User blog comment:NecropolisFiend/Nightmares/@comment-28266772-20160908094400

Out of all my stories only a few are not informed directly by my nightmares. Every single night I experience a range of vivid and immersive dreams that range from interestingly macabre to flat out fucking terror. Like you said there can be an element of control (I'm getting better at knowing it's all a dream) but it doesn't always make a huge difference. More than anything else my dreams focus on places and my arachnophobia. Landscapes, abandoned buildings, underground structures, and heights (I hate heights) typically play a role. Sometimes my dreams drop a story fully formed (like mullaghbrack) onto my lap, sometimes I borrow specific elements from my dreams.

The Shimmering Tree - as in the titular monster - is lifted directly from a dream. I found it in a cave washed open by a massive tide that revealed the entrance near the coast where I live. I remember the ocean disappearing to reveal a landscape of coral and endless dead creatures and near the rocky coastline was this small aperture. When I went down the place was coated in bright white chalk and crystallized salt and there was this colossal thing in the centre shimmering brightly in the dark while surrounded by this snowlike landscape. I remember realizing that the chalk and salt was the remnant of the tree's 'feeding' - it's hard to say why but I find in dreams complex thoughts and ideas come into your head pre-prepared. For me the cave with the tree was distinctly prehistoric but for reasons I could not say - I just knew, without any specific reason, that it was from a time when we were just descending from the trees.

I find it fucking fascinating that so many people describe such similar experiences with dreams and horror. Reading Lovecraft's experiences was incredible. I must admit that I find it not all surprising that so many people have these experiences and turn to explanations such as astral projection. I often revisit the same places over and over, sometimes for months at a time, and the feeling of consistency and authenticity really does feel like it must be more than just a creation of my sleeping mind. Combine that subjective feeling of authenticity with the way that so many people describe similar experiences and I can see why spiritual explanations become so compelling.

Not that I personally subscribe to those beliefs - it's just that sympathize with why people turn to them as explanations.