Hello everyone!

Just have to say I am glad I found this website and there are so many people talking about their dreams. I have always been fascinated by dreams and it seems hard to come by people who share the same interest. I hope that this site will answer a lot of my questions I have about dreaming. I'll just have to read more of the informational forum posts and all that is on the home screen. I also look forward to reading about all of your dreams (lucid or not).

A Tad Bit About Myself

My name is Adalin and I am currently a university student studying for a couple engineering degrees. There really isn't much to say about myself besides how much I enjoy video games, anime, engineering, and of course dreaming. All of my interests have been constant since I was very young (maybe about 5 years of age). Since then I have been able to lucid dream and have many lucid dreams every night (by definition: being aware of being in a dream).

Boring Lucid Dreaming Life Story

Lucid dreaming came practically natural to me ever since I was very young. I almost always knew I was dreaming. Even controlling dreams was never a hard task for me. In fact as a child I used to wake myself up very often. I would usually do this when I was having a nightmare or had to go to the bathroom (always signaled in dream by going to the bathroom). Before the monster could have the chance to hurt me or before I had the chance to wet the bed, I would wake myself up by closing my eyes very tightly and opening them up quickly. Doing this would make myself actually wake up immediately and worked every single time.

At maybe around the age of 8, I had learned to almost completely control my dreams. If I was in danger, I would no longer wake myself, but I would make the danger disappear or possibly make up something to help fight the danger. Around age 10 I created my favorite type of dreams, underwater dreaming. Because I was aware that I was dreaming and that I could not possibly drown in made up water, I was able to freely breath in my dreams. Underwater dreams were very similar to flying dreams and just as enjoyable if not more enjoyable. Also around age 10, I started to have what I called dream stories. I was able to dream one night and continue that same dream the next night or perhaps continue it in a couple weeks. I was able to continue stories and certain dreams that I enjoyed by intently thinking only of that dream. I was my prime for dreaming up until the age of 15.

At the age of 15 my life became more and more stressful due to high school and the roller coaster that makes up most teenagers' emotions. Due to all of this stress I started to forget the dreams I had just had. Dreams that I was completely aware of and I was able to control were all lost when I woke up. Every so often I would have a dream that I could remember but those dreams were always the most lucid I could recall. Everything in the dreams were mostly realistic (unlike the majority of my dreams) and much more clear cut (unlike the majority of my confusing dreams). Even though it seemed like I lost my ability to remember my lucid dreams, I never stopped enjoying dreaming.

Now at the age of 19 my life is still very stressful because I am attempting to dual-major in engineering. School is stressful and the work is tasking. I have never been more stressed in my life and now I believe my dreams are suffering because of it. Though I have not had a nightmare in some time, I do have depressing dreams (compared to my usual dreams). I cannot explain most of my dreams for they are pretty awkward in themselves. I would say about 90% of my dreams are in third person, and about 75% of dreams I am not myself (of the 75%, 50% of the time I am another person all together, male or female, but the other half of the time I am myself, but as a male). I have not come across a reasoning for me becoming someone of the opposite gender (so if you could tell me, that would be awesome). My only reasoning that could possibly come close it that I was a tomboy from ages 8-13 (dressing in boys clothes), I have always had male friends instead of female, and I still consider myself a tomboy mentally.

Dream Theme

I have a single characteristic in all of my recent dreams. I can't say how long this has been going on, but I would guess around three years now. The lights simply won't turn on. Every single time I am in a building and it is dark. I try to find the light switch, but when I do, it never works. At first when I started having these dreams, it was quite scary. I couldn't see anything that was happening and no matter how hard I tried to control the dream and making light, I always failed. Now these dark dreams have just become a pain in the butt. Half the time I don't even try light switches because I know they won't work. Many times a light switch is actually my trigger for knowing I am in a dream. If I do try a light switch my usual reaction is "Really? Are you going to do this to me again? When will you just turn on the lights?" It is really quite a hassle, but I do not know how to fix it. However, just the other night, I had a dream that I was able to turn on the lights! Oh you can not believe how happy I was to just be able to turn on the lights in my dreams. I think it was because it was not actually a light switch, but it was a motion detector light (as in I waved my hand in front of a motion detector and lights came on). Since the other night, I have not been able to replicate the experience though. Lights in my dreams will still not turn on and I do not know why.

Questions

1) Is there truly a way to interpret dreams? Or is every meaning different depending on the person? (For example, underwater dreams are sometimes interpreted as something troubling you and is often a nightmare resulting in downing. However, I really enjoy underwater dreams and are one of my favorites.)

2) Have you had something in your dream that is recurring and you cannot control? (My example is how I cannot turn on lights in my dreams but I am able to control other things.) And if you learned how to control it, do you have any tips for me?