Thread: death in dreams leading to the dream afterlife...

Dying in dreams rarely ever results in me waking up. In the worst cases, I'm forced to repeat the dream over and over again until I manage to get away without dying. But a lot of times I become a ghost and have fun floating around and haunting people.

Every time I've died I've seen a bright white light for a few seconds, and then woke up. Not a long experience but one nonetheless.

Originally Posted by Hazel

Dying in dreams rarely ever results in me waking up. In the worst cases, I'm forced to repeat the dream over and over again until I manage to get away without dying. But a lot of times I become a ghost and have fun floating around and haunting people.

wow! that's really cool. kind of like a video game in a way. figure out a way to beat a level without dying or you have to start over. cool stuff.

Originally Posted by Burke

Every time I've died I've seen a bright white light for a few seconds, and then woke up. Not a long experience but one nonetheless.

that's pretty cool. reminds me of what people say they see during near death experiences. maybe those stories in some way or another have been implanted on your subconscious?

I believe that i heard on the history channel that some scientists say that when you die, or have a "near death experience" the portion of your mind that conrols dreaming is turned on. They used an example of someone who had a heart attack at the same time as his father. The son died before the father and came to a field with a large oak tree and many of his family members there. He claimed that they said, "We aren't ready for you yet" and he woke up in the hospital. Before he woke up he said that he saw his father and that he told the son that it was o.k. and that it was his time.

I seems plausible, since 10 minutes dreams can take place in 1 minute of waking time, that when we die we dream and that is what people call, "heaven" or "hell." It seems to me that whetever you truly believed in, that's what your "afterlife dream" would be about. If you were christian, you would dream about heaven. If you were muslim, you would dream about whatever afterlife they believe in (sorry, i don't remember freshman year of highschool all to well).

That's just my two cents.

I just recently died in a dream and didn't wake up right away.
A bomb was dropped but the explosion didn't reach me until few seconds later, which gave me just enough time to realize I was going to die and there was nothing I could do about it (this is an occasionally recurring theme in my dreams).
So then everything around me was destroyed and I died. But I didn't wake up. I switched to a disembodied view of the dream, and started watching other people, the survivors, I guess.

oh, this is kind of a relief. I was fearing what would happen when i get struck by lightning. (task of the month)

Originally Posted by insideout

I just recently died in a dream and didn't wake up right away.
A bomb was dropped but the explosion didn't reach me until few seconds later, which gave me just enough time to realize I was going to die and there was nothing I could do about it (this is an occasionally recurring theme in my dreams).
So then everything around me was destroyed and I died. But I didn't wake up. I switched to a disembodied view of the dream, and started watching other people, the survivors, I guess.

neat! so you had a similar experience to mine except mine left the people out and the environment changed to all faded, cold and empty. did your vision change at all or was everything the same but your viewpoint changed to a disembodied floating one?

Originally Posted by mazillion

oh, this is kind of a relief. I was fearing what would happen when i get struck by lightning. (task of the month)

what are you worried about?

Originally Posted by somniumrex

neat! so you had a similar experience to mine except mine left the people out and the environment changed to all faded, cold and empty. did your vision change at all or was everything the same but your viewpoint changed to a disembodied floating one?

I'm pretty sure my vision was the same. Although the situation sort of changed. There wasn't any sign of the explosion or mention of it. But there was a lot of violence and destruction. Eventually I woke up because it was too much, and I didn't want to experience it anymore.

yeah i've thought about that a lot. since the brain uses implanted memories to bridge gaps of implied time anything along those lines is possible. one could be dead right now and just experiencing the last 6-12 minutes of life in the brain after the body dies. it's dream time so the brain is bridging the gaps in time created by making seconds look like days and months and minutes look like years. for example; one minute goes by and the brain gives all the necessary information to think one is sitting in the present moment and remembering yesterday and the day before and the years before and it gets foggier as time goes by because that's how memory is. one may actually be leaping from one moment to the next and spanning many years. like in three seconds one could be an old person and remember all the years and moments that led to being this age. these memories were just attached to this "moment" and since there is no difference between the present and the past other than memories, one would have no idea this is happening.

if you don't get this imagine you're dreaming that you are living in a new house, you remember moving in and selling your old house. then you wake up and realize, upon recalling the rest of the dream, that these parts of the dream never happened and couldn't have happened as they would have taken days or weeks for you to experience. our brains move us from moment to moment and insert memories so that we think it's logical for us to be in the middle of a certain situation when, without these implanted memories, we would always be lost in our dreams wondering what's happening and why we are where we are and doing what we're doing. it's a trick that works the same as a movie fading out after a scene where someone gets a new job and letters appear on the screen that say "five years later" then a quick montage of pictures plays to let you know a brief synopsis of what has happened in these five years. you didn't see the story that went along to bridge the gap but you accept that it happened. only what happens in dreams is so much more precise! you can instantly remember all kinds of details to explain situations that you don't have the time to dream.

all that being said, inside those 6 to 12 minutes it's possible that anything at all happens after we die in real life. you could be in another world for a thousand years and come back and be told you were only gone for a minute. your brain just gave you a memory created to tell you that all this time passed. or you could be in another life as someone else. what happens after that 6-12 minutes is the real mystery!

Originally Posted by insideout

I'm pretty sure my vision was the same. Although the situation sort of changed. There wasn't any sign of the explosion or mention of it. But there was a lot of violence and destruction. Eventually I woke up because it was too much, and I didn't want to experience it anymore.

that's interesting! almost like you switched to a parallel but slightly different universe in death. i like your signature by the way.

Originally Posted by somniumrex

that's interesting! almost like you switched to a parallel but slightly different universe in death. i like your signature by the way.

The way I saw it was that my mind doesn't know what not being conscious is like, so when I died in the dream, my consciousness just got displaced.
Also, thanks.

Originally Posted by insideout

The way I saw it was that my mind doesn't know what not being conscious is like, so when I died in the dream, my consciousness just got displaced.
Also, thanks.

oh yes that's the most logical explanation. i've just been reading about parallel universes lately so my mind jumped to that. although if i dreamed something similar then that would be the reason lol!

The same thing happened to me. I was shot in this dream (normal dream, not a lucid one), and after a brief moment of me just looking down at my blood in surprise I was "transported" to this place. Whatever this place was, I don't know, but it was very peaceful. It was like I was floating on water and I hadn't a worry in the world. Then I woke up. It was a weird dream. For that moment after I was shot but hadn't yet died, I remember being really annoyed at the person that shot me. Then I felt cheerful and happy again.

I'm not a religious person, so the dream was interesting for me.

There are so few where I did anything other than wake up.

I do, however, remember this one involving a bizarre psychopomp (who looked like an anthropomorphic Pikachu). After he had talked me through the dying part, I paused to kiss the forehead of the body I'd just left, and to say goodbye to my goldfish who was trying to jump out of his tank to join me. The Pika-pomp told me another of his kind would bring my goldfish to me in the afterlife. The dream pretty much ended around that point, though, so I didn't manage to go anywhere.

Originally Posted by EllisBell

The same thing happened to me. I was shot in this dream (normal dream, not a lucid one), and after a brief moment of me just looking down at my blood in surprise I was "transported" to this place. Whatever this place was, I don't know, but it was very peaceful. It was like I was floating on water and I hadn't a worry in the world. Then I woke up. It was a weird dream. For that moment after I was shot but hadn't yet died, I remember being really annoyed at the person that shot me. Then I felt cheerful and happy again.

I'm not a religious person, so the dream was interesting for me.

that's hilarious! shot and annoyed and then cheerful and happy i like the floating on water thing. any more description of the "place" that you can remember?

Originally Posted by L33tsaber

There are so few where I did anything other than wake up.

I do, however, remember this one involving a bizarre psychopomp (who looked like an anthropomorphic Pikachu). After he had talked me through the dying part, I paused to kiss the forehead of the body I'd just left, and to say goodbye to my goldfish who was trying to jump out of his tank to join me. The Pika-pomp told me another of his kind would bring my goldfish to me in the afterlife. The dream pretty much ended around that point, though, so I didn't manage to go anywhere.

wow, that's freaking great! i had to look up "psychopomp" and now that i know what it is your post is that much cooler and hilarious! it's an interesting mix of deep spirituality and comedy. "kissing the forehead of the body i'd just left..." very deep and beautiful and then "the pika-pomp..." just picturing it makes me laugh! i love it!

Originally Posted by somniumrex

that's hilarious! shot and annoyed and then cheerful and happy i like the floating on water thing. any more description of the "place" that you can remember?

To be honest this was a while ago so the memory of it is a bit foggy. However, I do remember lying on my back and gazing up to a beautiful, bright blue sky with only a few small clouds floating slowly through it. I was distantly aware of something like a forest being not too far away, it wasn't that I could see it, it was more like I could hear the trees swaying with the breeze. I can't give you much more detail sadly. Mostly, it was more about the FEEL of the dream (if that makes sense). To this day, it remains as one of my favourite dreams (ignoring the part of me getting shot!). When I got to this "heaven" I no longer felt any of the confusion and fear I normally experience in the average dream, so getting to this "heaven" was a nice dream holiday for me!

Well, i don't believe in ghosts, but when I died I saw my body on the floor. I was clear. My mom cried as she looked at my body. "Mom, I am RIGHT HERE!" I yelled. She couldn't hear me and it was frusterating. So, I walked to my school and tried to talk to them. Nobody saw me, and I was very upset. As a ghost, I felt the same. I just knew I was dead. I forget how I died, but I remember being alive in the beginning. "Hey, Mrs. Tomblin! Help, nobody can see me!" She just walked off, I got very angry and woke up.

Originally Posted by EllisBell

To be honest this was a while ago so the memory of it is a bit foggy. However, I do remember lying on my back and gazing up to a beautiful, bright blue sky with only a few small clouds floating slowly through it. I was distantly aware of something like a forest being not too far away, it wasn't that I could see it, it was more like I could hear the trees swaying with the breeze. I can't give you much more detail sadly. Mostly, it was more about the FEEL of the dream (if that makes sense). To this day, it remains as one of my favourite dreams (ignoring the part of me getting shot!). When I got to this "heaven" I no longer felt any of the confusion and fear I normally experience in the average dream, so getting to this "heaven" was a nice dream holiday for me!

yeah it makes me think about how, since this was simply a mind state your brain created to give you a "heaven" feel, technically people should be able to make themselves worry free and happy whenever they want... i guess that's the whole goal of enlightenment and all that. the most i've achieved is being able to make myself very calm and stable in times of stress or sadness. in times of mild sadness/frustration or neutral feeling though i can frequently make myself feel very content using mental will alone. someday it would be nice to learn the trick our brains use to simulate things in dreams in waking life. i read a book called the tibetan yogas of dream and sleep by tenzin wangyal rinpoche, the methods for lucid didn't work for me but some of his ideas were fresh and intriguing. for example he said to practice changing emotions in dreams and after lots of practice there you should be able to do it in waking life. i think this is a very valid idea! for now i am only so good at this but if i can get a lot of dream practice under my belt i think it will get a lot better.

Originally Posted by somniumrex

wow, that's freaking great! i had to look up "psychopomp" and now that i know what it is your post is that much cooler and hilarious! it's an interesting mix of deep spirituality and comedy. "kissing the forehead of the body i'd just left..." very deep and beautiful and then "the pika-pomp..." just picturing it makes me laugh! i love it!

The most amusing part is that because it was a dream, everything was taken very seriously. Upon waking up, however, I had a bit of a giggle over the idea of a big furry yellow creature performing such a solemn task.

Originally Posted by L33tsaber

The most amusing part is that because it was a dream, everything was taken very seriously. Upon waking up, however, I had a bit of a giggle over the idea of a big furry yellow creature performing such a solemn task.

i know! that always happens to me, stuff in the dream is really serious but then upon awakening you notice the absurdity of it!

I like to explore the afterlife in my dreams. I study myths of death of all the cultures I can and try to dream of them. I have dreamt of Tibetan death, Greek death, Celtic death, Christian death, and Egyptian death. I am working on Germanic and Norse Death. I want to be a psychopomp. I know of one dreamer who is a psychopomp and he is an author of books. His last name is Moss, I cannot recall his first name. He has very interesting ideas. He talks of creating a nice vacation house in the afterlife for yourself to stay in as you adjust to the afterlife. He speaks of using dreams to reach and help friends and family who have already or recently passed away. You should look into his works. I believe he has a book called The Dreamer's Book of the Dead.