Dreaming of a place I've never been to?

[JenTheStrange]

I had a dream my boyfriend and I decided to move to Chicago. Oddly, I fell in love with this amazing, modernized trailer which sat on the bank of a river with a fantastic view of the city on either side. The river split on either side of us, and we could see straight down the river. The rent for the trailer was $5000 a month, which somehow I fathomed to be affordable. Not knowing much about Chicago other than it's on the lake, I decided to see if there were any places like this location in my dream. I found a spot that was identical to what I saw in my dream. https://maps.google.com/maps?q=41.887103,-87.637682 The pictures from that location are just what I saw in my dream. I'm wondering if this is a coincidence or what...

[USA]

Hmm... maybe you've seen the place in a movie sometime? I don't know though, I don't believe in dreams being more than something created in your mind.

[Sageous]

Sounds to me like you were having someone else's dream!

[JenTheStrange]

What makes you say I shared a dream with someone? I've never had a shared dream, so I don't know what one feels like.

[Sageous]

^^ I was mostly being facetious, and plugging a long dead thread I started last year -- hence the smiley face! But let's think about it for a minute. You dreamed of a place you've never seen before, but later found one like it that exists in waking life Chicago. That's a hint that you might have picked up a plot from someone else. Or not -- coincidences do happen. But what if you did? Well, I guess you had a taste of what one form of dream-sharing (accidental and one-sided) might feel like -- just a dream, if you're not lucid. If it happens again, maybe you'll get a chance to lucidly explore the new dream and try to confirm if it's someone else's. If you do, then you'll be very popular on this forum! Bottom line: I was just kidding, and was not trying to start up the bazillianth dream-sharing thread. But now that you've tossed the term out there, maybe this is something worth considering...

[JenTheStrange]

I see! Thanks for the input. Now I'll have to patrol my dreams a little more thoroughly for any people that stick out like a sore thumb.

[KimJane]

I think it's very possible to have dreamed of a place you've never seen. It somewhat frustrates me how people who are so into dreams are such skeptics about the possibilities beyond the usual. So many people have precognitive, psychic dreams and i think the brain is in the perfect state to receive such information when dreaming. I had similar dreams a couple months ago. I saw an exit and a street name...looked it up and verified. I also dreamed of a street name along a school campus...looked it up on google and there it was. I've never been to either place or seen them in real life.

[JenTheStrange]

I guess the real question is why we have dreams about places we've never been to. I could understand if it was to prevent an incident in the future, but for the most part, they seem kind of random.

[KimJane]

I think maybe it could be a place of significance or memory of someone youre connected to (dead or living) or WILL be connected to. Or maybe it's someplace you will visit in the future. In my case I happened to dream about the city my father's family lives....I've never been there. Maybe what i saw is somewhere one of my (deceased) grandparents lived or someplace my father or his family sees frequently. Maybe I'll know the significance (if any) one day.

[EpicZombeh]

I had a dream about a school. Three years later, I was a part of a play, turns out the school we preformed at was identical to the one in my dream. It wasn't even one of those cliché rectangle schools, it was oddly shaped.

[TehDalek]

I think maybe it could be a place of significance or memory of someone youre connected to (dead or living) or WILL be connected to. Or maybe it's someplace you will visit in the future. In my case I happened to dream about the city my father's family lives....I've never been there. Maybe what i saw is somewhere one of my (deceased) grandparents lived or someplace my father or his family sees frequently. Maybe I'll know the significance (if any) one day. (Sigh, another skeptic) I think that when you see these places your parents may have known, you are seeing the place your mind has created from the stories you have heard. It may create a street name, some places that were described to you, etc. When hearing it in waking life, it is just a thought, but in a dream it is a place. A good test for this is to look at pictures of this place, current ones, see how accurate it is. Whats everyone's opinion on this idea? (/I am the skeptic)

[Sageous]

^^ Sadly, TehDalek, you're probably right. It is very simple, and quite understandable, to imagine places you really want to visit, or places that have real significance, like ones your parents may have visited. I think Mr. Occam wins here; yours is the simplest and most likely explanation. But what fun is that?

[Extremador]

I always have dreams about people I've never met. It's amazing that our brain can basically create full scale model of everything, even down to the details of a person.

[KimJane]

(Sigh, another skeptic) I think that when you see these places your parents may have known, you are seeing the place your mind has created from the stories you have heard. It may create a street name, some places that were described to you, etc. When hearing it in waking life, it is just a thought, but in a dream it is a place. A good test for this is to look at pictures of this place, current ones, see how accurate it is. Whats everyone's opinion on this idea? (/I am the skeptic) I understand your skepticism..there are lots of them around here. You're theory could apply to some people and it does make sense. But I should fill you in with a piece of information I didn't mention. I haven't seen my father since I was tiny--my father is not in my life and my mom isn't from that city. All I know is my dad and his family are from there. Therefore he's never told me any stories about the area, locations....nothing. I never had any prior interest in the area. I didn't even know that the area I dreamed (it was an Exit sign with a street name near a woody area) was even IN that city at all or suspect where it was. I just happened to find out when I googled it in the day. It just happened to be in the city where my paternal family is? So I continue to believe there's something more.

[TehDalek]

I understand your skepticism..there are lots of them around here. You're theory could apply to some people and it does make sense. But I should fill you in with a piece of information I didn't mention. I haven't seen my father since I was tiny--my father is not in my life and my mom isn't from that city. All I know is my dad and his family are from there. Therefore he's never told me any stories about the area, locations....nothing. I never had any prior interest in the area. I didn't even know that the area I dreamed (it was an Exit sign with a street name near a woody area) was even IN that city at all or suspect where it was. I just happened to find out when I googled it in the day. It just happened to be in the city where my paternal family is? So I continue to believe there's something more. I apologize, but it makes no logical sense to see something you have never heard about, read about, or seen ever in your entire life show up in a dream. How do you know that your subconscious didn't listen to conversations between your parents when your father left? He may have mentioned when he left you something to the effect of "I still love you, this is a tough decision, but I need to continue life in said city, and there is no way to bring you with me. I hope you will understand one day." Since then you may have seen pictures nonchalantly about the town, or heard about it without thinking about it. Why would you think any different? For all you knew there was no significance to the town.

[Smiley0123]

I guess the real question is why we have dreams about places we've never been to. I could understand if it was to prevent an incident in the future, but for the most part, they seem kind of random. I agree JenTheStrange. I'm having a hard time figuring that one out... I'm new to this thread and I've never joined a site like this, but I find myself feeling relieved that it exists. I have always been a very clear and lucid dreamer which started when I was very young. I learned how to control my dreams, change landscapes, fly...you name it, I did it. I have also had shared dreams, but typically occur with people that are close to me or at least that is how I have verified accounts of "being in or having the SAME dream." I've also had dreams and written or spoken then to someone upon waking and the events occur that same day or week. I'm guessing these are visions rather than dreams though. And lately for the past year or so, I have had more dreams where I am an observer of someone else's dream. People that trust me and expose me to things, events, happenings that I can't quite understand. They're vivid like visions and very real like (all senses present), but they do not pertain to me whatsoever. In my experience last night I was in an Asian country, I believe it was Japan and this young new father was changing his child's diaper when I walked in. He explained how he chose to use cloth diapers and to sooth his child to sleep and gave me a multitude of child care tips (by the way I have no children and I'm not married). i even held the chubby slobbery baby and touched the rails of the crib. he then traveled with me to introduce me to his family and his mother was a well know dance instructor of some sort and invited me to watch a ritual dance with all young women wearing purple iris face and body paint. They performed outside with barefeet in dirt in Park. It was beautiful, nothing like I had ever seen. And I've never been to Japan. I just can't understand why I am experiencing these lately. I looked up this morning japanese purple irises and supposedly brides dress in purple to celebrate their marriage? I am trying to take it in, but not sure if I should allow myself to be led by others in these dreams? Since I am lucid, I tend to exit after a while (because I can) and wake up. I know the people I am with in the dream get upset/dissappointed when I do because of facial expressions and gestures to stay (no one has ever grabbe me though). Sorry for this long post. But any info or suggestions you can give me would be awesome.

[Smiley0123]

That's what I've been told...possible psychic abilities, but to be honest, I am still skeptical. Has anyone looked into the theory of the halogenic world?

[Chickadee23]

Interesting really but I think it was just a coincidence, nothing more.

[JenTheStrange]

Smiley0123, sounds like a past life or even a life you may be living right now. (Time isn't linear, blah blah blah, etc.) The father could have been you or a relative. I've had past life dreams of being kidnapped and murdered. I didn't think anything of them until I read back on the dreams I recorded. They became so vivid that I couldn't ignore them, and I even found out my name was Laurie. I also found out that my kidnapper was still on the other side, bothering me in my dreams. He'd say stuff like, "You don't remember? I hit you over the head!" and "Want to see what it looks like when a head explodes?" And then he'd show me. Then he'd show me again in slow motion. I would have nightmares of escaping him, drugged and disoriented, grabbing for door knobs. He would casually guide me away from the door. That's when I knew he must have kidnapped me. It was like a light bulb switching on instantly when I woke up. None of that really bothered me until he barged into my bedroom with his friends during a night terror with a knife and wearing a mask, screaming and laughing, "Killers kill! Killers kill!" while making stabbing motions over my petrified body. I grabbed his mask, felt the trembling of his breath as he laughed at my terror, and woke myself up. I still thought it was all ridiculous until I contacted a psychic. I didn't mention anything except that I was having nightmares of a man shooting me. She right away said he was a past life kidnapper, and I was honestly surprised she picked up on that. She said his intention was to control me like he did before, even emotionally possessing me. It took months to tame him. I treat him like my pet now. Every now and then, he tries to seduce me or kidnap me or both. He gets jealous of my boyfriend, and whenever he sees something he doesn't like, he lets me know in a dream. He always says that we can grow old together or that I could stay there with him. For the most part, he's a pouty little bastard who can't get over himself. Bless his heart.

[shadowofwind]

I guess the real question is why we have dreams about places we've never been to. I could understand if it was to prevent an incident in the future, but for the most part, they seem kind of random. For me, there's a standpoint of identity from which the images that get drawn into the dream come from the future or from other people. But it is kind of random in that the images are just collage-like illustrations for whatever my underlying feelings and experiences are. It doesn't seem to be 'for' anything in the sense of doing something about the future.

[shadowofwind]

I think Mr. Occam wins here; yours is the simplest and most likely explanation. But what fun is that? Don't make me break out my rant about people interpreting Occam backwards Occam's principle is that if you see what appear to be sasquatch footprints, you should hypothesize "those look like footprints from a sasquatch", and not "those look like footprints from an brown sasquatch", if there's no hair left in the prints. It does not say that you must try to force the hypothesis that the footprints were made by a bear, unless it seems to fit that just as well and bears are already known to inhabit the area and sasquatches are not. It says don't introduce more variables than you have facts to fit when solving a story problem, it does not say that you must pick a hypothesis that other people find more familiar or understandable. For those of us who already know that dream precognition is possible, there's nothing simpler about trying to bend everything to make it seem that its not happening.

[Baron Samedi]

I think that you probably dreamed of a real place that you've never been to. But, why? It could be very significant, or not significant at all. Maybe you picked up someone else's thoughts like when you get others' conversations on your phone. Maybe you're supposed to move there? Probably not. Personally, I find when I do get "messages" from The Other Side, I usually misinterpret them.

[shadowofwind]

Places I dream of are rarely real places, though they contain elements that are influenced by real places. For instance, last night I dreamed of being in an ex-classmate's house. I've never seen his house, and I doubt it actually looks like that. But based on a lot of other similar experiences, I expect there are details in it that do come from his actual house. Other details come from other impressions of the person, because the house is also a metaphor for his mind. And I also mix in impressions of other people and their experiences that my ex-classmate and his life is a metaphor for, since I haven't met those people in person. I can sort of feel the differences, how much it is him and how much its not, but its mixed together. Some people say that everything in the world is a manifestation of thought, which is sort of a concretization of who we are spiritually. I don't think that's quite true, but I think its sort of true. The dream is also a manifestation of thought, so it bears a resemblance to things in the physical world that are related to the same thoughts. But the emphasis is different in the dream, because the perspective is a little bit different, so it comes together differently and doesn't quite match the corresponding physical places and events. I think that premonitions work sort of like this too, or at least mine do. They're not a vision of a possible future, they're a partial vision of a result or 'solution' to existing karma, which has some resemblance to a physical future. But the vision is different from reality because the perspective is different, so what I feel and see doesn't actually correspond to a "possible timeline". To make up a crude metaphor, its like a bunch of ingredients are sitting on the kitchen counter, and I can see half of them, and from there I can imagine what can be cooked. But I'll be partially wrong, because I can only see some of the ingredients, which makes me even more likely to misguess how they get put together. My guess does have a recognizable supernatural element to it though, because I'm not just extrapolating from my own past experience. Some kind of awareness of 'fate' or providence is included, so there are often details which aren't connected to my own experience. In the unlikely event that a math metaphor helps, a place in one of my dreams is like an alternative basis for a vector space. The equations x + y = 2 and x - y = 0 represent the same thing as the equations 2x + y = 3 and 2x - y = 1. The dream representation doesn't quite match the physical world representation, but the underlying reality is the same. All of these dreams are projected from a standpoint where I can feel something of that karmic reality, I'm not "seeing the future" in a physical sense. Likewise for "shared dream" experiences, which are the same kind of experience with more of an emphasis on identity and less of an emphasis on how it connects with physical events. I'm not suggesting that premonitions are exactly like that for everyone, I'm just describing how they are for me. When I share a mental space with someone, can I ever separate myself from them again? Or is it more like sex, where you have a child and your DNA is joined after that and its not reversible? I still feel people I met 30 years ago even if I wasn't very close to them. I think it hurts me, because I must move in directions that aren't the same directions that they must move in, and I feel the being pulled in different directions. The effect on them is probably much smaller, but I suspect its not good for them either. Is it possible to let go? Am I doing it wrong? Or is it like a divorce when there is a child, and what must happen is unavoidably painful, and I should be more careful about who I allow myself to feel in the first place? But I am cut off as it is, shut down psychically compared to what I am capable of, and that's painful too. I wish I could find better advice on this sort of thing, books by people who actually know what they're talking about. It seems we're all grappling around in the dark.

[Zamorye]

I once dreamt of a place that I had never seen before until I went on vacation and was riding alongside a house by a lake...oh did it freak ME out...I gaped and gawed at that house...so weird...