Does ignoring things really make them stop existing?

[Box77]

I was wondering about the fact when exerting dream control, if turning my back on uncomfortable situations, things, DC's, etc. make them really stop existing or if it's just a way to postpone my interaction with them? Perhaps it's something like "I have this problem of mathematics although I will solve it later" in stead of "I close the book and the problem doesn't exist anymore"

[yost]

In a lucid dream you only ever have to do what you want to do. So if there is a DC that is annoying and you don't want to talk with it or anything, you could do any number of things. Perhaps you may wish to explode it with a laser beam coming out of your hand? Or maybe you just expect it to go away/disappear? Anyway to actually answer the question usually within dreams things change easily. So maybe if you literally turn your back to this DC, it might change into another, change its attitude, it might stay the same. IMO, if there ever is a situation that I dislike within my dream (and I am lucid, still hoping!), I would just teleport away or destroy it or maybe just will it out of existence. Hope that

[Box77]

I understand that. My point is if we are avoiding to face those uncomfortable situations aren't we just letting those problems unsolved? I mean, wouldn't it be better to have the problem solved wether the book is closed or not?

[JoannaB]

I do think that it is better to try to solve a problem in a lucid dream. So for example if you have recurring nightmares, lucid dreaming is a good way of solving them, and I would think that it would be better to try to figure out more about hwy one is having those nightmares, and either befriend or defeat the monster that one is fighting, rather than just escape it. Of course, the approach in part depends on whether you think you are having the nightmares for a reason and whether dealing with them will likely do you any good in your opinion. It could also be that escaping the monsters by teleporting would solve the issue because by escaping you are actively taking an action, and you may feel empowered by that, and if your initial problem for example was a "victim mentality" and pessimism, always expecting to be attacked and defeated, then maybe escaping the situation is a perfectly acceptable solution which may give you the confidence needed to realize that you can figure out a way to not be victimized. So escape is not necessarily the same as avoidance.

[Box77]

It could also be that escaping the monsters by teleporting would solve the issue because by escaping you are actively taking an action, and you may feel empowered by that, and if your initial problem for example was a "victim mentality" and pessimism, always expecting to be attacked and defeated, then maybe escaping the situation is a perfectly acceptable solution which may give you the confidence needed to realize that you can figure out a way to not be victimized. So escape is not necessarily the same as avoidance. It has a lot of sense to me. Although, What about when I deviate the original course of a dream into something I artificially generate to build something different which leaves behind all the initial dream plot (assuming it's not the situation described above) i.e. just for fun or whatever it doesn't represent a plausible solution? Wouldn't it be the same as turning my back to whatever my mind was trying to tell?

[JoannaB]

If it is something really important, your mind will come back to it. It's not like it only gets one opportunity to share an important message with you. Also I think that a lot of times dreams are a creative problem solving strategy that just takes a bunch of things including current issues, things one randomly noticed, and memories, and then your mind subconsciously tries to make new connections behind those where there were none before. That is a powerful tool, and I would not want to replace all of that kind of activity with conscious thought - so having all of one's dreams lucid with full control and no subconscious input ever might mean that one is deprived of this powerful tool for problem solving. However, very few people are lucid in all dreams, and even in lucid dreams most people have elements that they do not control, so I think the subconscious can continue to do its stuff with most lucid dreamers. Also there are ways to get more in tune with one's intuition in waking life, and lucid dreaming also allows one to converse with parts of one's subconscious if one so chooses. So if a person wishes, one can then both in waking life and in dreaming create more collaboration between one's conscious mind and one's subconscious / intuition / conscience. I would think that this would be very beneficial, and lucid dreaming contributes toward that, I think, unless one takes the conscious control over everything to an extreme.

[Shantak]

I've never had this situation but one thing I have to wonder. If you're trying to ignore something surely you're actually paying attention to it? I imagine it would be hard to genuinly ignore something unless it is of no importance which would not be the case.

[Box77]

I see: "No matter where you go, your problems will go with you". Now I have a better understanding about the relevance of the different elements present in a dream, if I want to get deep, I must pay attention to those which constantly appear, such as some dreamsigns, recurrent dreamscapes, etc. It's possible some of them could have deep roots in my mind. Otherwise, if they are irrelevant, they simply won't show up again if I ignore them. Perhaps it's not a bad idea to try to ignore them in the first place after all. It's a good thing to know. I do appreciate your replies, thank you so much!!

[zedpapa]

I learned from meditation that the best way to free yourself from an unpleasant sensation (or anything really), is to just let it happen and pay attention to it, but do not react to it in any way. Think of it only as it is, not something of yourself. I think if you do this in a dream with any unpleasant occurrence, focusing on it but not identifying it with yourself, (or with the effect it has on you), you can reveal it's true nature, or at least get rid of it.

[Box77]

I was wondering perhaps not all things that don't tend to appear frequently, are irrelevant, specially when they are dealing with very old memories. How could I avoid reacting or identifying their roots with myself if they could have shaped what I am now?

[zedpapa]

If you deal with old memories in your dream is actually a good sign I think, be it a positive or negative dream, because whatever was stuck in your unconscious now expresses itself in some way, giving you the opportunity to realize how it affected you and making you free from it if you don't attach yourself to it any more. In my example, a few weeks ago when I was in a meditation camp, after an afternoon sitting where I felt I made a breakthrough and really experienced wonderful peace and bliss, I had a very unpleasant dream regarding my long-hidden anger towards my ex-stepfather. I couldn't control the dream, so I gave in to anger and wrecked the whole dreamscape and I wanted to hurt the man very badly, but after waking up I realized what happened was that this old thorn that was hurting me unconsciously for years now have surfaced. I felt really refreshed and 'clean' in the morning, despite having such a bad dream. So I think that you shouldn't feel depressed about dreams that show you something from your past you're not proud of, because it really gives you the opportunity to reflect on the event and free yourself from it's grasp. Maybe if you're lucid during the deam you can realize this right there, but if you don't that's fine too. What matters is your state of mind awake, because that conditions your unconsciousness to be the same. So if you're all positive and peaceful during the day, but have extremely disturbing dreams and nightmares, that means that your unconscious mind is tainted with negativity but is going through the cleaning process, and eventually you'll attain liberation.

[Box77]

Actually, I plan to do it during a lucid. One of my problems is how to find the proper direction to my past memories which could be causing some unsolved problem now. I don't want to be following the wrong track which could lead me to senseless stuff or something not deep enough. Thanks for your time!

[Sageous]

^^ Here's a funny thing: if you start examining or following past memories that emerge for whatever reason on your dreamscape, you likely will link them to current unsolved problems, even if they never had anything to do with them. I have a feeling that most of dream imagery, including DC's, memories, and schemata, if not all of it, are just meaningless stuff your unconscious mind throws up during sleep. I really believe that a lot of the meaning in dreams comes from what we attach to them after we wake up (or, sure, during LD's). This attachment is not a bad thing at all, as it offers a unique opportunity for a person to do a little introspection. So, if you start fussing during the dream about which old memories or new symbols are important, they will surely become important pretty fast, aided both by your imagination and your unconscious mind's interest in obliging your expectations (the actual conscious-unconscious communication going on, BTW). By corollary, ignoring an image and simply moving on will either be meaningless, with that image quickly forgotten, or will be filled with meaning as you wonder why that image appeared, and what harm you might have done by turning your back on it (in other words, you didn't ignore it at all; just changed your method for carrying the image with you). That said: If I'm wrong and there truly is some important symbolic communication with your unconscious going on, then I do agree with JoannaB in that turning away from an image representing that communication will only lead you to another image representing the problem, even when lucid with strong control; you just can't get away from your problems by turning away from them. The math is still in the book, even after you close the cover.

[JoannaB]

Sageous, btw, even though I am big into dream interpretation, I am not sure at all whether the dream images have meaning before we interpret them or gain that meaning during interpretation, but part of me thinks that it does not deeply matter: dreams throw at one a bunch of ideas and images, which can be used to gain meaningful insight about oneself if one so chooses, and whether that insight is there before you go seeking it out or whether it emerges during the seeking of insight using dream contents as a lens, the timing of that meaning does not deeply matter to me, because the point is that meaning can be found if one wants to find meaning, and whether the images are meaningful to begin with or meaningless until interpreted, the timing of the meaning matters less, in my opinion. Sometimes, I find additional meaning in a dream only weeks after I had that dream, and I do not care whether when I originally dreamed it my subconscious mind already had that additional meaning in mind, or whether the additional meaning emerged because my conscious mind interacted with the creative images of dream content and the meaning really emerged weeks after - as long as at the end I have gained some additional knowledge about myself which I find helpful, that's what matters to me.

[Sageous]

^^ 100% agreed. Indeed, you basically wrote a paragraph I wanted to write that said more than just "This attachment is not a bad thing at all, as it offers a unique opportunity for a person to do a little introspection," but couldn't figure out how to include it. Yes, the stuff of dreams is a great tool for finding meaning in your life or solving problems, and doing so responsibly is certainly a good thing -- even if the original objects of the dream itself never carried any meaning.

[Box77]

I have a feeling that most of dream imagery, including DC's, memories, and schemata, if not all of it, are just meaningless stuff your unconscious mind throws up during sleep. I thought something similar when I joined DV's. After a long period of experimentation on my own, I got to the conclusion that all what we dream depends basically on what's going on around our sleeping body and then translated into the dream -It could be that thing called schemata-- (i.e. I had barking dogs in the neighborhood--I concluded that I would be dreaming about dog related stuff until they stop barking and/or I start thinking about something else which called my attention) My limitations were/are my poor English, lack of time (I have 5 more days) and my very bad skills on making friends to properly discuss about these things. I really believe that a lot of the meaning in dreams comes from what we attach to them after we wake up (or, sure, during LD's). This attachment is not a bad thing at all, as it offers a unique opportunity for a person to do a little introspection. I agree with that, and I would add that the first attachments could be deeper if done during a lucid dream because of the expanded perception (I don't know how to say it in other way) So, if you start fussing during the dream about which old memories or new symbols are important, they will surely become important pretty fast, aided both by your imagination and your unconscious mind's interest in obliging your expectations (the actual conscious-unconscious communication going on, BTW). By corollary, ignoring an image and simply moving on will either be meaningless, with that image quickly forgotten, or will be filled with meaning as you wonder why that image appeared, and what harm you might have done by turning your back on it (in other words, you didn't ignore it at all; just changed your method for carrying the image with you). That said: If I'm wrong and there truly is some important symbolic communication with your unconscious going on, then I do agree with JoannaB in that turning away from an image representing that communication will only lead you to another image representing the problem, even when lucid with strong control; you just can't get away from your problems by turning away from them. The math is still in the book, even after you close the cover. One way or another it should definitively lead to what I'm looking for. Don't you think?

[Box77]

Sageous, btw, even though I am big into dream interpretation, I am not sure at all whether the dream images have meaning before we interpret them or gain that meaning during interpretation, but part of me thinks that it does not deeply matter: dreams throw at one a bunch of ideas and images, which can be used to gain meaningful insight about oneself if one so chooses, and whether that insight is there before you go seeking it out or whether it emerges during the seeking of insight using dream contents as a lens, the timing of that meaning does not deeply matter to me, because the point is that meaning can be found if one wants to find meaning, and whether the images are meaningful to begin with or meaningless until interpreted, the timing of the meaning matters less, in my opinion. Sometimes, I find additional meaning in a dream only weeks after I had that dream, and I do not care whether when I originally dreamed it my subconscious mind already had that additional meaning in mind, or whether the additional meaning emerged because my conscious mind interacted with the creative images of dream content and the meaning really emerged weeks after - as long as at the end I have gained some additional knowledge about myself which I find helpful, that's what matters to me. I like to do the first interpretation during the lucid dream because of the facility of flowing images and the opportunity to express my emotions without affecting my surroundings in any way. I don't know how deep meaning a symbol really has although I recently found relations and consequently meanings and roots that I wouldn't be able to easily find during my waking life because of a lot of factors which usually interfere with my process of understanding about what's going on with me (that possibly I could be reflecting on my kids). Perhaps I would get to the same point if I had the chance to do it during my waking life, but as said, I have little time to understand and it's during the dream itself.

[JoannaB]

A couple of examples of how dream interpreters use tools to find meaning in dreams might illustrate how dream interpretation may actually not be only about meaning that is already there: other dream characters are often interpreted as the dreamer or an aspect of the dreamer's personality; houses in dreams are often interpreted as the dreamer's mind. Now do all dreamers know that and form their dreams accordingly, or does this work in dream interpretation because one is much more likely to gain meaningful insight about oneself and not other people, and about one's own mind and not actual places and thus the dream interpreter steers the interpretation in the direction in which meaningful insight is most likely to be gained. It is safer to interpret a dream to be about the dreamer than about other people because the dreamer is more likely to know things about him- or herself, and benefit from learning more about him- or herself from a dream; whereas, if one interpreted the dream as being about the dreamer's mother if she is a dream character in the dream, one is more likely to reach incorrect insights and runs the danger of steering the dreamer toward potentially wrong conclusions about his or her mother.

[Sageous]

One way or another it should definitively lead to what I'm looking for. Don't you think? I do!

[Box77]

A couple of examples of how dream interpreters use tools to find meaning in dreams might illustrate how dream interpretation may actually not be only about meaning that is already there: other dream characters are often interpreted as the dreamer or an aspect of the dreamer's personality; houses in dreams are often interpreted as the dreamer's mind. Now do all dreamers know that and form their dreams accordingly, or does this work in dream interpretation because one is much more likely to gain meaningful insight about oneself and not other people, and about one's own mind and not actual places and thus the dream interpreter steers the interpretation in the direction in which meaningful insight is most likely to be gained. It is safer to interpret a dream to be about the dreamer than about other people because the dreamer is more likely to know things about him- or herself, and benefit from learning more about him- or herself from a dream; whereas, if one interpreted the dream as being about the dreamer's mother if she is a dream character in the dream, one is more likely to reach incorrect insights and runs the danger of steering the dreamer toward potentially wrong conclusions about his or her mother. Recently I had a lucid which started in my grand parents house where I grew, I decided to follow the plot paying attention to the meanings which popped up here and there, then I was running (actually floating/flying) in the streets together with the dog who was my best friend ever (I was full of joy and it was clear to me what I didn't do with him), then he stopped running with me (I felt sorrow because of he passed away long time ago), the city in the direction we were running was dark while the other side was full of light when I turned to see him, he started to run the other way so I decided to follow him this time (to the lights), then he turned into my old daughter and I saw her playing alone with a lot of kids playing around (here I understood what was my problem). The dream ended when I had to tell her to be careful when playing near a street because of she was following a bouncing ball. Once I woke up, it was clear to me what I was doing wrong with her and it helped us a lot to get her unstuck from a bad behavior. I think that's the way it could be working: "Once you understand yourself, you might help others." I don't know if there was really a pre-minded relation or I made it "on the run" when I decided to passively follow the dream plot and be aware of the different meanings which popped out here and there. But the consequences of this thoughts in my waking life, helped me a lot with my daughter. And I think that's the most important part here, because of I was able to solve a long time problem which I didn't know what else to do.