Latest news with #dreams
Fox News
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Fox News
KEVIN SORBO: What if Hercules ignored his gut?
As a kid, I loved books. Comics, especially. I stayed up late, flashlight under the covers, flipping through pages and stories of action heroes who lived larger than life and filled my little mind with big dreams. Somehow, I felt their muscle and strength were all pointing me somewhere. It is funny to look back now and realize those late-night pages were the tiny seeds of a much bigger calling. While Mom was often calling from the next room, "Kevin, lights out, go to bed," a tiny itch inside me made me a late-night rebel who stayed up way past my bedtime. All those years ago, it was as if there was a Herculean nudge in a little kid's body. I could not name it back then, but I felt it in my bones. Years later, pages and pictures would turn into a real costume, playing Hercules on a soundstage in New Zealand for what would become one of the most-watched shows in the world. But long before that break came, there were a thousand moments when I could have walked away and shut the book altogether, so to speak. I could have stayed in Minnesota. I could have let rejection wear me down. I could have believed the voices that said, "Be realistic." And in doing so, I would have ignored something sacred: that quiet pull toward something more. Something that lacked certainty but overflowed with purpose. That is what this reflection is really about. It is not Hercules or fame. It is about the power of listening to those internal nudges, the "what ifs" we all feel and too often dismiss. Because the truth is, "What If…," the film I made 15 years ago with a then-little-known director named Dallas Jenkins, was born out of the same kind of nudge. A new one. A deeper one. After years of success, I began to sense a shift that I could no longer ignore. Believe me, I tried to for years. Yet, deep down, I wanted my work to reflect not just action, but conviction. Faith. Hope. Something eternal. And that desire, quiet at first, grew louder. But it was following my gut as a kid that led me to Hercules, which gave me the evidence to trust the itch. And it led me to a small script from a guy named Dallas Jenkins. The story? A man is shown the life he could have had if he had made different choices. Think modern-day, "It's a Wonderful Life." We made "What If…" on a not-so-Herculean budget and mighty load of heart. We had no idea what it would become. And now, 15 years later, both of us call it our favorite film we have ever made. Since then, of course, Dallas has gone on to create "The Chosen," a global phenomenon and one of the most successful faith series of all time. But before that, before "The Chosen" ever existed, there was "What If…" "What if" Dallas had ignored his nudge? "What if" he had played it safe and never made that first faith-based film? What if I had forgotten mine? That film marked a new chapter in my life. It was my first faith-based role, and it remains the one I am most proud of, not because of what it did for my career, but because of what it does for others. I still hear from people who were moved by its message. A reminder that it is never too late to change course, to say yes to the life you were meant to live. People are hungry for meaning. For second chances. For faith that leads them somewhere beyond the noise. I do not take my career for granted. I know it is a gift and a responsibility. But I also know it is not the spotlight that matters, it is the voice and calling inside. We all get nudges. Some are quiet, some are disruptive. Some pull us toward a different job, a challenging conversation, a new beginning. The question is: Will we listen? Or will we spend our last days asking, What if I had? Will you find yourself saying, "What if I had not done _______? I am so glad I did." Rather than, "What if I only had done _______? I sure wish I had." As someone who did—I can tell you: I am glad I did.
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
New technology set to bring your dreams to life as ‘vivid cinematic reels'
A new tech development designed to turn your dreams into 'vivid cinematic reels' using AI has left people feeling horrified. A company called Modem Works announced that it was releasing Dream Recorder, a 'magical bedside open-source device' that 'captures your subconscious'. It has claimed that after you wake up, all you have to do is describe what you dreamed aloud 'in any language' and you can then 'watch it come to life as a dreamscape in the aesthetic of your choice'. Dream Recorded uses AI to turn whatever you say into a short film, so you can relive what was in your head overnight. The description on the website reads: 'Play back your dreams and reflect on their meanings as they echo into waking life.' The device can be made using a 3D printer at home and programmed with Modem Work's downloadable open-source software. The total cost comes to just over $300. 'Nah I don't want anyone to know how weird my dreams are,' one user confessed. Another asked: 'This scary as hell. Why is this a thing?' 'I'm both terrified and intrigued,' someone else wrote. A different user added, 'We really living in a Black Mirror episode.' Others, however, praised the new technology. 'Wait this is actually really cool,' said one supporter, while another added: 'This is actually pretty sick I wonder how accurate it'll be.' 'One of the coolest things I've seen on the timeline,' said someone else. 'I can finally visualize me and my dog flying through clouds in a pink car,' joked another. Mechanism: The device uses AI to turn whatever you say into a short film, so you can relive what was in your head overnight Speaking about the innovative device, Modem Works co-founder Bas van de Poel told Newsweek: 'Dreaming is one of the rare experiences shared by all people. Everyone dreams, which makes it powerful territory to explore. The fascination has always been there. 'For the first time, we have tools capable of giving shape to the subconscious, turning the invisible into something we can see, and maybe even begin to understand.' He explained that it was designed to 'transcribe your words and pass them through a video AI model, translating your dream into ultra-low-definition, impressionistic dreamscapes'. Van de Poel concluded: 'As soon as you wake up, you simply touch the device, speak your dream aloud, and watch it take shape as a dreamscape. 'No distractions, no feeds - just a quiet moment to reflect and reconnect with your subconscious.'
Daily Mail
22-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
People horrified at latest tech development designed to turn your dreams into 'vivid cinematic reels'
A new tech development designed to turn your dreams into 'vivid cinematic reels' using AI has left people all across the globe horrified. A company called Modem Works announced last month that it was releasing Dream Recorder, a 'magical bedside open-source device' that 'captures your subconscious.' After you wake up, all you have to do is describe what you dreamed aloud 'in any language' and you can then 'watch it come to life as a dreamscape in the aesthetic of your choice.' It uses AI to turn whatever you say into a short film, so you can relive what was in your head overnight. 'Play back your dreams and reflect on their meanings as they echo into waking life,' reads a description on its website. The device can be made using a 3D printer at home and programmed with Modem Work's downloadable open-source software, per Dexerto. The total cost comes to just over $300. Immediately, the internet seemed divided over the product. While some were 'intrigued' by the idea and thought it was cool, many were freaked out by it. A company called Modem Works announced last month that it was releasing Dream Recorder, a 'magical bedside open-source device' that 'captures your subconscious' 'Nah I don't want anyone to know how weird my dreams are,' one user confessed. 'This scary as hell. Why is this a thing?' asked another. 'I'm both terrified and intrigued,' someone else wrote. 'THIS IS THE SCARIEST THING IVE EVER HEARD,' read a fourth post on X (formerly Twitter). 'I don't know what I be dreaming and I don't want to know,' said a fifth. A different user added, 'We really living in a Black Mirror episode.' 'Oh hell nah leave me and my dreams alone,' penned someone else. 'No thanks, experiencing them once is enough torture,' replied another person. After you wake up, all you have to do is describe what you dreamed aloud 'in any language' and you can then 'watch it come to life as a dreamscape in the aesthetic of your choice' It uses AI to turn whatever you say into a short film, so you can relive what was in your head overnight Others, however, praised the new technology. 'Wait this is actually really cool,' gushed one supporter, while another agreed, 'This is actually pretty sick I wonder how accurate it'll be.' 'I've been waiting for this,' said someone else. 'This is wild wild! I would love to play back my dreams and recant them as movies,' read another post. 'One of the coolest things I've seen on the timeline,' shared a different person. 'I can finally visualize me and my dog flying through clouds in a pink car,' joked another. Modem Works co-founder Bas van de Poel told Newsweek of the device, 'Dreaming is one of the rare experiences shared by all people. 'Everyone dreams, which makes it powerful territory to explore. The fascination has always been there. 'For the first time, we have tools capable of giving shape to the subconscious, turning the invisible into something we can see, and maybe even begin to understand.' He explained that it is designed to 'transcribe your words and pass them through a video AI model, translating your dream into ultra-low-definition, impressionistic dreamscapes.' 'As soon as you wake up, you simply touch the device, speak your dream aloud, and watch it take shape as a dreamscape,' he concluded.
Washington Post
18-07-2025
- Washington Post
In ‘To a Land Unknown,' a new lens on the timeless story of migration
Chatila and Reda are cousins, living a limbo existence in Athens, where they have escaped life in a Palestinian refugee camp and where they await passage to Germany. Their dreams are to open a cafe, where the two young men will be joined by Chatila's wife and son. In the meantime, they have been scraping together money for forged passports, their fates resting on their own wits, resourcefulness and ability to dodge the predators lurking around every corner, eager to take advantage of people who, on paper at least, have no claim to exist.
The Independent
17-07-2025
- Lifestyle
- The Independent
We earn more than £100k per year, we're in our thirties... and we still can't afford to buy a house in London
When I was a child, my mum and I had a favourite hobby. At night, after tea, probably with Corrie playing in the background, we'd sit cross-legged on the living room floor of our little house in Lincolnshire making mood boards. The process was simple: potential dreams were ripped from piles of magazines and hopes meticulously pinned on a corkboard from Woolies. Some nights we 'redecorated' the house, or planned out what our lives would look like when we were finally rich. We'd have a car, for example, she wouldn't have two jobs, we'd go on holidays that weren't bought via coupons in The Sun. And sometimes, mum would clear the board, hand me the pins and say: 'So. You're 30. What does it all look like?' I had no doubts. I would live in London, I told her, working as a writer at a big magazine or newspaper. I would be happy – I'd perhaps have a partner, maybe I'd have children, too; more certainly I would have a flat, or my own little house to decorate. It was all, objectively, a bit unlikely. But having come to political consciousness to the sound of D:Ream and Tony Blair promising that 'Things Can Only Get Better', it made sense: I was raised in a generation taught to believe that, regardless of where I came from, hard work reaps reward and, if I really put my mind to it, that predictable rhythm of adulthood – work hard, earn enough, buy a place, build a life – would come. So that's what I did. I am, then, what you might consider a success story. Over the years, I've done everything that I was told would lead to stability: I studied hard, got an expensive degree, built a career now 16 years strong, lived within my means wherever humanly possible and gained that coveted status of 'working class done good'. Now aged 37, I work in a job I adore and live with my partner, an electrician, in a two-bedroom home in a lovely part of southeast London. I am five months pregnant. Together we earn more than £100,000 per year; more than I could ever have imagined from where I sat on mum's living room carpet, more than my boyfriend – whose similar upbringing meant he thought that £15,000 per year was nothing short of a fortune when he left school at 16 – once thought possible. We have some savings and decent credit scores. The unlikely dream came true. Yet, despite all that hard work, despite our successes and our sacrifices, it's another picture from the mood board that has, for decades now, felt like a child's fantasy: owning a home. For millennials like me who graduated into a recession in the early 2000s, decades of political negligence and economic short-termism – boom and bust cycles, deregulation after deregulation, stagnant wages, sky-high rents and chronically under-supplied housing – have conspired to render us the financially immature generation, never quite reaching that very British apex of what it means to be adult; to be the king of your own castle. Instead, we've done the hard work we were told to do and been told to be grateful for the opportunity. Without the roots of a stable home, one in four millennials are putting off having children and those without family money have long been priced out of London. While our household might earn just over £100,000 per year – allowing us, in theory, a mortgage of around £400,000 – first homes in London cost an average of £511,0514 and require an average deposit of £144,000. Houses are now 8.1 times the average income, a figure that has, over the years, horrified our parents – mine a nurse (a single mum) and a mechanic, my partner's a barmaid and a milkman when he was young – who believed that it would be easier, not harder, for us after they saved up their wages to get on the housing ladder. Instead of the stable foundations they started from in their twenties, we have spent years stuck in adultescent flatshares with mouldy bathrooms and greedy landlords, watching trust fund babies buy two-bed terraces as 'starter-homes' while posting about 'grit' and their 'working-class grandmother' on Instagram. Recently interest rates have been so high that a mortgage on a basic two-bed flat would be at the very top end of what we could afford anyway but, ironically, for the most part rent we pay (for me, at least a third, at times almost half of my salary over the years) is often way above what the bank might look for in a good borrower. It figures: money comes to money, as mum would always say: it's expensive to be poor. Homeowning has become simply an inheritance, passed down to the lucky ones. And this, for my partner and me at least, is the crux of it, really. Gifts, loans, or 'early access' to their future, all quietly received with a lot of chatter about savvy financial planning. For us, realistically only the deaths of our parents mean access to homeownership – a truly grim reality that just shouldn't be the case. Social mobility is no longer measured by hard work but by proximity to wealth, and Rachel Reeves ' plan to target savers with offers to invest in shares is unlikely to take off in my experience – when it's taken you more than five years to save up £20,000, there's little chance you're going to take any risks with it. And while those who point to millennials frittering their money on nice-to-haves, no amount of avocado toast or flat whites could negate a housing market rigged in favour of our predecessors – those who got in early and stayed to ride the property boom. The have-nots are trying hopelessly to buy at the peak of that boom. Decades of political negligence and economic short-termism have conspired to render us the financially immature generation, never quite reaching that very British apex of what it means to be adult; to be the king of your own castle Now, Rachel Reeves is offering a kind of soft intervention – looser lending rules, the (very good) idea that rent counts toward mortgage eligibility. Her reforms aim to bring in 36,000 additional mortgages for first time buyers in a single year, achieved by lowering the minimum salary required for an individual to £30,000 from £35,000 as it is now, and to £50,000 from £55,000 for couples on a joint income, and making mortgages for over 4.5 times a buyer's salary available. Could it help? Or are we being handed slightly longer ladders to reach the same crumbling ledge? Certainly, there's a good chance that this could be at least a short-term boost for the housing market – at least some people will be helped, and rent-proofing is sensible and long overdue. An optimistic ear might hear Reeves' attempt to 'cut the financial red tape' as opening up homeownership in a sustainable, inclusive way. To be honest, anything that makes it possible for people frozen out of the buyer's market feels like a positive at this point. If the so-called Leeds Reforms also work to boost regional economies and create greater financial equity as the Treasury hopes, all credit to her. There are obvious risks, however – over-egging demand without addressing supply, for instance, that could just make everything even more expensive (just like George Osbourne's Help To Buy scheme did in some areas). The clear danger of relaxing caps on loan-to-income ratios (as we learned during the 2008 crash), especially since real incomes rose roughly £400 slower than costs between 2020 and 2025, while house prices jumped 4 per cent year on year – basically, even if we get the mortgage, we might not keep up with it. Compounding that is a lack of new housing, without which, inflation is inevitable. It would all matter a lot less – and help first-time buyers save more readily, or at all – if the rental market wasn't ready to squeeze the life out of us. It's exhausting to continually see every pay rise gobbled up by rent inflation, or to wonder if your fertility will survive another year of trying to gain stability or consistently paying more for less. We've all had to accept that rent will, for many, now take up half of our income. But there's no fix without serious investment in social and affordable housing, proper rent controls and little regulation on the wild west of landlords – all of which should be at the top of Reeves' agenda. Right now, the insecurity of renting is only driving the pressure to 'escape' into homeownership – but that's little more than an emotionally-loaded symbol of stability in a system that, really, offers none. It wasn't supposed to be a luxury to want stability, to want a small patch of the world that doesn't depend on a letting agent's whim or a landlord's mortgage rate. All those years ago on the living room floor, Mum had blind faith in me that I might beat the odds to get to work at my dream job in London – that belief is probably the biggest gift she ever gave me before she died a few months ago. But struggling to buy a starter home at 37 with a baby on the way? Back then, we could have never imagined it. Not even with the most elaborate mood board.
