I taught myself to lucid dream at a very young age, and used it to beat my nightmares
When i was very young, possibly around the age of 10, i used to have a reccuring nightmare.
Ever night for what must have been a year i would have the exact same nightmare that i still remember perfectly to this day.
In the nightmare, i would be in a dark forest surrounded by dead trees.
Something in the distance would start to chase me, whatever it was wanted to kill me. So id start to run, through the trees as fast as i could.
The trees would begin to come alive and reach out towards me, crowing glaws and ripping at me as i ran bye.
Eventually I got to an opening in the forest, around the size of a football field, and in the middle of the opening was a mantion with a dark red door.
I would run to the mantion to escape the things that were chasing me.
The doors were open so i would run inside and slam it shut behind me, locking it.
The inside of the mantion looked clean and warm, not what you would expect to see in a nightmare.
To my right would be an elevator and a door leading to stairs.
To my left would be a large room, with an open fireplace, where an old man and a woman would sit and talk.
I would always walk to them and tell them about the things that had chased me.
They would comfort me and tell me i would be safe to stay with them, so long as i did not go to the third floor.
After sitting and talking to the man and the woman i would want to go to sleep, so the man would tell me to go to the second floor where i could pick a room to sleep in.
Usually i would go straight to the elevator and press the button to go to the second floor, but the elevator would allways go to the third floor and stop working so that i couldnt go back down.
There were no doors leading to the stairs so i was forced to remain on the third floor.
Sometimes, instead of taking the elevator, i would take the stairs. In this case as i walked up the stairs, where the first floor should have been i arrived at the third floor. From there wether i walked up or down it would allways lead to the third floor again.
Once i had been stuck on the third floor i would slowly start to walk down the corridor, which was very narrow, with doors running down either side of me.
As i got about half way down the corridor, a man would open one of the doors and lean out.
He would hurriedly whisper to me
"what are you doing? Its dangerous here! Come into the room before its too late!"
I would run into his room, and look at the blank emptyness inside.
I turned round to look at the man who rushed me in, but as i turned the man would change, growing claws and becoming more of a monster than a man.
He would push his now clawed hands through my stomach and i would wake up terrified.
After having this nightmate, night after night for what i remember as months, I eventually started taking control over my actions within the dreams.
Id never before heard of lucid dreaming.
Instead of going in the elevator or going up the stairs i would spend the time of my dream sat with the man and the woman, talking all night until i wake up.
Again after some time, the dream started to change. Things would happen that forced me to go to the third floor so that despite my efforts the dream would end the same.
The most common scenario would be my older sister appearing in the dream with me, and she would allways go to the third floor.
I would run after her to try and save her, but the man would always turn into the creature and kill my sister, and then stab me.
One night id had enough, and when i went after my sister i pretended not to know about the man so that he would try and trick me like he did when i first had the dreams.
As i walked into the room i had a knife in my hand, i dont know where i got it from, but i had it hid up my sleeve.
I turned round quickly and before the cdreature could stab me, i shoved the knife into its chest.
I seem to remember the dream falling apart, seeping away like the clocks in a Salvador Dali painting though i cant say for certain wether this realy happened or my mind has just made it up over the years since it happened.
After that night when i stabbed the man i never had the nightmare again.
Im now 17, and i was looking to see if anyone else had been through a similar experience and discovered Lucid Dreaming.
I realy want to get back that feeling of having control in my dream but i never realy remember my dreams.
Since iv been reading about Lucid Dreaming iv got a dream journal and have started dreaming almost every night.
I relay hope that i manage to get control of my dreams again.
Similar experience? Yes, almost exactly...
I know this is an old thread but i had to reply because your story is very creepily similar to mine.
So i too had a reoccuring nightmare that would haunt me night after night, though i think i was a bit younger than 10 at the time. It too was in a dark forest, except the trees where in autumn colors and most of the leaves had fallen off. From what i remember i would start out in a clearing just like the one you described (maybe a bit smaller) and there stood an old man and an old woman. I think i identified them as my grandparents. One of them would beckon me to hug them, with all smiles and everything. I would and then they would turn evil with big teeth and claws and stab me in the back. Sometimes i would escape, running through the woods as the trees grabbed at me tripping me and grasping at me like your forest.
Well i guess one night i had enough because when they told me to go hug them i screamed "NO!" and the nightmare melted away never to occur again. Im 17 as well and i've never had a nightmare since.
I just found it so odd that there were so many similarities...
