Exploring the Bizarre: Unraveling the Mysteries of Our Dreams

[wolram]

Totaly un connected from your every day life, i had the most strange one ever last night, and i can not imagine where my mind draged it up from.
Do you ever have odd dreams?

 

[Cyrus]

Is it normal not to have many dreams? I hardly EVER have dreams. Only once in a blue moon. The only dream I can remember being odd is being a kid and finding a big train set in a box. Another time I had a ferrari, and I drove to my friends house and we went driving around in it. But that's it as far as I can remember.

 

[Lisa!]

In the past yes!

 

[Jelfish]

YES. The other night I dreamt I was driving down a street at night. I made a right turn and everything got really dark (no more street lamps) and for some reason, I didn't have my headlights on. So I reach over to turn them on and they don't work and I start to panic because I can't see anything. Then I hear this really weird alien-movie sound and all of a sudden, I lose control of my body and just topple over onto the steering wheel. Then I pass out and later wake up (inside my dream) in a bedroom at night. I hear the sound of a snowy television channel, but the tv across the room isn't on. I notice a faintly flickering glow from a standing lamp with a shade, as though there were a tv monitor inside it. I get up to shut off the lamp and it roars at me. And then I woke up.

 

[Moonbear]

It's possible to not dream, but more commonly, you just don't remember the dreams when you wake up.

As for weird dreams, yeah, usually when I can remember my dreams, they turn out to be pretty weird.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

Like Moonie it's usually only the weird dreams that I remember.

I had one once where I was a detective on another planet investigating a mass murder.

I had one where I was a POW in a futuristic war where they used some sort of transporter to remove healthy organs from POWs and put them into their wounded soldiers.

There was one where there was this rabbi running away from crusaders in a very weird sort of scene that was a cross between Mel Brooks and Monty Python.

I was in an old school theatre troupe and had the lead actress hitting on me.

ect ect...

 

[Math Is Hard]

Sometimes I dream and sometimes I do my "astral wandering". *yawn* Think I'll go do some of that now. Do not be frightened if you see me, Woolie.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I once dreamt that I could time-travel by drinking anti-freeze. When I woke up I could actually taste it.

I spent years getting attacked by a big wicker chair at night.

Dreams have allowed me to solve problems that had alluded me thus far. I have dreamt real solutions for a number of issues including motorcycle engine assembly, brain storming concepts, circuit design, math, chemistry, physics, and for personal problems as well.

 

[Lisa!]

Recently I dream of PFand PF'ers. I think that's because I spend so much time here!

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

I have a lot of weird dreams involving spiders and elevators. Any ideas?

 

[rachmaninoff]

I have a lot of weird dreams involving spiders and elevators. Any ideas?

Repressed fears of spiders and close spaces...

 

[Cyrus]

Maybe I don't dream because I average 6-6.5 hours of sleep a day. (about 3.5 hours of sleep after this post until I gota wake up)

 

[zoobyshoe]

Sometimes I dream and sometimes I do my "astral wandering". *yawn* Think I'll go do some of that now. Do not be frightened if you see me, Woolie.

Couple years ago I had a weird dream where I was wandering around kind of staggering and disoriented. It occurred to me I might be dreaming, so I staggered over to these people sitting at an outdoor cafe set up in the middle of a road underneath a bridge, and asked, kind of urgently and drunken sounding: "Is this a dream?"

It was, like, a sixty year old couple, kind of upper middle class/well to do, just sitting there trying to enjoy their coffee, and the way the woman looked at me, it was clear I was a really unwelcome and peculiar interruption. She eyed me with caution and a bit of fear, shook her head, and said "Noooo..." (Meaning: No, it wasn't a dream), so I turned and staggered away, and the scene dissolved to some other.

Course, I woke up seriously wondering if some couple at an outdoor restaurant somewhere hadn't been approached by some drunk appearing zoobie asking stupid quetions.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I have a lot of weird dreams involving spiders and elevators. Any ideas?

Depends specifically on how you feel about them in the dream and how you feel about them in waking life.

 

[Lisa!]

Spiders!
Elevator: promotion.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I have a lot of weird dreams involving spiders and elevators. Any ideas?

Spiders = the web

elevators = PF. All alone at the top.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Depends specifically on how you feel about them in the dream and how you feel about them in waking life.

The spiders are always petrifying, they are ugly and narly things that are around me and usually I find myself unwillingly pulled near them or I find myself under them.

The elevators are always in a tall building I'm going up, sometimes I switch elevators and somehow at the end I find myself at a mass transit area like a highway, subway or airport.

When I wake up they have a powerful, existential and nostalgic feeling to them and I think about them the whole day. Also the dreams usually have a person I know in them like a friend, family member or ex gf. Maybe I need a shrink!

 

[zoobyshoe]

The spiders are always petrifying, they are ugly and narly things that are around me and usually I find myself unwillingly pulled near them or I find myself under them.

What's your reactions to real spiders in real life? In the dreams are they associated with a specific place, or kind of place?

The elevators are always in a tall building I'm going up, sometimes I switch elevators and somehow at the end I find myself at a mass transit area like a highway, subway or airport.

How do you feel about the elevators? Is it some kind of fear, like with the spiders, like it's going to drop? Or is it something else. What are your emotions in the mass transit place? How do you feel when you're in a place like that in real life?

When I wake up they have a powerful, existential and nostalgic feeling to them and I think about them the whole day. Also the dreams usually have a person I know in them like a friend, family member or ex gf. Maybe I need a shrink!

Nope. I've never met anyone who didn't have the same strong, lingering kind of reaction to dreams now and then.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

What's your reactions to real spiders in real life? In the dreams are they associated with a specific place, or kind of place?

I usually am interested in insects and spiders, however I don't necessarily like them or like having them near me. The places are always indoors in like a room or basement.

How do you feel about the elevators? Is it some kind of fear, like with the spiders, like it's going to drop? Or is it something else. What are your emotions in the mass transit place? How do you feel when you're in a place like that in real life?

Elevators are fine with me, no problem, I live on the 11th floor of an apt. In the dream I'm not scared either. Also no problem with mass transit, I live downtown in a large city.

They must be some complex metaphorical symbols.

 

[Lisa!]

Also the dreams usually have a person I know in them like a friend, family member or ex gf. Maybe I need a shrink!

Are they with you from the bigining to the end?

P.S. Not surprising if you have these starnge dreams every night since you think of them the whole day!

 

[wolram]

Sometimes I dream and sometimes I do my "astral wandering". *yawn* Think I'll go do some of that now. Do not be frightened if you see me, Woolie.

It was probably you in my dream last night, but no, you would not wear thoses clothes, would you ?

 

[Mk]

No, moonbear is smart enough not to wear skimpy biohazard/radiation suits.

 

[wolram]

I am glad other people get strange dreams, even Greg!

 

[Math Is Hard]

It was, like, a sixty year old couple, kind of upper middle class/well to do, just sitting there trying to enjoy their coffee, and the way the woman looked at me, it was clear I was a really unwelcome and peculiar interruption. She eyed me with caution and a bit of fear, shook her head, and said "Noooo..." (Meaning: No, it wasn't a dream), so I turned and staggered away, and the scene dissolved to some other.

Course, I woke up seriously wondering if some couple at an outdoor restaurant somewhere hadn't been approached by some drunk appearing zoobie asking stupid quetions.

How did she say, "Noooo..."? What was the tone of her voice? Was it fearful? That is a very peculiar dream.

No, moonbear is smart enough not to wear skimpy biohazard/radiation suits.

MIH<>Moonbear
We are similar but not interchangeable.

It was probably you in my dream last night, but no, you would not wear thoses clothes, would you ?

That was me in the sheep suit with the lacy garter belt.

 

[arildno]

The strangest, and scariest dream I've had was a recurring nightmare I had when I was about 11-12:

The garden outside my parents' house had turned into a mud plain, and of course, I sank down in it.
On my way down, disembodied faces of people in pain or just with blank stares floated past me.
After some time, I reached the bottom, and found myself in a dark corridor, sparsely lit by torches along the wall. Dead, lonely faces floated past me here as well.
With a sense of inevitability, I glided or walked along the corridor until I reached a door on my left-hand side where there was a plaque saying "Office".
I knew I had to go in.
The door opened into a large room, dominated by a mahogany desk (on the left side of the room, upon which a large brass-bound book lay, and behind the desk was some plush chair.
As I entered the room, the chair swivelled around, and I faced its occupant:
A grinning skeleton wearing a top hat on his skull.

Then I woke up sweaty and scared..

 

[hypnagogue]

Mind Hacks recently posted an interesting Sylvia Plath excerpt about dreams:

http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2006/02/johnny_panic_and_the.html

 

[zoobyshoe]

I usually am interested in insects and spiders, however I don't necessarily like them or like having them near me. The places are always indoors in like a room or basement.

If they don't bother you that much in real life, then one train of analysis to follow is to see if there's a common link to the places where they appear in the dreams. Could these places be somewhere where, in real life, you ever found yourself unwillingly pulled closer to, or underneath, something petrifying, ugly, gnarley.

Here's the sort of thing I mean: a woman goes to a therapist complaining of dreams of being in her aunt's house where the walls are studded with razors and knives which she must avoid or get cut. Thet therapist asks her about her relationship to that aunt, and finds out the aunt is always criticizing and insulting her, making "cutting" remarks. So the therapist says "the razors and knives in the walls obviously symbolize your aunt's 'cutting' remarks that you have to avoid letting get to you whenever you have to stay with her."

Elevators are fine with me, no problem, I live on the 11th floor of an apt. In the dream I'm not scared either. Also no problem with mass transit, I live downtown in a large city.

It's funny because I have a similar dream about riding up in the elevators of a kind of super-skyscraper. At the top is an amazing sort of outdoor mall with shops and reastaurants that is so large I never end up completely exploring it in the dream. In the elevator part, there is some procedure for riding up only so far then getting out and switching to another elevator to get all the way to the top.
It always ends up being a kind of powerful, overwhelming dream that stays with me a long time after I wake up.

I've never really tried to analyze it, but what I'd do if I wanted to is go through the dream and write down every place and incident in real life the dream reminded me of, however loosly. It would turn out there is something that all the entrys on this list have in common, a common mood maybe.

If you don't dream of a specific elevator it means it's a mixture of two or more elevators and buildings, in each of which, in real life, you had a similar emotional experience. Our brains store these together and they come out together in dreams kind of smeared into each other.

I once had a dream in which there was a woman who kept shifting physically into different women, and some times seemed to be a mixture of three different women at once. I wrote down a list of every woman in real life she reminded me of, and pondered it for a while utill I figured out what they all had in common. This was perplexing because they were all very different kinds of people, and different ages. But eventually I figured it out: they were all women to whom I had said something flattering at one point or another in order to seem like a nice person. The dream was "about" behaving insincerely for effect, and all the instances I'd done this had been stored together in my brain, and all came out together in the dream kind of merged into each other as one thing.

 

[zoobyshoe]

How did she say, "Noooo..."? What was the tone of her voice? Was it fearful? That is a very peculiar dream.

Her tone of voice clearly showed she was disturbed, wanted me to go away, but also wanted to give me an honest, straightforward answer, as if she couldn't figure out if I were crazy, on drugs, or maybe had a more "valid" reason for being disoriented, like some kind of illness. There was a quizzical spin to it, as if her next question might be "Are you feeling alright? Should I call an ambulance?"

It was very peculiar, and part of a set of dreams I've collected over the years in which I wonder if I am dreaming and somehow end up determining in the dream that I am fully awake, not dreaming.

 

[wolram]

My dream, there is a large well furnished house, with mother farther
daughter, the house shows signs of neglect, the roof leaks and the floor
boards are rotten, the daughter is wearing a long dress but seems unhappy
with it.
Jump to daughter in a theater watching two friends who appear to be some one else to all other people, some one in the ballcony throws down two diamonds.
Jump, daughter in a timber yard wearing very sexy clothing, along comes
a double decker bus towing a train of busses and cars, in the last car is the two friends, daughter tells them i know what you did.
Jump, Old bi plane towing open topped car full of soldiers, they are climbing
into the sky chased by another old plane which is shooting at them, there
are some words spoken, i remember the pilot telling the soldiers to, shut up,
The plane gets to 22000 feet the wings and tail are jetisoned and the
plane begins to fall, then accelerates upward, the pilot tell his wife, i
will just accelerate for the next two years.

 

[Math Is Hard]

Very bizarre!

I think it's some kind of prophecy, Wol. Why don't you try writing it in quatrains?

 

[wolram]

Very bizarre!

I think it's some kind of prophecy, Wol. Why don't you try writing it in quatrains?

Aw, now you playing with my mind, I have not been on an english train for years yet allone a french one.

 

[zoobyshoe]

I have no idea what it means, but it's a great dream. I enjoy the really surreal ones, and lnes like "I will just accelerate for the next two years." when spoken from a dismembered biplane.

 

[Evo]

That was me in the sheep suit with the lacy garter belt.

Danger's dream woman.

Where *is* our funniest member?

 

[wolram]

I have no idea what it means, but it's a great dream. I enjoy the really surreal ones, and lnes like "I will just accelerate for the next two years." when spoken from a dismembered biplane.

Whacky or what, no ideas at all Zooby?

 

[Gale]

i dream A LOT. and i almost always remember them if i wake up on my own.

i had a really really really weird dream last night. we went shopping, my mum and sister and i. and i bought some red lingere, cause I'm out of bras. then we went home, and i was playing with my brother and dad i guess. and it was some weird game. and like, it was mutilating animals. and first it was a maze, and then there was pieces of dead cow i think. and then some card game and then this machine that was like a wood chipper kinda. and like, i had to put on some suit with a target, and my brother had to shoot at me, but he had to put chickens in it. so like, he's shooting this chicken pieces at me, and at first i was like woah, they're squishy and wet and gross. but then, as he kept going, apparently there was a set number of chickens he had to shoot, i realized that all this squishy stuff around me was parts of once live animals, and if i looked close enough, i could tell what parts. and i started to get really sick, and screamed for it to stop. but it was some game, and we couldn't stop. and i cried and screamed and stared at the chickens, it was so horrible. i don't really remember what happened after that.