Is life a dream?

As beautiful and wretched as life can be, I’ve often found it to leave a lot of room for questioning. Where I once would have taken much of what was in front of me at face value or what I was told to be gospel, I now look at it all through a truly unique lens. It’s something I see as both a blessing and a curse. Refusing to see all thought and opinion as fact and choosing to challenge what is, was, or could be brings me an immense amount of joy—I’m not afraid to ask the big questions or explore the deeper meaning or reasoning of things, and I truly wouldn’t wish to be any other way. And yet, it feels relentless at times.

Oh, to take the world as it is—to fall in line and live in peace among governed society in pure, ignorant bliss. In some ways, I wish my mind would switch off—leaving me to enjoy the beauty of life for what it is without the need to ask more, probe further, uncover newness. Oftentimes, I do live in a seemingly blissful state—almost a dreamlike state—and there I wish I could stay. But more often than not, I’m thinking. I can be somewhat esoteric with my philosophies—hungry for new ideas, theories, and thoughts on life, living, being, and all it encompasses. Ultimately, it’s what led me to create of an artist.

But in my isolated existence, I don’t have an awful lot of soundboarding as an option, despite longing for it. I enjoy transcendent thinking and questioning, and for the most part engage in it alone or through various bits of research related to my work. And, Reader, it’s generally pleasurable—but I’m unable to challenge myself in ways I would like to and, ultimately, it can feel like a lonely pursuit. But I’d quite like to change that.

While the past months have been what they have, I’ve had quite some time to think, pause, and ponder some more. I’ve certainly had more moments that I’d care to count in reflection and mourning—grieving what I thought this year would be and adjusting to what it is. I’ve also contemplated a lot of who I wish to be and what I desire to do with my time, my work, and my existence in general. Pushing the boundaries of life as I know it is a huge part of that. I don’t wish to settle for a small existence or limited knowledge—I’d love nothing more than to debate key thoughts and theories, explore new concepts that are both new to me and ideas of my own, and engage you in it all.

And so it shall begin in The Philosophy of Being—a series on some of the deeper philosophical questions, theories, and ideas for us all to examine and inspect in ways that feel best to us—both together and individually.

In conversation with you over the past six months, I’ve come to realise that so many of you are searching for meaning as much as I am. We’re all navigating our own versions of what it means to build and sustain a life of purpose, intrinsic value, and joy—searching for peace in the everyday as part of that. And here, through The Philosophy of Being, we have the opportunity to do so in unison.

Through thought-provoking questioning, speculative hypothesising, and curious conversation, I hope for us to scratch the meaningful itch we’re facing—and, as such, I’ll continue to include explorative prompts and reasoning to encourage you to think beyond what you already know. I am already thrilled to see what this could become.

To begin, today we will look to explore the idea of life as a dream.

As children, to dream and explore the depths of imagination was as natural to us as breathing in air or falling asleep at night. We knew no different. We’d think and create and explore all sorts of worlds and paradigms and ideals without boundary, without a second thought as to what was real and what was not. In early adulthood, we learn relatively quickly to forget play, replacing it with whatever concept our culture or community sees as ‘reality’—but is said reality as we know it even real? Is anything? Or does something only go on to become solid or concrete when we decide as such, giving meaning and merit to it in the process?

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