A Choice of Power

It’s a harmless, playful question: “What superpower would you want?” Or magic talisman, ultimate gadget, or any other way to phrase the one thing you know you won’t be getting for Christmas… so what does it matter what we wish for?

I think it does matter. Not only because dreams always do—especially for those of us who spend hundreds of hours reading about dragons and telepaths. But, because it might tell us something about how we see our everyday world too.

So, ask yourself that question, and think about your answer. Then, take a look at a few ideas I’ve put down here.

Of course, it’s not always that simple. If we could all look at our favorite heroes and instantly spot some great missing piece of ourselves, we’d all be doing just that and the world would be a simpler place. (More exciting too. There’s a book in that, I’m sure…)

What I think is, none of us even hear the question the same way as other people, and none of us hear it the same at different times either. Which can tell us a few things too, or keep us guessing.

The Wow Moment?

Your first thought might be a single Moment of Awesome. Buzzing over crowds with flight, or seeing into someone’s mind what they really think of you. Clear, primal satisfaction of using a gift in its most obvious form, just for those pure instants.

If that’s the kind of image that comes to mind, enjoy it, but I wouldn’t suggest trying to see much more in it. You never know: one person might latch onto flight as a way to get away from people, and another loves it because they like spending all day juggling different people’s needs but think of flying away for the few moments they dream of taking a break. And a third might want to fly because she lives near an airport.

A Day in the Life?

Or, you just might picture something more than a moment with that gift, and have a sense of how you might build a life around it. Not just swooping down on those crowds but planning how you’d gear up for a rescue, or a search, or how that power’s being almost impossible to conceal barely matters if it means you become famous for your aerial adventures. It might be you don’t just picture the moment, but pieces of a different life it could bring you.

When my wishes come out like that, I often wonder if the life I picture around the magic tells me more than which power’s at its center. Sure, common sense says that if I want to see the future it’s a sign I’m concerned about my own… but it might just mean I wish I had more to talk about with my neighbors, both to help them and just to practice convincing them I had something to say. If I wanted to protect them without persuading them, I‘d have pictured myself with super-strength.

An Edge on Reality?

There’s one other form that wish might take. Namely, to see ourselves just fitting a gift into our daily lives and barely changing them at all, but with that one great advantage to what we already do. These are the dreams of being the telepath who has the right words to help everyone get along… or walking to work as usual knowing no disease or mugger can touch someone invulnerable.

I have to say, a wish that comes out in that form might be the most interesting. What can I say, these are times I’m dreaming of something I actually could have in some form, if I spent more time in the gym or on Google or wherever else the answer might be.

 

So, which form did your wish come out in? Did you picture one of those moments, or part of a different life, or as a plus to your real one? What degree you saw the answer in might tell you more than what power you saw in it.

One way or another, dreams always matter.