Thread: What's different about your dreams?

Hmm.

I wonder here if another question shouldn't be asked on this topic: Is there really "normal behavior" in a dream?

Seriously. We are all individuals, and all our dreams are generated in a manner that reflects our unique personalities and life experiences. Sure, similar people might have similar dreams, and there are arguably archetypes (i.e., the presence of water, or public nudity, or perhaps being handed a test for a class that you hadn't attended all year) that may hold similar symbolic meaning in most of our dreams -- or not, as Azaleaj noted about nudity in her dreams. But it may be a mistake to assume that there are any "normal" images or behaviors in dreams; and I believe that that mistake has been made quite often in popular books (especially dream dictionaries, which in my mind are invariably useless) and forums like this, to the point where dreamers start to think they're supposed to dream in a certain way, and that if they don't then their dreams are weird, different, or somehow wrong. This is especially true with LD'ing, where novices feel like they must experience or do specific things when lucid and if they don't then they've somehow failed... and that is not a good thing, in the end.

For instance, Cron, your example of clocks always working for you is a good one: Yes, for most of us clocks (especially digital ones) tend to change their readout each time we glance at them in a dream. But if your dreaming mind has established that clocks don't change, then they don't; and that is not unusual at all, but rather simply the way your mind has chosen to present an image in your dreams. As an extension of this, I wonder how many dreamers actually cause the clocks to change, thanks to their expectation that that will happen (same goes for reading text, BTW, which is something I personally have never had trouble with),

So maybe the real thing to wonder about is when similar images or behaviors occur, as in Azaleaj's example above, because that could reflect true oddness.

You've definitely broken it down, Sageous, and I have to agree. On the topic of dreams being influenced by our mind's expectations, this is my largest problem in lucid dreaming. I have a crippling doubt that I cannot continue lucid dreams for long, because I cannot imagine the places I want to go to or the things I want to do. Every lucid dream I've ever had goes black quickly whenever I try to change the dream from what it originally was. Lately, when I become lucid, I simply become an observer out of fear that if I try to change anything the dream will fade. I've learned to be calm years ago, but it does not help either. I've incubated ideas in an imagery based fashion and tried to go to my imagined places in lucid dreams, but alas, the dreams will still fade if I try to change them. I've said in my introduction that my dreams defy common methods, but I know it's probably me. I'm not sure what to think to counter this problem.

I'm a bit late here, but Sageous started with basically what I would have said: I'm not sure if there really is a such thing as “normal” dream behavior. For pretty much every popular “rule” I've heard about dreams, there's at least one person for whom it doesn't follow, myself included (e.g., reading is usually no problem for me, light switches and electronic devices at least sometimes work, blinking or closing my eyes doesn't generally cause me to wake up, etc.). And then there are those times where a person can have the occasional odd dream that totally violates the “normal rules” of their own typical dreams.

Originally Posted by Sageous

As an extension of this, I wonder how many dreamers actually cause the clocks to change, thanks to their expectation that that will happen (same goes for reading text, BTW, which is something I personally have never had trouble with),

I've wondered this a couple of times myself. I wouldn't be surprised if I could just invent my own random, crazy rule for an RC and get it to work fairly easily just by the expectation/intention alone. Since RCs for me mainly seem to start working after I've already become at least very slightly lucid in the first place, it would make sense. In fact, when I think about it that way, performing RCs and making them work in this case appears to be not much more than a basic act of lucid dream control in general.

So maybe the real thing to wonder about is when similar images or behaviors occur, as in Azaleaj's example above, because that could reflect true oddness.

Or perhaps another clue to the elusive mystery of dreaming!