My alarm went off at 5:40am this morning, as it is set for most work mornings.
For a brief few seconds the radio blasts a song from the 80’s before being abruptly cutoff by a slam from my palm. Sometimes this song ricochets through my brain throughout the day, and in some cases I will even find myself humming or singing it. It might happen while furiously typing out CSS code at my desk, or while standing at the urinal… well… urinating – you never know.
But no song would distract me this morning – something else was occupying my mind as I sat up in bed. We are often inspired by our dreams, and in my case (and those of a few of my fellow web developers), we often discover the solutions to a work-related problem we had the previous day. We have those “ah-ha!” moments somewhere between deep sleep and just waking up. Sometimes, we pull out something much more random, and in those waking moments/minutes this random thought can appear to be something very deep and important.
I recall one morning, while living in Cupertino (across the street from Apple), I sat up at the sound of my alarm as I always had. As I sat up and gazed out the window, a voice echoed in my head… “Behold, the amazing, JORBA!”. It was such a strange thing for me, to hear a voice from my dream while knowing I was awake. It was 4am and raining outside, but the orange glow of the street lights offered me a clear view of the reality that I was indeed awake, but I simultaneously knew (without a doubt) that Jorba was a giant bear, the star of a circus show I had attended (even if only in my dream, as I would soon discover).
I would go on to use “Jorba” as my online handle for a number of years, the incident had clearly meant something to me for whatever reason.
So, back to this morning… queue the music. It was Aerosmith. “Walk this waaay, talk this waaay” was all I heard as I silenced it, and then it hit me. As the room filled once again with the dull hum of my air filter, I heard it… an echo of a voice… it said, “Beards are serious.”
This phrase would follow me to the bathroom. Even as I started the shower, eyes half open, I was pondering the implications… what could it mean? Beards are serious… Okay, but why… I must be missing something.
In the shower, I continued to mull it over. For some reason I imagined the phrase printed on a shirt, and all of a sudden this serious phrase (or at least it felt like something serious and important) became utterly ridiculous, likely marking the point at which I had finally become fully lucid. In fact, the idea of a shirt with this printed on it caused me to laugh – you know, that half laugh you emit when you are barely awake. That laugh that, at least in my case, feels more like a Sheldon laugh than a real laugh. Your body says it’s funny, but your brain is still trying to “get it”.
Dreams can be inspiring and give you ideas. They can help you solve problems, or give you a better understanding of things…
…but sometimes they just give you beards and giant dancing bears. Take what you can of value and run with it.