Fortunately, I don’t often experience nightmares. Maybe one or two a year. When I do have a nightmare its frightening but the fear–though intense–is very basic and familiar. The other night I had a dream (nightmare?) which was very different and considerably more disturbing. (Actually I’ve had two or three of these types of dreams over the last few years.) It wasn’t fear in the dream it was some type of very morbid, twisted, demented even, evil feeling or vibe. Its really hard to put it into words. So, instead of waking up from a run-of-the-mill nightmare and taking a deep breath and shaking it off, there was a distinct ‘evil’ feeling that I fealt from the dream upon waking. This is I think the best I can describe it right now, so if this sounds like enough of a fit to someone else’s experience, please share your thoughts or refer me to some info. Thanks.
First, interpreting dreams is a very iffy business, fraught with charlatans. Despite what Freudians say, there is no manual that gives cut-and-dried definitions of what objects in dreams mean. (I am not a psychologist, but I’ve long been interested in dreams, and this interest has lead to some study and some verification that dreams are often your mind recounting recent events in your life. These can include wishes and fears, in my experience.)
It would help if you were more specific about what you mean by “evil.” Do you mean that you felt evil? That you felt like doing something “bad”? Or did you have a feeling that there was evil around you?
What other word could you use to describe this evil? Danger or doom? Anger? Violence? Dread?
First, I’m with Andy; are there any other discriptors you can use that could help us out?
Second, this might be a shot in the dark, but have you noticed that these dreams occur at a certain time in your life? For example, have they occured more when you were feeling as if…say…you were suspsicious of the motives of someone close to you? Or when you were unsure as to how an important event in someone else’s control would turn out?
I have a reoccuring dream that doesn’t mean much of anything. (Actually a lot of people have this dream, and usually it indicates the same thing, I’ve found). I’ve had it probably six times, maybe more…and sometimes when there is a big change (moving, starting to drive, ending/beginning a relationship), I’ll have it. The events/location/people in it are always different, but the aspect that’s the same is this: I dream my teeth fall out…sometimes I pick them out, sometimes they wiggle loose in food, and sometimes they crumble or come out in chunks. It’s really quite disgusting.
I have a couple other reoccuring dreams, and the process most helpful to me when I tried to interpret them was to look at what was going on in my life that would make me feel the way I felt in my dream. With the teeth thing, I felt terrified. I didn’t know what was going to happen, why it was happening, if it was going to stop…what had caused it, etc. These were the same sorts of feelings I’d have during the various changes.
If I were you, I’d try to see if there is any such parallelism with your own dreams. Nobody knows you better than yourself, and all that.
Your brain is rehearsing feelings of dread. You woke up during such an exercise. That’s all to it…
unless, there are dreadful things happening in your life that’s causing dread to be rehearsed…
in that case, deal with that dreadful thing.
Peace.
Well, scratch it, then.
You are going to meet a monkey on a bicycle.
He will give you the name of your future spouse.
It has been foretold.
Either that or you’re eating too much cheese before bedtime.
I don’t believe you were actually dreaming.
I think you were watching the evening news on TV, and then, when the lottery drawing came on, you thought that you “woke up”.
I can’t interpret, but I have experienced the same. A dream that is somehow not a dream - you can even be conscious that you’re dreaming - but still terrified. And when you wake, the fear and the terror lasts for a while. I’ve only had this about twice.
The Catholic Church (though I am not a Catholic) recognises something called demonic oppression:
I experienced my dreams while I was with someone who (in my more religious moments) I quite strongly believe was suffering from demonic oppression. He wasn’t into the occult, and wasn’t a “fanciful” type of person. This sounds odd, but often I used to challenge or fight this force oppressing him (which may indeed have had a psychological, not a spiritual - or even both - explanation) that I would win in the end. During this time I had the two strange and terrible dreams. I don’t think he has had any of the dreams or oppressive moments since.
Who knows? Maybe I fought something off. Maybe it was just love and support helping someone overcome their own (psychological) demons.
Suggesting demonic possession/oppression would be funny if it weren’t so nasty, blinkered, backward and ignorant.
Nice, istara, nice.
I absolutely love Sylvia Browne’s interpretation of dreams, just read her ‘Book of Dreams’ and began my own dream diary a couple weeks ago, truly fascinating reading (the book and my dreams, both)
While I highly reccommend checking that book out at the library over my vague memory, I’ll take a little stab at your dream…
Many, if not all ‘nightmares’ can be clasified as “Release Dreams”
“release dreams are our way of ‘emotionally exhaling’ and working out some of our fears, frustrations, stress and anger during the night so that we don’t have to carry the whole burden of them during the day.”
“Usually a jumble of chaotic images, turbulant, negative… If it’s a recurring dream, you can rewrite a happy ending.”
The teeth falling out dreams are nearly always the result of having said something to someone that you wish you hadn’t or could have been more tactfull, (it’s subconscious, you may not have a clue in your conciouse mind that you’re spoken words hurt others)
I dreamt that there was an omnipotent being who pulled the teeth, tweaked the nipples, and, kicked the shins, of every poster who made a bold and brazen unsupported assertion in GQ.
What could that mean?
I too have a deep interest in dreaming (and in particular, lucid dreaming). I don’t believe one smidgeon in dream interpretation. At least, not to the point that it means anything interesting. Your dream isn’t going to reveal anything you don’t already know/feel.
Avoid people who claim to be able to interpret your dreams, it is very unlikely. Dreams are highly personal and not open to general translation by someone who does not know you intimately. Imagery for you does not mean the same is it would for me. Your best bet is to explore the details and try to determine how they could relate to your personal experience, its not the kind of thing someone else can do for you.
Answer this: do you have allergies or hay fever?
If so, blocked sinuses may be causing you difficulty in breathing, & this may cause you distress.
???
I beg your pardon?
If you read my post - you will see I am just as open to interpreting it as psychological or paranormal. I really am undecided.
What they flying fuck are you trying to suggest? That I am nasty, blinkered, backward and ignorant for linking to a particular religious doctrine?
The Great Unwashed - I just noticed your other two posts on this thread are both flippant and insulting.
Why in the name of fuck are you posting here if you have nothing to offer and don’t take the subject of the OP seriously? You’re not being helpful, frankly, you’re displaying jerkish behaviour. In fact, the criticism in your above post IMO near if not cross the line towards personal insults, which are not permitted in GQ.
It’s called Sleep Paralysis, or, it could be simply dreaming bad feelings. Just like your mind will rehearse visual images in dreams, it also rehearses feelings, which can seem as ‘real’ as a visual dream you thought was ‘real’ until you finally woke up.
Oh, man, this is wrong in so many ways, it’s hard to know where to start.
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You linked to a page of links, not to the text itself.
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The text you quote has nothing to do with Catholic theology of demonic possession. You’re quoting Fundamentalist Christian theology.
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The Catholic Church has no teaching on demonic oppression. The quote mentions Act 10:38 (“how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and power, and how he went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.” NIV). That’s clearly a reference to Jesus’ exorcisms of demonic possessions. This fundamentalist invention of ‘oppression’ is not scriptural at all, by the standards of mainline Christian scripture scholars. This site sneaks in obsession (and not oppression) into the text without verifying it with a citation. A search of The Catechism of the Catholic Church under ‘obsession,’ ‘oppression,’ and ‘demonic’ will show that the only demonic activity is ‘possession.’ (I’ve ranted before on the lack of reliability of “religioustolerance.org.”)
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The Catholic teaching of demonic possession is that it will only acknowledge possession if every other natural cause is excluded from explaining supernatural signs of possession. Feeling icky when you wake up, or experiencing sleep paralysis will not get a Catholic exorcist to your door, let alone return your calls.
Occam and I say go with the latter.
Peace.
I only exist in the White Queen’s dream.
Thanks for all your replies.
The Great Unwashed and istara, knock if off. You’re free to disagree with each other, but if you can’t be civil to each other, stay out of this forum.
I’m not sure if there is a factual answer to this question but there are some good factual responses, so I’ll leave it here for now.
bibliophage
moderator GQ
my sister used to have dreams that meant things all the time… normally bad things. sometimes they’d be literal and sometimes not… about things from cows getting loose near our house to her boyfriend getting kicked out of his house to one of her best friends getting in a nearly fatal car accident (the last one was symbolic.) ever since she had a baby, the dreams stopped. maybe it was the drugs, but i seriously believe these dreams were real.
Ya see? This is what sucks about manhattan resigning. He would have kicked 'em both in the nuts, and probably sent the thread to The Pit for good measure.
Umm, regarding the OP…I dunno, was there any specific imagery, or just a feeling of dread? Been there, done that, means nothing likely. I don’t get disturbed by nightmares, either. Mostly.