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Someone once told me his favourite conversation starter at a party was, “What did you dream last night?”

I imagine that brief, light-hearted responses might prove fruit for frivolity and bonding: “I was ice-skating with a panda,” “I was running for a bus, naked,” “I was icing a birthday cake with dog poo.”

Let’s flip this idea.

What if your dreams were the conversation starters, inviting you each morning to engage with the questions they pose?

Be creatively loose, be curious. Each dream has many conversation starters. There’s no right or wrong question. Pick one that makes you smile.

The ice-skating panda might kick off the conversation: “Look at me! Big cuddly panda skating on thin ice! Do I remind you of a certain situation?”

The bus in the naked dream might be the first to jump in with a conversation starter: “Feeling a bit exposed, trying to catch up?”

Now, that dog poo icing. How about, “Do you feel like you’re doing a sh!t job?”

These are fictitious dreams, but even so, I’m sure you can imagine other conversation starters they might offer.

See how I’m writing this blog in single sentence paragraphs? I’m setting you up for the art of writing dream dialogues. (But, oops, there are two sentences, now three, in this paragraph.)

A dream dialogue is where you pick a character or item from a dream, get it to voice a conversation starter, and then have a chat in single sentences.

Here’s an example: Let’s say you dreamed of a house that burned to the ground.

Burned house: “Is this all that is left of me?”

You: “Your structure has gone but I sense your spirit.”

Burned house: “I have no spirit. I am completely burned out.”

You: “That’s how you feel now, you’re too exhausted to see.”

Burned house: “To see what?”

You: “That your spirit will rise again, a phoenix from the ashes.”

Burned house: “No energy for that. I’m done.”

You: “Time will tell, first you need to rest.”

Burned house: “The old me, the old structure, I’m over that.”

You: “The old structure led to your burnout, your exhaustion.”

Burned house: “I don’t want to be like that again.”

You: “This rest time is for you to imagine a more fulfilling structure, a lighter way to be in the world.”

Burned house: “Can you imagine a more fulfilling and lighter way for you to be in the world?”

You: “I feel a flicker, a flame, the promise of vitality returning, an end to exhaustion.”

Burned house: “I am your burnout, delighted you have recognised and acknowledged me.”

You: “Thank you for the shape you took in my dream and for this healing conversation.”

As you can see, I chose an obvious dream symbol to make the point, but a dream dialogue works brilliantly with the most bizarre and seemingly obscure symbols from a dream.

Try this with your next dream, or – just for fun – pretend the dog poo icing dream was yours and imagine the dog poo giving you a conversation starter.