“Once before, Chuang-Tzu dreamt of being a butterfly, gaily butterflying and himself embodied in this sense of purpose! He knew nothing of Chuang-Tzu. Suddenly awakening, he then is rooted in Chuang-Tzu. He doesn’t know if Chuang-Tzu dreamt being a butterfly or a butterfly is dreaming being Chuang-Tzu — though there must be a difference. This is called ‘things change.’” — Chuang-Tzu
Thank you for that word, ubiety, I definitely get that, lots of architecture, and streets, buildings all places I have never seen or been, also lots of people I’ve no memory of. I lost my mum couple years ago and have had some lovely dreams, one just recently and in the dream I was aware as the meeting (group with a mission) was ending that she was going again and I told her all the good stuff. She is never upset and I only filled with love. Being able to see her so vividly is such a consolation.
Thank you for sharing your story. I am glad that you are getting comfort from those dreams.
And yeah, the place ones are really cool. They also always feel a little weird, though. Sometimes, on some level, I am aware that it is a dream and I get this weird feeling that is hard to describe… Almost like a conversation: "Is this place real? Have I been here before IRL? No." "But it IS real, because I keep coming back here."
A friend tried to get me to do it once. I was in Scotland at the time, and the "destination" was my friend's house here in the States.
I saw my friend's room, but the furniture was rearranged in a way different from how I had last seen it. The bed was set up in front of the closet, which makes no sense (at least in terms of conventional interior design). And yet when I spoke with my friend, he told me that he had indeed rearranged his room in just that way.
Like you, I often dream of places. Sometimes I would have to say that I’m dreaming of architectural surroundings: a house that goes on and on, one room after the next, often with a piano in every room. My extra special dreams have background music, like the soundtrack of a big screen romance.
The most amazing dream experience I’ve had was a recurring dream: I was in school, probably college level, and I had signed up for a class that I never attended. I kept thinking that I should go to the registrar and drop the class; but then I would think maybe I could get caught up if I would just look at the textbook, and maybe actually go to the class. The dream would end and I would still be in the quandary of trying to catch up vs dropping the class. I had the same dream for weeks, maybe months, not every night, but repeatedly. As time went on, in the dream the semester was progressing—it was getting closer to the deadline for dropping the class. Finally, I had a dream in which I went to the registrar and dropped the class. That was the last dream in the series. I have no explanation for what stimulated the series of dreams, or why/how I managed to end it—though I do believe I had some agency in bringing the unconscious dilemma to a conclusion.
I have a wild and fun dream life, mostly. I have a few recurring scary ones, a weird house in particular that is eerie AF! I get creeped out thinking about it in the day. I too have lots of flirtatious and sometimes very sexual dreams which I really like. I have blown many a chance in the dream world with amazing beings because I didn't want to be cheating on my wife!! Guess that's good, I never have cheated on her, doesn't really cross the mind, except in dreams. I used to wait tables a lot, I still have dreams on that usually centered on this restaurant on an outdoor mall i worked at in C'ville, Virginia. Those are almost feverish like having to walk two miles to get someone's wine as my section is over full and people are looking for me, or I don't have any pants on and can't find them. Lots of family dreams, was raised by a narcissist mother who is now lorded over by a narcissist sister. Yikes. I've finally been able to tell them all i needed in dreams. Many doomsday adventure dreams, skies full of aliens and me saying shit like "I told you so!" lol. The science explanations, for me, of dreams, and their talk of chemicals and all that seem like utter horse crap really. They really don't have any clue, as with most things in my humble opinion. All animals dream, wonder if the plants have their version. It's a wild world! I look forward to sleeping and dreaming every night. Oooooh, some sexy lady was trying to get me last night but, once again, i was reluctant and loyal. I gotta' learn to break that habit! Cheers!
What a great dream-life! Thank you for the sharing!
My subconscious usually solves the problem in the sex dreams by making me single. It generally seems like I am younger in those dreams. Or it is my wife in the dream. But yeah, I do very occasionally have a dream in which I am married but the prospective woman is not my wife. Decisions, decisions…
I like that your subconscious helps you like that!! And I've certainly gone beyond the line in dreams, I'm glad I have!! lol. What fun. My wife tells me her dreams and I love to hear them, sexual or not. It's wild to chat about. I'm trying to get better about just going for it in the dreams! and not just in that way... but yeah... There are some cool techniques to control yourself in your dreams but they take perseverence, as with all arts...
ten four! sometimes i ask to get shown things before going to bed with things I'm needing to work on in life, or people, or whatever. did it the other night and my deceased Pop showed up and we got to talk. Have a good day. thanks...
Once or twice a year I will dream I am back at my old work place where I spent twenty-eight years, and was glad to be able to take an early retirement. I call these reoccurring nightmares.
Thank you SO MUCH for all of that!! Fascinating and cool.
It weirds me out too when people say they don't dream. But I think they do dream, but because of some way in which they wake up, they just cannot keep ahold of the memory. That is what I suspect, anyway.
Oh, and the dream where you have lost your child. OMG. So awful.
My wife actually just had that dream last night, and she was telling me about it this morning while making coffee. (But then I guess our child turned into some frolicking monkey-pig thing, and everything was okay. LOL)
I've had the sleep paralysis on many occasions. Used to scare me until a friend of mine told me he just went with it to explore it. So i tried that and just went on and on... Sometimes in that I wake up in my dream and think I am moving around only to wake up in reality and realize I couldn't move anything. So weird. I have had amazing flying dreams. I always wanted to see the North American continent before the last takeover, back when it was way more "uncivilized." I dreamt one night that I was flying and I went coast to coast and saw so many villages, rivers, mountains, deserts, it was unbelievable! I got into the Don Juan Carlos Castaneda books way back, i love Don Juan, Carlos annoys me, but Don said to look at your hands before you go to bed and imprint them on your brain. He then said when you get into your dream to remember to look at them. When you do look at them you are supposed to say I can do anything! I did this a couple of times and was able to control my dream, i went flying of course. It was intense. As a sorcerer he said it was a pre-requisite to be able to control your life in your dreams. Cheers. thanks for sharing...
A reasonable requirement indeed. I am going to try again on the hands thing. Hard to remember to keep at the forefront. Love the old Australian Aboriginal culture. All the old Earth cultures really. Amazing. Yes, was so neat to see the continent like that!!! Good luck! Let me know how it goes!!!
I have had a few such dreams, but they were always mundane events. The dream and the event were never close in time, maybe months apart. Only when the event began did I realize "I've done this before." I would then remember the dream and all my actions were mapped out, and I knew what I was going to do next. The event usually was five minutes or less. I have read that we dream in real time.
-things that happened that could not possibly be true
at five
i would lay down to sleep in the crib
-yo ma crib - lol
i would awake on a high cliff
alone in the wind
heart beating
knowing why i was there again
i look out at the same stormy weather that is always here
the same winds pull at me
i look down
-i pause the movie and zoom out
-it's perhaps ...
-fifteen hundred feet to the rocks below
i look down
onto the distant rocks
my will flutters briefly
but then i am certain
again
step
step
step
jump
fall
falling
the wind screams
i gather my intention
i know it is possible
-wham!-
dead again - wake up - then real sleep - ahhhh
night after night
-i have no memory of mentioning this
-to my teenage parents
it feels like hundreds of times now
but it must have been less than that
~
on the last dream
i got the trick
just before the rocks
-voom! - out across the plain - arms straight out to the sides - mind centered in body
since then
flight has been a common
companion
in the night world
-thanks for asking :)
And I like how you overcame the falling through effort and learning!
And flying
Very cool. I have only had a handful of flying dreams. Magical every time!
Dreams are simulated environments designed for the bootstrapping of consciousness, graduated learning in nonphysical reality.🙏
Who is creating the simulation?
Our double dreams the self.
“Once before, Chuang-Tzu dreamt of being a butterfly, gaily butterflying and himself embodied in this sense of purpose! He knew nothing of Chuang-Tzu. Suddenly awakening, he then is rooted in Chuang-Tzu. He doesn’t know if Chuang-Tzu dreamt being a butterfly or a butterfly is dreaming being Chuang-Tzu — though there must be a difference. This is called ‘things change.’” — Chuang-Tzu
Pretty cool.
Then there is the South Park episode where Randy Marsh becomes a butterfly. Rather different :-)
Media puts its own spin on these things, vs one's personal experience in dreams.
Thank you for that word, ubiety, I definitely get that, lots of architecture, and streets, buildings all places I have never seen or been, also lots of people I’ve no memory of. I lost my mum couple years ago and have had some lovely dreams, one just recently and in the dream I was aware as the meeting (group with a mission) was ending that she was going again and I told her all the good stuff. She is never upset and I only filled with love. Being able to see her so vividly is such a consolation.
Thank you for sharing your story. I am glad that you are getting comfort from those dreams.
And yeah, the place ones are really cool. They also always feel a little weird, though. Sometimes, on some level, I am aware that it is a dream and I get this weird feeling that is hard to describe… Almost like a conversation: "Is this place real? Have I been here before IRL? No." "But it IS real, because I keep coming back here."
What do you think to the Astral travel idea of our dreaming? Seems to have been significant military research into out of body stuff.
A friend tried to get me to do it once. I was in Scotland at the time, and the "destination" was my friend's house here in the States.
I saw my friend's room, but the furniture was rearranged in a way different from how I had last seen it. The bed was set up in front of the closet, which makes no sense (at least in terms of conventional interior design). And yet when I spoke with my friend, he told me that he had indeed rearranged his room in just that way.
Woah!! That’s wild.
I take a lionsmane mushroom supplement in capsule form at nighttime
And I have technicolor vivid dreams always when I take it
Whoa!
Like you, I often dream of places. Sometimes I would have to say that I’m dreaming of architectural surroundings: a house that goes on and on, one room after the next, often with a piano in every room. My extra special dreams have background music, like the soundtrack of a big screen romance.
The most amazing dream experience I’ve had was a recurring dream: I was in school, probably college level, and I had signed up for a class that I never attended. I kept thinking that I should go to the registrar and drop the class; but then I would think maybe I could get caught up if I would just look at the textbook, and maybe actually go to the class. The dream would end and I would still be in the quandary of trying to catch up vs dropping the class. I had the same dream for weeks, maybe months, not every night, but repeatedly. As time went on, in the dream the semester was progressing—it was getting closer to the deadline for dropping the class. Finally, I had a dream in which I went to the registrar and dropped the class. That was the last dream in the series. I have no explanation for what stimulated the series of dreams, or why/how I managed to end it—though I do believe I had some agency in bringing the unconscious dilemma to a conclusion.
Yes, the endless house ones are great!
Love the piano in every room!
I have had music in some dreams, but not often. Unless it's a feverish dream where some stupid snippet of music just keeps hammering away. Yuck.
Yes, it does sound like you exercised agency in that college dream. Cool.
I have a wild and fun dream life, mostly. I have a few recurring scary ones, a weird house in particular that is eerie AF! I get creeped out thinking about it in the day. I too have lots of flirtatious and sometimes very sexual dreams which I really like. I have blown many a chance in the dream world with amazing beings because I didn't want to be cheating on my wife!! Guess that's good, I never have cheated on her, doesn't really cross the mind, except in dreams. I used to wait tables a lot, I still have dreams on that usually centered on this restaurant on an outdoor mall i worked at in C'ville, Virginia. Those are almost feverish like having to walk two miles to get someone's wine as my section is over full and people are looking for me, or I don't have any pants on and can't find them. Lots of family dreams, was raised by a narcissist mother who is now lorded over by a narcissist sister. Yikes. I've finally been able to tell them all i needed in dreams. Many doomsday adventure dreams, skies full of aliens and me saying shit like "I told you so!" lol. The science explanations, for me, of dreams, and their talk of chemicals and all that seem like utter horse crap really. They really don't have any clue, as with most things in my humble opinion. All animals dream, wonder if the plants have their version. It's a wild world! I look forward to sleeping and dreaming every night. Oooooh, some sexy lady was trying to get me last night but, once again, i was reluctant and loyal. I gotta' learn to break that habit! Cheers!
What a great dream-life! Thank you for the sharing!
My subconscious usually solves the problem in the sex dreams by making me single. It generally seems like I am younger in those dreams. Or it is my wife in the dream. But yeah, I do very occasionally have a dream in which I am married but the prospective woman is not my wife. Decisions, decisions…
I like that your subconscious helps you like that!! And I've certainly gone beyond the line in dreams, I'm glad I have!! lol. What fun. My wife tells me her dreams and I love to hear them, sexual or not. It's wild to chat about. I'm trying to get better about just going for it in the dreams! and not just in that way... but yeah... There are some cool techniques to control yourself in your dreams but they take perseverence, as with all arts...
I love that your fidelity translates to your dreams.
But hey, if you have gained that level of control over them, just make yourself single for the duration of the dream. Problem solved!
Only a few times was I able... Maybe I'll focus again. Looking forward to sleep tonight. Take it easy. Great post.
Well now you're going to have to report back with details! 🤣
ten four! sometimes i ask to get shown things before going to bed with things I'm needing to work on in life, or people, or whatever. did it the other night and my deceased Pop showed up and we got to talk. Have a good day. thanks...
Just the question gives me a defensive posture. My father used to tell me that I am as crazy as an outhouse rat. He may have had a point....
No need to be defensive here. Most of the commenters here are really nice. Certainly I am open to anything you have to say.
You're not crazy; you're unique!
Great article Chris 🙏 Speaking of dreams and places, please check out this link to just such a place. https://mbtimmersive.com/toms-park
Thank you :-)
(I have to say, re: Tom's Park, that VR freaks me out a bit…)
Once or twice a year I will dream I am back at my old work place where I spent twenty-eight years, and was glad to be able to take an early retirement. I call these reoccurring nightmares.
Makes it all the nicer to wake up and realize it was just a dream!
You bet! I awake very relieved.
Thank you SO MUCH for all of that!! Fascinating and cool.
It weirds me out too when people say they don't dream. But I think they do dream, but because of some way in which they wake up, they just cannot keep ahold of the memory. That is what I suspect, anyway.
Oh, and the dream where you have lost your child. OMG. So awful.
My wife actually just had that dream last night, and she was telling me about it this morning while making coffee. (But then I guess our child turned into some frolicking monkey-pig thing, and everything was okay. LOL)
I've had the sleep paralysis on many occasions. Used to scare me until a friend of mine told me he just went with it to explore it. So i tried that and just went on and on... Sometimes in that I wake up in my dream and think I am moving around only to wake up in reality and realize I couldn't move anything. So weird. I have had amazing flying dreams. I always wanted to see the North American continent before the last takeover, back when it was way more "uncivilized." I dreamt one night that I was flying and I went coast to coast and saw so many villages, rivers, mountains, deserts, it was unbelievable! I got into the Don Juan Carlos Castaneda books way back, i love Don Juan, Carlos annoys me, but Don said to look at your hands before you go to bed and imprint them on your brain. He then said when you get into your dream to remember to look at them. When you do look at them you are supposed to say I can do anything! I did this a couple of times and was able to control my dream, i went flying of course. It was intense. As a sorcerer he said it was a pre-requisite to be able to control your life in your dreams. Cheers. thanks for sharing...
Wow—it sounds like you have a lot figured out. Great dreams. I will try the hands thing!
A reasonable requirement indeed. I am going to try again on the hands thing. Hard to remember to keep at the forefront. Love the old Australian Aboriginal culture. All the old Earth cultures really. Amazing. Yes, was so neat to see the continent like that!!! Good luck! Let me know how it goes!!!
Those streets and places that repeat…they are, in some sense, REAL.
As far as the beautiful dark-haired woman..is it possible that you just have not met her yet, and that you might yet have Alexander?
Fantastic account. I feel pretty confident that those dreams were sent to you for that purpose—to save you. Glad you listened!
I have had a few such dreams, but they were always mundane events. The dream and the event were never close in time, maybe months apart. Only when the event began did I realize "I've done this before." I would then remember the dream and all my actions were mapped out, and I knew what I was going to do next. The event usually was five minutes or less. I have read that we dream in real time.
Freaky!
I hipped people to yours in mine. Now we're cookin' with gas!
Rarely relaxing :-)