Dreams, visions, and the things too easily dismissed
I had a vision in the small hours before dawn, somewhere far from home. Not a dream. I know the difference. I’ve known the difference for a very long time. Dreams are random nonsense. Incoherent. Flat. Fleeting. Visions are vivid. Visceral. Profound. The five senses are all active and engaged. I’m conscious though unconscious. I control my mind, speech, and actions despite sleep.
Dreams are forgettable. Visions are indelible.
Upon returning home, I thought I’d browse an old copy (1911) of the Encyclopedia Britannica — a practice I’ve enjoyed since I was young. And, after some time searching, found under the word Apparition, emerged an interesting and rather detailed breakdown of related things, including ghosts, phantoms, phantasms, etc.
The article is quick to dismiss such things as illusions and pathology, despite the detailed inventory of terms. As evidence, it further recounts the story of Sir Walter Scott's ghost of Byron, diagnosing it as hanging cloaks. So, by conventional standards my experience was imagination, unusual dream, a pathological mental state, or the result of drugs since no fever was present.
I beg to differ.
I suppose if the authors had experienced what I had, their expedient dismissiveness might have taken a different turn. But then, by their logic, that supposition is just my imagination. Delusion, even. I'd counter that it takes a vivid imagination indeed to write off the greater part of human experience as pathology, and then dare to call the remainder reality.
By D. Bowman Nomina Numina is a journal of reflections, moments, and meaning-making between worlds. Reply by email.