I rarely ever find myself dreaming about people, places, or things that actually exist in my life, and I’d prefer to keep it that way. Personally, I live for dreams. I use them to escape reality, and when reality bleeds into that sanctuary, I get very upset. I go to sleep so I can be away from the places I’m sick of seeing, away from the people who want to hurt me - not so I can revisit them. They took the happiness out of my waking life, and I’ll be damned if I let them do the same to my dreams. With the exception of my one friend, someone or something from IRL even making a minor appearance just infuriates me. The thought of getting better at dreaming lucidly is one of the only things that keeps me going. One day, I’ll be able to just collapse their lungs with my mind, snap my fingers and boil their blood.
Anyone else feel this way, or is dreaming realistically a comforting thing for you?
Most of my dreams are RL based. I would prefer if they weren’t but I’m not as enraged about it as you would be. For me, the downside of improving dream recall is that more of these tedious dreams are remembered - whereas for folk who don’t make an effort to recall dreams usually only remember the dreams that stand out.
I also think that this is the main reason my recall has gone down in recent months … stress and the wish not to recall these dreams.
As someone who has been through depression and thankfully out the other side, I feel quite concerned about some of the things you wrote in your post. Dreams are incredible, but they’re just a fraction of our lives. Real life shouldn’t be endured like some kind of trial. I hope you can find a way to change your reality for something more positive. You deserve an awesome life just as much as you deserve awesome dreams.
In answer to your question, real life saturates the majority of my dreams but it’s mostly people, places and things that I care about with a (un?)healthy dose of insanity thrown in. Some of the weird things my subconscious picks up from daily life and dumps in my dreams I personally find highly amusing.
I agree with obfusc8. You should find a way to enjoy waking life and find people you can trust and have fun with. I can affect my dreams to some extent. Real life is going ok, but I enjoy fantasy themed dreams for sure. I get those every now and then.
I usually only dream of waking life things. Very rarely do I dream of things ore places that do not exist in waking life. I guess I prefer these dreams more, but waking life things do not bother me at all. Some of my most realistic false awakenings that seemed to perfectly recreate waking life resulted in me getting lucid because my mind was clear and I was not sucked into some fantasy dream plot, which is usually what prevents me from becoming lucid.
But fantasy dreams are still cool. I don’t really care what I dream about. The only thing that bothers me is when I forget my dreams.
Thanks for the advice… I always tried to bleach my dreams clean of the outside world, but I guess I never thought of doing things the other way around: making real life something I’m glad to dream about.
At the moment, reshaping my life isn’t an option (it’s a long story, but I’m kind of stuck with and depend on the very people who think I’m crazy and not worth anything and are trying to dump me off to residential treatment facilities), but one day I’ll find a way out and meet some people who care about me.
If you look closely, I think, dreams have their own way of telling you what’s wrong with your life, so I guess that’s why my attempts to shut out reality have occasionally failed. My brain might be telling me to let some of it in.
Dreams are argued to be an evolutionary tool for the brain to cross real-life possibilities with imagination - a sort of ultimate simulation game. If this is the case then not dreaming about real life at all sounds a bit insane but I am glad that in it you find solace against your dreadful reality
You sound like you have an abusive family that tries to escape-goat their problems into you. They might as well be narcissists so you should get acquainted with this disorder.
Well, I extremely rarely dream about my own life. And I like it so. But I sometimes meet people I know, I don’t talk with them usually.
Most of the places I visit in my dreams aren’t real.
I find dreaming about real life a bit sad : you’re free to go out there when you’re awake. Dreams are a way to escape the routine by offering you the possibility to “see” what you imagine, and explore it.
Agreed. I might try one day (new addiction ? :3)
Finally, if I wanted to explore the world in my bed, I think I would try to induce OBEs from my LDs, or WILDs.
Most of my dreams are about RL.
I don’t complain about it because it makes RCs more effective.
However, my dreams are usually very realistic so I need more than one RC to be sure.
If we talk about non lucid dreams then yes of course I do dream about waking life and I wouldn’t preferred it any other way because as of what you said yourself:
When it comes to lucid dreams being in touch with waking life I still find very useful because dreams are here to teach us more about us and our life in waking life, I think so.
Sure there are times and dreams when we go crazy and it’s ok to do so but neglecting your waking life can’t be healthy the same as neglecting the dreams isn’t healthy. But you might ask: what about most of the people? they are neglecting their dreams too. And that’s true and I say that they are not healthy people because if we would learn to let go ego and become more connected to other people as we become in dreams then this world would be much more nice and peaceful!
It depends, it’s a bit complicated. Almost all of my dreams are as mundane as it gets, and those that aren’t about my real life are about me in situations based on it. For example, being in a normal town that isn’t my own, going to a university that isn’t my own, and so on, but all those things don’t exist in the waking world.
In short, I do and when I don’t it might as well be real life. The situations are very real-life-like, even if the details are different. But the gist of it is the same.
EDIT: I forgot to say if it bothers me. Kind of. I’d be happy even if I were lucid in that kind of dreams, that would be something. I’d also be happy if they were more surreal or something. But it doesn’t actively bother me. Or maybe it does.
Hang in there moogle haha
Ever considered playing videogames? I had some good ones for you After playing several years I regularly have game related/fantasy dreams. And I haven’t played in months~
But surely reading “fantasy” books and/or watching movies have the same effect.
Other then that, I have nearly the same amount of RL dreams ^^’
Especially in which old friends or family members occur. Overall my RL dreams doesn’t bother me, except some few.
After playing several years I regularly have game related/fantasy dreams. And I haven’t played in months~