So... ever talk about a dream within a dream?

[Amanda]

I had a dream last night-- basically, my high school French teacher was giving the class a test. (It wasn't even a French test, it was on theory and math stuff). I had the majority of the test completed, but could not for the life of me figure out the rest. The teacher came over, took a look at my test and empathized; she basically told me that what I had done was well enough, she could see that I had put in a lot of effort so she was going to give me the answer sheet to the rest. Everyone else in the class was really p*ssed off about this. I took the answer sheet, but I kept losing it in a bunch of papers-- it seems every time I found it again and would start to apply it to my test, it would slip away and get mixed back up into other papers on my desk. I remember looking at the clock in the classroom, and I did this for about 2 hours between 6 and 8 pm. I could feel the angry stares from my classmates as I did this... finally, I was tired of struggling with this answer sheet and I couldn't figure out the rest of the problems, but decided that since my teacher told me it was good enough and I had put in the effort to do as well as I did, I would just turn it in to her the way it was... and I rationalized in my dream that this would be better anyway because then I wouldn't have cheated and no one would be upset with me.

At the end after turning in my test, an old classmate that was sitting next to me and who was previously angry with me (and in real life is now a preacher) came up to me smiling and laughing, joking about the awful time I was having. I was joking back with him and then mentioned how I had a dream about him and Jenna. (Jenna, also an old classmate of mine, now married in real life to the guy I was talking to in the dream). Which the night before (in real life) I had actually dreamed of him but not Jenna, and we were going to school in our rival's school.

 

[canid]

That's kinda sorta a lucid dream. There are a lot of threads here about it. I think in many cases you're actually doing some travelling in the spirit, & it's really cool to remember.

 

[Amanda]

Hm, interesting. So, you think it's possible that maybe I was chatting it up with him in spirit in dreamland? That's interesting because I saw them last year at my high school reunion, and I was thinking about it the other day, about how I could have been more personable back then- maybe I was trying to reconcile that little tiff I had with myself over not feeling personable enough? And maybe since they aren't a huge part of my life, I decided to do this astrally?

 

[Milfoil]

Agreed, sounds like the start of lucid dreaming.

 

[Amanda]

Thanks Milfoil I'll have to read up some more on what that is exactly.

 

[Amanda]

Okay... not even kidding or making this up; I looked up some stuff and read up on lucid dreaming a little more... this was right after you guys posted- and then last night, while I'm dreaming, I'm analyzing what is happening in the dream. I don't remember anything now because I waited too long and did a bunch of other things before coming here... but literally, right after my dream would throw something at me, a symbolic image or something, it's like I'd freeze-frame it for half a second, and think about what it could be representing in my waking life.

So is this like a common thing? I think I've done it many times before, but never with so much control it seems. Before it would seem like that once I realized I was dreaming, I'd lose control of the dream and wake up. Now, just last night, I'm analyzing it as it happens...? Is that normal... or healthy?

 

[Milfoil]

Lucid dreaming is a good skill to aquire and adepts can effect considerable change on many levels through lucid dreaming.

However, even though it seems very easy to simply be aware that one is in a dream and then purposefully choose to go to meet someone or do something, it rarely happens that way.

There is a good book about this called the Tibetan Lamas of Dream and Sleep. Although you may not follow the Buddhist aspect of it, the exercises it gives are very helpful.

 

[Amanda]

Lucid dreaming is a good skill to aquire and adepts can effect considerable change on many levels through lucid dreaming.

However, even though it seems very easy to simply be aware that one is in a dream and then purposefully choose to go to meet someone or do something, it rarely happens that way.

There is a good book about this called the Tibetan Lamas of Dream and Sleep. Although you may not follow the Buddhist aspect of it, the exercises it gives are very helpful.

Thanks Milfoil! I don't follow much of any one thing, but I think I tend to have some Buddhist tendencies, so it might be even better than first thought. I'll check it out!