Let sleeping dogs lie……

What are dreams? Do they have a purpose, and do they have a significant meaning?

Existing theories are the Freudian theory that attributes disguised meanings to dream content, and the Hobsonian theory that reduces them to experiences of disordered brain activity. The Freudian theory gives dreams hidden meanings, and the Hobsonian theory denies that they have any significant meaning at all. Y

Yet our immediate intuition about dreams is that they are little movies that we experience and take part in. If dreams are movies, do they have producers and script-writers and directors and all the other personnel required to make one?

Dreams are normally non-lucid. Dreams are often bizarre and incoherent. And finally, most of them are completely fforgotten bt the time we awake.

We can compare those characteristics to those of a cinematic movie. The creation of a cinematic movie is a purposeful activity. We can ascertain an overall purpose, which is something like: to give the movie-goer an exciting, emotional, disturbing or satisfying experience.

Can we ascribe a similar purpose to dreams?

The possibility that dreams are purposefully constructed by a dream-maker suggests an alternative interpretation of non-lucidity: dreams are non-lucid because this intensifies the experience.

One specific phenomenon that is given an interesting interpretation by this theory is that of realizing that you are dreaming and then dreaming that you are awake…. Dreaming that you wake up is the same thing as no longer realising that you are dreaming.

If there is a dream-maker, who or what is it ? If we are not to believe in supernatural beings accompanying us in our sleep, the dream-maker must reside in some part of our own brains. Presumably it is found in some or all of those regions specially active during dreaming.

What is the overall purpose of the dream-maker's dreams? I have given some reasons why we can believe that dream-making is a purposeful activity, and whatever the purpose is, it is one that requires dreams to be experienced as if they were real. Unfortunately I can only speculate as to what this purpose actually is. It may for example be some sort of testing or rehearsal

Careful study of dream content may shed more light on this question. Better understanding of the mechanisms that hold the dream-maker accountable for the success of its dream-making may also give some clues.

But all of us need dreams and the need to dream. They are the first stage to satisfying our innate hopes and desires. Desires, which one may be embarassed to express in front of others…

As indicated earlier….if there was a dreammaker, things would have been very convinient. But since we still have yet to identify one, what does one do.

We watch movies, cinemas, serials, and identify the themes, the stories the actors and actresses enact with our unsatisfied desires, thus being able to fill that void

Now there is an advantage for this as well….. it also fills that void for those real-life dramas, one is unable to enact with the reel-life ones, and which can be filed and enacted at any stage with a definite result. There is satisfaction for both sides, hopefully, we never know….. but at least they are being paid for it…..

We might have some disagreement here, but every cinematic or a serial plot has some link to some real-life drama who knows where…… but it’s better that neither the script writer nor the innocent role-players who enact that drama are unaware about it….. mainly because, it is the connection that the viewer makes during the movie, that make the movie more exciting, and that leaves a sense of déjà vu behind…….

Basically, it keeps the wheels of the society churning…. In other that separates a good scriipt writer from a bad one….

Fortunately, by the time a script is written, edited and made into a movie, the drama process for the role player would have changed considerably…otherwise it could have devastating efffects

He dreams about his hereoine, his perfect woman and likewise the woman, her perfect charmer and the process goes on…..

If not for them, where would we be……

The proverbial masturbators

Recently, stole this from a blog which I took a fancy to…..

The last day I was goin through the articles and news reports on violence in Bangalore at Rajkumar's death. Due to a quirk of fate, Salman Khan got released from jail on the same day too. The reactions of common people to these 2 news got me quite uncomfortable - people were willing to risk their lives and security for some person they see in a cinema hall.

But thinking a bit more in detail about the issue made me realize that its not the hero they are willing to sacrifice their lives for, its the character he plays and the dreams he helps the audience to dream.

Entertainment is all about a willing suspension of disbelief, of helping the audience to be what they could not be in real life. So when Rajni, an auto driver becomes a crorepati one day in a movie, the audience laps it up with full fervour. We do not see Mohanlal as a person, we see Dasan, we see Induchoodan and we see Mangalasery Neelakantan. This is also true with Amitabh Bachan in north India.

But how ethical is this dream weaving? I started thinking along these lines because a couple of weeks down the line, i will be doin the same thing for a living. Use a deo and patao a girl; use a cream and u can make a career; use a soap and u can be like a movie star.....

All these ads might seem like useless to the educated audience like us [hopefully]... But think about a farmer or a daily wage labourer.. who uses these products and spends that much extra money which he could have spent for his kids or family... Are these companies doing the right thing by creating these "emotional and experiential attributes" for products and selling them at a premium?

However this issue has an other side too... It is definitely true that the customer has the right to choose. More importantly the issue is that products like these and films like that of Rajkumar or Rajnikant help the poor farmer to become a crorepati or an Aiswarya Rai by spending 5 bucks or 10 bucks.

Every individual has a right to dream irrespective of the living standards he is in.. and as society moves towards a materialistic one, products and services like these help the poor to satisfy their dreams within their limitations... Something worth discussion??

No let sleeping dogs lie……

The Child Inside

He came out of nowhere.

It's a windy day and I'm sitting on the bench, ignoring my messy hair and waiting for a friend.

He was walking by slowly, looking at me curiously.

Something about him forced me out of my shell, and I smiled at him. He accepted with a shy forwardness, and took a seat on the bench next to me.

When I asked him what he was doing, he told me that a big wind had come and he lost his friends.

We became immediate buddies

His name is Yonatan. He is a four-year-old on a mission.

Yonatan came to unleash something within me that's been concealed, put down, and woefully unexpressed.
I asked him questions, and he answered with enthusiasm. He was gentle and unafraid when he realized I don't speak his language fluently. It didn't matter to him. There could be nothing in the way of what he was sent here to do.

He told me about his family. He told me about school. He's very excited for Purim. He wishes they didn't have to learn about Pesach yet. He likes candy, and seemed unsure of my sincerity when - in normal adult behavior - I shared his enthusiasm.

But the thing is, I was being totally sincere. While talking to Yonatan, I realized that I was expressing a vulnerability that I have closed off to most people. I felt light and simple. I towered over him, but I felt soft and small. There was something about this four year old that was overpowering me.

I thought I was innocent, but Yonatan opened me up to the kind of innocence that I have forgotten to hold sacred, that I have forgotten to value.

It's the kind of innocence that let's you approach a stranger. The innocence that doesn't see boundaries. The innocence that lets you give all of your attention to the moment. An innocence that believes in its own strengths, but that takes itself lightly. An innocence that sees beauty, discovery, and adventure everywhere. The kind of innocence that doesn't believe in bad motives, that trusts the goodness in others, and won't be convinced otherwise. An innocence that allows dependence on another. An innocence that wears no sign of unnecessary seriousness.

An innocence that doesn't know how innocent it really is.

Yonatan made me miss the child I once was. I never got to say goodbye. Who dared to steal my youth and why did I not protest? Why can't I be more like Yonatan? Can I recover what's been lost? Can I invite my inner child back into this world I've created? Will it be comfortable with the new me?

I'm too serious. Serious about learning. Serious about relationships. Even my happiness with life has a seriousness it can't seem to escape. But deep beneath my intensity, my ever present feeling of adult existence, is a child. A child that went to sleep without a lullaby and has been waiting for someone to jump in and turn the light on.
Yonatan flicked the switch.

If I would have had more articulate Hebrew skills working for me at the moment, I would have told Yonatan that he changed something within me by stopping to say hi, by sitting on the bench and talking with me. I would have told him that his precious smile lit up a world within me that's been dark for way too long.

It pains me to think that, one day, Yonatan might come across someone who will send him the message - albeit subtly - that he "needs to grow up." It frustrates me that something about this world might harden the softness of Yonatan's warmth, might force him to put blocks up, get serious, get tainted, and never turn back - all without even saying goodbye.

But why can't we all be a little bit more childish? Why do we all leave a part of ourselves behind? As we grow up, our inner child wants to be tamed, but it never asked to be destroyed, to be forgotten. It still wants to be a part of our new world, our new adventures. Why do we fear our inner child? Why can't we grow up together?

I wanted to ask Yonatan if I could carry him around in my pocket. But, no. Yonatan knows my new mission. He vanished as quickly as he came, leaving me feeling old and lonely - but inspired to turn on the light switch to my inner playground.

This is an article piece by Mimi Notik.

Mimi Notik is a young published writer from Seattle who is currently living in Brooklyn.

This article is copyrighted by the author, publisher and/or Chabad.org, and is produced by Chabad.org. If you enjoyed this article, do distribute it further, provided that you comply with their copyright policy.

More articles by Mimi are available here

Let's Wait And Watch......

There’s too much mental telepathy at work these days.

Imagine how much easier it would be if everyone simply stated what they wanted. Rather than making grand assumptions about other people’s motives, we might actually start getting our needs met. Lies seem to be the in thing. It has no origin, and has lost its actual source and flavor.

Nowadays, a lie is so obvious, something to be made mockery of. It sucks.

Hey, I didn't say that. ...... Say what ?

Well then it may have been somebody else’s soliloquy, but I feel your anger. This is the usual form of conversation these days

It's become very difficult to function with images nowadays, i.e., on a virtual reality basis. Although it has becoming a bit stabilized, nonetheless, cries of MTV coming in now and then. Blank as it may seem, there is an enormous amount of loose data going to waste, but where seems to be the general question.

When the image game is over, who is responsible for the mess ?

The feeder or the doer ?

It appears that it is both. Now how is this possible ?

The “image feeder” does in most cases, with a malicious intention (naturally there are exceptions), but the doer being innocent, jumps upon thinking it is an opportunity not to be wasted and commits the action.

But then again, the main idea is that someone is performing, without which the system won’t function.Then there are some of us who fall in the category of knowing the situation but not functioning.

As mentioned earlier, things don't just come, ideas must flow spontaneously, for which obviously there must be a source or reservoir of information.

We all know that a vision (“nowadays media introduced images”) without a task is but a dream.

In other words, a thought without action is useless, and an action with no sense of thought is even more useless. It has no meaning. So we have little choice but to perform, whatever the action may be.

There is however, an interesting scenario here.

Despite the fact that most ideas are created from media induced sources, there are instances that this manipulated information could prove exceedingly useful.

But then again, allowing yourself to be passively manipulated and not getting involved is risky. Because once caught in that cycle, it's rather difficult to find a way out.

To put it in a different perspective, we can either make ourselves miserable or strong and the amount of work involved is almost the same.

Sometimes, it is difficult to understand these imaged based junk inflows of various sources that practically nobody understands.

What we are seeing here is the ultimate of waste, the paradigm, and maximum symbol that could define human mental waste, as there is absolutely no productivity.

A fantastic exchange of ideas that destroys itself immediately and cannot be utilized anymore. It is even more sad as some of those ideas can be passed on to someone.Financially, it appears that mutual funds are making a comeback. Bankruptcies are yet to raise its head. Appears embezzlements are out of fashion. Fudging the books is slowly poking its head up, and laundering is still a baby.

Where have the good old Cambodians gone. Perhaps we ought to come up with a grant so as to support this ailing industry.

If something is not done, there would not be countries to buy depleted weapons, which as a result would be an increase in taxes again. Well, if this continues, it appears politicians eventually have to fund themselves, apart from an occasional handout.

Nonetheless, there is capital being wasted away, but if we focus, the reverse is sure to happen. Mainly because when we have a capital base of practically nothing, and a solid debt base, I cannot theoretically visualize anything but gain

The stink has also started permeating to the common man, but somebody has to answer for the enormous amount of capital invested for every nonsensical action or a “war expense”, besides providing a very justifying tax plan to substantiate the expenses. What happens should it come to be known it was investment worth wasting !

But still, there is something seriously wrong.

And killing a source or an idea is just not the solution. No it's not worth discussing it, realization is what matters.

The answer primarily lies in the media.

Unfortunately majority of the decisions are made based on television reports, something unthinkable.

After the glitter fades, beneath the leather and lace, we're just scared, trying to learn how to love, amid the gaudy after images of popping flashbulbs of the paparazzi. And when darkness falls, and we crouch naked and are alone in our slack, aging bodies, snuffling with fear, and snarling at the grinning phantasms of our toilet-flushed dreams, with a fistful of pills to keep us company.

Well anyway TV stations have boosted their ratings, young things have started prancing around enjoying their newfound status, as there is somebody to pay for it.

The biggest and scariest trend is that there is more and more stimulation in our culture.

It is lights, camera, action-everybody, all the time.

It's going to be good for the drug companies; at least, they're going to be the ones trying to calm us back down. I know people who have come up with creative ways to disguise the banners that scroll along the bottoms of their television sets. People put yellow sticky notes on the top of revolving logos on their TV screens.

There's just too much stimulation everywhere. Whatever happens, I hope that the media is not subjected to more censorship.

What is essential here, is that newcomers are explained the basic objectives of media and media communication, or else more and more live events have to be recorded.

Otherwise, we would have to learn to interpret articles such as these, so as to rectify and make sense of it.

Now is there a solution to this... perhaps......

Now let me think up some rubbish... so as to justify above trash !!]

They say it is the subconscious, or even the unconscious, which can answer these problems.

As ideas must flow spontaneously, for which obviously there must be a source or reservoir of information. In other words, we know that a vision without a task is but a dream.

So, a thought without action is useless, and an action with no sense of thought is even more useless. It has no meaning. So we have little choice but to perform, whatever the action may be.

Although the doer may not be right, the main thing here is that there is a response, be it inexperienced, and most of all he performs that action without which the system won’t function.

Then there are some of us who fall in the category of knowing the situation but not functioning, as they believe their ideas come from a manipulative source. Now, if you do not check your ideas sources, your action may not lead to anything fruitful.

On the other side, if you start questioning ideas, problems seem to arise.

What we have here is definitely a Catch 22 situation. !

You do not know whether the information received is genuine, yet you have to perform, putting your conscience in disorder. Hence the huge mental waste.

Furthermore killing a source or an idea is just not the solution.

In other words, allowing yourself to be passively manipulated and not getting involved seems the best option.

However, the risks are exceedingly high as once caught in the cycle, it's rather difficult to find a way out.

It is only our subconscious within which can have answers to most of these problems, and how essential it is to preserve that subconscious. To put it in a different perspective, we can either make ourselves miserable or strong and either way the amount of work involved is almost the same.

One must note that our greatest fear should not be of being inadequate but it is the fact that we know that we could be and we are powerful beyond measure.

If we at least try and stop now, then perhaps there is some kind of hope.

I think we are not far from it either.

All we are saying is……. let's wait and watch…

Baby Halder

From a maid to a best selling author, Baby Halder has come a long way.

She is an Indian housekeeper who penned down her autobiography Aalo Aandhari or A Life Less Ordinary, describing her harsh life. Abandoned by her mother at age 7, raised by a neglectful father and married off at age 12, she later left an abusive husband with her three children for a life as a housemaid in New Delhi.

She wrote after work, using plain matter-of-fact language in Bengali.

Her story powerfully illustrates the lives of domestic servants in India, who are often abused and ill-treated. Her last employer encouraged her and aided in editing the book. He translated it into Hindi and this version was published in 2002. The Bengali original was published in 2004. A Malayalam version appeared in 2005 and the English translation was published in 2006.

The book became a best-seller in India.

Translations into French and Japanese are being planned. Now she is busy writing her second book.

Not bad for a girl who started has a housemaid.......... must try and pen an autobigography [please forgive the sarcasm.... it is out of pure envy...]

Hope she goes a long way.....

Three friends and their heavenly reward

Three friends all died and went to heaven at the same time.

Saint Peter meet them at the Pearly Gates and said to one of them "welcome to Heaven! here is your reward." after saying that Saint Peter immediately handcuffed him to a extremely unattractive woman.

"Saint Peter! why is this my heavenly reward?" the man asked ?

Saint Peter replied, "when you were five you killed a bird with a stone."

Saint Peter then turned to the next guy and did the exact same thing for the exact same reason. He was asked the same question and answered the same. finally he turned to the third guy and said, "Welcome to Heaven!

Here is your reward." the third man was immediately handcuffed to a beautiful girl. extremely happy the man walked off. the other two men, who had stuck around to see what their friends fate was, were outraged.

How come he gets a beautiful girl and were stuck with these?

We can name a few things that he did that were worse than ours!" Saint Peter said, "When she was five she killed a bird with a stone."

'Newhart' Actor Tom Poston Dies at 85

LOS ANGELES --

Tom Poston, the tall, pasty-faced comic who found fame and fortune playing a clueless everyman on such hit television shows as "Newhart" and "Mork and Mindy," has died. He was 85.

Poston, who was married to Suzanne Pleshette of "The Bob Newhart Show," died Monday night at home after a brief illness, a family representative, Tanner Gibson, said Tuesday. The nature of his illness was not disclosed.

More details available here

Brant Parker Calls It A Day

In rememberance of Brant Parker.....who has poked fun at political follies for quite some time..

Phew.... from the politicians

Brant Parker, a co-creator of "The Wizard of Id," an award-winning comic strip that is set in medieval times and has poked fun at politics and cultural follies for more than 40 years, died on Sunday at his home in Lynchburg, Va. He was 86.

The cause was complications from Alzheimer’s disease, according to an announcement by the Creators Syndicate, which distributes "The Wizard of Id."

Incidentally, Mr. Parker’s death came eight days after the death of his partner, Johnny Hart, who was best known as the creator of the comic strip "B.C."

Well he musta received mail from him saying that there was a much better future over there.... than here.... plus the fact that they set your biological clock back by fifty years...

Anyway, bless them both....

Outrageous News Bloopers

Funny live tv blunders from around the world