Dream Trauma?

[Cat Pillar]

This is something that's been brewing in my mind for a while now.

 

Can dreams create psychological scars like those of waking life traumas?

 

I've been thinking a lot about dreams lately. I remember what my dreams used to be like when I was a little kid...they were often as terrifying as they were incredible. It wasn't all nightmare material, either. Some of them were terrifying because they were beyond my ability to process or understand.

 

It's hard to even describe many of them...some held a semblance of coherent story or setting, others were so surreal that I can't even put words to them. Many left me feeling disturbed on a fundamental level.

 

I sometimes wonder if the intensity of my dreams when I was a child had a significant impact on my psychological development growing up.

[Sloppy Zhang]

Can dreams create psychological scars like those of waking life traumas?

 

I believe so, yes.

[Jetsun]

My understanding of dreams is that it is largely about emotional processing of events from your waking life, so young children dream intensely because their brains are making sense of all the impressions they have taken in throughout their day.

 

But I think some young children may take in a lot of impressions which really have nothing to do with their lives because children are so open energetically, so they may absorb the impression of another persons trauma for example and later that night have a nightmare while processing it. An example of what I mean is that there have been studies of children of Holocaust survivors who would draw pictures of death camps and suffering even though their parents had never talked about their experiences to them, so somehow the child non-verbally takes in the experience of the Holocaust into themselves just from being open around their parents even though their parents had done all they could to shield them from those horrors.

 

Which goes to show that you need to energetically release your own traumas and anxieties or they may be passed on even if you make a conscious effort not to harm anyone, there may be traumas passed down in families energetically for generations maybe even hundreds of years until someone does the work to heal them.

 

So personally I doubt a dream itself could harm you unless you are attacked by a Shaman in some way, but you may have picked up upon some traumatic impressions from your environment or family which then manifested in your dreams.

Edited July 31, 2011 by Jetsun

[Clarity]

Dreaming can take place at the level of body, mind, or spirit. It is not simply a psychological issue. The way I see it, we have a mind so our dreams get filtered through our minds.

 

For example, I know with certainty that I've had many dreams that were memories of spiritual experiences. Other dreams were more like spiritual visions. I've also had had dreams where my body was speaking to me through my mind. And of course, there is the typical re-hashing of thoughts and emotions which can permeate the dreaming state.

[tragblack]

Some of my dreams must have affected me, but maybe more subconsciously. Inversely, my dreams reflect more of my waking fears now. Major themes I'm noticing are regret and procrastination.

 

Usually, emotional dreams affect me for just a few hours after dreaming. Thankfully, I have never been prone to bad or frequent nightmares.

 

Edit** Sometimes, I think my dreams are trying to teach me to dream lucidly. The repetetive nature of them and the fact that most of my dreams occur in the same settings has started inducing some interesting dream thoughts bordering on fully becoming aware. I'm... so... close...

Edited August 1, 2011 by tragblack

[Sloppy Zhang]

Edit** Sometimes, I think my dreams are trying to teach me to dream lucidly. The repetetive nature of them and the fact that most of my dreams occur in the same settings has started inducing some interesting dream thoughts bordering on fully becoming aware. I'm... so... close...

 

Keep going

[Taomeow]

I have a book recommendation:

 

The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep

Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche (Author), Mark Dahlby (Editor)

 

Dreaming is a high and mighty human art in many traditions, but not all of them are written... so if you want to do it in a traditional non-haphazard way, oral transmission is best, but a good book describing a written dreaming tradition is better than trying to invent the wheel.

 

I am working on switching timelines in dreamtime... not really interested in lucid dreaming in this one, I spend enough time here in my waking state.

 

Your access to different timelines is determined by their emotional rather than spacial or temporal proximity. I.e. if you feel you "belong here" and all you want to do is tweak with your position "here," you can learn to lucid-dream in this timeline. But if you feel you "belong elsewhere," you will need to work out the details of this "elsewhere" first. Lucid-dreaming in the current timeline is much easier, because you remember many details (millions) on autopilot. What your clothes look like, and everybody else's. What houses, lampposts, money, toilet bowls looks like. What a "car" is. What a "Ph.D." means. Millions of details are already there, you don't have to change "it all" in your dream -- only something minor like your own position within this timeline.

 

Not so easy with switching timelines. Things you don't remember outnumber things you do by orders of magnitude. Luckily, once you remember something, it's like a bead on a string -- you pull and the whole necklace of related, connected "beads" can be dragged out, and then you notice where it is tied to another one... you can disentangle a whole timeline like this. The "bead" is an emotionally significant or a very vividly remembered (due to repetitive use, e.g.) little detail. One such repetitive detail is the shoes you wear in a particular timeline. I like to start exploring other timelines by looking down at my feet (with my mind's eye, not with my physical eyes) to see what I'm wearing there. The routine is, as you go to sleep in "this" timeline, you visualize waking up in "another" one, and when you wake up, you put your shoes on, or go barefoot as the case may be. (I can't gain access yet to timelines that have no shoes.) When you are putting your shoes on, use your hands (in your mind, that is), and keep looking at your hands and feet and the shoes might materialize. If they materialize, put them on and go... where?.. Keep watching your feet, see where they are going... take it from there.

[suninmyeyes]

Hello Taomeow!What do you mean by different timelines ?Like a different time zone as in past ,future or?

Edited August 1, 2011 by suninmyeyes

[suninmyeyes]

I have a friend who is naturally lucid dreamer like me and we are learning from each other and are about to go on expirimenting with trying to meet up in the dreams.Anyone done this succesfully?I knew somebody who did it long time ago.

Latley I have been waking myself up from dreams(as my main dream practise) by remebering that I am dreaming ,but waking up into the void instead physiaclly waking up,sort of earising dreams.

 

Catpillar,I feel that embracing my own shadow in a dream does it for me.This works on many levels ,as well on astral level in which if I am getting attacked if I 'embrace'attackers and send them love theyll melt away becouse they dont like those vibrations.

[Taomeow]

Hello Taomeow!What do you mean by different timelines ?Like a different time zone as in past ,future or?

 

Hi Suninmyeyes,

 

no, different time zones (nice term!) in the past, future, etc. are part of any one timeline, but what I'm talking about is different timelines that exist simultaneously. "Line" is not the best term but it's more or less accepted, so I use it. In actuality, time is like a river that is not only a far cry from a straight "line" but a river with many tributaries, and all the tributaries exist simultaneously.

 

Unlike on a spacial river extrapolated from its temporal aspect, however (which is what a "river" is to a 3D spacial creature), in the river of time you can be present at all of them simultaneously. Picture yourself swimming in one of them on a hot summer day while you're fishing in another one in early spring and skating on yet another one which happens to be frozen solid because it's winter, and drowning in yet another (that's the end of you in this one tributary but it does not faze the total you anymore than a loss of a hair does the 3D you of this one timeline) and so on. All the "you" out there are parts, cells, units, pearls, petals -- of the single multidimentional multispacial multitemporal flower of the whole you. Each petal has a life of its own but not really. Each pearl IS the necklace but also isn't. The whole matters to the part but not really. The parts matter to the whole but not really. Hard to explain but not really... ...

 

...that's reality as it has revealed itself to me to date. If at some point it hits me with another "not really," I'll simply switch to a timeline where everything is real -- or where nothing is real --

 

...that's infinity, there's infinite ways to play with it. But some are much more fun than others. In fact, there's an infinite number of ways to play with it that aren't much fun. I am trying to learn to choose my games wisely...

[Todd]

sort of earising dreams.

 

Erasing? Or?

 

Catpillar,I feel that embracing my own shadow in a dream does it for me.This works on many levels ,as well on astral level in which if I am getting attacked if I 'embrace'attackers and send them love theyll melt away becouse they dont like those vibrations.

 

Or pulling out a dream of being attacked, noticing the malevolent presence still there, and then opening to it and it revealing something beneficial. I don't know that I can recommend it, but it has happened in my experience. I think it was partly conditioned by a recognition of lack of ultimate reality in the malevolent appearance. The appearance wasn't fixed in my mind.

Edited August 1, 2011 by Todd

[Birch]

I have a book recommendation:

 

The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep

Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche (Author), Mark Dahlby (Editor)

 

Dreaming is a high and mighty human art in many traditions, but not all of them are written... so if you want to do it in a traditional non-haphazard way, oral transmission is best, but a good book describing a written dreaming tradition is better than trying to invent the wheel.

 

I am working on switching timelines in dreamtime... not really interested in lucid dreaming in this one, I spend enough time here in my waking state.

 

Your access to different timelines is determined by their emotional rather than spacial or temporal proximity. I.e. if you feel you "belong here" and all you want to do is tweak with your position "here," you can learn to lucid-dream in this timeline. But if you feel you "belong elsewhere," you will need to work out the details of this "elsewhere" first. Lucid-dreaming in the current timeline is much easier, because you remember many details (millions) on autopilot. What your clothes look like, and everybody else's. What houses, lampposts, money, toilet bowls looks like. What a "car" is. What a "Ph.D." means. Millions of details are already there, you don't have to change "it all" in your dream -- only something minor like your own position within this timeline.

 

Not so easy with switching timelines. Things you don't remember outnumber things you do by orders of magnitude. Luckily, once you remember something, it's like a bead on a string -- you pull and the whole necklace of related, connected "beads" can be dragged out, and then you notice where it is tied to another one... you can disentangle a whole timeline like this. The "bead" is an emotionally significant or a very vividly remembered (due to repetitive use, e.g.) little detail. One such repetitive detail is the shoes you wear in a particular timeline. I like to start exploring other timelines by looking down at my feet (with my mind's eye, not with my physical eyes) to see what I'm wearing there. The routine is, as you go to sleep in "this" timeline, you visualize waking up in "another" one, and when you wake up, you put your shoes on, or go barefoot as the case may be. (I can't gain access yet to timelines that have no shoes.) When you are putting your shoes on, use your hands (in your mind, that is), and keep looking at your hands and feet and the shoes might materialize. If they materialize, put them on and go... where?.. Keep watching your feet, see where they are going... take it from there.

 

 

"Your access to different timelines is determined by their emotional rather than spacial or temporal proximity. I.e. if you feel you "belong here" and all you want to do is tweak with your position "here," you can learn to lucid-dream in this timeline. But if you feel you "belong elsewhere," you will need to work out the details of this "elsewhere" first. "

 

Interesting. I keep wondering if the interweb might be interfering with my ability to switch over to a world without a certain number of undesirables in it (including mercury in fish and fiat currencies that leave millions up the creek without a paddle). Although it also seems that it's one of the principal channels through which I'm gaining a sense of hope that all is not entirely lost and that big and beneficial changes are on their way in many areas.

[Sloppy Zhang]

So Taomeow, if we take something as described in these videos to be true:

 

 

 

You're trying to get into different dimensions through dreams?

 

And since the dimensions you are trying to get into are so radically removed from our dimension, and may have different laws concerning everything from basic particle physics to toilet operations, you have to relearn everything? Which would then make recalling details from these dreams harder, because you don't have any reference point in this dimension that you are "waking up to" in the morning?

 

Do I have all that right? Because if so, sounds awesome

[suninmyeyes]

Hi Suninmyeyes,

 

no, different time zones (nice term!) in the past, future, etc. are part of any one timeline, but what I'm talking about is different timelines that exist simultaneously. "Line" is not the best term but it's more or less accepted, so I use it. In actuality, time is like a river that is not only a far cry from a straight "line" but a river with many tributaries, and all the tributaries exist simultaneously.

 

Unlike on a spacial river extrapolated from its temporal aspect, however (which is what a "river" is to a 3D spacial creature), in the river of time you can be present at all of them simultaneously. Picture yourself swimming in one of them on a hot summer day while you're fishing in another one in early spring and skating on yet another one which happens to be frozen solid because it's winter, and drowning in yet another (that's the end of you in this one tributary but it does not faze the total you anymore than a loss of a hair does the 3D you of this one timeline) and so on. All the "you" out there are parts, cells, units, pearls, petals -- of the single multidimentional multispacial multitemporal flower of the whole you. Each petal has a life of its own but not really. Each pearl IS the necklace but also isn't. The whole matters to the part but not really. The parts matter to the whole but not really. Hard to explain but not really... ...

 

...that's reality as it has revealed itself to me to date. If at some point it hits me with another "not really," I'll simply switch to a timeline where everything is real -- or where nothing is real --

 

...that's infinity, there's infinite ways to play with it. But some are much more fun than others. In fact, there's an infinite number of ways to play with it that aren't much fun. I am trying to learn to choose my games wisely...

OK this is very interesting and I think I am starting to understand what you mean.Exploring the infinite possibilities of our own multidimensionality.This has occured to me more during long sittings in meditations ,but with a slightly different flavour.

 

'Each petal has a life of its own but not really. Each pearl IS the necklace but also isn't. The whole matters to the part but not really. The parts matter to the whole but not really. Hard to explain but not really... ...'

 

This is nice ,it is also too large and too invisable to fit into words properly though,but not really.

[suninmyeyes]

Erasing? Or?

 

 

 

Or pulling out a dream of being attacked, noticing the malevolent presence still there, and then opening to it and it revealing something beneficial. I don't know that I can recommend it, but it has happened in my experience. I think it was partly conditioned by a recognition of lack of ultimate reality in the malevolent appearance. The appearance wasn't fixed in my mind.

Hi Todd,

Yes erasing haha.My English sucks sometimes.

 

I have done pulling out of the dreams many times .I think it is reccomandable if a person gets scared .

[Taomeow]

Thanks for the videos, Sloppy!

 

You're trying to get into different dimensions through dreams?

 

Not different dimensions, different timelines. (I've glimpsed different dimensions too, but that's a different story.) Timelines and dimensions are not the same. I use dreamwork to access a 3D process which involves multiple timelines without any of them changing dimensionality except on occasion and for a purpose (e.g., a surgery that can't be done in 3D can be done in 4D -- whether physical or an "exorcism" that actually is necessary every single time when a different-dimensionality entity has trespassed and squatted in a 3D being -- but under normal conditions, no 3D creature is comfortable with 4D intruders or in 4D environments, and higher than that -- or lower than that for that matter -- is absolutely unlivable for a human being, I know this for a fact.)

 

3D+time=a 3D process, not a 4D space. Time is not a dimension "like the rest." Time is part of all dimensions, because all dimensions are processes, not "objects."

 

And since the dimensions you are trying to get into are so radically removed from our dimension, and may have different laws concerning everything from basic particle physics to toilet operations, you have to relearn everything? Which would then make recalling details from these dreams harder, because you don't have any reference point in this dimension that you are "waking up to" in the morning?

 

Do I have all that right? Because if so, sounds awesome

 

Yup, you got the interdimensional travel right, but that's not what I do unless forced to (I was forced to on a couple of occasions... I can't handle it. I get dimensionsick much like one gets seasick. Only worse. I might get used to it with practice, the way someone might get over seasickness with practice, but I don't practice this. Maybe someday... if I have to. I'd rather not.) Switching to different timelines is possible without switching to a different dimensionality. I was basically shown how in a dream I had when I was 4. It is indeed awesome but very scary. I'll give you an example of some ordinary everyday activity to illustrate just how scary it is.

 

Imagine you need to get to the supermarket to buy some groceries. It's a ten minute walk, and you are debating with yourself whether you should take a walk or drive there. In our everyday functioning, we create such bifurcations in space-time every time we make a decision, and once the choice is made and the road is taken -- whichever road -- the other option goes extinct, does not cross over to the domain of the manifest and reverts forever to the unmanifest (in taoist terms, does not enter Houtian and reverts to Xiantian). It never happens. It never manifests simply because you made something else happen and manifest.

 

Say, you decide you'll walk, and walk. The whole sequence of events that would have, could have, should have resulted from your driving immediately goes extinct -- the timeline where you took the car to the supermarket goes extinct. You proceed on the timeline you've chosen, the one where you walk. What happened on that timeline that never happened? Maybe nothing to make it much different from the one that did happen -- you arrived three minutes sooner, nothing changed. Or maybe something happened there to change everything -- e.g., a fatal car accident, or alternatively, in the space of those three minutes you met your future wife who was just leaving the supermarket and dropped something and you picked it up and it resulted in children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren -- a timeline of posterity sprouting from that 3-minute window of opportunity. But since you didn't take the car, these and all other infinite versions of different timelines never happened and you can never know the "what if" of any of them.

 

Now then. In reality, this is not the case. In reality, you are something or somebody who can manifest any such timeline at any time in any place, always and forever for all infinity. You are someone who decides to pull a timeline outta Xiantian. If you know how that is.

 

If you do it even once, this changes everything, this changes how you relate to the world you're in -- in particular, this basically renders its timeline which is supposed to be irreversible quite extinct.

 

And that's very

very

very

scary.

[Sloppy Zhang]

Thanks for the videos, Sloppy!

 

 

 

Not different dimensions, different timelines. (I've glimpsed different dimensions too, but that's a different story.) Timelines and dimensions are not the same. I use dreamwork to access a 3D process which involves multiple timelines without any of them changing dimensionality except on occasion and for a purpose (e.g., a surgery that can't be done in 3D can be done in 4D -- whether physical or an "exorcism" that actually is necessary every single time when a different-dimensionality entity has trespassed and squatted in a 3D being -- but under normal conditions, no 3D creature is comfortable with 4D intruders or in 4D environments, and higher than that -- or lower than that for that matter -- is absolutely unlivable for a human being, I know this for a fact.)

 

3D+time=a 3D process, not a 4D space. Time is not a dimension "like the rest." Time is part of all dimensions, because all dimensions are processes, not "objects."

 

 

 

Yup, you got the interdimensional travel right, but that's not what I do unless forced to (I was forced to on a couple of occasions... I can't handle it. I get dimensionsick much like one gets seasick. Only worse. I might get used to it with practice, the way someone might get over seasickness with practice, but I don't practice this. Maybe someday... if I have to. I'd rather not.) Switching to different timelines is possible without switching to a different dimensionality. I was basically shown how in a dream I had when I was 4. It is indeed awesome but very scary. I'll give you an example of some ordinary everyday activity to illustrate just how scary it is.

 

Imagine you need to get to the supermarket to buy some groceries. It's a ten minute walk, and you are debating with yourself whether you should take a walk or drive there. In our everyday functioning, we create such bifurcations in space-time every time we make a decision, and once the choice is made and the road is taken -- whichever road -- the other option goes extinct, does not cross over to the domain of the manifest and reverts forever to the unmanifest (in taoist terms, does not enter Houtian and reverts to Xiantian). It never happens. It never manifests simply because you made something else happen and manifest.

 

Say, you decide you'll walk, and walk. The whole sequence of events that would have, could have, should have resulted from your driving immediately goes extinct -- the timeline where you took the car to the supermarket goes extinct. You proceed on the timeline you've chosen, the one where you walk. What happened on that timeline that never happened? Maybe nothing to make it much different from the one that did happen -- you arrived three minutes sooner, nothing changed. Or maybe something happened there to change everything -- e.g., a fatal car accident, or alternatively, in the space of those three minutes you met your future wife who was just leaving the supermarket and dropped something and you picked it up and it resulted in children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren -- a timeline of posterity sprouting from that 3-minute window of opportunity. But since you didn't take the car, these and all other infinite versions of different timelines never happened and you can never know the "what if" of any of them.

 

Now then. In reality, this is not the case. In reality, you are something or somebody who can manifest any such timeline at any time in any place, always and forever for all infinity. You are someone who decides to pull a timeline outta Xiantian. If you know how that is.

 

If you do it even once, this changes everything, this changes how you relate to the world you're in -- in particular, this basically renders its timeline which is supposed to be irreversible quite extinct.

 

And that's very

very

very

scary.

 

Damn.

[Taomeow]

Damn.

 

Nothing if not succinct.

 

[Sloppy Zhang]

Nothing if not succinct.

 

Why add extra words to something that was already laid out perfectly?

 

My interest has always been, first and foremost, on imminently practical things. I find the subjects of other universes, philosophy, morals, religion, thought experiments, and the like to be incredibly fascinating. But I'm finishing up my last year at university (provided I'm not suddenly stirred to continue my education), facing a royally screwed up economy, and pickings are slim enough as it is thanks to my poor life choices regarding a field of education (something I like, rather than something that the market demands).

 

So things like this:

 

Now then. In reality, this is not the case. In reality, you are something or somebody who can manifest any such timeline at any time in any place, always and forever for all infinity. You are someone who decides to pull a timeline outta Xiantian. If you know how that is.

 

Sounds incredibly enticing to someone in my position! Imagine if I could pull out the knowledge of an alternate "me", the "me" who is a master of medicine, or computers, or chemistry, and manifest it in the timeline that I am in now? Well then I could make it rich fast, get my affairs in order to ensure that I won't be disturbed, and then retire to my hermit lifestyle (with round the clock access to TTB's, of course ) to ponder life and other universes without a care in the world.

 

Unfortunately, I do not presently possess the knowledge of how to do that. Imagine if I could bring in the knowledge from an alternate timeline "me" who DID know If you know, Taomeow, please let me know, I'd love to hear it!

 

If you do it even once, this changes everything, this changes how you relate to the world you're in -- in particular, this basically renders its timeline which is supposed to be irreversible quite extinct.

 

And that's very

very

very

scary.

 

I'm up for scary and rabbit hole trips. Maybe I don't know what I'm asking for. Maybe I'm lulled into a false sense of security, and that I know not what I wish for out of "boredom" with the "present".

 

I like to think that my capacity to handle scary things has gone up. I've had a few scary experiences here and there. Maybe as they increase in scariness I am training myself for the "big one", the finale rabbit hole plunge. Maybe nothing will happen until I go through a few more requisite scary experiences. As of now in this timeline, I dunno

Edited August 4, 2011 by Sloppy Zhang

[Birch]

How to pull timelines out of Xiantian?

How about getting rid of the conditions under due course in Houtian?

Then a new timeline practically has to come into effect because you rid yourself of the other one.

I'm just thinking about it - I don't actually know how to do it. Although I suppose I've done it at least twice:-)

 

Mr Slopps, I'm quite convinced that if your interests are as wide-ranging as you say then it really won't matter much about your education not "fitting" the market. I don't think most people's does. I don't think it was supposed to be a market-entry plan.

[Small Fur]

Cat Pillar,

 

Dreaming is a form of reality and a type of experience. Reality and experiences take on many dimensions and can be explored at many levels. Rather than worrying about a theory as to whether the reality within dreaming can affect the experience of waking, just ask yourself what it has meant in your own life.

 

If your experiences in dreams have disturbed you than that's the important information you need to know to begin to heal yourself.

 

Just as dreams have the power to be painful, they can also have the power to be healing. Just as your waking life is affected by dream, so can you affect your dream life through the waking life.

 

The veil between what we call each of these states is as thin and permeable as the blink of an eye.

Edited August 4, 2011 by Small Fur

[Cat Pillar]

Thanks for the replies, everyone! Interesting discussion about timelines there (thanks for the book recommendation Taomeow, I'll try to get my hands on a copy soon.)

 

I've had a lot of dreams that were terrifying, that I would label "nightmares," but taken outside of the emotional context of the experience they seemed to lack anything worth being terrified about.

 

I don't have nightmares much anymore...the last one I had was many months ago. I don't remember much about it, I just remember waking up screaming.

 

I have this feeling that some of my fears and triggers are related to dream experiences. It seems like understanding the connection(s) could be useful and informative.

[Everything]

I sometimes wonder if the intensity of my dreams when I was a child had a significant impact on my psychological development growing up.

I believe this is possible aswel. It certainly must be!

 

In lucid dreaming, people sometimes develop positive trauma's, or faith, by doing things in their dreams they do not dare in real life.

 

Singing in front of a crowd of people is an example of forming a positive trauma in a lucid dream. After that kind of lucid dream, you are less fearful of singing in front of crowds if you've already overcome that fear in your dreams, even if you would have forgotten such a dream. So if the "positive trauma's" are possible, surely the negative ones must be there aswell.

 

As for regular dreams? Forgetting the event itself that formed the trauma can be even more potent, wether its positive or negative. It leaves no knowledge of the trauma. Only the impulsive instinct, the invisible scar, in your psychology.

 

In the end, you will see that there is no single reality, but that it changes every moment. So you begin developing trauma's on the fly, you find faith in the void, you start to do impossible things and become a new person every single second. Improving, addapting... Thats lucid dreaming.

 

All dreams are highly unstable and unpredictable. They are merely stress tests, like a sort of meter of your performance and challenges of your believes. Some crazy thing you fear deep within starts to jump out of nowhere, you decide to give a cup of coffee and talk with it, then the coffee begins to melt and you freak out! Now, you failed the test, because you were not flexible and aware enough to notice your fear of the hotness of the coffee.

 

In my dreams I often deal with fears this way, perhaps I have more fears then usual, but love them.

Without fear, courage would have no meaning.

Edited August 4, 2011 by Everything

[Everything]

I have this feeling that some of my fears and triggers are related to dream experiences. It seems like understanding the connection(s) could be useful and informative.

Well, usually they relate as organizing your core believes and realities in more solid ways.

 

A nightmare would simply relate to the fear in a way that it makes the fear stronger and gives it a ground to stand upon, to grow and relate to your reality, so that it may grow in waking life aswell. Either that, or the dream completely takes away the fear. But usually the dreams are not the source of fears and triggers. It is usually a trauma formed in early childhood or some other traumatic event of which the memory is supressed. You can always identify the concept that is feared trough dreams and decide wether or not to alter its emotional effect on you.

 

But yes, dreams do strongly relate to fears and instincts. In our dreams, we find our natural, primitive self. We witness our fear in its true form. Everything in our dreams is, in fact, us... The "fear" was put there by you. You connected the emotion to the idea during its birth, you are its mother. You run away in your dreams from this "fear" and it will always be there, because you cannot avoid that which is inside of you. You start to approach your "fear", in a lucid dream, and you can change your emotional relation to this idea, concept or thing you "fear". But it will not be easy. The moment you face your fear, all the concepts that this anxious emotion accumulated over your lifetime will start to pop in your dream and you'll have to face it all. It can be overwhelming at first, but with practice anything is possible.

 

For example, you begin the dream approaching one spider, trying to hold it in your hands. Suddenly a whole nest of baby spiders pops up and starts frenzy on you. You remain faithful and continue your couragious act by defending yourself from the spiders with fire. Suddenly spiders crawl under your clothes and start to walk around in your mouth... Now in such a situation you either start to chew the spiders and drink some whine along with it, which would certainly deal with the fear once and for all, or you could completely panic, freak out, wake up and scream and jump out of the bed with spidy sensations all over your body.

Edited August 4, 2011 by Everything

[Cat Pillar]

I don't have the hang of lucid dreaming yet, so it's a bit difficult to implement techniques based around it. But that does sound like something worth trying once I DO get the hang of it.

 

Hopefully I'll start getting somewhere once I'm out of my current apartment. That place is everything a cultivation environment shouldn't be.