Do Dreams Have A Meaning? (souls, devil, Earth, married)

[june 7th]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

June wrote:

I thought we were already married!

It was a "trick question" my love!

Signed,

Mrs. June Montana

[coosjoaquin]

Dreams are all about sex sex sex, anything you dream of, no matter how innocent your dream may sound, Freud will find a connection between it and sex. Why my dream of drinking coffee in paris is so raunchy that even I was surprised my subconscious could be such a deviant

[wileynj]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

My dreams rarely make any sense but they've very vivid. I'll be dreaming about different people I've known throughout my life that have never even met each other in real life but they're interacting with each other in my dreams. I don't think it could have any real meaning because it's so jumbled up and the events in the dream don't follow any logical storyline because it's constantly changing. I think our brains must need to dream and it probably does represent something that's happening in our life but it's just not intelligible.

I always have a reoccuring dream that I am sitting on a beach and the beach begins to tilt upwards..steep slope, and a huge wave is headed my way. A pal of mine who believes in reincarnation said it's because we all came from atlantis... I see it more as an anxiety dream... stress related. I haven't had that dream in years so life must be good

[Deb in VA]

Originally Posted by GCSTroop

I watched my dog sleeping today. He was panting very rapidly, moving his legs as if he were running, and he even let out a slight whimper. He does this on occassion. By golly I do believe my dog was dreaming. I don't think it had any special meaning either.

As far as humans go. Nope. No meaning in the sense of some sort of higher power coming to me in a dream. Although I do feel that certain dreams can stick with us for a while. I've had nightmares that actually seemed to put me in a bad mood all day. But as far as some sort of "special meaning" I don't think so.

On the topic of dreams, I know a few people who swear up and down that they can lucid dream. Essentially, it is where you control your dreams while you're sleeping. Somehow the conscious, collective mind exerts influence on the unconscious "dreaming" state. I guess it'd be like your computer monitor controlling the computer? Something like that, I suppose. I'm skeptical of it but I think it'd be pretty cool if you could do it.

Lucid Dreaming -- Dream Views

Our dog will do the same thing....I always wonder if he's dreaming of chasing a rabbit or something.

I've never heard the term "lucid dream" before but I wonder if that's what I'm able to do when I'm having a nightmare. I'll realize that what I'm experiencing is a dream and then I'll force myself to wake up. It always happens right before I'm going to be killed (or whatever scary thing I'm dreaming about). That's the only control I can have though so maybe that isn't considered lucid dreaming. Interesting topic!

[Miss Blue]

Originally Posted by coosjoaquin

Dreams are all about sex sex sex, anything you dream of, no matter how innocent your dream may sound, Freud will find a connection between it and sex. Why my dream of drinking coffee in paris is so raunchy that even I was surprised my subconscious could be such a deviant

Given your age coos, I have to agree with your post I think Freud was a 'dirty ole man', I would have kept my kids and grandkids far away from him

[bigthirsty]

The other night I dreamed that I forgot to shave half of my face... then I went to work with a half shaved face.

and it wasn't even symetrical.. it was like a brush stroke here.. a brush stroke there..

[b. frank]

Originally Posted by Deb in VA

Our dog will do the same thing....I always wonder if he's dreaming of chasing a rabbit or something.

I've never heard the term "lucid dream" before but I wonder if that's what I'm able to do when I'm having a nightmare. I'll realize that what I'm experiencing is a dream and then I'll force myself to wake up. It always happens right before I'm going to be killed (or whatever scary thing I'm dreaming about). That's the only control I can have though so maybe that isn't considered lucid dreaming. Interesting topic!

I think dreams count as lucid only when you remain dreaming, but realize that you are dreaming and actually begin to control the events of the dream.
I used to be very fascinated and I worked at having them - and it did work to a degree. I had already had dreams in which I become aware that I am dreaming. Usually I would wake up right after that - but I found that it is possible to "hold onto" the dream for a little while and actually make stuff happen. Still usually I would wake up very soon after making the dream go lucid -- or maybe I just dreamt all of that.
I also have forced myself to wake up from nightmares but I think that is different from being lucid - maybe trying to force the nightmare to change into something good would be a good exercise for achieving lucid dreams.

[rubyskye]

Originally Posted by MontanaGuy

For centuries people have talked about their dreams and quite often have interpreted a dream in a religious sense. I often have very intense and vivid dreams, sometimes they're the worst kind of nightmare you can imagine and sometimes I see beautiful images and hear music that is being created right out of my subconcious mind. Maybe it's because I'm a musician and I'm always thinking about music but I would give anything to be able to record music that happens spontaneously in countless dreams that I've had. The question I really have about dreams is what purpose do they serve and for those who are religious do you believe that a dream could possibly be some kind of a connection to something spiritual? Of course I'm not religious and don't believe that a dream is anything other than a function of the brain but a dream must still serve some purpose or we wouldn't have them. Religious literature from various sources often describe a dream as a kind of vision or revelation of something that is coming from God or from a spiritual realm while nonreligious sources will talk about various psychological factors that may be taking place in our subconcious and appear in the form of a dream. Do you think that dreams have any real meaning or purpose?

If you're open at all to a Buddhist perspective, you may want to do some reading on Tibetan Dream Yoga.

“May I awaken within this dream and grasp the fact that I am dreaming, so that all dreamlike beings may likewise awaken from the nightmare of illusory suffering and confusion”.

This is part of a practice / approach wherein your intention is to, at night during sleep, become aware that you are in fact dreaming.
When you become aware that you are dreaming you are then able to have volition and make choices within the dream because you're "awake" or "conscious".
People do this in the lucid dreaming practice but the yogic approach takes it much further (and avoids getting hung up the cool aspect of being able to control your dreams) in that it is a practice to assist in or that can lead to enlightenment.
This realization that you are dreaming is applied to the "waking" state so that you may realize that you are also dreaming during day to day life (even though you do not realize it) and "wake up" from the dream and realize the illusory nature of all phenomena .... which is not to say that it (phenomena) doesn't exist in the nihilistic sense.

And this is the way that Tibetan Dream Yoga categorizes the various kinds of dreams that we have:

"Clear light" dreams: spiritual visions, blessings, and energy openings
Lucid dreams, which are characterized by awareness that one is dreaming

Under these three broad divisions, dreams can be divided into a further six categories:

Dreams of events that occurred while we were still awake
Dreams about other people, alive or dead
Forgotten elements emerging from the subconscious
Archetypal content, evocative symbols, and so on
Extrasensory perceptions, profound dreams, and omens
Radiant, luminous, spiritual dreams


And during the day these ideas are contemplated:

- "Contemplating the body as illusory and unreal"
- "Contemplating the mind and mental activities as similarly insubstantial"
- "Regarding the world and all phenomena and experience as dreamlike, insubstantial, impermanent, and unreal"
- "Recognizing the relativity and ungraspable quality such as time, space, knowledge, and awareness"



Anyway, that's just a little bit of info about dream yoga and regardless of whether or not that interests you it's a different way to approach/perceive dreams and dreaming.

I'm not a musician but many years ago (when i was hanging out with a very good musician) i had the most amazing musical dreams for a period of about 3 years.
Some of the music was absolutely otherworldly .... no instruments on this planet could produce such sound.
Some of the dreams were choral ... "heavenly" and angelic and just stunning ... "music of the spheres".
And i remember one dream where i was actually in a very elaborate production studio and was creating or hearing (both?) some unbelievably fascinating, funk/fusion/rock/"root" music. It was incredibly good and i woke up just stunned and with absolutely no way to manifest it.
I know longer put too much energy into "figuring" dreams out.
I do not waste time with analysis as i once did. To me, the most "meaningful" dreams are clear and require no figuring out.
I'm grateful for the beautiful dreams whenever i may have them. The energy/vibe of them can carry me through an entire day and lighten the load of day to day living.
Conversely, when i have disturbing dreams i do my best to accept them and deal with the "negative" effect that they will often have on my entire day.
To understand the nature of mind (which includes the realm of nigh-time dreaming) is quite an endeavor.

[esselcue]

Seems to me that dreams must serve a lot of purposes. All my life I have had several recurring dreams...not the exact dream each time but the same theme: the naked dream, the flying dream, and over the past few years I keep dreaming of a house we lived in 30 years ago and how that house was being demolished or changed and I was trying to stop that from happening.

Three months after my son died he appeared in one of my dreams wearing the clothes he had on at the reception party on his wedding day (white shorts, Hawaiian shirt) and he grinned at me and said "Don't worry Mom, I'm basically okay". That dream was over eight years ago and is still as clear in my mind as if it was last night. It soothed me...made me feel a little better to think my son was "okay". So...do dreams have meaning? Probably so, but I doubt even the wisest psychiatrist on earth could dare to guess what they are.

[MontanaGuy]

Coos wrote:

Dreams are all about sex sex sex

You're confusing that with my daydreams, when I'm wide awake, they're always about sex.