If there is such thing as a common ground, in this world. Perhaps that common ground is found in dreaming

What if our weirdest, most personal experiences are actually what connect us most?

I’ve been thinking about dreams lately—those strange, vivid stories our minds create while we sleep. We rarely talk about them, maybe because they feel too personal, too weird, too… well, dreamy.

But what if we’ve been thinking about dreaming too narrowly?

The Intelligence That Never Sleeps

Arnold Mindell spent his life studying something profound: our dreams aren’t just random brain activity that happens when we’re asleep. They’re doorways to a deeper kind of intelligence that we all share—and through his revolutionary concept of the “dreambody,” ( and later the Processmind )  he showed us that this dreaming intelligence is actually happening all the time.

You know that moment when you’re about to say yes to something, but your chest tightens? Or when you meet someone new and instantly feel at ease, even though you can’t explain why? That’s your dreaming intelligence speaking. It’s the same creative, organizing force that’s working in your sleep—but it’s happening right now, in your body, guiding you toward what’s true. Your creative intelligence ( or dreaming )  is always trying to catch your attention!

Mindell’s research revealed that this creative force is present in our body symptoms, our relationship conflicts, our creative blocks, and our moments of inspiration. In other words, we’re experiencing dreaming when we get that “gut feeling” about someone. We’re dreaming when our body tenses up in certain situations. We’re dreaming when we find ourselves drawn to particular images, songs, or places without knowing why.

Think about it—when you dream at night, your mind creates stories, that seem chaotic, nonsensical. However, when you learn to work with dreams and dreaming you begin to see that nighttime dreams, and troubles in your body or relationships are ingenious  ways that your creative intelligence is using to wake you up to highest potential!

The Intelligence That Connects Us All

With practice dreaming intelligence and it’s inherently self-organizing tendency shows you ways to interact with seemingly awful or incompatible perspectives and challenges. Life can become more of a purpose driven flow!

Dreaming intelligence facilitates understanding between different parts of ourselves, different people in our families, and different voices in our communities. It’s the same process happening in your dreams every night and in your waking moments of sudden insight.

Maybe that’s why sharing dreams feels so intimate—because in that strange, symbolic language of dreams, we recognize something essential to our survival. Something that reminds us we’re not as different as we think. Something that connects our individual nervous systems to a wisdom that transcends personal experience.

Sometimes the most personal thing is the most universal—and the most necessary.

What happens when we ignore this intelligence?

In my practice, I’ve noticed something troubling: many of my clients are exhausted, anxious, and struggling to regulate their emotions—but when I ask about their dreams, there’s often nothing. Just blank space.

What if our modern exhaustion isn’t just about being busy? What if we’re literally starving ourselves of something our brains need to survive? Perhaps even our society! In my clinic I help people feel and sense their dreams and their dreaming. I

help people see that their imagination is alway active. That their dreaming intelligence is closer than they rationally think. It is right here now… and learning to live with and from your creative mind is something worth learning how to do!

Next week, I’ll share what cutting-edge neuroscience reveals about why we can’t function without dreams—and what happens when we’re dream-deprived.

In the Meantime: Notice Your Dreaming Intelligence ( or Creative Mind) 

This week, pay attention to those moments when your body speaks before your mind does:

• The gut feeling that says “no” even when logic says “yes”
• The sudden inspiration that arrives out of nowhere
• The tension in your shoulders when you’re around certain people
• The images, songs, or places you’re drawn to without knowing why

This is your dreaming intelligence at work. And it’s trying to tell you something.

Want to explore this deeper?

I’m developing an experiential workshop for early 2026 called Dreaming Forwards—where we’ll move beyond analyzing dreams to embodying them.

📧 Email admin@bencrebertpsychology.com.au with “Dreaming Forwards” in the subject line to be notified when details are released.