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The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

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Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#131
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people have mostly bad dreams. If I become aware that I am dreaming I stop everything in the dream and "go back to sleep" in the dream. It results in better rest. Everything I've learned in a dream would only be helpful in a world where we wear watermelons for shoes and the trunk of our cars open into hidden ballrooms. It is a really dumb place to spend too much time

My take on dreams is that they're not literal. The mind is structured on a network of symbols and relationships between them, so the language of dreams are metaphors, double entendres, similar-sounds, etc. Why it is important is because it tells a story about what's going on in your emotional state that you're otherwise unaware of or repressing in conscious experience. It can also provide solutions. It can be a power…

> This isn't to say you should be reading "dream interpretation" guides or speaking to interpreters.

The problem with using guides and interpreters is that you don't know whether they explain your unconscious associations, or just substitute their own.

If you interpret your own dreams, you can be sure that all associations were generated by your own brain. Maybe during the dream, maybe during the interpretation. Who cares; either way, it's about your brain.

My simple interpretation method is to write an outline of the dream, and to some words add an arrow and write what it reminds me of. Usually at least three things in the dream remind me of the same topic -- that is the core message of the dream.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#132

How else has this? I sometimes remember dreams from easily 15y - 20y ago absolutly vividly, although I have had forgotten them in the mean time. Suddenly, during the day, like in a split second (maybe triggered from a scene or scent) I feel that "feeling" (or more like a superposition of all impression of that dream i had) of a dream long lost and the dream is fully present in that moment and I kind of "remember" it…

I'm completely the opposite. 50 years old and I have never once in my life remembered a dream. Never. I see things about dreams, such as this like, as interesting, but can relate to them at all, because they are things that happen to other people. I assume I have dreams, but when I wake up, I never have any recall of them.

Do you have any interest in remembering your dreams? Taking a magnesium glycinate supplement may help.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#133
Anyone else ever fall asleep awake? I've been able to lucid dream for a while now, but I started meditating recently and I've discovered I can meditate myself to sleep while still being "awake". I have to be really tired to do it, like physically exhausted, but mentally awake, so usually during naps, but it's really strange. First time I freaked out because I could feel my body going into sleep paralysis I felt like I was choking / couldn't breathe. Unfortunately I've only managed to stay awake for a few moments and didn't procede to a lucid dream yet.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#134
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's that most people don't take time to reflect. I recently became very anxious that I was "dreaming less". Then I remembered that this couldn't be true because my cognition wasn't impaired. This indicates I'm still hitting REM So what gives? The answer, I'm not showering in the morning to go to an office. No shower, no dedicated dream remembering time. Hence the perception of "fewer dreams"

Also, dreams are quickly forgotten, even if you make an effort to recall them. Once I was writing a dream diary. I had a dream, and I was like "this reminds me of another dream I had a few weeks ago". I opened the diary, and saw that the "few weeks ago" was actually yesterday. So, if the dream from yesterday feels like a few weeks ago, and the dreams before yesterday are either forgotten or feel like an ancient past,…

I'm fairly certain this is due to the same reason it's easier for a chess player to recall 'real' chess positions rather than if you just placed pieces randomly. Causality makes it possible for us to "compress" memories into a small enough representation. Dreams usually don't follow the same kinds of rules.

I'm remembering a particularly vivid dream I had perhaps a month or two ago. I remember the settings it took place in, some of the characters, some of the story elements, though to call it a "story" is a bit of a stretch, just a rambling sequence of unconnected events. I often dream consciously, So I can remember actually wanting to pay attention to how cause and effect worked, but when I woke up, I couldn't recall how stuff managed to happen.

Without that thread running through everything, dream recall would seem to go very against how the brain normally works. Not that techniques can't help anyway.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#135

I wish sites had a browse feature, like “here’s a sample of what you’ll find, here are the keywords that would reveal this same entry” This and Sci-hub are two of many examples that bounce me over and over again because I have no inspiration on what to search or how This site even has an entire primer on how to make a useful search query, because apparently its not even a familiar search bar? And all the users are li…

I just ended up searching "I" in the search bar to read all of the dreams as all of the dream diaries are written in the first person.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#136
If I had a good dream and suddenly woke up. I can get back to sleep and continue the dream and somehow manipulate the story woke I'm in it. It's very weird, usually i know immediately when I'm dreaming while it's happening and I can wake up if it's not interesting.

There are only 2 times that i remember that i didn't realize it. ( One quite embarrassing one).

One time when u had a fake wake-up ( i thought I woke up for real and the feeling during afterwards that something is off was really weird.

Another time i needed to go to the toilet and i couldn't. So i tried harder... Yeah, quite embarrassing this one...

I do think I'll having less dreams lately. Since I never have the need to try to fetch the dream again. But I'm using my alarm clock again and perhaps that's related.

Fyi, i forget about the dream immediately after standing up.

It's possible that I talk in my sleep, i once woke up during that and had a conversation with my girlfriend. Somehow my dream was a visual interpretation of what she said ( while my eyes were closed ofc) and I was way more open than i usually am. She could have asked me anything and I sincerely doubt of i would have been able to dodge a question if I would have wanted that.

Ps. I'm a very irregular sleeper.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#137
If I had a good dream and suddenly woke up. I can get back to sleep and continue the dream and somehow manipulate the story while I'm in it. It's very weird, usually i know immediately when I'm dreaming while it's happening and I can wake up if it's not interesting.

I don't have real nightmares, because I can wake up, since I realise it's not real.

There are only 2 times that i remember that i didn't realize it. ( One quite embarrassing one).

One time when I had a fake wake-up ( i thought I woke up for real and the feeling afterwards that something was off was really weird. Since I already thought I woke up). After a while, i woke up for real ofc, not by my doing.

Another time i needed to go to the toilet and i couldn't. So i tried harder... Yeah, quite embarrassing this one, 10 years ago after a night of going out pretty late...

I do think I'm having less dreams lately. Since I never have the need to try to fetch the dream again. But I'm using my alarm clock again and perhaps that's related.

Fyi, i forget about the dream immediately after standing up.

It's possible that I talk in my sleep, i once woke up during that and had a conversation with my girlfriend before I woke up. Somehow my dream was a visual interpretation of what she said ( while my eyes were closed ofc) and I was way more open than i usually am. She could have asked me anything and I sincerely doubt of i would have been able to dodge a question if I would have wanted that.

Ps. I'm a very irregular sleeper. I can only sleep 3-4 hours and it's almost all REM/deep sleep according to an app that i placed on my bed.

Ps2. If you have trouble waking up. Set a hard noise 10 minutes before the desired time ( 1 second duration), you should get up more easily when the real alarm goes off.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#139
post #19

Just curious, does anyone here have dreams with some recurring themes? I've tried googling for this but sadly most of the content seems to be related to spiritual/mystical "explanations" of it. And I don't bring it up with anyone in real life so as to not appear like a kook. I don't usually remember my dreams, but when I do there's a great probability that it falls into these 2 categories - 1. I suddenly find myself…

Yea, every time I try to run in a dream it’s a fuckup, I start slipping and sliding and make little to no progress.

One time though, I had a dream where I was successfully running so fast and so smoothly, it felt amazing, better than flying.

Re: The DreamBank, a collection of over 20k dream reports

#140
post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only recurring dream I have is I'm back in college and it's the end of a semester, suddenly I realize there's some math class I haven't been attending and I have just a few days to cram everything I've missed in time for the final.

I have this dream constantly. Always that I forgot to ever go to the class, never that I'm struggling in a class or that I'm going to fail I class I've been attending. I wonder, did you skip a lot of classes in College?

I've had that a lot for years after College. During College, I skipped a lot of classes and instead studied by borrowing books from the library, it worked well in terms of learning but it meant that if I failed my exams, my teachers would probably not hesitate to expel me. That added a lot of pressure and is most likely why I've been having that dream regularly since even 15 years later.
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