For David Lynch, filmmaking is all about ideas.

“You have ideas, and I always say ideas are the most important thing, and the idea tells you everything. The idea is like a seed. The tree is in the seed, but it doesn’t look like the tree. So, when you finally see the tree, you might make some changes, but when you get an idea you really do see the whole tree, but it’s in an abstract form.”

Sometimes these ideas will take strange routes to get where they feel correct, Lynch goes on to explain. But eventually, they will arrive at where they were meant to be all along—but the film-maker didn’t know that.

Interspersed with behind-the-scenes footage, David Lynch shares his wisdom for aspiring filmmakers, in this documentary Room to Dream, and explains how best to realize that original idea.