Bee and Hornet Nightmares

[indescribable]

Okay, so last summer (2006) I got stung by an actual bee for the first time in my life. Then this summer I began to get afraid of walking barefoot outside because of all the bees and hornets that live around my house. Very soon after July 2nd, I began to get nightmares about being chased and stung by swarms of (and occasionally solitary) bees. These dreams became more and more frequent until now I am having at least one of these dreams almost every other night. Normally I wouldn't care, I mean, it's just a dream. But here's the thing, in almost all of my dreams I feel real pain, even after I wake up though only for a few moments. And even though I am starting to become lucid in most of these nightmares (because of recognizing the bees and hornets), I can't seem to control ANYTHING anymore. It's very difficult and I can only make tiny little changes. I would like to know how I can make these dreams stop and / or regain control of my dreams. I have tried almost everything I can think of. Thanks in advance for any help.

[Chris182t]

If you can gain enough control in your dreams to make descisions, then face them head on, whilst remembering that this is only a dream and nothing in it can hurt you. This should stop the nightmares for good

[mark]

Oh my god man!! I have the biggest phobia of bees and wasps and stuff. I litreally run if I get within a few meters of them. I know the feeling you talk about in dreams they are scary as hell....and yeah it really does hurt. I cant say the pain carries over into real life thats bad man I feel for you there like

[Redrivertears]

Hey there, The reason the stings hurt is because your mind is expecting them too. Most likely when you get stung in the dream you're focussing your attention on it and your mind creates the corresponding sensations based on the association it has learned. In lucid dreams however, you can overwrite this automatic reflex. In my dreams I tend to get shot at from time to time. Originally I would just decide that shooting me wouldn't hurt me, but I'd still be focussing my attention on the getting shot while it happened (trying to 'not feel anything'). This worked to some extend but there was still a dull pain quite often. Later on as I began to understand my dreams better, I learned it was better to simply ignore the shots altogether, and I felt no more pain. Armed with this knowledge, I would agree with Chris and advise you to try and confront your fear, turn towards the bees, ignore their stings, and just try and remain calm. The thing with fear is that it is often at it's strongest when we try to get away from it. Confronting the object of your fear and allowing yourself to just feel the fear and experiencing it often makes it fade away very quickly. Additionally, I tend to think this sort of 'facing your fear' in lucid dreams is psychologically very helpful. I did it once for an specific type of anxiety dream that kept reoccuring, and after having succesfully confronted the object of my fear, I never ever had the dream again. Just my 2 cents, -Redrivertears-

[M45t3r]

Hi I agree with Redrivertears, if you expect to feel pain, then you will feel it, in one of my lucid dreams i got shot in the back of my head, i felt warm in that place, but i didn't felt the pain because i wasn't concentraiting(?) on it. I felt bullet though ;P And my friend had one lucid dream where he was fighting with american soldiers (battlefield 2 game) and then he realised that theres too much of them soo he started to run ! american soldiers started to shoot at him, bullets were flying above his head, and suddenly he concentrated on his leg and thought that he will be shot in that place. And guess what ? after few seconds he was shot in that place and felt extreme pain, even when he woke up :] Soo my advise is to not to concentrate on pain, or you could try to shout very loud, and from your heart to those bees to leave you alone ! this helped very much

[indescribable]

Thanks for the replies and I will try to follow your advice. The only problem with that is also connected to my control problems. Every time I focus on changing something or try to focus my mind on something other than pain, there are little voices in the back of my head telling me that it's possible this wont work or what if this happens anyway? How can I learn to completely focus on what I want?

[Redrivertears]

Well, in this case very little control is required. The only thing you need to control is your own reaction. You control what you pay reaction to, and what not, what you flee from, and what you simply accept. On a more broad sense, dream control is a tricky subject (it's not for nothing is has an entire category on this forum dedicated to it). Basically, with any attempt at dreamcontrol, you have various unconscious impulses all warring with one another, and then your consciousness again adding its own layer. Control is strongly connected to expectation, belief, fear and desire, etc.., and often these things are in conflict with one another. For instance, an attempt to fly might be influeced by your desire to feel freedom and your belief that this is a dream and it can be done, but at the same time it can be negatively influenced by yours of condition that such a thing is impossible (expectation) because it is impossible in waking life, and your fear of losing control mid flight and crashing to the earth. Whether you finally manage to lift off and how much control you have is dependant on all these things. People create tricks and techniques for dreamcontrol and I'd strongly recommend you to browse through the forum category for dream control for many good tips. In the end though, you have in my opinion only two options open to you for better dreamcontrol. The first is to strengthen your belief and expectation (this is what most techniques and tricks focus on), and the second is through introspection and trying to figure out what's blocking you. Combine both, and you'll likely see your control over a particular situation begin to increase. Hope that helps, -Redrivertears-

[Hazel]

I had a dream where I WAS a bee one time, but more like a cartoon bee. Anyway, to get rid of your bee dreams, you must stop being scared of bees. Don't be afraid to go barefoot, just say to yourself, "If they sting me, so what? I can handle it." (Unless, of course, you're alergic.) Don't worry and fret about it so much, I know bee stings hurt, but the pain isn't unbearable. (I hope this helps.)