Go to a library or bookstore or somewhere with books. Find three books at random – trust your feet to take you to the right book. Open each book to a page at random – trust your fingers to take you to the right page. Find one sentence on each of those pages at random – trust your eyes to take you to the right sentence. Write each of the three sentences down on a single piece of paper. Put the piece of paper under your pillow before you go to sleep and tell yourself to remember your dreams. Then, with your Oracle, design and complete a fast, free, and fun mission inspired by those three sentences and your dreams.
Why? Because heroes learn to trust in the ever-present help of invisible agents who guide through intuitions, synchronicities, and dreams.
Beginning the mission by finding the books and sentences.
Reminding myself what to do.
The three sentences I found at the Avid Reader bookstore on Broadway in Sacramento: #1: “Wrestlers could hold the opponent only above the waist, though tripping to destabilize him or make him fall was allowed.” (Greece: Dictionaries of Civilizations); #2: “A peace is of the nature of a conquest; for then both parties nobly are subdued, and neither party loser.” (Shakespeare quoted in One Thousand White Women); #3: “With an ORAC score of 6552, one cup of blueberries can take care of your minimum daily recommendation of antioxidants and then some.” (Zapped)
I had two dreams I remember the night I put the three sentences under my pillow. In one, I was on a horse and the horse and I were being threatened by a bull — the Freudian dream interpreters please be quiet! In the other, I was aware of a series of masks being displayed that each represented a different expression or emotion. With the three sentences and these two dreams I then created a mission very, very loosely “based off of” (“based on” is not loose enough) the said three sentences and two dreams. The mission was to first of all make a smoothie with blueberries as an ingredient (connects two sentence #3). Then, I was to deliver this smoothie to my friend, Leslie. Finally I was to compete (peacefully) with her in a game of ninja (akin to Greek wrestling). See the dramatic photo below of the ninja challenge!
Here is proof of blueberries in the smoothie!
Here I am pouring the smoothie; I show you because it was that exciting!
Here are two fox pups Lily and I saw when we went to deliver the smoothie and make the ninja challenge. I include the foxes because they are at least as relevant to the mission as the three sentences and two dreams — it was all one great mysterious, somewhat messy, synchronicity. Just so you know, Leslie, there were no fox hairs in the smoothie.
The three sentences I found at the library read:
1) What was worse was that the subsidence formed a big crater on the surface.
2) A homely but most delicious cake, which will keep fresh for several days.
3) The situation is much more complicated in the girl.
The only dream I could recall from that night was very short, in which me and a friend were comparing how long we slept. My friend told me she had slept 12 hours, and I told her that was much too long.
Pulling from that dream I am creating a simple mission, in which you allow yourself to sleep as long as you want, totally guilt free.
My 3 sentences:
1. (In Japanese)
2. The Saturday Book: Such love, they maintained, was impossible between husband and wife.
3. K1-95: Advances in Artificial Intelligence: If one of both cases is true, x is moved from stack to one of the lists: if x’ is expandable (not each child mode of x is stored), then x is inserted to E (step (7), otherwise simply into N (step (8).
In my dreams I was confronted by friends who were accusing me of making them suspects in my brother’s stealing of something.
In the case of troubled dreams:
Think, write, or speak out to defend yourself, forgive your dream friends, and find closure before starting your day. Alter to fit your dream circumstance.
3 sentences:
“Les enfants qui ont commence la série des Harry Potter a page de 11 ans, comme Harry, ont vécu une experience unique.”
“Most people take great solace in the double hull being the magic cure for tanker spills.”
“The army is now at North Hampton.”
dream:
wind chimes subtly rustling in a breeze while a dog in the distance is barking, my toes are being tugged. I am mostly content but feel restrained, I am concerned about the well being of something other than myself. I am warm.
mission:
while meditating before falling asleep i will attempt to to recognize that i will dreaming soon..
1.)
*P. Cai. Mich. = A Tax List from Kranis (P.Cair. 359).
2.)
The Treaty of Versailles signed on June 1919, had decreed that Germany’s future armoured warships could not exceed a displacement of 10,000 tons, with cruisers limited to 6,000 tons, and destroyers to 800 tons.
3.)
To keep kids on this trajectory, advertisers reinforce stereotypes with monumental posters of teenage boys in tattered shorts and nubile girls with pierced and tattooed Navels.
Dream:
Surreal experiences with intimacy and bizarre interactions with people whom I have never been attracted to but only good friends with.
mission:
Unpacking the sexuality and gendered realities of advertisements and war ships.
Sentences:
After Paul’s retreat it had become testing ground for pubertal pairings.
Like in a helicopter, a huge ferris wheel, you sleep among the stars.
Dear me, an alluring girl, plainly.
Dream:
I walked into an unknown bathroom to pee. When I went to wash my hands the sink was clogged and filled with soapy water and bubbles that were almost overflowing out of the sink. I could see the reflection of my face in each bubble, literally hundreds of bubbles. All at once my reflections jabbered back at me, “right now would be a good time to…”. I have no recollection of what the ending of the sentence was.
Mission:
To keep dreaming so I can figure out what my tiny soapy reflections were trying to tell me.
1. Stretch Receptor: A Specialized cell or group of cells found in the muscles or tendons that is sensitive to mechanical stress.
2. …this follows directly from our definition for pushing moves things away (either from the agent of from something else) to some other place, and pulling moves things from someplace either to the agent or to something else, the motion of the pulling agent itself being faster than the motion which tends to separate the two continuous things from one another; for in that case the second is towed along by the first.
3. hair; hairpi, suspending cord, referring to cord to which a small object is fastened, down the flowing hair of Ana’kchina, 399.
Dream:
I dreamed that I had too much chewing gum in my mouth, and however much I tried to pull it out there was always more. And I was very embarrassed because I needed to speak to people but didn’t want them to know I was struggling with stuff in my mouth. It’s actually a recurring dream, though sometimes it’s shredded carrot, not chewing gum.
Mission:
Use chewing gum in an artwork that explores physical tension – pushing, pulling, stretching, suspension.
1. The Critical Radius is defined as the radius where the substrate has been totally consumed (C’S=0)
2. Fresh red or golden pears, fanned out in an orange sauce, end dinner with finesse
3.D’autre part, une exposition consacree aux industries artistiques n’aurait pas ete complete, si des productions comme celles des jouets & des instruments des musique n’y avanient eu une place speciale . . .
My dream: I don’t quite remember doing anything but from some source, I learned that I had no money in my bank account. A zero balance.
Mission: With my last $10 (cash), I went to by some fruit. I consumed with relish.
Anna Davidson:
The sentences I started with:
1. Which of these pictures represents your proudest moment?
2. What greatly aggravates the severity of this treatment is the disproportionate intensity, which it involves.
3. The only relaxation is a letter on the death of a relative or for urgent business reasons.
The night I slept with these sentences under my pillow I did not get good sleep at all. I don’t remember having any dreams, but I do remember tossing and turning a lot and waking up slightly grumpy. Then again, I’m never a good sleeper. I also never really took a liking to the sentences so I felt it was fitting.
I decided to make it my mission to increase the sample size/ test subjects. I wrote the sentences down and gave them to my friend Corey who put them under his pillow. Corey had to get up to milk goats the next day early, so he didn’t have the time to dream in the morning therefore he remained unaffected by the sentences.
Then I asked my friend Bobby to write down three sentences for me without telling him about the mission. I decided to replace the original sentences with his. Since I received those sentences I have slept like a log, which is strange because I’m sort of an insomniac. I have kept these sentences there. I’ve been sleeping like an angel since I placed them there. I’m going on 5 nights of good sleep in a row!
Bobby’s Sentences:
1. The world is a pineapple.
2. If it smells like a rainbow chances are it sounds like French toast.
3. And the bonus round?
I stumbled upon three sentences, two of which were quite fitting for my practice at the moment:
1. In the form reviewed 2 years later, Kaufman’s commissioner proposed to nationalize all family farms (dehkan), leaving their former owners with limited rights to their permanent use. [Ferghana Valley]
2. Theater fordert die gleich Stellung [Everything Design]
3. Rodchenko’s interests himself only in the aesthetic function & reduces the whole task into a reeducation of task according to some new basic principles. [Situational Aesthetics]
The first night I put these under my pillow, I did not dream… at least I did not remember any dreams. The next night the same. It intact took over a week for me to remember a dream again. This is normal for most people, but not at all for me. I dream incredibly vividly almost every night to a point I never feel rested, and I remember the entire dream. The dream draught was frustrating, but also welcome.
Once I finally remembered a dream, I was back on tour (I used to be in a band) and the tour had ended and we needed to get back from the east cost to Denver CO. I had made us a dinner reservation at an important restaurant in Des Moines, Iowa. (strange locational choice, I’m aware) Once I made this, a friend who was not on tour with us, but would not be riding back with us requested we instead stop at a giant picnic near Eames, Iowa she had heard about.
The mission, if you choose to accept it, is to plan a trip to somewhere you have been meaning to go, but have not yet. Along the way, allow yourself to get distracted, and potentially change your plans all together….
3 sentences:
1) With the exception of numbers 2 and 7 examples of the foregoing have been placed in the National Museum
2) These actions included protecting boundary water by means of iron (often in the form of nails) and salt.
3) Those who fell off were “tickled”, that is they were severely beaten and a noose was put on their necks.
Dream:
I was in a large open prison with a couple of friends. Concrete walls and metal ladders and catwalks leading from one level to another. The top level was a sort of gabbled-ceiling floor separated by security glass. It was nicely furnished with white rocking chairs and plush rugs, and a patio door that was open, with wind blowing the curtain. We could see it, but couldn’t get in, even though squirrels and rats could come and go as they please.
Mission: Took a few minutes to sit in the grass with the squirrels, hoping to let it sink in that we were in the same space.
The writer … heard Mr. Joplin play the overture of his new opera and to say that it was exceptionally good would be putting it mildly.
Spartan though the residencies would be, the dining hall, library and chapel were not so constrained.
Those who seek the treasure are ultimately foiled by the constantly shifting and turning paths of the evil maze.
I don’t really remember dreams very well. I do remember dreaming that a professor of mine had a Wikipedia page, and that made me laugh – it was a delightful dream, but it was a different night.
Mission:
I want to write my dreams down whenever I remember them. Hopefully that way I will get better at holding on to them.