Can Dreams Help Find a Missing Person?

Why, in God’s name, would I embark on a missing person project when I knew nothing about finding missing people?

Why would I host a podcast series about a missing girl from my neighborhood when it’s totally off-brand? I’m Doctor Dream, for God’s sake, not the Dream Detective!

And why would I spend my time (of which I barely have any) looking for a missing young woman, when the only foreseeable outcomes would be tragic:

· Murder

· Suicide

· Abduction

· or if I/we were able to locate her physically alive, the fact that she’s been gone for nine years probably meant she didn’t want to be found.

Why would I embark upon a journey, that would be a leap into an abyss with no discernable bottom, if I knew, once I did hit the bottom, whenever that would be, it would be heartbreaking?

WHY? FOR A COUPLE OF REASONS…

1. Because the Nomadic, wild people in my life, like my sister, Shannon, have affected me so deeply that it has felt like a mystery, I was compelled to understand.

2. Maybe…because I’ve been struck by this same seismic bolt of lightning before, like the one that set me on the path years before when I was led to the United Nations, and there became inspired to write a curriculum for school children (the Dream Project) that’s affected over 100k children. So far, that feeling, though unsettling, disruptive, and terrifying, it’s never steered me wrong.

Still not completely convinced, I decided to put my question through the dream test. I’d “sleep on it” and ask my dreams to give me a sign.

But I’m getting ahead of myself…here’s what happened the day before:

I was jogging through the park in front of my house, minding my own business, when I crossed paths with a neighbor, I’d seen on the trail many times before. We had the same workout timing: dusk — when the summer air was cooling down. Normally we’d just pleasantly say…