The City and Its Uncertain Walls

by Haruki Murakami

When I told you this you said, “I keep a notebook and pencil at my bedside, and as soon as I wake up, I write down my dreams. Even when I’m busy and pressed for time. When I have really intense dreams in the middle of the night and wake up, I fight the urge to fall asleep and instead I write them down in as much detail as I can. Since most of those are really important dreams and teach me a lot of important things.”

Too often we dismiss our dreams as cheap tricks of the mind but what if they are trying to convey important messages?

For you, dreams were almost on the same level as events in the real world, not something that you’d easily forget or something that would vanish so easily. Dreams were like a crucial water source nurturing your heart, conveying something vital.

I could not survive without the ability to dream.

As the sun began to set and it grew darker, around the time when the Gatekeeper prepared to blow his horn, I would “whistle” and call my consciousness back to my body and set out from my house and walk to the library.

This reminded me of lucid dreaming. How often does our consciousness journey from our body while we sleep?