Your other life

Do we have two lives? One when we're awake and one when we're asleep?

According to university professor and dream therapist Roger Kamenetz, we do. Kamenetz is the author of "The History of Last Night's Dream," as well as such wonderful books as "The Jew in The Lotus." 

In his latest book, Kamenetz talks about the dream dimension and how it is a gift that can transform our waking lives. While he says there is some symbolism -- flying, aerial dreams signifying the higher, more removed self while swimming dreams the deeper, emotional self -- it's not what Sigmund Freud wrote about. Freud was coming from a place of fear and to avoid that, he purged emotion.

To Kamenetz, who has studied with Buddhist monks, Kabbalist rabbis, native intuitives, and even the Dalai Lama, our dreams have much to teach us and even the fear we feel in them can lead us to place of self-knowing beyond fear. You can hear him discuss this with Oprah, here. 

We spend a third of lives asleep and we need to dream to be healthy. Perhaps there's more to it than we realize.