Dreams & Nightmares

[Catmando]

Anyone like to share a vivid dream.....a strange nightmare of theirs?

I have one, it was several years ago, but it was quite frightening at the time.....! Here it is:

I was riding my bicycle on the dirt road that runs behind the backyard where I grew up. I was panting heavily, trying hard to pick up speed on the bike, because I had looked in back of me and these lily white snakes (about 5 or 6 of them), were chasing me.

I tried to peddle faster, yet they were gaining ground on me. They were really after me. They finally caught up, right behind my bike. The white snakes started lunging and striking at my ankles and legs. I must have got about 3 or 4 vicious bites. I could literally feel the pain of the venom as they bit into my ankles, shoot all the way up my leg. I had never felt such hot, searing pain as this!

This is when I finally woke up!

All a dream, yet so vivid was that feeling of that unforgetable pain shooting up my leg, and the whiteness of the snakes. Indelibly stamped in my mind!

Ray

[navneeth]

All a dream, yet so vivid was that feeling of that unforgetable pain shooting up my leg, and the whiteness of the snakes. Indelibly stamped in my mind!

That's really interesting. Have you ever been bit by a snake (a venemous one) before, or was the "pain" created by hearing descriptions of it from snake-bite victims?

[bignaf]

two recent ones: one, a Japanese "zero" airplane chasing me.
two, I'm listening to music on real player. the track is something like 7 minutes long. when it reaches 7 minutes it continues so it says 7:32/7:12 for example, and the music is heavenly! should have written it down!

[DavidS]

1. My father died when I was a child over 50 years ago. Until quite recently I had a recurrent dreamt that he was still alive and came back to me after a long absence.
2. I participated in the Yom Kippur War, and for some years after that dreamt of my Artillery battery being bombed and strafed by enemy aircraft (it actually happened 2-3 times, and a couple of my comrades were killed).
3. I have had several nightmares about road accidents and car breakdowns (probably induced by tv).

[Catmando]

That's really interesting. Have you ever been bit by a snake (a venemous one) before, or was the "pain" created by hearing descriptions of it from snake-bite victims?

No, I've never been bit by a snake of any kind. Maybe I got it from hearing testimony of snake-bite victims.

[shostakovich]

I dream often, and sometimes so vividly I can read print in the dream. I have several recurring dreams. One is particularly disturbing. My brakes fail. Yet I can manage to stop at intersections unless the grade is too steep. I always resolve to get the brakes fixed, but the same problem occurs in the next dream.

David, watch out for me. I drive a Plymouth Grand Voyager, olive drab.
Shos

[BigJon@Work]

I could probably fill a thread bigger than Bignaf’s “big thread” if I related all my dreams. I routinely have intense, physically strenuous and vividly full-color dreams of dramatic situations and strong emotions. When I relate my dreams to my wife, she kids me that I should write them down and turn them into movie scripts. I literally have feature-length movie dreams.

Frequently recurring themes in my dreams:
-World on the brink of nuclear war (sometime we go, sometimes we don’t)
-Tornados bearing down on me (I’m normally the one herding everyone to shelter.)
-Getting lost in the streets of the small town of my childhood (I knew each street by name in the waking world so this would be impossible.)
-Going back to college
-Exploring old buildings of impossibly complex, maze-like construction (This one and the previous one often occur together.)
-Shopping (Really!)
-Bodily floating through air where I can move around by just willing myself to hover over the ground. Not really flying, more like a hovercraft. In the physics of my dreams I still need something to push off of. (These dreams are so intensely realistic that for a while I thought I had actually done it.)
-Extra-terrestrial invasion and war (not so much anymore, more often when I was younger.)

Right on topic, this morning I dreamt that I was helping a friend clean out an old house. I was going to remove an old bee nest from under a shelf and didn’t realize the bees had built a new one right behind it. I jostled the new nest and got stung repeatedly. I was trying to get out of the house but I couldn’t get away from the bees. I woke up and could still feel little pinpricks of pain all over my body. My wife was awake and was wondering why I looked so distressed when I woke up.

[barfle]

I remember my dreams so rarely (and when I do, for such a short time) that I don't usually feel like I have dreamed at all.

But I do recall one from when my wife and I were living in a condo in southern California. We had a small yard, and a patch of lawn that might have been 8' by 10'. As is typical of most of my projects, this one involved a lot of labor, cutting off the edge of a patio, breaking it up with a sledge hammer, digging up another busted up patio that was buried underneath it, hauling it all away, hauling in soil in a wheelbarrow to bring up the level again, yadda yadda yadda. We had planted the area with Irish moss, which is nice and green and grows very low to the ground, so I didn't need a mower (which seems like overkill for a patch of lawn that size).

I dreamed that one day when I was at work, she dug it all up and had a patio put in.

[jamiebk]

Agree...this thread could fill volumes. Dreams are so darned interesting. Sometimes I can't wait to get to sleep just to experience them. When I was younger, I used to have dreams about fall down or off of things...primarily,, it was the rather imposing staircase in our 1856-built home. I would always jump awake with a huge start. One night, I was having the dream and somehow or other I simply decided that this was a dream and no matter what...I was going to see it through. So, there I was falling through space, willing myself to experience the outcome no matter what. Well, when I got to the "bottom" I simply landed as if I had hit a pillow or a marshmallow...it was a soft, beautiful landing and I bounced gently until I came to a stop and just lay there in total comfort. Then I woke up. I never had the dream again.

I have also had a number of dreams about flying...like I could will myself to do so. Usually it involves concentrating my energy toward the skyand then lifting off. I could do loops and dives and dips often pulling out at the last minute and soraing to great heights. I could even hover around the ceiling of a room ro something. Maybe this is why I always had a passion for rollercoasters and aerobatics (open cockpit planes). I have also tried skydiving a few times. I still get these dreams today, only not as frequently.

Another set of dreams I had dealt with actually breathing underwater...That was cool....I was just swimming around and never had to take a breath. A few years ago, I synthetically duplicated this by taking up scuba...it was everything I dreamed of!

When I was back in HS, I had a long recurring set of dreams that I was a secret agent type guy...I was chasing crooks and screeching around in cars etc. I even got shot a few times, and strangely, it did not really "hurt" but I could feel a hell of a thump when it happened...I hope I never have to find out the reality of that one. These dreams were cool because I would often pick up where I left off the night before. I have no idea as to why.

I have also had a number of dreams that I think I better not discuss on the BB...

Anyway, fun topic.! Sweet Dreams everyone....

[navneeth]

...Sometimes I can't wait to get to sleep just to experience them... One night, I was having the dream and somehow or other I simply decided that this was a dream and no matter what...I was going to see it through.

That reminds of a chapter from Richard Feynman's book Surely You're Joking, Mr.Feynman. He actually trained himself to "experience" and control his dreams. The book as a whole is fun to read, but the chapter related to this thread is titled Always Trying to Escape.

[shostakovich]

Like Jamie, I've also had a sequence of dreams about being able to breathe under water. They may have been prompted by almost drowning at summer camp once many years ago. I was in a deep area without knowing it, and relaxed, looking for the bottom. I didn't bother taking a deep breath because I thought I was in shallow water. As I went down, struggling, I remember utter peace before blacking out. A counselor dived in and pulled me up. In my dreams, I always had that feeling of utter peace under water, even though no one else in my dreams could breathe under water.

In about 20% of my dreams I know I'm dreaming. Usually it's because I've been there in what I recognize as a recurring dream. How many other people have this experience?
Shos

[analog]

"How many other people have this experience?
Shos"

What a fascinating thread.

Carl Jung maintained that dreams are telegrams from our subconcious. He said when his patients commenced talking about their dreams they always made ".. immediate and marked progress.." I'd reccomend "Man and his Symbols" to anyone interested in dreams. One should write down their dreams first thing because they often disappear within a few minutes of waking up.

I have recurrring dreams involving airplanes. They always reflect how my life is going at the time. When things are generally calm and in order the flight is smooth, but when chaos erupts on family or work front the flights get bizarre. During various life crises I've driven city freeways in a 707, weaved through powerlines in a Bonanza, and watched a B29 plummet straight down. The dreams help me become aware when I'm the one stirring things up, or am trying to do too much.



I think every telegram should be opened.

[analog]

how'd that double post get there?

[Serenity]

I haven't had a dream in a long time. If I'm troubled by a math problem then I remember dreaming the same math operations over and over again until I wake up (blech!).

Do composers dream written compositions or hear them or both or picture themselves conducting them? (*ig?)

I wonder if you can really learn stuff or fall to suggestion by listening to something in your sleep?

[jamiebk]

Dreams really frustrate me...I see visions..colors, compositions, ideas etc. that I just can't convey to others no matter how hard I try. I can see them, but simply don't have the words or capabilities to externalize all that I experience in my dream state. I really envy people who can, through art, music, film, words etc. really reveal whats inside of them.

[Schmeelkie]

Now that I'm on my second pregnancy I'm again finding I'm having much more vivid and memorable dreams when I'm pregnant than normal. Last pregnancy, most of my dreams were about getting married (strange since in the months leading up to the wedding I had lots of dreams of being pregnant). I'd have forgotten my shoes, my dad had gotten lost on the way to the church, I'd ended up with a bridesmaids dress and not the wedding gown I picked, etc. This time I seem to be having lots of 'living in a college dorm' dreams. I keep wondering if the bed will be big enough for my husband and who's watching Pumpkin. I had one recently where I had been given a really big room and was moving in and figuring out how to arrange the furniture when people started coming in and taking couches and chairs saying - well, noone's in this room. I had to yell at them that I was staying in this room and I deserved it cause I was a senior.

For anyone who watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer (I was catching reruns on FX twice a week when my husband and son left for work/daycare about an hour before I had to leave this past semester) this is a good one: Oz was depressed and I had to cheer him up. We went to a carnival and went on a ferris wheel - it started going really fast and I fell off (but didn't get hurt on the landing), then had to find Oz again (everyone was depending on me to keep him safe). I did, then lost him again getting on a ferry... I just had this fear that Buffy was going to show up and kick my butt for losing him.

Lots of my dreams mix up people from real life and TV or movie characters...

[Schmeelkie]

"How many other people have this experience?
Shos"

Carl Jung maintained that dreams are telegrams from our subconcious. He said when his patients commenced talking about their dreams they always made ".. immediate and marked progress.." I'd reccomend "Man and his Symbols" to anyone interested in dreams.

I do sometimes know I'm dreaming. Got rid of a long-lived 'falling-down-the-stairs' dream by taking control of it.

Wow - Carl Jung - I read Man and his Symbols for a psych class in undergraduate - think it was personality psych and we just read 4 big names - Freud, Jung, Skinner and someone else. Should see if I still have those books somewhere.

[piqaboo]

originallyposted by bigjon:
[qb]Bodily floating through air where I can move around by just willing myself to hover over the ground. Not really flying, more like a hovercraft. In the physics of my dreams I still need something to push off of. (These dreams are so intensely realistic that for a while I thought I had actually done it.)[/qb]

I had this one as a child. In my dream we were at a local shopping mall (its still in business) and it was a very windy day. It was a long time before I could decide if it were a dream or a lucky one-time occurrence!

I dont remember dreams much. As a kid, thru college, there were three nasty recurring dreams, fortunately gone. As an adult, I remember less than 3 dreams a year on average.

Now when I dream its usually because there is some serious stress going on - recalcitrant issues at work or whatever. The dreams are pretty straightforward. When I moved to FL, my roomie and I had room enough til her hubby changed his mind and announced he was moving in too. Then I dreamt about storage space for a couple weeks. No hidden symbolism. I expect Im about to start dreaming about timelines.

My pregnancy dreams were funny - in part because I had them. They were all about traveling and all kinds of mixups and complications during the trips, but it all worked out to a good trip in the end, even if not exactly as planned. They were confused but never scary or maddening -they all had happy endings. Lets see, metaphor????
(I was ripped off; I never got any of the classic xrated dreams of the knocked up. )

[BigJon@Work]

This morning’s dream is one that happens to me once in a while. I use a clock radio to wake up and sometimes I turn the radio volume down without fully waking up. So I am still slumbering and dreaming while it is playing and I fully integrate whatever is playing into my dream. This morning they were talking about hippos for some reason, and I dreamt that I was at a theater and some a-hole insisted on talking about hippos into his cellphone/speakerphone during the show. I wanted to kill the guy and started to threaten him. He just kept talking about hippos. Sheesh!

[DavidS]

This morning they were talking about hippos for some reason, and I dreamt that I was at a theater and some a-hole insisted on talking about hippos into his cellphone/speakerphone during the show. I wanted to kill the guy and started to threaten him. He just kept talking about hippos. Sheesh!

Would that have been at the Hippodrome Theatre?