this isn't real!"

and i hear it and i know it's true, but i can't do anything about it.

my first lucid dream happened when i was a kid. somewhere between 12 and 14. i'd died and gone to heaven with a friend, and we soared through the clouds without a care. i remember, at first, crying, and feeling helpless— i missed my family. i didn't want to leave them behind. but then i flew, and i laughed.

it was exhilarating! i flew! i soared!

i believe i've lucid dreamed once or twice since then, but i can't remember the context, the content.

it wouldn't be so different from where i go now.

in lucid dreams, you can't do whatever you want. you can't change the general concept that your brain has concocted. you get the blueprints, and you work within those limits. the narrative is set. you just decide when to go off script.

you will always be limited by your subconscious. you will always be limited by what you think you know to be true.

what you think you know.

i wonder, what doors can we unlock by opening our minds to the impossible?