Originally Posted by
SomeDreamer
Let's say you lose a close relative like your mom. If this happened in a dream, you would wake up from it and have a clear memory of this sad event taking place right there in your dream, yet when you get up from bed and go to say good morning, she will be right there, alive and well. While dreaming, this might have given you extreme emotions of sadness and loss. The feelings we perceive in the dream is equal to those we will experience in waking life, no doubt about that, we all agree there, one is not less "real" than the other. But the state of your dreaming world and the state of your waking world is clearly two different things. Your mom died in your dream, though she is alive when you awaken If you instead lost your mom in our wakening life, it would affect you in an entirely different way and more serious way. It could have serious psychological consequences for you, and also the fact that unless your dream world, your mom won't come back in this one. So here there is clearly some form of difference between the two worlds. Losing your mom in a dream, you are able to wake up and simply brush it off, saying "ah, it was nothing but a dream". On the other hand, lose her in wakening life, and it is suddenly not that simple.