What do you know about dreams?

[D'Snowth]

Wellp, that dettachible potato showed up in my dreams again last night.

Of course, that could've been fueled by the fact that earlier in the evening, I was watching old Mr. Potato Head commercials on Retrojunk and YouTube.

 

[Fragglemuppet]

Snowth, I've never heard of twilight sleep, but what you described sounds like sleep paralysis. I had a bad case of it last week, so it's still kinda fresh in my mind... Usually they happen either in the middle of or in between dreams, and just consist of me having vertigo (Sp?), for a few seconds. This one though happened just before I woke up. My arms and legs felt tingly, like when they've fallen asleep and are just starting to wake up, and it's like a very intense tickling sensation bordering on pain. There was this voice in my head, (not a real voice but more like what you would imagine if you were imagining dialog in your mind), telling me to scream, but it was kind of in a taunting way, like a killer in a movie might. At the same time, being at least partly awake, I knew that screaming would be a bad idea since I wasn't in any real danger and screaming would alarm the other people in the house. Eventually I tried to scream anyway, and as is tipical in such instances, nothing, or at least nothing substantial, came out. Naturally I couldn't move throughout this whole thing, which seemed to last a few minutes. Anyway, now that I've gotten that off my chest, lol, I think I read somewhere that it's caused by part of the brain waking up too soon or something, and the parts that are asleep and awake sort of clashing with each other.
I've also had that happen where I've woken up, gone to the bathroom or something, still felt a bit tired and gone to bed, only to have a horrible nightmare. The last time was so bad I swore I'd never do it again! There've been times since when I've wanted to go back to bed, checked the time, and suddenly felt much more awake... I think that the reason we tend to have nightmares often during the day is that it's not normal to sleep in the daytime. So when we do, it's our brain reacting to the idea that something's not right. On a related note, I think it was on
www.dreammoods.com
that I read that most nightmares tend to happen in the early morning, shortly before we wake up. Maybe this is because they're usually dealing with some issue that we desperately need to be paying attention to, and are therefore more important for us to remember?

Sleep and dreams are also topics that I'm extremely interested in!

 

[D'Snowth]

And now, I would like to ask everyone participating in this thread something...

Do any of you have the ability to dream in the third person? I found that occasionally, though not too often, I can dream in the third person; nothing like an "out of body experience", but rather, it's like I become the "audience" to my own dream, and can see myself during the "act".

One of my more memorable, and recent third-person dreams include seeing someone trying to catch my attention by waving me down, but I don't notice the person, and basically walk right on by, without making any contact.

 

[D'Snowth]

Oh man... oh man... oh MAN...

I hardly got any sleep last night, mainly because I was so fricken constipated all throughout the night, it wasn't funny (I think they put something in that popcorn at the movies yesterday)... but the little sleep I DID get last night... gee whiz... I mean to tell you, it was one nightmare after another, and each one was worse than the one before... I finally went ahead and got up early this morning, because I figured if I fell back asleep again, it'd be yet another nightmare that was worse than the last one... though I don't really know how it could've gotten worse than the last one.

And the killa-dilla of all of this? I know exactly what the nightmares mean. I do. Remember when we mentioned that the two things that appear in our dreams the most are our biggest wishes, and our biggest fears? I'm 100% positive the nightmares were composed of the latter.

 

[TogetherAgain]

How ironic that I find this thread today... Last night, I had this dream--very much like another dream I've had, but with numerous variations--in which I was part of this squad of people that hijacked a jet for its cargo (with no intent to harm any passengers, for the record) and got caught and somehow crash-landed and ended up in Alaska, where we were stranded for about a year. (Sounds more like something I would write than something I would dream... And yes, there's usually a very definite difference between the two.)

What was unusual about this dream for me (aside from the fact that I was about ten times more confident and bad-a** than I am in real life) is that I already had a general gist of what was going to happen. It was like re-reading a book that I loved, but had forgotten details on--primarily because, like I said, I'd dreamed this before, but there were a lot of changes. For example, the fact that my mom showed up giving massages and handing out post-it notes for us to write what we were going to do when we got rescued. And the plane catching on fire and us having to run back in to save people, some of whom didn't want to be saved... That was a new feature. So while I won't go so far as to say I knew I was dreaming, exactly, I knew that it wasn't real, and that it was different from the last time I "saw" it.

Anyway... <Hugs> to Snowthie for last night's nightmares and insomnia. I'm much more familiar with lack of sleep than I am with bad dreams, but neither one is terribly enjoyable!

 

[D'Snowth]

Aww, thanks Toga.

And wow, that dream of yours actually sounds quite epic, and yeah, it does sound like something you would write... but now, I have to ask... what exactly is this precious cargo abound the plane that you risk your life to hijack for?

 

[Fragglemuppet]

Sorry, but after thinking about it I don't know if I believe the bit about our greatest wishes and greatest fears. I mean I know sometimes, particularly when I was younger, I had fantasy-oriented dreams in which I was a witch, and one where I had a good friend who was a vampire. Of course magic and fantasy is or should be a part of all kids' lives, and I woke up thinking, wouldn't that be cool? So in other words I think some dreams may fit that discription, but not all of them. I had at least one dream where my mother was killed and a few where I was dying. These are not really fears, and they're certainly not wishes of mine.
Funny, but I find talking or reading about dreams or other frightening subjects just before bed is kind of a safeguard against nightmares. I'll scare the living daylights out of myself before I go to bed, and have either sweet dreams or an uneventful sleep.

 

[D'Snowth]

I look at it this way: our "biggest wishes" and "biggest fears" that they say make up a majority of our dreams are more psychological than metaphorical/rhetorical.

Something that's really deep in our subconscience, that we really ponder on in regards to our lives, present or future, something that we may try to act on, or something we dwell on, something that you would change your life or would give something up for... something like that.

Wishing you were a witch or a vampire is cute, and has a child-like whimsy to it, but is it really something that we really WISH for? Is it something that's a part of our psychie? Likewise, with fear, I think it's more of a psychological thing. I assessed my nightmares from the other night, and tried to figure out just what exactly is it about this fear of mine that I fear? The subject of the fear is a situation, and I know what I fear about the situation, but what is it about it that I'm fearing? I'm I fearing finding out about something I don't want to happen (or have happened), or am I fearing knowing it's happened, and having to face the reality of it?

And I'm not sure that any of what I just said made much sense, lol... I don't know, I guess you guys can judge that for yourselves.

 

[Fragglemuppet]

It took me a while, lol, but I think I got it. I got caught in the trap of taking things too literally. The first thing anyone learns about dreams is they're all about symbolism.

 

[RedPiggy]

Yeah, but sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.