Question: In a recent dream I had woke up and left my room. I came out into the hallway and there stood a man I know from school. I asked him what he was doing there (in my dream), he asked me what I was doing there.
As the dream went on we had conversations. This dream above my other ones seemed so odd. Different in many ways with color, and sound. He was answering my questions. Near the end of our dream he picked up a snake and disappeared. He left the dream like that. I was still dreaming, I was cooking the snake.I haven’t seen him yet because the semester hasn’t started. I wanted to ask him but I don’t want him to think I’m crazy… Is this real, is dream telepathy real?

Answer: Hi Mary, there are certainly different beliefs about this, but from my perspective dreams such as the one you have experienced are generated entirely by the dreamer, drawing on past experiences and such to create a projection of a familiar person that seems like he or she could be real. In other words, the man seemed real and was conversing with you by means of your own mind’s creation.If you’ve seen the recent movie Inception, I think Cobb offers a great way of expressing this in a line he directs softly to his projection of Mal near the end, in one of the most powerful bits of the film. He says:”I wish you were. But I couldn’t make you real. I’m not capable of imagining you in all your complexity and… perfection. As you really were. You’re the best I can do. And you’re not real.”The dreaming mind’s capacity to create is incredible in its vivacity, but it’s not ever quite right. The projection of the mind seems so real because it is made by how we perceive it, but our own perceptions are limited and cannot measure up to the infinitely nuanced complexities of reality. Again, different people would tell you otherwise, but this is my thought. If you do mention the dream to him at school, feel free to update this page with how it goes. Just use the Post Comments link below.

Thanks for your question and good luck,
Kevin