General Discussion Thread

[Fenris]

I tend to have rather unpleasant dreams, although I wouldn't call them nightmares. Fighting something or being chased is common. One dream I had a few weeks back that stayed with me was being chased around some... hotel, I think. Like, a hotel in a mountain, old-fashioned, with long corridors. I was chased by some... zombie, I suppose, a big rotting man. Then I found an axe, managed to chop off its arms then threw it out a window. It took a while too, felt like hours, as I tend to have rather long dreams. Many times, I don't dream I'm myself, and I also have dreams entirely in third person which feels like watching a movie. Sometimes, I have lucid dreams where I realize I am in a dream, but I still can't really control it but I know that whatever I think will happen, will happen. Sadly, my pessimism causes those dreams to quickly turn into lucid nightmares.

Have anyone else had semi-lucid dreams, where you realize you are dreaming, but then everything starts turning out as you expect/fear they will, outside of conscious control?

[noako]

I have many kind of dreams but rarely nightmares - I cannot remember the last time I had a nightmare.

I often have apocalyptic dreams but they usually feel more like epic action movies, in which I never die. I think one even took place in SSSS's setting.

The best dream, also the only lucid dream, I had some years ago.
I was in a coffee/bakery shop, looking all the delicious desserts on there.

"Oh, they all look so good," I whined at myself. "But I should watch what I eat, I'm already overweight.."
Then I pondered for a while. "But this is a dream! It doesn't matter what I do!"

Then I proceeded to stick my hand through the display glass and picking one of the desserts from there. It was some sort of mocha muffin if I remember correctly. I laughed when I woke up.

[Eich]

I wish I could have lucid dreams... hey, I know my next wish in the game!

It depends. Perhaps the best example is when I dreamt I was Robin Hood with two weird sidekicks (who got kidnapped and possibly tortured and/or killed) and I had to steal a giant golden toilet (maybe I really needed to go to the bathroom?). All the sneaking in and seeing my friends get taken away was in first person, then when I reach the golden toilet and escape through it (without even taking it...) it was in 3rd person.

Your post just epiphany'd me into remembering I sometimes switch perspectives as well... 
Freaky.

I dream almost exclusively in first person, but almost never as myself.

Also, aaaargh, I'm so jealous of you! I've always wanted to have a lucid dream. The closest I've gotten is dreaming that I realized it was a dream, only I didn't really realize it, because if I had I would have realized I'm not actually supposed to be an indian in the middle of the american civil war. And male. I'm surprisingly often male in my dreams. I'm practically only female when I'm myself. Or maybe I only realize I wasn't myself in  dream when I was male. Or something. Dreams are weird.

I haven't had a lucid dream in a while.  I often realize I'm dreaming but, in the last year or so, it hasn't kicked me into being lucid at all.  I think it's because I haven't been actively trying to remember my dreams.  In the last couple of weeks, though, I've been recounting my dreams to myself when I wake up, so hopefully I can start lucid dreaming again in a few months.  Also, yeah, dreaming as the opposite sex is weird.  Doesn't happen to me often, but it's interesting being... short.  The change in height and the smaller hands are always the biggest deal for me, weirdly enough.

[ThisCat]

... Also, yeah, dreaming as the opposite sex is weird.  Doesn't happen to me often, but it's interesting being... short.  The change in height and the smaller hands are always the biggest deal for me, weirdly enough.

It's not a big deal for me. It's just something that happens. It's like, I'm another person a lot, and sometimes that person is male. If I actually start focusing on my own body in a dream, things get weird. Like that time my arms turned into chocolate and I ate them, or that time my face slowly melted/disintegrated. Not nightmares though, just really disturbing. My nightmares usually consists of me walking somewhere I've walked hundreds of times before and then suddenly getting lost. Like walking home from school and finding myself lost in the storeroom of IKEA, or walking to the store and getting lost somewhere in London.

[Eich]

It's not a big deal for me. It's just something that happens. It's like, I'm another person a lot, and sometimes that person is male. If I actually start focusing on my own body in a dream, things get weird. Like that time my arms turned into chocolate and I ate them, or that time my face slowly melted/disintegrated. Not nightmares though, just really disturbing. My nightmares usually consists of me walking somewhere I've walked hundreds of times before and then suddenly getting lost. Like walking home from school and finding myself lost in the storeroom of IKEA, or walking to the store and getting lost somewhere in London.

I think I'm very aware of who I am in dreams because I dream in 3rd person so much, so it's kind of a shock to be someone else, unless it's someone awesome like batman or something.
My nightmares are usually about my teeth falling out and people hurting my family and me.  That said, one of my favorite ever dreams was one where my family were pirates, and we had to save my mom and my sister from the bad pirates.  It was very bright and colorful, kind of like One Piece, actually...  Not sure if my teeth ever fell out, but if they did, it was because of scurvy, not nightmares.

[ThisCat]

I think I'm very aware of who I am in dreams because I dream in 3rd person so much, so it's kind of a shock to be someone else, unless it's someone awesome like batman or something.
My nightmares are usually about my teeth falling out and people hurting my family and me.  That said, one of my favorite ever dreams was one where my family were pirates, and we had to save my mom and my sister from the bad pirates.  It was very bright and colorful, kind of like One Piece, actually...  Not sure if my teeth ever fell out, but if they did, it was because of scurvy, not nightmares.

I would love to dream of One Piece. Usually my dreams are just a big mix of settings and characters and my own imagination until everything is thoroughly unrecognizeable.

[Eich]

I would love to dream of One Piece. Usually my dreams are just a big mix of settings and characters and my own imagination until everything is thoroughly unrecognizeable.

Mine are very thematic.  A dream will usually focus on one setting and one series of events.  With the foxes, it was mostly on a farm, and the whole dream was about taking care of them for a little while.

Fenris:  Have you tried training yourself to lucid dream?  It takes a few months, but since I did it a few years ago, I remember my dreams more vividly and almost every morning, and I rarely have bad ones anymore.

[Nimphy]

I dream almost exclusively in first person, but almost never as myself.
I would have realized I'm not actually supposed to be an indian in the middle of the american civil war. And male. I'm surprisingly often male in my dreams. I'm practically only female when I'm myself. Or maybe I only realize I wasn't myself in  dream when I was male. Or something. Dreams are weird.

You mean you were Connor Kenway? XD

Have anyone else had semi-lucid dreams, where you realize you are dreaming, but then everything starts turning out as you expect/fear they will, outside of conscious control?

I do. It's usually shortly before waking up. I sometimes realize I have a dream, but I still can't control it.

Fenris:  Have you tried training yourself to lucid dream?  It takes a few months, but since I did it a few years ago, I remember my dreams more vividly and almost every morning, and I rarely have bad ones anymore.

 

How do you even train yourself to dreaming? You're sleeping!!

[Miss Honeyham]

Have anyone else had semi-lucid dreams, where you realize you are dreaming, but then everything starts turning out as you expect/fear they will, outside of conscious control?

I have lots and lots of lucid dreams. Often I'm perfectly aware that I'm sleeping and nothing is real. While this makes my dreams less scary, it makes them a heck of a lot more annoying.

I would say about 50% of my dreams have something to do with alligators. 50% of my dreams have something to do with my sister doing something crazy and me having to rescue her (and these two things often overlap into a big alligator-y, sister-y dream). And then there's this dream where I'm locked in WalMart and velociraptors keep jumping out of the clothing racks and eating other people.

Practically all my dreams are recurring, and have been recurring for years and years now. And I'm usually a very young child in them.

[Sue D Nym]

I had a really freaky dream once. I was walking through some dark citadel, an endless maze of black metal hallways. Then I came to an antechamber with someone standing in the center of the room. I moved around the figure to see what it looked like from the front. It was wearing long torn black robes and had its hood pulled up. It had a face like a horse's skull. I was thinking how strange it looked, when it turned....and looked right at me. I knew it could see me and suddenly I was awake. I spent the next ten minutes being totally freaked out. I felt like somehow it was lurking in the shadows watching me.

[Fimbulvarg]

I'm not usually into the whole "share a dream" ordeal, but there is this one thing:

Back in the mid 90s during the daily children's hour on TV they used to show a Finnish cartoon called "Moomins" based on the children's book series by Tove Jansson. This series was usually a cozy, fun series about some peaceful creatures living their daily lives. But one episode things became pure nightmare fuel for little kids with the introduction of a new character called Mörkö in Finnish, Mårran in Swedish and Hufsa in Norwegian.

Even as a now (mostly) grown person I wake up every now and then feeling that piercing glare.

[StellersJayC]

I had a really freaky dream once. I was walking through some dark citadel, an endless maze of black metal hallways. Then I came to an antechamber with someone standing in the center of the room. I moved around the figure to see what it looked like from the front. It was wearing long torn black robes and had its hood pulled up. It had a face like a horse's skull. I was thinking how strange it looked, when it turned....and looked right at me. I knew it could see me and suddenly I was awake. I spent the next ten minutes being totally freaked out. I felt like somehow it was lurking in the shadows watching me.

I would say I've only ever had two nightmares. The first happened when I was seven-ish. I was driving my mom's van and my siblings were fighting in the back seat. The other, which is semi-recurring, is about being late for school.

Do y'all dream in first person or third person?  I only dream in third.

You know, I've never really thought about that. I would say I tend to start my dreams in first person - but I will switch between different characters - and they turn into third person. I would say in dreams I am female 75% of the time and male the other 25%.

Once, I dreamt I got tired of earth, so I built a huge rocket and ran off (also I was an old man and a mad scientist for some reason). We landed on a planet much like our own, but with all the colours switched around, and we met a girl with a large circle on her stomach. We tried to communicate by music, since that's appearantly an universal language, but it turns out she was allergic to music, so she nded up writhing on the floor in pain, and the circle turned blue, so we just walked away.

Then we met a big, yellow crocodile who looked like he was drawn by a six-year-old. He was sitting under a huge, rocky overhand and playing chess. Exept the pieces were black and red, the board didn't look right and none of the moves he made made sense. We asked him what the meaning of the game was an he just looked at us with a puzzled expression and said "meaning?" as if the word itself didn't mean anything to him. And then some other stuff happened.

My dreams tend to take the shape of really nonsensical but epic adventures.

This is what happens to me! It makes perfect sense mid-dream, but the logic is gone when you wake up. Like, I'll instinctively know that I have to walk only on leaves on my way down the street to avoid being noticed and when I wake up I'll wonder how I knew that.

[Nimphy]

I would say I've only ever had two nightmares. The first happened when I was seven-ish. I was driving my mom's van and my siblings were fighting in the back seat. The other, which is semi-recurring, is about being late for school.

Those aren't nightmares. I dream that some crazy assassin has locked me and my family, that our house is on fire, that there's gas everywhere and everything explodes.

[ThisCat]

Those aren't nightmares. I dream that some crazy assassin has locked me and my family, that our house is on fire, that there's gas everywhere and everything explodes.

Anightmare doesn't need to be something scary when you talk about it. The only thing is it needs to give you a sense of dread while you're having it. Like that time I ended up dreaming about poisonous blueberries. Completely ridiculous, but terrifying while it happened.

[Nimphy]

Anightmare doesn't need to be something scary when you talk about it. The only thing is it needs to give you a sense of dread while you're having it. Like that time I ended up dreaming about poisonous blueberries. Completely ridiculous, but terrifying while it happened.

Yes, but... fighting siblings? To me is too normal to be a nightmare XD