Thread: How do I know... I've got questions here!

hi krys
love your enthusiasm, dreams are so facsinating its easy to get so excited about everything about them, you have alot of good questions i think you should start reading some general dream books to help you get started The best person to interpret your dreams is you so if you have started a dj you should write down dream signs common things you dream about or people called DC dream character, or places that you are often in, also what the general feeling of the dream was happy sad scary, this will help you get started understanding what your dreams are trying to tell you.
In general there are alot of different reasons we dream some are more physical and some are more spiritual, for example alot of pregnant women say they have scary nightmares, this is quite common mostly because when you sleep your body is 'fixing' issues with your body and having 1 or 2 kilos lying ontop of your lungs can scare your body so you have a nightmare telling you 'you have problems with your lungs' of course when you wake up you remember 'oh i'm just pregnant' no need to be scared...
Some dreams have stuck in my mind for years, and i told them to someone else they interpreted them, I'm still the same person now that i was 5 years ago so i can still use the general idea of how to solve a new situation ...
I think the main difference between LD and 'normal' dreaming is the fact that you are more aware for example. in a normal dream you dream your outside your mothers house and a big scary dog is outside barking , when you wake up you realize maybe your scared of going to your mothers house (or something) now if you were lucid you could try and figure out why you are scared of your mothers house or what the scary dog is really doing there ... Anyway thats just a few thoughts here are some good books
Lucid Dreaming: Gateway to the Inner Self
stephan la berge etwold
heres a good site about dream interpretations go into dream information section
Your Online Source For Dream Interpretations

Before I offer up some (very) short answers to your questions, I highly recommend that you avoid using dream dictionaries or even other people's opinions (unless they know you very well, or are your trained psychologist) when interpreting your dreams. Yes, there are some archetypes that tend to carry similar meaning from dreamer to dreamer (like water) but ultimately the only person who will ever determine the true meaning of your dream is you.

If you can find it, and if you are really interested in gleaning meaning from your dreams, I suggest you get a copy of Inner Work, by Robert A. Johnson, as it offers an excellent and very simple method for dream interpretation.

That said:

Originally Posted by Kryslove

1. How do I know what my dream is referring to?
For example... Is it:
The day I've had, what happened in it and how I feel.
A situation I have been pondering or rather obsessed about.
A relationship with a person.
The future. Future events.
My emotions.
Myself telling me to feel a curtain way when I am unsure.
- I'm sorry if I'm not explaining myself well here, I hope someone knows what I mean.

Your dream could well be drawing from any of those things, all of them at at once, or none of them at all. Perhaps there really is no need to wonder what your dreaming mind is using to form its dreams; sorting out the end result is enough trouble, right?

In other words: If your dream carries meaning, and you are able to successfully learn that meaning, its source (aka, what your dream is referring to) will be obvious.

2. Is the dream able to be interpreted days or weeks later and still mean something even though you can't remember what you were dealing with in life then?

Sure... but it does work better to deal with the dream right away.

3. Can a dream just be a dream and mean nothing? If so, do most dreams fall under this category?

Yes, and, in my opinion, yes.

4. Is LD the only dreams that really mean something?

Absolutely not!

In fact, since LD's by their nature include your conscious input, they probably carry much less meaning than regular, non-lucid dreams (NLD's).

5. What does it mean to have a vivid and real like dream but it not be a LD? Are real like dreams the same as LD?

You will likely hear differently as you browse the forums, but lucidity has nothing whatsoever to do with vividness, aside from an ability to make them more lucid through conscious input (which I don't think counts, in this context).

You can have LD's with the dullest of imagery in which you are incredibly aware, and you can have NLD's that are incredibly vivid -- and vise-verse.

I've heard Stephen LaBerge (the guy who brought LD'ing to the popular table with his Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming) voice regret about using the term "Lucid Dreaming" in his book, mostly because the word "lucid" inadvertently implies that LD's will be more vivid.

So, to answer your question: A "vivid and real like dream" doesn't mean much of anything, except maybe that your dreaming mind is firing on all cylinders, and that vividness is just as likely to occur in a NLD as in a LD.

Here's another thing, as long as I'm here: NLD's are probably vivid just as often as LD's, but during NLD's you don't tend to notice that vividness because you are assuming your dream world to be the real world, where everything is as vivid as it "should" be. When lucid you witness the vividness that you normally take for granted, so it might seem that LD's are more vivid than NLD's.

6. I was reading some posts and there is something you refer to as a DC, what is a DC? Any other terms I should know that is used on this forum would be helpful.

A DC is a Dream Character, which is basically the people in your dreams.

7. I've been wondering lately.. one time my sister and I had the same dream. A real like dream, vivid. I told her my dream and she said she had the same dream- and we had it down to the T where we knew we both were there Caz of the answers to our questions to each other. It was also in the same night. She has a twin and they are often in each other's dreams where they are there together and dream the same thing. Is this/ how is this possible?

Sure, it's possible.

People who are very close to each other, and live similar lives, might tend to have the same sort of dreams, to the point where they think they are having the same dream (and yes, because of their similar lives, those same dreams will likely occur at the same time). So the coincidence is possible, and can be impressive -- especially in twins.

Okay, that was one answer, but there may be others -- including the possibility of dream-sharing, where you actually do experience the same dream as another person. Dream-sharing is a fairly popular topic around here (I've even started a thread or two about it myself), so with a little browsing in the Beyond Dreaming forum you should find a lot of discussion.

Thanks for sharing, it's all very interesting, especially learning about why pregnant women have scary dream- I have wondered that. And thanks for the book recommendations!

Thanks for breaking some things down for me it's interesting stuff. And to learn not to really use dream dictionaries. Really appreciate your insight and am looking forward to reading more in other threads! Also thank you for the reading recommendations as well!

Dreams are complext stuff,but if they are very clear,you know these are important,if vague they are not that important.

for Nightmares,try not to sleep on your stomach or left side,from my experience,sleeping on my stomach gives me nightmares and sleep-paralysis.