What about nightmares?

[Mystic Seeker]

Are nightmares the shadow self? or could they be memories of past lives from our subconscious mind? I have had nightmares my entire life off and on since a very small child up to the present day. Some are very reoccurring, some are random, all are violent and very disturbing. I've done some dream interpretation and its always very metaphoric symbols and just certain things in the dream represent something else. As I continue my spiritual growth I want to work on my shadow and I'm curious if anyone has any information other than Jung and Freud regarding this topic.  

Edited October 13, 2023 by Mystic Seeker

[Buck Edwards]

See my journals regarding this topic. Wealth of information in there. I talk about nightmares. Just yesterday I had one. It was a doorway into my subconscious and I also think a part of it is related to my past life. I have karmic burdens and debts and I made some karmic connections in this lifetime in the romantic sense that have caused me great personal injury and harm. I'm trying to get closure on that since a year now. Also I'm dealing with demons, psychic attacks, negativity. 

Leo talked about psychic attacks. I don't remember the post. He was talking about negaity entity removal and things like that. 

These things are disturbing, violent, rapey. I get very disturbing nightmarez due to pedophile abuse. I don't know if it's present or past. 

They unravel during sleep rem. 

Also if you are stuck in hung mode where you can't find karmic closure in this birth. Read about reincarnation. 

It means unfinished business. 

I'm trying to resolve my karma but this is not an easy path. I recommend self exploring in zen state. 

Sorry for the typos. 

[Mystic Seeker]

@Buck Edwards Thank you, I will check out your journals. Leo talks a lot about God wanting to experience everything and that we as God need to realize there is no such thing as good or bad. But these dreams feel bad and if it is memories from my past life, the idea of working through that or closing that karma is daunting. I wouldn't know where to begin to accept this, its hard enough for me to try to accept the idea that everything in this life/reality is love and God, even the murderers and rapist and Hitler. 

[Hojo]

A good dream is a gift from God

A nightmare is a gift from satan 

In quran they say ignore bad dreams and remeber good ones

Edited October 14, 2023 by Hojo

[Mystic Seeker]

@Hojo thank you for your perspective. I appreciate all perspectives even though I do not know much about the Quran, I am open to all opinions. 

[Jordan]

I recently watched an interview with Andrew Huberman and he seemed to think nightmares are like your body's way of giving you exposure therapy to your traumas. If you watch at around the 20 min mark for a few min he gives his view on nightmares. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKyyF9MQXn4&t=2444s

I don't have much info on shadow work but I would start with doing contemplation and meditation on your fears to try to get to know how they work. 

[Tomek6]

Could you write the most common story of your nightmares? As much details as you can

[Hojo]

@Mystic Seeker i dont know either i was just looking up keywords in the quran and saw that here is the jist of what it says

If one sees a dream which one does not like, one should spit on one's left side and seek the refuge of Allah from the satan; it will not do one any harm, and one should not disclose it to anyone and if one sees a good vision one should feel pleased but should not disclose it to anyone but whom one loves.

[Mystic Seeker]

@Tomek6 see hojo post with some advice from the Quran, states not to disclose the dream to anyone, I feel that is good advice. Jesus as well with  some of his work would say ''Tell No one". Of course people did listen and told everyone. 

[Tomek6]

@Mystic Seeker I don't think this is a good advice. Dream is a translation of multidimensional fields that project our being here. There are many powerful informations if someone can read it. And if one do, then he can at least try to solve the real cause of the problem, that no healer or doctor could see.

[Osaid]

Nightmares tend to be a manifestation of unresolved worries and thought loops from the waking state. Your dreams cycle through and process all the different thoughts and worries and scenarios you have during the day, and also many of the thoughts that you suppress. In the dream state, there is no ego to prevent thoughts from manifesting. The strength of the dreams and how often they occur can be greatly amplified through bad or interrupted sleep quality. If you enter a deep and peaceful sleep, you won't get much dreams.

Just as an example, if there is a certain thought which occurs to you during the day which creates a feeling of impending doom or something of that sort, and you find yourself encountering it often, this can trigger your dreams to carry a similar emotional sensation. 

[Mystic Seeker]

@Osaid interestingly I do sleep well and pretty sound throughout the night. The nightmares do not wake me up, they continue with quite a long story, which when I do wake up in the morning I write down as much as I can remember. Curiously, these dreams have seemed to surface again at this time in my life when I have been working on lucid dreaming. I want to realize I am dreaming and confront these traumas or suppressed feelings that are surfacing in my sleep state. I started trying lucid dreaming however just before the nightmares started and I’m thinking maybe this is happening for a reason. So that I can confront the issues. I still have not awoken in these nightmares to know that it is a dream while I’m in the dream. 

[Osaid]

4 minutes ago, Mystic Seeker said:

Curiously, these dreams have seemed to surface again at this time in my life when I have been working on lucid dreaming.

Does "working on lucid dreaming" involve a change in sleep schedule? I would consider that interrupted sleep. I remember I was able to enter sleep paralysis with about 90% accuracy just by following a certain sleep schedule.

4 minutes ago, Mystic Seeker said:

I still have not awoken in these nightmares to know that it is a dream while I’m in the dream. 

I think it will be very hard to work on issues while you're dreaming non-lucidly. Like, you're not gonna do shadow work while in the dream. That's gonna come from waking up and analyzing the dream, and then working on yourself from that waking state. That's what I think at least. I also think that is the simplest way to do it. Although you might be able to do something with lucid dreaming, but I don't have much experience in that.

Edited October 16, 2023 by Osaid

[Mystic Seeker]

@Osaid by working on lucid dreaming I just mean I meditate before sleep with the intention to lucid dream. 
 

You are probably correct that the simplest way would be to analyze the dream from the waking state. It’s just odd that the stuff I’m dreaming is so far from how I think/live/be in my waking state. So I don’t know what the root cause is. I was maybe 3 years old when this started and the dreams then were crazy, reoccurring and nothing my 3 year old mind would even know how to analyze. Maybe I’m reaching but I just feel there’s something more to it. 
obviously now as an adult I can say maybe feelings from waking state, suppressed or playing out…it’s just not clear to me where it’s coming from. 

[Schizophonia]

On 13/10/2023 at 10:16 PM, Buck Edwards said:

See my journals regarding this topic. Wealth of information in there. I talk about nightmares. Just yesterday I had one. It was a doorway into my subconscious and I also think a part of it is related to my past life. I have karmic burdens and debts and I made some karmic connections in this lifetime in the romantic sense that have caused me great personal injury and harm. I'm trying to get closure on that since a year now. Also I'm dealing with demons, psychic attacks, negativity. 

Leo talked about psychic attacks. I don't remember the post. He was talking about negaity entity removal and things like that. 

These things are disturbing, violent, rapey. I get very disturbing nightmarez due to pedophile abuse. I don't know if it's present or past. 

They unravel during sleep rem. 

Also if you are stuck in hung mode where you can't find karmic closure in this birth. Read about reincarnation. 

It means unfinished business. 

I'm trying to resolve my karma but this is not an easy path. I recommend self exploring in zen state. 

Sorry for the typos. 

Are you on medication?
Certain medications can cause nightmares

[Rafael Thundercat]

On 13/10/2023 at 9:40 PM, Mystic Seeker said:

@Buck Edwards Thank you, I will check out your journals. Leo talks a lot about God wanting to experience everything and that we as God need to realize there is no such thing as good or bad. But these dreams feel bad and if it is memories from my past life, the idea of working through that or closing that karma is daunting. I wouldn't know where to begin to accept this, its hard enough for me to try to accept the idea that everything in this life/reality is love and God, even the murderers and rapist and Hitler. 

You can solve that with good diet and or cleaning yourself from gut parasites. Never ever you noticed that your diet affect your current conscious state? So if this is true to daily life why do you think diet dont affect your nigth too. 

A more Sattva Diet will help a lot. Plus observing your daily reactions, emotions and relationships with men,women,money and everything. Somehow during the day we plant the seeds that will sprout at nigth. But of course  even doing everything, sometimes nigthmares will come, better to study them. We are all in the study of dreams anyway, day and nigth.

[Mystic Seeker]

@Schizophonia Just recently a muscle relaxer for back pain, I am aware that could have an impact. This has happened without any medication in my life as well though.

[Schizophonia]

14 hours ago, Mystic Seeker said:

@Schizophonia Just recently a muscle relaxer for back pain, I am aware that could have an impact. This has happened without any medication in my life as well though.

I tried clomid and it gave me vivid nightmares.
People high in catecholamines are more likely to have nightmares.
That's all I know.

[Schizophonia]

I expected to have insomnia again but in fact I was able to fall asleep for a few hours, I had the worst nightmares ever.

The strongest image I remember was a human body without legs, shaped like bones/tendons like in a scanner, and so the trunk consisted of a monstrous face reveling (but with a look mechanical, not sadistic, oddly enough) of a large, very fresh and bloody piece of meat from a mercilessly killed animal. I don't remember the other parts of the dream, but it revolved around the terrifying possibility of being tortured/shredded to death in the worst possible pain.

I also dreamed that I was being robbed and that I had to defend my house with two guns that I didn't know how to work.

 

i hate my brain 

[at_anchor]

My nightmares are usually about real people in my life and events. Kind of like visions of the future, but I wouldn't say that because yeah. I don't remember it all.