You ever a commit a horrible crime in your nocturnal dreams? Something severe, like murder?
It happens to me frequently. Funny thing is, the dream doesn't center on commission, but rather on the after-effects: the complete disconnect between what the crime means for my life. The wholly-fictional crime collides mightily with my real life. My mind and soul boil over in confusion: What will my children think? Can I bring myself to confess it to a priest? Do I turn myself in as part of my penance? But if I'm in jail, how will I provide for my children?
When I wake up and realize it was a dream, I settle down. I'm relieved. But that collision is still with me, my heartbeat is still accelerated.
I like it, in an odd way. It's not because I then feel thankful for my life as it is. I'm relieved and I settle back down to sleep, but I'm still disconcerted. Not severely troubled, just disconcerted. In the jagged cloud hovering around my mind, the feeling is there: my life could suddenly become fundamentally altered.
I like the dreams because they give me a glimpse of how I might respond. In the dreams, I think they're really happening. Everything but the crime appears to be real, to correspond to my life as it really exists: married, seven good children, gainfully employed. I'm guessing my emotional and mental and spiritual state correspond to my life as it really exists. I get a glimpse of how I might really respond.
The dreams rarely show my external response: running to a defense attorney, going to the priest, fleeing the country. It's all inward: My state of mind.
And that's the part I like: It shows how sin really disrupts life.
It's helpful to see big things. If you want to see a microbe, put it under a microscope and it'll appear big. You can see it better.
That's the way it is with these dreams: They're big sins. You can see how sin instills fear, kills peace, disrupts lives.
Obviously, murder is much more severe than yelling too harshly at your children, but the lesson is the same: sin disturbs. The enormity of my sins in these odd dreams merely magnifies that truth that is often to microscopic for us to appreciate in our day-to-day lives.
