Chicken or the Egg?

I got an email from a dear old friend in which she told me she had a dream in which she was reading a story I wrote.

I dreamt I was reading a fantasy novel you had just published. It was somewhat like Harry Potter and The Hobbit. The main character's name was "John" and was styled after you. I really enjoyed the story and couldn't wait to tell you how impressed I was!

Last night, not feeling particularly well and unable to fall asleep, a story idea I had been percolating slowly bubbled to the surface and became a realized concept. It naturally fit into the mold of the above, and it seemed to be just "right" to use 'John' as the main character and partly model him after myself (as they say, write what you know). The story plot is the most fully formed idea I have had in a number of years, and this morning I have been spending some time writing down the plot points (in an outline, my mother the English teacher would be so proud), general character points, main themes, etc.

Now, I know that this idea in some form or another was down inside me and struggling to get out. Did my friend's email prompt my thoughts to realize it in this particular direction, or was her dream prophetic and tapped into the direction I was starting to go with it? Or did she plant the seed that completely changed the direction of my thinking and cause me to head down this new path?

I have a feeling it was the latter rather than the former. I say this because, both in high school and in college, I made some extra cash writing short stories for people for their English classes. What I would do is ask them for a) 2-5 names that were important to them to use as character names, b) what their favorite sport, activity was, d) something personal (like, did they have a divorce, alcoholism, a death in the family, etc.-- something that would make it seem much more like them writing), c) and what general genre or direction they needed the story to go for their class. I would then write for them a story using those general guidelines and always achieved an A (although one guy only got an A-... the teacher's assistant graded me down for being "too wordy").

It feels good to be getting the ideas out on paper. I am realizing there are some points that I can't quite remember from last night, and I'm not sure how to connect some idea points to the main plot, but overall it has the making of decent teenage adventure story. We'll see what happens with it as I continue its development.