Thread: Is this normal?

Hey everyone, I'm new to this site but have recently become fascinated with lucid dreaming.
I've always been a vivid dreamer, and had many lucid dreams without knowing what they were or that they were out of the ordinary at all. I'm hoping to hone my techniques and truly learn to appreciate it from now on.

What I wanted to ask though, is do many people have - well I guess I would describe it as a separate dream memory? I have deja vu a lot within dreams, as well as a new but intertwined set of memories within my dreams. I will visit locations in dreams I have been to in other dreams, or feel I have been to before, and I will recall what I did in these places. (often these are locations that don't exist in waking life or that I've never been too). Likewise I will meet dream people with whom I already have well established relationships, memories of things we have done together (which I don't recall the dream the events happened in) and memories of shared moments I have when I've past dreamed of them.

Its like I am me, but more than me within my dream life. Everything in my waking life is carried over, then merged with another me, who has experienced a whole other life...but not too unlike mine.

I don't know if any of this makes sense. I'd just like to hear about similar experiences.

Hey there, first of all, welcome to Dream Views! Have you checked out the tutorials? They will help alot with having more Lucid Dreams. http://dreamviews.com/community/showthread.php?t=69883

As for the dream memory thing, its is debatable. Some people believe that your dream will create a history for itself, while others believe that you have been there before in old dreams. I think they are from a history that occurred in old dreams. I have a house that I always go to that is my home in the dream world. I also swear I have gone to dream locations that I used to go to when I was a kid. I recall the older dreams and feel all nostalgic about being there again. It depends on the dream I suppose. This is why having a dream journal is so helpful. You can go back to old dreams and realize that you met the dream person before

Welcome to DV, Shortcake

Originally Posted by strawberry_shortcake

What I wanted to ask though, is do many people have - well I guess I would describe it as a separate dream memory? I have deja vu a lot within dreams, as well as a new but intertwined set of memories within my dreams. I will visit locations in dreams I have been to in other dreams, or feel I have been to before, and I will recall what I did in these places. (often these are locations that don't exist in waking life or that I've never been too). Likewise I will meet dream people with whom I already have well established relationships, memories of things we have done together (which I don't recall the dream the events happened in) and memories of shared moments I have when I've past dreamed of them.

I have this on a somewhat regular basis, maybe once or twice a week or every two weeks. I get the feeling that I've gone through said situation before and thus am able to steer it in a particular direction if I don't like where it's going. I've repeated a few scenes in dreams as well, but they ended up different both times. I don't think it's strange, as you're more open to ideas that are out of the ordinary. Perhaps the dream is already sort of mapped out and we become aware of what's going to happen. I don't know. This is the first I've considered of that option

As far as being familiar with other dream characters, I suppose it's along the same line. You know why you're there and what the other people are doing there and you make logical assumptions about the (hypothetical) past. It's somewhat a bit of a reflection of real life in that when we see people, we do assume certain things until we learn more about them, whether we're aware of it or not. If someone reminds you of a friend you used to have, it's wouldn't be unusual to assume that they had a similar past as your friend.

My dreams seem to have a lot of characters but there are few with whom I've felt a real connection. I can't think of them right now, but I know there have been a few. I tend to focus more on the events than on the environment.

I hope this made sense and I'd be happy to think more on this if you have further questions. If you need anything in general, feel free to ask. We at DV are here to serve

(Edit)

Originally Posted by strawberry_shortcake

What I wanted to ask though, is do many people have - well I guess I would describe it as a separate dream memory? I have deja vu a lot within dreams, as well as a new but intertwined set of memories within my dreams. I will visit locations in dreams I have been to in other dreams, or feel I have been to before, and I will recall what I did in these places. (often these are locations that don't exist in waking life or that I've never been too). Likewise I will meet dream people with whom I already have well established relationships, memories of things we have done together (which I don't recall the dream the events happened in) and memories of shared moments I have when I've past dreamed of them.

Its like I am me, but more than me within my dream life. Everything in my waking life is carried over, then merged with another me, who has experienced a whole other life...but not too unlike mine.

I don't know if any of this makes sense. I'd just like to hear about similar experiences.

Hello "Strawberry Shortcake", let me first say I just stumbled across this site and well entire concept just now in the last hour or two. I mean the whole idea of actually self-inducing lucid dreams. I had a few very notable and quite pleasant experiences of lucid deaming during childhood and adolescence but nothing since. I'm 47 now btw. I'm gonna take my notebook and pen upstairs to bed in an hour or so as a matter of fact and see what happens.

Anyway onto your question. Yes I think I've had similar experiences and do on occasion dream quite vividly of them. In some of these dreams I do remember feeling as though I'm going through the next episode of a story. Which has been picked up from a previous dream. Sometimes I get the feeling of "haven't I seen this episode before?" too. Also I get the feeling when I'm actually dreaming these dreams and also (of course) upon awakening that I've picked up on a thread of something that I dreamed about months or even years ago.

That's my own intuition on how it works for me anyway. That when I go to sleep this wonderful highly imaginative little bit of my brain goes to work and tells me these strange but nearly always nice and sometimes even entertaining tales. Once or twice I've woken up and even directed a silent word of congratulation at the sheer creativity of this story-teller or whatever it is that we all have sway over us when we go to sleep.

As they say hope this helps!
molfluon

Thanks for all your responses, this has given me a lot to think about