Top 10 Most Famous Dreamers of All Time…

Last updated on: May 10, 2013 at 11:45 am by Kelly Sullivan Walden

Top 10 Most Famous Dreamers of All Time… 2013-05-10T11:45:10-06:00 Kelly Sullivan Walden

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Again and again some people in the crowd wake up.

They have no ground in the crowd and they emerge according to broader laws.

They carry strange customs with them, and demand room for bold gestures.

The future speaks ruthlessly through them.

~Rainer Maria Rilke

Perhaps you will be inspired to up the ante of your dream work/play when you realize you and your dreams are in good company. In fact, the greatest thinkers, scientists, artists, visionaries, and leaders throughout history were ordinary people like you and me, who happened to have a deep respect for dreams. Because of this respect, these mere mortals became legendary as they shaped the world through their contributions to art, science, technology, politics, and spirituality. Many of these people attributed their greatest successes to their ability to carry their dream wisdom and visions across the divide into the three-dimensionality of the waking world. For example:

Our founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, attributed the philosophy contained within the Declaration of Independence to their dreams
Albert Einstein ascribed the theory of relativity to a dream he had as a young boy
Thomas Edison credited his discovery of electricity to his dreams
Colonel Harold Dickson made history’s biggest oil discovery (which later became the Kuwait Oil Company) based on guidance illumined in his dream
Elias Howe sourced his invention of the sewing machine to his dreams
Dr. Frederick Banting discovered insulin in his dream—and won a Nobel Prize
Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein was inspired by her dream/nightmare
A dream led Otto Loewi to a Nobel Prize for his contribution to medicine
Mendeleyev beheld the complete periodic table in his dream
The planet Uranus was discovered by William Herschel in a dream
Stravinsky, Wagner, and Beethoven heard musical compositions, from fragments to entire canons, in their dreams
Bob Dylan composed music from his dreams
Paul McCartney praised his dreams for his multi-platinum song, Yesterday
Jeff Taylor dreamed of his patent for Monster.com
The movie, Avatar, was dreamed in vivid detail by director, James Cameron
The Twilight series was dreamed by stay-at-home-mom, Stephenie Meyer…and the list goes on…

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Perhaps the dream you have tonight will be your breakthrough to heal your body, solve your problems, lead you to your very own gold mine, or contribute your unique gift to the world. And if your dream “awakens” you, in any way shape or form, to the realization of the heroic, beautiful, genius being you truly are, then know you are not only contributing to peace on the planet, but to helping me to sleep (and dream) tonight with a smile on my face.

Who is the most inspirational dreamer (to you) on this list?

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Excerpted from It’s All In Your Dreams (Conari Press). Once you buy your copy, click here to receive $4,000 worth of fr*ee dreamy gifts throughout the month of May.

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Join the conversation! Post your dream on Dreams Cloud, then tweet it using #DreamChallenge.

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I had the strangest dream