IntroductionWe all dream whether we remember our night visions or not; dreams have fascinated many for countless years, and inspired works such as paintings. Night time can also be a time of discomfort, in the form of nightmares which plague children just as much as adults. Even today the true purpose of dreams remains unclear; even some animals appear to dream though of what similarity to humans in unknown. This page is dedicated to dreams as I attempt to explore the imagination of my mind by using some of my dreams, or parts of them, to discuss various aspects of my time alone at night. If there's one thing I've noticed more than anything else is that there are common themes or dream symbols amongst us humans, yet with a personal twist. Lucid DreamsIf you are fortunate to have a lucid dream this simply means that you were aware that you were dreaming while you was actually still dreaming. The virtual world which the brain creates for your sleep is so convincing that often we are fooled into thinking that we are awake, i.e. experiencing real life. However, as we dream we can sometimes spot minor imperfections which reveal to us that we are actually dreaming. So, what's so special about lucid dreaming? Not much unless you take advantage of your lucidness while dreaming. Generally, when we dream we go with the flow and have little say or impact on how the dream progresses, but when lucid we have the power to dramatically affect the dream in some way. Since a dream is built upon imagination, lucidness allows one to acheive what is not possible in real life and without any consequences, such as getting hurt (?). Some may use a lucid dream to prepare for an important speech, for example; see what kind of reaction the dream characters give you. And then there's really using the power of lucid dreaming, such as to fly without wings. Or summon mighty powers to combat evil entities in a super hero style movie sequence. The limit is your imagination! To initiate a lucid dream, the most common approach is as mentioned above, to realize you're dreaming by spotting something wrong. If you're wearing a watch in your dream check the time, look away, and then check it again. If the time has changed by more than just a few seconds then you are certainly dreaming. This is a common (but useful) flaw with dreams, similar situations I've had are writing that changes or the name of a shop change. This does not guarantee lucidness but with practice you'll get there. It is supposedly during the last hours of sleep that you are more likely to have a lucid dream, so what time you go to bed and awake are obviously important. But I do believe that lucid dreaming is something that can be learnt, not something that you have to be born with. As for myself, I've had lucid dreams since young but only recently I discovered that there was a proper term for it. Even when you do become lucid, staying in that mode can be difficult and therefore natural that you slip in and out of the lucid state. However, there are techniques to remain lucid such as spinning around on the spot, though personally I've yet to try out that technique. While dreaming, you should realize when you're about to loose lucidness perhaps because you're about to wake up, this warning should give you enough time to act. Don't worry if you do wake up, if you fall back to sleep soon afterwards it can actually increase your chances of having a lucid dream again. You might also want to tell yourself that you will have a lucid dream, or say what you will dream about. I once outlined before falling asleep what I would dream about and it worked, so that is one way to control your dreams without having a lucid dream. Similar, when I was much younger I told myself that I would not have nightmares if I slept facing a certain way and regardless of the fact that I most likely turned over more than once during the night, I now rarely have nightmares. When lucid during dreaming, probably the most fascinating thing to do is explore the world that your brain has created for you. Sure it may seem like the real world but it's not quite as it seems, more as if a horror film in some ways. And then there are the people to talk to; test their reactions or just observe them, assuming that you're surrounded by humans... If you were planning to talk to someone or ask them something tomorrow, you may get the chance to ask their dream equivalent while lucid. It makes you wonder what judges their response (assuming they give you one) since you don't know how they'll reply in real life. Therefore, the brain must decide what would be the most obvious answer to your question judged by what you know about that person. Surely you've asked someone something and have already predicted what they will most likely say to you, especially a best friend or a member of your family? I'm not so sure about out of body experiences but while I was having a very lucid dream, towards the end I realised that I was waking up because I could sense my real body as opposed to my dream body. This gave me enough time to finish my tests before I woke up; I checked a pile of DVD or video game cases on the floor in the living room and they had changed size and the pictures on the front were now different to when I had last checked. Why is it that mechanical objects, electrical and electronic devices in dreams don't behave as they should do? In the past I've dreamed that I've used a gun despite that not being the case for real life (most likely influenced by films and video games), so it's not hard to understand why the gun never fires any bullets or is slow to react. But then there are computers which I have used a great deal, they too are often suspect in my dreams. In dreams I can get really worried because I'm using a computer or building something electronic and it goes wrong, only to realize after I've awoken that it had only happened in a dream. This could, of course, represent my fears of making a mistake big time, and that's been playing on my mind. The point is that dreams can appear so real yet if we open our eyes and spot the mistakes in the dream then the power of being lucid can be ours. I do have the idea that because dreams have been with us humans for generations, before technology was invented, then maybe them misbehaving in our dreams is because they're not treated the same way by our brain as other things, like people, that are more natural to us. So, if lucid in a dream, it's a good idea to do some tests if you can remember and I have been fortunate enough to have done that a few times. I must warn you that being lucid and trying things out isn't a good idea if you sleep walk, which is just as well I don't for what I'm about to share with you. I was in the living room of my home, a common place to be in a dream for me, and I was lucid. I knew what I wanted to do, often I go outside the house in my dreams, since then I am not restricted to one place; could a dream really show you the entire world? So I ran to the front door and opened it and headed for the main road which is outside the house that I live in. I was determined to really test the dream, usually when walking across a road in a dream I would manage to avoid speeding cars but this time I purposely ran into a car to create a crash. If it had been real life I might have been killed and interesting enough I awoke before the impact which is very revealing. Either I awoke then because I was awaking anyway (which I was aware of as I had ran outside), my brain didn't know what should happen next in the dream, or my brain thought that I was actually awake (which may be something of a contradiction) so the shock woke me up. I'd like to highlight a few points about this dream: * This was the last dream I had that day as I awoke around one in the afternoon, I had previously awoken about midday before falling back to sleep (I make a point of checking the time). * In real life the front door of the house I live in is locked at night, so the dream might have been set during the day; I cannot recall if it was sunny outside in the dream but it wasn't pitch black. * As I ran across the road in my attempts to collide with a car what I saw was one lane of traffic (where the second lane was I don't know); the different coloured cars (red, white, yellow I think, no vans or other larger vehicles) were so close to each other that it would have been impossible for me to get past them without jumping over a car. In actual life people wouldn't drive that close so it seems to me that in the dream the cars were packed so near to each other to stop me getting to the other side of the road. * Outside in the dream I felt a strain as if I was waking but also because of the change of direction (going outside instead of staying indoors) as if my brain was having trouble altering the dream. I have had that feeling in other dreams when I've ventured outdoors and those times I did not cross the road, instead I continued down the pavement until I woke up or got distracted and entered someone else's house. One last thing about that dream, it is kind of ironic that in real life there have been many accidents that have occurred on that main road. I was in complete control of the dream, I knew what I wanted to do; I would never had done such a thing had I been awake since that would have been suicide. So, if I knew I was dreaming but my brain thought otherwise...do you see the contradiction? Let me expand upon that, who really has control, my brain or me; but my brain is me, isn't it? If I can force myself to wake up as I have done in the past such as to escape a nightmare, is that my power or my brain's? Who really has total control in a dream if lucid, my brain or do I simply tell my brain what should happen? As I believe in the soul as the real me I make the distiction that myself and my brain are two separate objects. In that dream because I was lucid I took control and changed the dream but if you will, the dream or my brain had the last laugh because it ended it before I could do anything else. I wonder what would have happened had I stayed sleeping, would I have been hurt at all and if so what state would I have been in and would I have felt pain? Or maybe I didn't actually hit the car and so I would have continued to the other side of the road and carried on with my exploring; when would the dream have ended in this situation? It appears that you can be lucid in a dream from the start or more usual for me, I realize that I'm dreaming later on because of suspecting that something isn't quite right, or it just happens almost naturally. There are also different levels of lucidness, I might be aware that I'm dreaming but not take advantage of that understanding or I can be lucid and use that power in some way.
Another dream I had that's similar to the running out in the road also started indoors, in the hallway. As I went outside it felt as if force was trying to pull me back inside but I imagined myself being pulled towards the door and so I ended up outside.
The first thing I saw on the main road outside the house where I live was a huge lorry or other large van, coloured blue I seem to remember. I imagined the lorry coming towards me and it did; I had every intention to crash it into me but I must of awoke up before it did.
Why was that lorry in my dream when I only thought to test the dream upon seeing the vehicle? I didn't say to myself that I was dreaming, I just seemed to be lucid perhaps because of the force trying to stop me from going outside.
Dream OddotiesWhat is it with light in dreams, when younger I could never turn on a light in a room in a dream, even after changing the lightbulb! This is of course very much a pain as the room would be in complete darkness and thus difficult if not impossible to see any detail.
But later on I have had dreams where I have managed to turn on a light but generally the level of light in one dream is the same as in any other. Having said that, I have had dreams where I'm outside and It's clearly set at night because it's very dark. Ok, when I'm dreaming that I'm playing a video game seeing the character I am watching or controlling from a third person view is no surprise since I play mainly third person type games. However, why is it in some dreams that I see myself from a third person view and most of the time it doesn't occur to me that I'm actually dreaming? In a dream you can be happy enough in one place but then find yourself somewhere totally different, as if transported there in seconds. In one dream, for example, I thought I was on holiday which is hundreds of miles away from where I live and then I ended up home. Speaking of being on holiday, when away I usually dream about being home as if my brain has yet to realze I'm somewhere quite different and when actually at home it's quite rare for me to dream that I'm on holiday. This can confuse me somewhat when I awake as I have to remind myself that I'm actually at home or still on holiday. Machines including those of the electrical and electronic types don't like to work well in dreams even to the point that unplugging a TV in a dream doesn't stop it from showing a picture. In one dream I had I was using a TV outside in the garden even though that would not be possible for real without a generator or a lead running indoors. Whether you can feel pain in a dream is something that can be argued but for me most of the time it's wonderful that I can survive an attack and not feel any discomfort. I've been bitten by zombies in my dreams and not felt any pain, that might be to do with playing video games and watching films since the most they can do is affect your emotions and in the case of video games provide a bit of feedback (i.e. a rumble effect). As a child I've had dreams where I suddenly realize like I'm missing clothing like shoes or more worrying, underpants. The thing is, no one in the dream takes notice which is probably for the best, if that happened in real life I don't know what I'd do. In a dream I had recently I was nearly or totally naked laying somewhere and happy which may be representive of me getting to like my body more.
My Dream DiaryPlease go to My Dream Diary.
Dream SymbolsI will always maintain that dreams are very personal, yet there do exist for sure a number of common dream symbols having a set meaning. The brain seems to be clever at integrating these symbols into dreams to get a point across that are familiar to us such as every day objects and that which we may use with our hobbies. I often dream about famous people in particular soap stars, usually actors and actresses from EastEnders. I've always liked the drama Holby City which follows EastEnders for one day a week but when I had a short dream in which I chatted to one of Holby City's actors I at first thought very little of it. First of all, in the dream I mentioned to who I though to be Elliot Hope (from Holby City) about when he played Nigel in EastEnders to which he was not pleased. This suggests that in the dream I was actually talking to the actor Paul Bradley who plays Elliot in Holby and played Nigel in EastEnders. That said, though I don't think I was in a hospital (where Holby is mainly set) in the dream, if he was meant to have been the character Elliot, I actually broke the fourth wall. But there might have been a pun in the character's name since Elliot's second name is Hope. It gets better, in the progran Holby Elliot has a son called James, which is my name. So, his name almost speaks a message, James Hope; James, have hope? But this might be due to both Elliot and James featuring a lot in recent episodes of Holby and I've already thought to myself about the 'hope' pun before having this dream. But what this might mean is that my brain chose Elliot to serve as a dream symbol knowing I would be aware of the significance.
Common Dream ThemesDreams are very personal yet there are without a doubt certain themes that pop up again and again, from person to person, throughout the years.
School Those who enjoyed their time at school or college most likely have far more pleasant dreams involving school yet I cannot pretend I had a good time at school. Even after leaving, I still have frequent dreams about school, though usually more relaxing than a few years ago. More often than not, in the dream I would find myself in a usually crowded corridor sometimes with a friend walking with me, knowing that I had to make my way to the next lesson. This presents an obvious predicament in that I have no idea of what my next lesson is, since I have no way of finding out the time (or didn't think to check my watch) and the one time I actually had my planner I couldn't read it (as reading text in a dream is often difficult if not impossible). Fortunately, I would just arrive at any class and join the end of the queue or enter the class and sit myself down. The dream would end then, as if this was the perfect time to stop; that I had acheived a certain goal. The reason for this type of dream is most likely because of the troubled time I had at school, though to be fair the school themed dreams I had were rather tame, though annoying. There are variations of this type of dream that I've had, as listed below: * When I sat myself down in class having just entered a random room, the teacher actually pointed out that I was in the wrong class (as would a teacher in real life). This is very rare for me and it gets more interesting; another boy realized that he was in the wrong class too. This is almost like someone else having the same dream as me who joined me in my humiliation that night. But this might just reflect the first couple of days at a new school, not knowing my way around the building well. * Determined to escape school, while in the playground I would fly away far enough to put enough distance between me and the school, then return to the ground. This is clear in representing my desire to leave school, which of course eventually came true, explaining why I don't have this school variation type dream anymore.
Recurring DreamsHaving the same or similar dream more than once could be joyful yet bad dreams as repeats is something that are just horrible. To me, the reason for recurring dreams is if we miss what the dream is trying to tell us perhaps to improve our life when we're awake.
School dreams are a common recurring dream that I had but now that I've put that time behind me I have them very rarely. Another recurring dream I've had is that of being in the kitchen and turning the gas on or trying to turn it off and having trouble, worried that I would burn myself. I think that dream is about loosing control so it's a reminder to get back into the driver's seat so-to-speak.
Common Dream Myths ExploredYou CAN'T read text in a dream FALSE! Sure, when I was younger I found it very difficult to read any form of writing in a dream but over time it became possible, however, text in dreams tends to consist of random words that makes no sense, and changes from time to time. It's almost impossible to remember anything that I've read in a dream though remembering a name of a shop, for example, is somewhat easier. You CAN'T see colour in a dream FALSE! I know I've seen colour in plenty of my dreams, it's just hard to remember colours once you wake up. This is of course similar to real life; if someone asks you to tell them what colour tie the man was wearing that passed you a minute ago, you'd probably struggle! You CAN'T feel pain in a dream FALSE? I would say that while dreaming you are free from pain but I wouldn't say it was impossible for some. The following is a dream I had when I was a child relating to pain: I was chasing a car along a train track for reasons that I cannot recall. I stepped onto one track, then the next which must have been the live one as I awoke immediately, and felt a brief, mild surge of pain. There are two things to note from this dream: * Unless I had learned this and forgotten, I was unaware that only one train track was live and the other wasn't; I of course learnt that latter on. * Although I felt no pain in the dream I did feel an after effect as if I had been electrocuted.
Dream Tricks You Can LearnThere are aids that you can teach yourself in order to make the most of your dreams, to help yourself.
* As I already mentioned, lucid dreaming allows you to take control of your dreams which can help you to combat dream nasties, for example. * It is possible to learn to read text, your watch or other writting in a dream; just keep trying! * As many children have, and adults too, nightmares can be particularly disturbing at the best of times. A trick I taught myself was to, while dreaming, rub my eyes if I wanted to wake up a.s.a.p., and it worked. Now that I think about it, I wonder if that was possible through the power of lucid dreaming?
NightmaresProbably most of us have had at least one nightmare but they are not restricted to just childhood, many adults can experience terrifying dreams as well. One particular nightmare sticks in mind was of dreaming about using a computer which I turned off and unplugged but it stayed on and then actually came alive. I now believe the reason for that dream was due to a teacher who scolded me for not starting my name with a capital 'J' as I was typing it onto the computer.
I have had dreams that could be classed as nightmares because they contains scenes of horror such as zombies yet weren't that terrifying since I felt no pain when attacked; there was never any dire feeling of dread. Compare that to another nightmare that I have had where I was hiding from a monster and really wanted to wake up as it seemed for real my life was in danger.
Can Dreams Show the Future?Predicting lottery results or the fate of someone you know, whether dreams allow you to see the future is a debate that is likely to exist for a long time to come. It's easy to say that there is no way a dream could show the future of which I would normally agree, that if anything at the very most it could only be coincidence. But, one particular dream goes beyond what I just said: To outline, a dream I had one Sunday morning made no sense to me until I arrived at Church. Maybe coincidence, but the dream I had the night before had shown me what we would be learnig in Church that day, without any prior knowledge of the theme of that service.
What Influences a Dream?The most obvious is events that have happened in your life, perhaps from the day before or even many years ago. One reasoning as to the purpose of dreams is to deal with our experiences, to help us with our emotions so thoughts that have been on your mind lately are likely to make there way into your dream. I have found that it can take quite a few days before dreaming about something that has happened not long ago.
Maybe I've mentioned this before, when on holiday I often dream about being at home but that is understandable since that's where I spend most of the time. The living room is usually the starting point for most of my dreams, again as in real life the living room is very familiar to me and is where all of my family are together for the majority of the day. It's where we watch TV, use our computers to go online and play games.
Your senses while sleeping certainly affect your dreams, I have had dreams that begin pleasant and then for no reason turn into more of a nightmare; when I awoke I found that I had been sleeping on my arm in such a way it caused discomfort. Another time I've dreamed of needing to go to the toilet but still needing to go after, this is because I needed to go for real. Temperature also may affect your dreams, I seem to have lucid dreams when it is warm indoors as opposed to cold or hot.
Your ExperiencesThanks to PunchoutFan who has this dream to share with us: On may 2008 I think it is I had a dream where I was in a video game character and I was the main character where I had to collect game money to by stuff i need to buy stuff to finish the game. Like one thing I need was a green gem thats open this door that takes me to the game ending, the green jem cost 5000 game money which to get money i had to do hard, hard quest like one i had to find his dog which is lost in a dark and in there I had to look around every where the dark room was also very, very big.But at the end of that quest I got only 100 game money which is not very much.. anyways when i had 5000 game money i got the green gem.. and when I got the gem it some how got in my skin on my right hand. I also saw that the gem said something "if you want to get out of here you need to believe and use this gem" and right when I came to the big door I need to open I put my hand on the door and said "I beleave I can do this" and the door open and I find my self on my bed at my house at 6:00 am and that was my dream. YouTube user WaluigiWaluigi recalls this dream:
Last night, right before I woke up I had a really short dream that I was getting Star 4 on Dire Dire Docks in Super Mario 64. I started out right in Submarine Bay and swam through the rings, then as soon as the star appeared (it was yellow) I woke up. The weird but also cool thing is that on Super Mario 64 I have one file with 119 stars and I just need Dire Dire Docks Star 5, which is actually the star after the one I dreamed about. The only difference was there was no lives, coins, and stars display, and there was no red numbers that appear when you go through the rings. This could possibly mean something like I should keep trying or I'm doing something wrong that I'm not realizing.
Thanks to YouTube user SilentWolf64 for his experiences:
I believe it was 3 days ago. I had a dream, but it was just a regular day. I was just going to school. But when I went to the band room to practice for an upcoming concert, I realized I was dreaming. By the way this dream happened the day I read the lucid dreams section on your site.
I realized I was dreaming because everytime I looked out the window the weather seemed to be changing. It was foggy, then sunny, then raining. But everytime I realize I'm having a lucid dream, I seem to lose control of my body for some reason. My point of view also switches very quickly. Now I'm watching myself. Do whatever actions my body does. I try very hard to move my body right, all I get is a slight jerk and i continue to do what my body is doing. It's very aggravating not being able to control myself... I rarely have dreams. But i'm happy to never have gotten a nightmare since i was about 5.
YouTube user spyke4995 has this to say:
I have had strange lucidness dreams that i can remember quite clearly, one, i was waking up for school, i got dressed then suddenly it was half 11 and i was late, so i ran to my friends house, where a yellow monster truck pizza delivery vehicle, with a happy green face on the hood was driving, when i thought, "i dont want to be ran over" then it turned into a red angry face and chased me, so i ran to get over the road, checked it was clear, then crossed, and instantly there where cars speeding down the road at me, i woke up.
Another strange thing is, in some dreams, i can talk, but the most annoying ones are when i try as hard as i can, but i cant get a word to come out, only faint breathing, as if im not allowed to talk, but another i had fallen to sleep with the blanket over my face by accident, in the dream i must have been suffocating, because in the dream i was working on Rez, when ot was bieng made, and was shown what area 1's boss would have been, it looked the same, except i could see my bed, like i had opened my eyes and it rolled over me, and i felt that i was suffocating, for how long i dont know. Oh by the way, it seems in every dream, as i dont want to be ran over, cars allways speed down the road when i cross it, like im not allowed out of a certain area... did i mention the dream where i was getting dragged into my old TV by super sonic and hyper shadow? i had to get my friend who just appeared to unplug the tv, it was still on, like you described on your site, but i was freed so i ran downstairs, my big bro was having a bath in the toilet, wich now had a bath sized area at the bottom, reading a world of warcraft manual, and, how come, say if your parents die in a dream you can feel the sadness, and, if its extreme, cry? May i just say though, as much as i like to explore in lucid dreams, when things like cars etc are trying to kill me, the best thing is to run to a building and duck down and dont look outside, to try and forget the thought of the bad thing, and change the dream, your in trouble though, when the room your in suddenly has windows where they shouldnt be, or extra ones... I've just remembered, i watched war of the worlds on bbc3 the other night, well, my latest dream, after i finished uploading the vid this morning, was where all my friends, family, some random robots, you and that topsyandpip56 guy where around my house, when a giant robot was destroying everything, to avoid it we had to all duck so that we couldnt be seen from the window in my little brothers room, we all survived, but there was that wierd thing that happens in most of my dreams... where you think you already saw this dream or had one similar, which actually turns out to have been the same dream, but, the dream flaw was there, the fact that it was day then instanty night when the killer robot thing was outside the house looking in the window, why non of us closed the blinds, and why there where 2 beds and we where hiding on the top of the beds and not under them... ZRKFilms (age 13) from YouTube has this to say:
I ALWAYS HAVE THEM (lucid dreams). I always spot whats wrong. :P iT is very fun to have a lucid dream. Except when you are waken up. 2 i can remember off the top of my head. Flying without wings, and multiply for some odd reason, a schoolbus trying to run over me :P. i alway ask my self/other people in my dream, "Is this a dream?" I am DEAD SERIOUS. What else can i remember? ... Oh Yeah. I had the power to move objects with my mind! Also, the sun was woving back and forth across the sky in my backyard. Day and Night! It Was Weird!
I Usually Explore, but never thought to do tests. Very Interesting.
I have had forced myself awake before. I Just Rememebred A Dream. Being an Astromony Lover, its odd to be afraid of looking up into the sky in dreams. So i was next to my driveway playing with legos. (yes i remember details from dreams and real life. Like They Were Yesterday. But Only Certain MemorieS For Some Reason) Anyway. I looked up at the big dipper ( this was about 4-5 years ago) and each indivudial star lit up. at that point i was awake. I Also See Myself In 3rd person in memories and dreams. Rarely first. I sometimes know i dreaming but not alwasy. One time i did is when i was the first kid astronaut on the shuttle. Wo That was a cool dream. Ohh Yes. Missing Clothes. The St. Louis Zoo. (Missouri. My Home town) Field Trip. Grade: 2-3. I am only in a shirt and my underwear. I pulled my shirt, trying to stretch it over my underwear. Dreams Like this Are at the same location but carie in grade. This is the only location i have ever lost my clothes in a dream. School: One Night in 5th grade i dreamt a WHOLE Day of school ending with a flyby of our playground with me on the swings. waking up i had NO IDEA That was a dream and i had to go through school again. Well Anyway. Some times i am afraid to look out my window after dreaming about something that is not in place in the background. for instance, a recent dream, i was in my home town in MO and i saw the space shuttle on the Crawler in the background. The next morning, it was freaky to look out my window. I LOVE DREAM REPEATS!!!!!!!!! (I actually burnt my had under a oven when i was three. I had to get a cast. (Referring to the gas on the stove) I really love them when they are about me flying or having powers. One More Experience: There Was An EarthQuacke and our all eyeballs popped out (weird huh?) amd anyway. the onlw way to see was if you had your eyes closed. if you opened your eyes, you wore special glasses that let you see. i was the only one to keep their eyes shut untill the end of my dream. Thanks to mark smith for his dream recalls:
once i had a nightmare where i was in southick, near the school (i live in southwick) around midnight, behind a white van holding a toy car controller. i looked over the van as i was controlling my car, and saw a bush with about a thousand scary red lights. afraid it was something evil or whatever, i reversed my toy car under the van and picked it up. i looked at the van which now was hovering up and down almost as fast as a hummingbirds wings, when it shot off forwards from 0mph-100mph in 0.5 seconds, which then vanished into a purpley smoke ring it had created. scared i ran along the outer school gates, and all of a sudden i was paralized and floating while being carried by the wind (same direction i was heading)AS the wind said in a creepy, scary voice "i'm coming...". at this point, i woke up on purpose
oh, i also remember another i had last year. this is ironic because, it was a nightmare, but the scariest part of the dream was, by coincidence, where i accidently became lucid, otherwise i would of been freaked out.
it starts where i'm in my bedroom one morning with only my friend as company(sleepover) and no one is in the house. all of a sudden, i smell burning. i go downstairs into our living room and the wood burning stove had a little fire inside it. i put it out with water and went upstairs. then i smelt burning again. i went downstairs again and it was on fire again. i then put it out a second time. on my way upstairs, i saw that next to my light switch, inscribed in blood was the word "ghost", but i didn't care and went upstairs. i then told my friend about the word. but they didn't know what it ment so i told them. then he stood up and said something like "i'm a ghost" and then vanished into thin air. then, all of a sudden, downstairs, blood-written writing was appearing everywhere, and the shower (along with some other stuff) kept automatically turning on. soon after, Christine(my foster mum) walked in the front door and i told her my friend was a ghost. she didn't seem to notice, because she was looking at my hands all of a sudden (this is where i became lucid) she then said "Mark, what's happening to your hands" i said "what do you mean?". i lifted my hands up which had now dislocated at the wrist(didn't hurt for some reason) and then slowly revolved 180* degrees so they were facing the wrong way which then re-located into this NEW position. also, my finger tips (finger tips, as in you know fingers look already divided into 3 sections? well, i mean my TOP section,)and thumb dislocated and revolved 180* degrees each and re-located into the new position. but, because i was lucky to be lucid dreaming, i was saying "Cooooool!". I could even feel the way my hands were, which was new, because, obviously, hands aren't naturally that shape/rotation, which just seemed awesome. then i woke up. Thank you to H.C Eikeland who says:
"I have had lucid dreams where I can do anything i want to. That's interesting what you said about deja vu, yet another phenomenon that we don't know for sure what causes it. I also have had deja vu now and then, it's just so difficult to explain how I knew that I had done something before when I'm certain I haven't; I wonder if it's a glitch in the brain. Tom Fischer, age 13 (as of 2007), has this to say about his dreams: "I rarely have dreams, and when I have them, I have no control over them. They will either show parts of some day or the whole day, but I can never remember the details. I tried to write the dreams down once, but it seems I forget them the moment I wake up. But I still have the memory of having this dream. This memory usually disappears when the moment in my dream happens or when the day in my dream completes in real life. I only have a surge of deja vu when these moments occur. There was only one time that I have ever had a lucid dream, and it was at school and everyone was trying to wake me up. They were trying to stop me from seeing a boy from my class, a boy whose name I cannot remember, who was waiting by the opposite side of my classroom. I ignored everyone around me and went to face him dead on. He said something to me which I cannot remember. And then I said 'You are not real'. He stumbled back, he looked shocked and even slightly defeated. He fled, then I woke up to get ready for school. The most scary thing was, that the next day, he transfered to another school over in Melbourne. I never heard of him again, and the day I had the dream, he avoided talking to me." It's accounts like this that brings up the possibility of dreams showing the future but many will say that in most cases it's nothing more than coincidence. There have been times when I have seen events that surely couldn't be due to coincidence, but we have to remember that what we do when awake is often the topic for our dreams. I thought about something briefly and dreamed about it the following night yet have focused on something or someone for a long time and not dreamed about it (or did not remember). It's a great idea to make the effort to keep a dream diary, different to your ordinary diary (if you write one), but I only usually write down what I feel to be significant dreams. I often look back at entries in my dream diary and sometimes they make more sense, or discover they are like other dreams I've had, or even appear to have come true. Caroline Ablett, age 23 (as of 2007), has sent me a collection of her dream accounts, which I present for you here: 03/01/1996 And I thought I had strange dreams! Maybe the voice representing her dog was a form of comforting; a fridge is used to preserve food so maybe that means that Caroline needs to think of the good memories she had when her dog was alive. 04/01/1996 I'm not so sure about this one, Caroline dreams a lot about death related topics, it seems. But to me there is a clear message, a reminder that one person dies and then another, a repeated cycle. 05/01/1996 Very similiar to the previous dream entry, so nothing to add for this one. 06/01/1996 For a child these form of dreams are very frightening yet they actually have a positive meaning. Yes it's disturbing to see someone you know and love die in a dream, for example, but the death might actually refer to a new start (i.e. passing into the next world). 06/01/1996 Again, the moving to a new house is talking about moving on in other ways, getting over what has happened to you in the past. 07/01/1996 Was perhaps Jason someone she knew and forgot about? The 'aged 10 and a half' is a typical remark from a child, especially a boy, to be as precise as possible. Maybe because she's missing the point of the coffins and such, in this dream Caroline was directly addressed to make it clear that she was the focus and not anyone else in the dream. The old lady could either be someone paying her respects or a symbol of wisdom, both meanings are appropriate here. It sounds like Caroline is feeling suffocated, that she is finding it difficult to deal with something. This is the sister who used to be a bit of a goth... Rather than avoid the coffin it would have been a better idea to face it as that would represent Caroline dealing with whatever problem caused these types of dreams. 17/01/1996 04/02/1996 11/02/1996 14/01/08 Matt found the lead on the cabinet and picked it up and said "Ahh, here it is!" We went outside and I said to Matt, Bubbles (my guinea pig) needed washing (as in bathed). Matt got out the guinea pig but she looked nothing like Bubbles, she had dark and light brown fur. It was daylight outside which is weird as it was dark in the bedroom! I also saw my Mum in the garden but she didn't say anything, she just stood there! Matt put Bubbles in a tub and closed the lid and plugged it in. The next part of my dream doesn't make no sense as it relates to the dream but makes no sense. The next thing I recall was I was chasing Matt around a house or caravan, it looked like a bit of both. He was hiding behind the doors and we where having fun. Then we came into the lounge where my guinea pig was. This is where it gets confusing because we are actually in the louge of a machine which is suppose to be cleaning my guinea pig. I looked out and saw my Mum looking in this box or caravan lounge and me and Matt were sitting on the couch feeding my guinea pig a treat. In actual fact it looked like she was eating a rather large guinea pig ear!" UltimateYoshiMaster has a few dream accounts to share with us: In one dream, I was in a huge pool of water, and I could jump super high, and not need to breath. Above the pool was a little net being moved up with a motor or something, and I jumped up and jumped on it and it failed to raise anymore and just fell down to its initial height. Another dream was that I was in some sort of forest, and I had touched some kind of odd blue poison ivy, and turned into some sort of blue poison ivy type thing, and I was going through the forest (I don't remember much about it, it was years ago!) and I got to some waterfall(I was on the ground, not on the top where the water went down from) and there was some naked person, holding on for their life, and I helped them... At the end of the dream I went and sort of rolled towards my mom, feeling embarrased... Another I don't remember much about, but it was after playing a Digimon game a whole lot. I was at some arena, and my Digimon, a Veemon, had lost, so I had comforted it saying "You did your best...", and that's all I remember about the dream... Last night, after reading about your dreams page, I wanted to have a lucid dream of my own, and finally got one. I wasn't really aware that it was a dream, but I was no longer confined to going with what the dream had in store for me and I was free to explore. I was in a field, with some fences, probably a park or something, and I got up onto a big swing, that was very high up. I swung a bit, then I think around there, it jumped to another dream, where I dreamed that I was awake and went over to someones house, and in that dream too I was somewhat lucid, and I wasn't confined to the dream's content and could decide what to do. That was the last dream I had that night...
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