So...

We've already talked about how sometimes people are aware that they're dreaming. I figured it occurs in the last few minutes of the sleeping period, when the person starts to wake up. This...theory...of mine comes from the observation that every time I was conscious enough in my dreams, I usually woke up minutes later.

I've also read about dreams where people were lying in their beds, and felt as if there was someone else in the room with them, walking around, hearing noises, but they couldn't move no matter how hard they've tried, as if they were completely paralyzed. It was explained that experiences of the sort maybe the cause of so many alien abduction, or alien visitation stories.

Now, I had a dream recently where I felt paralyzed as such, and felt and heard a presence in my room, moving behind me. But, I was also conscious. And what's more, I remembered, in my dream, about the articles I've read about these experiences, and I even remembered the last time I had such a dream, not too long ago, either. Back then, I didn't know that these paralysis dreams were associated with the alien stories and such. However, in this latest one, I was fully conscious and I wanted to turn around. I remember even screaming in anger and trying to move. I was going super-saiyan there... AAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGGGHHHHH...still couldn't budge an inch.

I wanted to turn around and face whatever my mind had constructed. I wondered what would I see. Would it be some weird-shaped creature, a person, and if so, what that person would have looked like...and why? In retrospect, a stupid question, I think.

I also had a dream after that, where I was on some tour of a...castle, or what. I remember staring down in some river, then my gaze traveling back down closer, and seeing that I was over 10 stories high. And that weird feeling I get when I'm that high up kicked in, in my dream! That's the odd thing. I never had this dizziness occur in my dreams. I was crawling on walls, jumping down from the top of my apartment, flying over parks, web-swinging ...etc. and it never happened. But, at that moment, I actually fell backwards, on my ass, my back to the wall on the opposite side of the walkway, cursing.

So, I think I'm through trying to make sense of dreams, Freud-ing around, or whatever. I don't think dreams can be pinned down and interpreted like that, finding some message, meaning in them.

Is it just my mind trying to organize my memories, defragmenting my drive, or what? Fine by me. It still weird.

CookieJon wrote:

Is it just my mind trying to organize my memories, defragmenting my drive, or what?

It was probably just Jesus rifling through your underwear drawer.

That's what I heard behind me, then!! The cunt!

twistor59 wrote:yeah, sleep paralysis.

Happens to me. Occasionally. I now find myself thinking, "oh no not this fucking shit again, just wake the fuck up body will you...."

Yeah, when I woke up immediately after, my eyes didn't even snap wide open like if I had nightmare. I just lay there, blinked once and went "Oh fuck me! *look at the clock* Back to sleep!"

Animavore wrote:I've had sleep paralysis in a dream, in bad dreams, were I realised I was dreaming and wanted to get out, I could feel my actual body lying in bed while my dream-self was playing out an abstract drama. Pulling myself out of those dreams felt like trying to rip myself out of a bath of jam. Once broken free I would pop awake.
I've never had the pleasure of waking while remaining paralysed. I did once start a thread on Rationalia on how to induce it but it became clear pretty quickly I was receiving old-wives tales (and maybe even piss-takings).

That's the other thing. I don't think it is possible to influence, in any way, what your mind will come up with in your sleep. You can try thinking about one specific thing, your work, a game...etc. and you wouldn't dream about it, not immediately that night, anyway. I've had dreams where I believed I was playing with the latest game from a series. I was anticipate the game, but that's about it. My mind wasn't on it, not before sleep.

keypad5 wrote:

MattHunX wrote:
That's the other thing. I don't think it is possible to influence, in any way, what your mind will come up with in your sleep. You can try thinking about one specific thing, your work, a game...etc. and you wouldn't dream about it, not immediately that night, anyway. I've had dreams where I believed I was playing with the latest game from a series. I was anticipate the game, but that's about it. My mind wasn't on it, not before sleep.

I've managed to have a conscious affect on the direction my dreams go. Because I would know that I was dreaming, I could think to myself, "ah crap, this is a dream... and if the dream wanted to be a right bastard to me then right about now would be the perfect time for a big monster to crash into the room..." and then, as if on cue, a monster would barge into the room and I'd try and run away like some random extra in a horror movie.

But lately I've been entirely absorbed in my dreams and unaware that these crazy dreams are actually dreams. I blame my new antidepressants.

No, that's not what I meant. I meant influencing what you will dream about, before going to bed, or when you're still awake and starting to slip into sleep. You can day-dream about something, or run your mind a bit on something related to your work, hobby or other interests...etc. and your dream will be related to it. But, I don't think it works.

Controlling your dream, when your conscious of being in one, is easy. As I've said, I web-swinged, crawled on walls, acted out that scene from Supernatural, where Death walks on the street. I even had that theme song going in my head and people were dropping like flies around me, on a corridor for some institute I was in. I flew around, super-speed around (that's a bit difficult, doesn't always work), erected telekinetic barrier, smashed a pot a someone's head with telekinesis, created shock waves, sent people flying....etc. I had blast.

The_Metatron wrote:

twistor59 wrote:yeah, sleep paralysis.

Happens to me. Occasionally. I now find myself thinking, "oh no not this fucking shit again, just wake the fuck up body will you...."

Occasionally, I have some sort of dream in which I need to yell, or scream, or whatever. Sometimes, that bleeds over to the real world and I end up making some wierd sounding loud groaning noise that scares the hell out of my wife. Apparently, that paralysis applies to the vocal apparatus, as well.

I think it's funny.

Happened to me, too. My mom told me a was groaning in my sleep, loudly. I remember that in my dream I was actually shouting something. I think I did a KAMEHAMEHA!!

John P. M. wrote:Yeah, I've had it once, possibly twice (I only recall one at the moment). I've written about it here before though, but here's an 'encore'.

I guess I can't call it 'sleep paralysis' in my case, because the strange thing was that I wasn't paralyzed; I "woke up", felt uneasy I think, opened my eyes slowly, and a shadowy figure was sitting on my bed, right next to me (big head, skinny body - your typical alien, but only as a black silhouette). But I reached out to grab it by the shoulder, while I angrily and grumpily thought "What the hell, I don't believe in this shit!", and as my hand reached its shoulder, it disappeared. I then proceeded to turn the light on, got out of bed, opened the door to the livingroom, stepped over to the window and peeked outside. The street outside had turned into a river, with lots of people walking/swimming through it while pushing shopping carts(!). Then I woke up. For real this time. I hope.



I have very weird dreams all the time though, and often remember them, at least for a while after I awake. It's usually kinda fun.

Oh, those flooding dreams are weird. I had one where my town was turned into a lake-district. Nice change of scenery, I thought. I did a fly-over.

The coolest dreams I've were about some planet being close to us, huge in the sky. I was just gawking at it with starry-eyes. Then, I woke up.

orpheus wrote:I also suffer sleep paralysis. Started a thread about it a while ago; maybe it's a good idea for me to link here: http://www.rationalskepticism.org/paran ... 19043.html

Orph!