Creativity in dreams and hypnagogia

Discuss creativity which occurs in dreams, wakefulness and everything in between. Many including Beethoven, Richard Wagner, Walter Scott, Salvador Dalí, Thomas Edison, Nikola Tesla and Isaac Newton — have credited hypnagogia and related states with enhancing their creativity. Edgar Allan Poe wrote of the "fancies" he experienced "only when I am on the brink of sleep, with the consciousness that I am so." Edison would hold steel bearings in his hand and drop them on the floor as he nodded off to sleep, which would wake him, and then he would write down ideas. I do visual art and music so it can get pretty crazy. Sometimes in or in between dreams I can flawlessly visualize films with a fully developed visual style/identity which perfectly matches their plot. Sometimes the plot might reveal itself to be not that brilliant after I wake, but even then the visuals (often with elements of complete photorealism) were fully articulated and matched the story beautifully. Or if there's no plot, then just incredibly detailed and intricate visuals in general. Although I am fairly skilled, I do not possess photorealistic visualization skills which some people have. There's always an bit of patchiness and fogginess if I need to imagine something, so dreams like these offer an amazing, albeit sad glimpse into the brain's potential. With music, besides very catchy melodies (which is often most I can salvage after waking) the instrumentation and composition is sometimes absolutely fuarrrking unreal - way, way beyond my musical skill set. What are your experiences and have you been able to apply them in real life? How does this creativity differ in the areas of logic, visuals, music, math, etc.? How does it work and how is it so incredibly powerful? And how can we harness it more efficiently?

I find myself in a state of hypnagogia rather frequently, especially when doing a repetitive task over and over. The repeating task functions as almost a sort of meditiation and eventually i dont need to focus on anything and i drift away. It feels like all my energy is pointed inward rather than outward and it can feel like I'm sinking deeper and deeper into myself. generally when im in this state i just think and listen to ambient/experimental music. I've never really put the effort into being creative while in hypnagogia but I think it helps my creativity overall after i come out of it.

>>3324 Are you referring to this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flow_(psychology)

I experience hypnagogia fairly often, typically when napping in the sun or going back to sleep after morning alarm. Havent tried to experiment in this state really I just let it happen. Difficult remembering afterwards if it isnt thought on for 15 minutes at least. Still struggling with the rubiks cube of time idea.. This producer may be of interest, a lot of his earlier tracks sample noises similar to what I hear during the lead up/start of episodes of hypnagogia or alice in wonderland syndrome https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NF2nh3BjkFg

>>3325 no its not flow, i mean hypnagogia. Me referring to a repetitive task was more of an example. I think "flow" would refer to a more mindful state of activity and I think of hypnagogia as a more mindless one. When I'm in hypnagogia there's no task to be accomplished and I just sink into it.

>>3336 Hypnagogia is the transition from wakefulness to sleep and the state of consciousness during that transition. Unless you're falling asleep during those activities then I think you're experiencing something else. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypnagogia

Perhaps in the state of Hypnagogia our brain is shutting down all of the non essential 'programs' that are running in our conscious and subconscious minds. It lightens the load, therefore allowing space for a level of creativity that's not accessible in our waking state. In our waking state, the brains 'ram' or 'disk space' or whatever you wanna call it is essential for physical awareness since that's what has been top priority when it comes to survival. We as humans inherently own creativity as a survival mechanism, and we know it has the ability to make us feel bliss or hell. We've evolved to subconsciously create feeling and now we're evolving to consciously create it. However its hard make this shift since Feeling, and by extension Creativity, often need to be suppressed in our daily lives since they are uncomfortable and non essential to the monotonous actions that we need to do in order for our society and collective well-being to thrive in convenience. The brain, in order to keep us sane, has adapted to shut down its feelings and creativity throughout the day so that we are consciously numb to the discomfort that we experience in our daily lives so we can just get our soykaf done then come home and live in mindless 'comfort' by burying our negative feelings and emotions under comfortable novelty. Anyways, it seems our brain utilizes this harmonious period between conscious and unconscious to freely express the subconscious thoughts and ideas of the day that are automatically deemed and programmed as low priority. The inherent sense of inner peace that keeps us running and motivated throughout the day through our subconscious becomes unrestricted to its full potential when our forefront programs shut down, so we think and 'see' higher things in this state of relaxation before the state of deep sleep regeneration. This creativity is what we Are underneath the hood. Human consciousness is always reaching a higher level of awareness. People are realizing that feeling and creativity are linked, and that we can influence our feelings through creativity by creatively knowing what thoughts to think and not think at any given moment. Our brains potential is always with us, we just have to learn how to optimize our mind through mindfulness, habit, de-conditioning and re-conditioning to direct our energy to what we know is important for the goals we create to become noticed.

>>2978 How do I get into visual arts?

>>3340 Don't. It's not worth it.

>>3342 unless you're wealthy or have existing support for your material needs. in which case fuarrrk off and go do some real work with your money >>3340 just start practicing drawing objects near your desk space on paper. draw characters if thats what motivates you. making good drawings follows your curiosity because curiosity leads practice. theres nothing you can do to prepare for "getting into" it. you just have to wanna do it, then do it a lot. i went to art school and saw some really untalented people become pretty good just because they practiced a lot and were motivated

>>3340 everyone's creative process is different, but i start off with an idea or a feeling i want to convey and just mess around with ideas or sketches until things come together. the important part is that you do it, you gotta create stuff to be creative. also do it as good as you can and hold yourself to that standard of "did i convey what i wanted to with this piece?"

>>2978 I have hyperphantasia(extremely vivid mind eye, can insert anything into my vision like AR, extremely high visual spatial IQ) I took an IQ test once stoned out of my mind at scored 131 on the visual-spatial intelligence section, despite getting 80 on numeracy and verbal bc dude weed lmao. I can generate paintings in mind's eye instanteously. I occasionally get completely original music playing inside my mind. I can hyperfocus on specific instruments/audio tracks/midi tracks in songs and isolate it and "turn down" the other parts of the song in my head.