The Dream Mindset.

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08-05-2006, 08:16 AM
Ev

I've been thinking about dreams and why we dont act in them the way we do in real life.
Suddenly it occured to me that we may not be "ourselves" because dreams are random events, not connected to real life or each other. An action in one dream will cause no reaction in the next dream. Therefore our minds may process them differently. Have you noticed that your dreamsselves often lack qualities that are almost essential to our everyday survival in the RL. I'm talking about fear, expectations, responsibilites, concern about our future or our past, and many other types of behavior that are associated with linear time. I cant quite put a finger on them all. At the same time the qualities that help us "live in the moment" are increased - confidence, bravery, curiosity, desire to act and experiment. Once again I dont think this is a full list. We are so intensely focused on the moment that we disregard or dont pay attention to the past and that causes us to most of the time overlook the fact that we are dreaming.

Do you think this idea is close to how things really are?
08-05-2006, 10:03 AM
Leo Volont

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ev

I've been thinking about dreams and why we dont act in them the way we do in real life.
Suddenly it occured to me that we may not be "ourselves" because dreams are random events, not connected to real life or each other. An action in one dream will cause no reaction in the next dream. Therefore our minds may process them differently. Have you noticed that your dreamsselves often lack qualities that are almost essential to our everyday survival in the RL. I'm talking about fear, expectations, responsibilites, concern about our future or our past, and many other types of behavior that are associated with linear time. I cant quite put a finger on them all. At the same time the qualities that help us "live in the moment" are increased - confidence, bravery, curiosity, desire to act and experiment. Once again I dont think this is a full list. We are so intensely focused on the moment that we disregard or dont pay attention to the past and that causes us to most of the time overlook the fact that we are dreaming.
Do you think this idea is close to how things really are?
[/b]

The next time you are Lucid and think of it, access your Dream Memory -- simply look around and suggest to yourself that you remember the last time you were at or nearby this same Dream Scene. If you are anything like myself, then you will be flooded with memories. You will then discern that the Dream Persona is not just sporadically dreaming, but is constantly and always on the move. During our remembered Dreams, it is as though we visit the Dream Persona for a time, but it is only a visit, and hardly a possession. The Dream Persona is its own Person. We should not be fooled by the 1st Person Experience -- we are the "I" of a Personality that is not entirely identical to our Waking Self. The Memories and Experiences are different and extensive.

But Lucid Dreaming IS different. In a Lucid Dream, the Waking Personality takes full possession of the Dream Persona. For awhile, as long as Lucidity lasts, the Waking Self takes over. What this DOES is that it helps the Waking and the Dreaming Personas to Integrate... it brings the Waking Perspective to Dreaming -- the Morality and the Aspirations, goals and ambitions of the Waking Self give a bit more guidance to the Dreaming Persona that would otherwise tend to be more primitive, sensual, simplistic and violent.

After years of Lucid Dreaming Experiences the Waking and the Dreaming Personas become easier of access to each other... which is what I mean by 'integration'. The Dream Persona no longer needs to be 'possessed' by the Waking Persona and so transitions to Lucidity are no longer experienced so frequently, but the Dream Persona ordinarily behaves as though more in touch with the Waking Persona.

However, there is still the matter of Dreams allowing for a great deal of flexibility in Personality and Persona. When we dream, our 1st Persona Experience may visit a Corresponding Self -- a Dream Persona that seems to be 'one's self' -- that is, if one looked in a dream mirror, one would see one's self. However, this is not always the case. Often when walking by dream mirrors, or reflective glass doors and such, I have been surprised to see 'who' looked back. One naturally supposes that one is 'one's self' when in a dream, but often looking into a mirror shows quite a different fact. One doesn't always 'feel' the difference. One time I saw myself in a reflection and was surprised to see that I was a svelte young lady not more than half my own age. And yet I had thought I was me.
08-05-2006, 12:17 PM
three and four

I have a few thoughts on this subject. I certainly don’t claim that my theories are correct (I may be way off the mark) but… here they are.

Ev wrote:
we may not be "ourselves" (in dreams)

This comment brings us to the huge question of who “ourselves” (or “me” / “I”) really is. Volumes have been written on this question, but my own take is this: maybe “I” is not as central to “me” as it might seem. I’ll try to make that a bit more clear: it certainly feels like the thinking, deciding, observing “me” is at the centre of who “I” am. (A bit like it certainly feels & looks like the earth is flat, from our everyday perspective).

After all, “I” make decisions, “I” am in charge, it even feels like “I” am situated right in the middle of my brain, where all things are run (it certainly doesn’t feel like “I” am situated in my foot or knee…), right?

However, I suspect that this “egocentric” vision of things may be way off the mark (possibly as far off the mark as the idea of the earth being flat…). I suspect this because, when you think about it honestly, the really major things that seem to come from the decision-making “I” simply don’t: do “I” decide who I’m going to fall in love with? Does the decision-making “me” really produce the creative inspiration that leads to works of art? Do the deep desires that push us towards life-changing decisions really come only from the “I”? I don’t think so.

What I’m getting at is this: what we perceive as “I” is only a very small fraction of who we are. The unconscious is the ocean we all carry within us, and from where our all our deeper aspirations spring. The “I” likes taking credit for all of it, but don’t be fooled – the “I” is only an observing passenger (who does however have a right of veto what springs up from the deep – thus giving us what could be called free will (or at least responsibility)).

I very much agree with Leo when he writes:

“We should not be fooled by the 1st Person Experience -- we are the "I" of a Personality that is not entirely identical to our Waking Self. The Memories and Experiences are different and extensive.”

However, Leo, when you say:

”But Lucid Dreaming IS different. In a Lucid Dream, the Waking Personality takes full possession of the Dream Persona.”

I’m not so sure. Please don’t get me wrong: I’m not saying I disagree, I’m just not so sure that the WP takes “full” possession. I’d be more tempted to say that the waking personality takes MORE control on the dream persona… But maybe I’m just splitting hairs.

My take would be this: in waking life, the “I” acts a certain way because it is floating on the ocean of the unconscious (walking on its waters?!), fully influenced by what is below. However, in an LD, this veto-holding “I” is no longer just floating above, it is directly FACED with the other parts of which the whole “me” is made up: call them archetypes, call them dream guides, angels, whatever: these are the multitudes of which “me” is made up, but with whom “I” can now have a direct interaction in the lucid dream state, thus exerting much greater influence (hopefully positive!). The aim being, as Leo said, integration…

Wow, all this seems way heavier and more obscure that I hoped it would be… I hope at least one or two people can make some sense out of it!! Thanks for reading! :)
08-05-2006, 04:16 PM
Distant Clone

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ev

I've been thinking about dreams and why we dont act in them the way we do in real life.
Suddenly it occured to me that we may not be "ourselves" because dreams are random events, not connected to real life or each other. An action in one dream will cause no reaction in the next dream. Therefore our minds may process them differently. Have you noticed that your dreamsselves often lack qualities that are almost essential to our everyday survival in the RL. I'm talking about fear, expectations, responsibilites, concern about our future or our past, and many other types of behavior that are associated with linear time. I cant quite put a finger on them all. At the same time the qualities that help us "live in the moment" are increased - confidence, bravery, curiosity, desire to act and experiment. Once again I dont think this is a full list. We are so intensely focused on the moment that we disregard or dont pay attention to the past and that causes us to most of the time overlook the fact that we are dreaming.
Do you think this idea is close to how things really are?
[/b]

On one end of the spectrum, it may model dreaming quite accurately. However, I'm at a point now where most of those observations are incorrect. As far as I'm concerned, there is cause and effect. There is no such thing as random, or lucky, however chaotic is there if you need it. Meaning if you don't understand all the causes and effects, call it chaotic.

First, I believe life is only a dream, and so my behavior is bidirectional. Not only do I live life like a dream, but my waking personality carries over into the dream as well. I'm also leaning towards the belief that we are actually one soul separated into seven tiers, living each life/afterlife at the same time, although we are not too aware of them. I think our dream life is the adjacent one. The dream person experiences a continuous life, that cause and effect also applies in the dream world. However, we don't see the entire life, just clips and pieces, so we don't always see the reactions.

Because my waking behavior carries over into the dream world, I more or less go with the flow. Everything else you mention, I don't experience.
08-06-2006, 07:27 AM
Ev

The whole reason I made the original post is the idea that been brewing in the back of my mind for quite some time now. It is still kinda hard to put it in a brief and easily understandable form, that's why the original post was not complete.

My idea came after thinking about the huge question of *What is our "I"?*. After analyzing my experiences with various altered states of consciousness I realized that the thinking and decision making "I" process is not the only process in our mind. It is surrounded by a whole group of other processes (note that I dont use the term subconscious) that support the "I" process and supply it with various input. During the "Real life" operation all processes are relatively stable, they are always present and slowly evolve throughout our life. If these processes are changing rapidly the person is diagnosed with some kind of mental problem/illness and medicated to stabilize these processes.
Now, in dreams, during drug trips, deep meditation and whatever else some of the usual processes are altered or missing, but the self is still present. Sometimes the "I" is able to deal with the changes and the "I" remains in control (as in the case of mild intoxication or WILD). Other times the changes are too fast and too dramatic, making the "I" switch into passive observer mode (as in case of profound intoxication or a regular dream) to avoid being totally confused.

My dreams much like the real life feature a certain set of processes that are usually present and some processes that are not present, I've listed them in the original post. Thinking about it dreaming experience is very close to some of the drug experiences that I had - normally it's a passive observer with some flashes of awareness to correct or challenge some significant event in the dream/trip. I'd really love to include and expand upon personal experiences and accounts to show how they made me come up with this idea, but that will make this post ridiculously long and boring. :(

Leo, my dreams convice me that I have the same "I" that inhibits both real and dream me. I think that the "I" puts on a different "mask" or "mindset" to deal with real and dream world. Just a thought - by thinking of dream persona as totally different you are separating your dream self and the RL self. Then you are trying to integrate them together. Is that cause you dont want to take responsibility for your dream persona's actions and try to alter it to fit your RL self?
For me it works the other way - sometimes I find myself in a dream posessing all qualities of a full waking self. All the expectations, fears, responsibilites, whatever else comes from the real life. I'm 100 % sure that I'm in real life and I'm 100% myself. This is the worst kind of dream because it often ends up in trouble (cause of expectations and their effect on dreams). This just doesnt work.
In my LDs I try to bring minimum RL qualities to the dream self and use the usual "dream mindset" plus a bit from real life (namely awareness and the experiement I want to perform).

About the dream memories and continuous life. I've experienced dream memories and they are indeed extensive, but there's never enough time to examine them to determine if they are genuine or fake. The cause and effect also doesnt hold - DCs that i kill may show up in the next dream alive and without any recollection of the previous event. Recurrent dreams also work against the "continuous dream life" hypothesis. To date i've had only one case of cause and effect - when a very significant DC came back to kill me for an action I did some time before. Then that DC showed up a few more times, but recently I was able to talk to that DC and there was no tension whatsoever.

three and four:
About the LDs and facing multiple aspects of myself - that's what I'm doing now and it's quite bizzare. I'm noticing how multiple parts of myself or processes influence my dreams - one is helpful, helping me achieve lucidity, other is spiteful, bringing negativity every time it's avatar shows up. I've also noticed how my dreams are profoundly shaped by making posts on these forums claiming that I experience dreams the certain way. For example once I posted that I dont see realistic violence in dreams and the same night I saw the most realistic and grotesque gore dream I've ever had. There are other examples of that - some part of my mind wants me to know it's there, while other part strongly opposes contact...

PS I'm still sculpting this idea, thsi time it only took me a page to explain it :D maybe soon I'll squeeze it to a sentence or two...
08-06-2006, 08:11 AM
Leo Volont

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ev

Recurrent dreams also work against the "continuous dream life" hypothesis.

[/b]

I am not saying that the Dream World operates exactly in the same linear fashion as the Physical World.

Perhaps the Dream World is like a Tree and the Physical World is like a Vine. In the Physical World the Persona is restricted to one Life. yes, there can be the Career Person, the Home Person, the Party Person. but essentially the Waking Persona is fixed to one specific Persona. the Vine. a Linear Self.

But Dreaming may be a Tree -- many branches, many personas. In some cases the other branches are Dream Characters, but even the Dream Persona -- our 1st Person "I" experience may jump branches.

What we Recall from our Dreaming Sessions may be compared to a what a Lightning Bug lights up while flying through the Tree. The Mind may be having Thousands of Dreams, but our Consciousness -- the Lightning Bug -- may be attracted only to certain areas.

Recurrent Dreams occur again and again because of a fixation to a certain interest or area. honestly, you don't find your Waking Self ever repeating certain themes. Do you have certain hobbies that have you repeating certain activities again and again? You don't go Clubbing? Hiking? Dating? These are all Recurrent Motifs of our Waking Experence. For instance, for years I was into Flying Airplanes, and then for years I was into Sport Motorcycling. I finally recognized the Motif Behaviors and decided to break the patterns. But now I am Writing all the time. If one can have Recurrent Waking Motifs, then why do Recurrent Dream Motifs make no sense to you?
08-06-2006, 12:54 PM
SKA

The Difference between the Waking (Concious) Mind and the Dreaming (SubConcious) Mind and in how they act and are characterized lays in this:

As a Child you are born Pure and Innocent, As we grow up we are taught what is good and what is bad, how to behave, what to and what not to do, To hate, to love..everything. And all though we learn how to ''Act'' in this World to survive: To FILTER and Restrain your True Self and act Conciously instead, our Ego SPLITS in 2 because of this:

The Concious Self The ''you'' that acts, thinks and does everything that is taught, forced upon you..etc Your Concious Self is Bound By Society Rules and Morals, , Realism's boundries, materialistic and Rational thinking, Social Ethics of people around you..etc This Concious ''you'' is supressed and formed by these conditions to behave in an (What we were TAUGHT to be) ''Apropriate'' manner in respect to them.

The Sub-Concious Self : Your TRUE self really. It is the 100% Pure form of ''you'' NOT being restrained by any social pressure and all the things the Concious Mind is Restricted by.
It is Fair, Rightious, Mysterious and Dreamy, Abstract, Symbolical, Contains your Moral Conciousness: I.E. Guilt ( Which our Concious Minds easily can Denie and Ignore) Very Visual, Has a very inconceivably huge hidden Memory-Archive of 1000000nds of things we thoughtwe had Forgotten. It is also the Creative Mind which Creates our Dreams. Which is why the Subconcious Mind are also called The Dreaming Mind.

All these above prescribed Typical Characteristics of the Subconcious Mind are all present in Dreams, thus leading me to Believe that as we fall Asleep we sink deep down in our own SubConcious Mind and see the world from the Point of View that the REAL Subconcious, ''You'' sees it. It's like everynight our True self gets a chance to speak it's (Your) Mind with (The Concious) you, so that You stay in touch with your (Real) self. Well that is how I see it

In (Normal) Dreams we sink from the Concious State of Mind into The Subconcious State of Mind and Needless to say the way we act in Dreams is Weird: Subconcious: Unaware: Not Concious.

In a Lucid Dream we bring our Concious Mind INTO our Dreaming Mind, that's why we behave and think ''normal'' like we would in Waking Life, during Lucid Dreams: Your Concious Mind has appearantly entererd the Dream.
08-07-2006, 07:25 AM
Ev

Quote:

Originally Posted by Leo

But Dreaming may be a Tree -- many branches, many personas. In some cases the other branches are Dream Characters, but even the Dream Persona -- our 1st Person "I" experience may jump branches.
[/b]

This does make sense yet sounds a bit far fetched at the same time. So there's a dreaming persona that is guided through a branched experiences by the higher mind? And the conscious self is just coming along for the ride every night?

Quote:

Recurrent Dreams occur again and again because of a fixation to a certain interest or area. honestly, you don't find your Waking Self ever repeating certain themes. Do you have certain hobbies that have you repeating certain activities again and again? You don't go Clubbing? Hiking? Dating? These are all Recurrent Motifs of our Waking Experence. For instance, for years I was into Flying Airplanes, and then for years I was into Sport Motorcycling. I finally recognized the Motif Behaviors and decided to break the patterns. But now I am Writing all the time. If one can have Recurrent Waking Motifs, then why do Recurrent Dream Motifs make no sense to you?
[/b]

Recurrent waking motiffs involve desicion making. Here's how I see it: when we do someting again in the RL the initial urge to do that originates either from the "I" or from some other part of our minds. Here are 2 possible scenarios:
1) The "I" wants to do something, and the body/mind has to either agree or disagree. Ever felt like doing something, but suddenly you are so tired that it seems like too much hassle to do that? Of course it is possible to push your body to do something, but then there's a feeling of discord.

2) The mind wants to do something. So the "I" feels the urge to do something, then contemplates about that and possible outcomes, then either gives in or refuses to give in.

In the dream this process is not present - the recurrent dream is just there and you repeat it with no pleasure and often the feeling of frustration. In my recurrent dreams I'm always half aware. I respond to the dream scenario with facts from the RL. For example if I find myself in the math class taking a math lesson I may recall that I dont have to take any more math classes ever again or respond with some advanced calculus. The most recent phenomenon that I've encountered is very weird - Let's say I sit in my recurrent dream class, following whatever is going on. Passively observing. Then instantly I turn to someone sitting next to me and ask them why do I see this dream. The transition is not just seemless, it is extraordinary - the flow of the dream is uninterrupted, there's no "Oh, I'm lucid" moment, I just become lucid and instantly ask the question that I meant to ask. The dream becomes my second life.
This instant transition makes me almost certain that the dream self and the RL self are the same - there's one awareness and two distinct world that awareness lives in. Therefore I question your "dream persona - waking persona" model. It seems to me that you broke what was one in two and now trying to piece the halves back together.... But I dont know enough about your model to make any final judgement.

SKA - you have an interesting idea.
Following your idea there's one mind split in two parts - one part of your mind deals with the real life while the other part remains true and they meet together in dreams? This definitely makes some sense and thinking about it makes me feel more complete.