The Realm of Dreams and Nightmares
This thread was inspired by Chyron's mention of a nightmare in General Chat.
Have you ever experienced a particularly wonderful dream or an extremely nasty nightmare? Here's your opportunity to share your memorable moments in that bizarre realm of the subconscious.
I've had many a dream of "waking" up within my dream. The worst one was about a year ago...
I dreamt that I was laying on my bed at the home I was raised in, there were no lights on and the only illumination came from the moonlight, which was seeping through the windows. I arose from my bed and exited my room, only to see a flickering light emanating from the crack beneath my Sister's room's door. I could also hear the faint sound of whispering coming from within the room, so I slowly opened the door and saw a group of six young adults sat on the floor in a circle around a small camp fire.
They all stopped whispering and turned their heads to look at me, with a sinister smile upon their faces. Within a heartbeat the group jumped to a standing position, pulled out large knives and rushed at me. They surrounded me and pierced my flesh multiple times whilst laughing joyfully. Then at the point of death I "awoke" back in my bed in the same house. Only this time I exited my room and attempted to quietly walk away from my Sister's room by going down the stairs, but before I could reach the first step, the group of murderous youths burst out from my Sister's room and butchered me again.
I found myself back in my room, laying on the same bed. I made no attempt to leave my room this time and instead I put my back against the door in order to barricade myself in. The group formed in the corridor outside and repeatedly threw their weight against the door. It didn't take long for them to smash their way in, at which point they gleefully took my life again. When the macabre process began for the fourth time, I knew there was no way out of this terrifying situation and so I ran out of my room and in to the corridor where predictably the group awaited. I ran straight at them, letting out a battle cry as I did so.
Of course I was no match against them and as I fell to the floor, feeling their blades enter my body, I laughed manically. I had accepted my fate of eternal torture and in doing so had slipped into the realms of insanity. When I died this time however, I awoke back to reality. The sense of relief was palatable but I was severely shaken by the whole experience.
Have you ever experienced a particularly wonderful dream or an extremely nasty nightmare? Here's your opportunity to share your memorable moments in that bizarre realm of the subconscious.
I've had many a dream of "waking" up within my dream. The worst one was about a year ago...
I dreamt that I was laying on my bed at the home I was raised in, there were no lights on and the only illumination came from the moonlight, which was seeping through the windows. I arose from my bed and exited my room, only to see a flickering light emanating from the crack beneath my Sister's room's door. I could also hear the faint sound of whispering coming from within the room, so I slowly opened the door and saw a group of six young adults sat on the floor in a circle around a small camp fire.
They all stopped whispering and turned their heads to look at me, with a sinister smile upon their faces. Within a heartbeat the group jumped to a standing position, pulled out large knives and rushed at me. They surrounded me and pierced my flesh multiple times whilst laughing joyfully. Then at the point of death I "awoke" back in my bed in the same house. Only this time I exited my room and attempted to quietly walk away from my Sister's room by going down the stairs, but before I could reach the first step, the group of murderous youths burst out from my Sister's room and butchered me again.
I found myself back in my room, laying on the same bed. I made no attempt to leave my room this time and instead I put my back against the door in order to barricade myself in. The group formed in the corridor outside and repeatedly threw their weight against the door. It didn't take long for them to smash their way in, at which point they gleefully took my life again. When the macabre process began for the fourth time, I knew there was no way out of this terrifying situation and so I ran out of my room and in to the corridor where predictably the group awaited. I ran straight at them, letting out a battle cry as I did so.
Of course I was no match against them and as I fell to the floor, feeling their blades enter my body, I laughed manically. I had accepted my fate of eternal torture and in doing so had slipped into the realms of insanity. When I died this time however, I awoke back to reality. The sense of relief was palatable but I was severely shaken by the whole experience.
Sign in to comment in this discussion.
Comments
I can't say I've had a dream in a while.
But to contribute, I suggest that one should look up a Japanese PS1 game called LSD: Dream Emulator.
(Only commercially available on the Japanese PSN store, but its not exactly hard to find...)
(Also hunt down the book and the CD if you can *cough*youtube*cough*)
Its based on a woman's dreams that she recorded.
Its a fascinating experience to say the least.
(Can't call it a game since all you do is walk around)
EDIT: Here's a vid
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62IR-bs4hNo&feature=fvwrel
Fixed
That sounds... awesome. I'll be giving that a play for sure. Naturally, I'll be flying to Japan and buying a PS3 over there in order to do so. *cough*
It takes place in this rather bizarre mall that varies between three and four stories in height. I've dreamed about it enough times now that I could actually blueprint it out, if I had any skill in blueprinting.
The first floor has an arcade filled with identical racing game cabinets. They're unremarkable except for the fact that the steering wheels are replaced with Styrofoam cups. The ceiling of the arcade is mirrored, for some reason.
The centerpiece of the first floor is a large clothing store. Whereas most of the stores in the mall are oddly understocked, this one is filled to the point where you can barely maneuver. Again, unremarkable except for an enormous gumball machine facing the display window.
Further down is a magazine shop, one of two stores that carry extremely disturbing merchandise. Instead of the usual magazines, they carry collections of crime scene photos, medical pictures, and general gore. There's a set of TVs bolted above the racks that show graphic eye surgery on loop.
The second floor has generic storefronts that I haven't seen in detail yet.
The third floor is where I usually end up, and it changes every so often. There's usually a small dark movie theater on the far left that I never entered, followed by a huge bookstore that only has two shelves of books, then a game store, also near empty, thinner but tall, and what I guess is a normal mall cafeteria.
Once in a while, between the theater and the bookstore appear a restaurant and another arcade. The restaurant is like a building all its own, with two floors and a bowling alley. The arcade has all sorts of insane cabinets, like a one-button Street Fighter clone with a six foot by six foot screen, a House of the Dead cabinet with photorealistic graphics and a surprisingly in-depth story (one dream was entirely dedicated to me playing this), some other weird but generic lightgun shooters, a big DDR machine, and a top down racer.
Out in the parking lot is a small but well-stocked video store. It has red streamers hanging from the ceiling, and almost nothing but horror movies. Some rare videos, but nothing special until you come across one shelf with authentic snuff films. Hundreds of VHS tapes with titles scrawled on them and a date underneath. Somehow I knew that these were legitimate murders filmed by the killers and given to this store. I've only been there once.
Until last night, there were always very few patrons in the mall, but it was absolutely packed this time.
I have NO IDEA what's up with these dreams, but I thought it'd be interesting to share.
"If you build it they will come... but you might want to leave out the gore mags and snuff movies."
But that's my hook to get customers in!
Fair enough but don't say I didn't warn you when you've got a mall full of the kind of people who enjoy perusing through magazines stuffed with surgical photos and watching videos of a serial killer's murders...
...thinking about it, perhaps it's a mall for trainee surgeons and police looking for evidence.
OF COURSE! Police cars have Styrofoam cup steering! My god, it's all coming together! My subconscious is telling me that cops love gumballs!
... Thanks, subconscious. Really helpful.
It was just like a normal day.
I was sitting somewhere (where exactly I have forgotten), watching videos on youtube, then I decided to watch Tribute by Tenacious D.
(I love Tenacious D!
About half-way through watching the video, it suddenly changed to demonic, satanic imagry, with loud screams and strange sound effects playing in the background.
I tried clicking off it, but it wouldn't stop, and thevpicture on the screen was also expanding out of the screen, eventually consuming my vision.
Then I woke up, cowering in fear.
I think I might have screamed in the dream, but no one said anything, so I don't think I physically screamed.
I love dreams. I usually remember what they were about each morning I wake up. In regards to nightmares, I usually don't let them bother me much. Only occasionally will a nightmare physically get me shaking and laying awake unable to get back to sleep. The last time I had a nightmare like that was last year somewhen. I remember it quite clearly, but I wish I didn't.
Nightmares aside though, I love the bizarre things that can occur in dreams. I wish there was a way to record them so I could watch them all back. I don't think I'd want anyone else seeing them though - just in case! :rolleyes:
That's the sort of thing my own perverted and demented mind envisions every time I close my eyes.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kpc0IVs1dVI
As I was viewing this thread, I heard someone talking to a friend outside through my window. He was telling his friend about a nightmare he had last night.
*Insert X Files theme tune*
Of course, my dreams tend to be extraordinarily boring. Like this one, where I was taking a final on...something and then was informed that the "Biochemistry final" I'd taken before was actually just the third midterm and I'd need to now sit for the actual final.
So there I was, desperately trying to remember the steps to Beta-oxidation and failing, while the rest of the class was just hammering away because somehow they already knew this was going to happen and they spent the past few days studying. I spent the past few days playing the Witcher.
At some point, I realized that this was actually a dream and so I think I just left the exam and ate candy or something. That's what usually happens when I realized I'm dreaming. I just do random crap for no reason.
I start manipulating the very dream world itself rather than acting in it.
I remember once I was in a small room, and became aware. I decided to destroy the room and it was all black, apart from me standing in the middle of it.
Once I left a room and I was in a studio. I then decided to put on a T-rex costume, and started running around and doing weird things.
I turned myself into a god-like figure once. I was flying through the air and smiting people who I didn't like by throwing lighting bolts at them. I started building earth constructs and I was drinking tea on one of them.
I was also a zombie-vampire king!
(Yeah you get the point...)
Make of that what you will.
Its the opposite for me, I normally think creative thoughts rather than dream.
If I get a videogame idea, a lot of the time I keep thinking about it in my head to the point of where in the blackness; images, text and music appear (but yet I can't seem to successfully replicate it), narrated and commentated by my own voice of course.
Sometimes its a conversation to myself, sometimes I pitch it to myself.
actually, maybe it is a dream....
Interesting....
EDIT:
I used to do that, but oddly enough the experience quickly became shallow.
A lot of the time, I let my dreams create the characters,since they become more realistic (and sexy! XD)
I swear I felt like I spent months in a dream in a relationship once.
OH GOD, THATS TERRIBLE!
I have mundane dreams, if any. HUZZAH
I finally got rid of the nightmares by dabbling in lucid dreaming. Only now I sometimes get a dream where I (later) notice it's supposed to be a nightmare, without actually being scared. Small price though.
I have the mall dreams about once a month, but plenty of unrelated dreams in between.
That's good. I would find it really dull to have the same dream over and over and over and over and over ect. for 10 years! That would be like watching the same film once every day.
Agreed. Not to mention it'd be terrifying after awhile. "Why do, brain? WHY DO!?"
I've always been tortured by horrifying dreams, but mostly when I was a kid. I used to have dreams in hundreds of different settings every week about a terrifying creature who wore a top hat, suit, had a cane, was viciously fat, and had a horrible blank face with a nasty grotesque smile and a cruel nose. As soon as I'd see him I wouldn't be able to move, and if I could I'd run really really slowly. Once in a while I could escape him by flying. He would run extremely fast, could take the form of people I knew such as my parents, and whenever he'd appear everyone possibly safe who could protect me in my dreams would disappear and I'd be alone to face him. I used to call him Happy because he looked so happy as he'd chase me down and grab me to do who knows what to me. His arms could grow long, as could his legs, and he had these two idiot buffoons names Who and War who would help him get me, or even get me for him. Unlike him, who I couldn't do anything against, I could outwit or combat his cronies. This one series of dreams led to turning me into a childhood basketcase who couldn't go into dark rooms, down hallways alone, couldn't be left in the house alone, was afraid to be in the car alone, was afraid of his parents, especially when they laughed, and was extremely paranoid everywhere. I finally ended the dreams somehow by going purposefully into one to find the son of a bitch, then I let him grab me and I laughed right in his face. The last dream I ever had about him after that had me in a strange city like something out of expressionism, with snow falling, and Happy in a Santa outfit sitting in front of a cup dejectedly on a street. I walked up to him and he looked sadly up at me and I said something derisive and walked away. I got over a lot of my childhood mind-numbing phobias after that.
The last nightmare I had was a dream where my family and I were at a cottage by the sea. A vampire was living nearby, and had cursed our family to kill us all. He would come every night, or send one of his horrifying brides to do his work. We'd pass the day together, but at night we'd go into a room, put a nameless thing on a wall, and do a Catholic cross sign over the door. Then a force field would come up, the sun would fall, and Dracula would come and stand outside the force field staring blankly at us, or one of his brides would come in white gowns and fling ultra long, snake/tentacle like arms at the force field trying to break it. Eventually it'd get to where more would come, and we'd end up leaving someone out of the force field or wouldn't get it up in time before someone would get grabbed. The last person to get grabbed was my mother, and that left my father and I alone to defend ourselves. I ended up killing Dracula by shooting him, and we were the final survivors.
The worst dream I had in recent memory was one where I was in a small house, lowly lit. There were various people in it, and it felt safe, but as I went further into the house, I felt less and less safe. I began to want to go back, but when I looked back the rooms were darker and there was no sign of life. Real good news, that. I went forward and took a left in a kitchen and came to what looked like a child's room. I saw toys inside, a cabinet, a rocking horse, and a mirror. I could see my reflection somewhat in the mirror. I decided to go into the room. As soon as I did a HUGE wind started going and started dragging me toward the mirror. I was terrified. Demonic voices started shrieking in the wind. I turned and ran for it, barely able to run at all. I made it out of the room and the wind ceased, so I turned to look. I saw my reflection clearly this time in the mirror, looking back at me, and suddenly with a horrifying shriek its face morphed into something I would never describe or draw or mimic ever in my entire life. It was awful and I woke up into a complete panic attack. I avoided mirrors for a couple of days after that.
I have stories of other amazing nightmares that are so vivid and memorable to me as instances of unique, pure horror, one involving a straw scarecrow and giant matches, and another involving an old man on a bridge who said "Fuck" and started chasing me with super long arms and tiny legs, running at odd angles with his body horrifically bent, or the one in a horrifying city with nameless bulging horrors everywhere, or my numerous carnival dreams.
Now my subconscious torments me only with academic failure. This shows my priorities: I'm not afraid of death or dismemberment, but I am terrified of getting anything less than an A in classes at school.
If I met a boggart, it would turn into a midterm with an F on it.
Sorry. My roommates beat you to it. Actually, they alternate between calling me Hermione and Severus depending on my mood and general attitude towards the universe.
Oh. Alrighty then. Just be aware that you're not alone.
I find it interesting that this is incorporated into 3 out of 4 of the nightmares you mentioned. The only one you didn't mention this in is the one with the mirror. Is it the same with other nightmares? You don't have to answer of course, I'm just curious. Dreams interest me.
I noticed that too and am equally curious as to any kind of reasoning you may be able to provide Fawful.
Which is more disturbing to you Fawful, the elephant headed creature, the ladyboy, or the long armed man?
That and horrifying unnaturally smiling faces and such things are pretty common.
I've also had some neat apocalyptic dreams. There was one where the moon was like the one in Majoras Mask, but with a really horrifying face, and it was colored red. My father was driving me around in a butler's outfit, and the town we were in was dilapidated, like something out of Mad Max, and the air was a polluted misty yellow. I was investigating some sort of cult that was going to use an Elder God to bring about the end of the world. I don't remember where that one went though.
Another dream I had had a comet or asteroid or something that was going to hit the earth and kill everyone. I was racing to find a scientist who had a way to destroy he asteroid, or save the world somehow, and I forget how. I finally found him through a series of events, and he had already shot himself. So I walked out of his facility, down the road, and came to a basketball court where a bunch of friends were spending their last hours playing basketball together. I sat and watched them, then a massive roar pierced the sky, and a bright flash occurred, and then the earth was destroyed and I woke up.
Um, the dream in the city I mentioned at the end of the last post was really interesting, in fact it's one of the best and creepiest I've ever had. I started out on a road leading into a dark, pitch black city, and there was a dilapidated gas station nearby that looked like it came out of the 50s, but was rusty and empty. There was some sort of old car there without wheels. I went on and went into the city, and started walking past building after building, dilapidated, and empty, except for old signs and merchandise in the windows. I came to a section in the road where the road led into this pitch blackness. I couldn't see anything in it except for an occasional moony face that would pop up, and these two moony faced bums walked up to me pointing with hands that were nothing but white globes with one long pointing finger on the end. I looked to where they were pointing and it was a building with a bright, warm, golden light coming out of the doorway. I went to it, and a bunch of people with friendly faces greeted me and took me inside, and warned me not to go down the road I left. So I went through the building, which was golden inside and full of happy people selling crafts and other things. They motioned me on my way out of another door to a better road, and I went out of it to a balcony overlooking a gorgeous river. The stars were bright on this side of the building, and Spielbergesque. Across the river were many houses with golden-lighted windows reflecting onto the water. I went out of the balcony and onto the new road, and was looking for a way to cross the river. Then down the road I came upon a huge hill on the side I came from, with a place that looked like a prison, and a large sign on its opening that said CARNIVAL. Behind the rusty, nasty walls I could see some rides and disproportionate tents, as well as a strange tower. I decided, against my better judgment, to go into the carnival. Inside it was dark, with pine trees everywhere, and tents and trailers and cages with glowing eyes inside and attractions and such. I made my way for the tower. I went inside and found rotating stairs, which I climbed. Suddenly I had a video-game-ish cutscene where a horrible evil little midget wearing black leather came out of the door at the top of the tower and started running down the stairs. There was a recess nearby above the stairs so I climbed into it and hid. The midget ran by uttering strange gibberish that sounded like the Hidden People in a Grickle video. I climbed out and made my way up the tower. I found a girl there dressed in white, and trapped in the tower. I talked to her and told her I'd help her escape, but when I turned around to leave I found myself face to face with the midget. I tried to fight him, but he was too strong, and he hurled me out of the room and down the stairs and started chasing me with a butcher knife. I ran my ass the hell out of that place and out of the carnival and onto the street, vowing to return to help the girl, even though I ran like an utter coward. I decided I needed to get help from people across the river, so I jumped into the water and swam for it, but I turned and the carnival was gone, and as I wondered at that, the dream ended.
This is "better"?
"Give us a hug Fawful."
Yeah, using a mouse by resting it on your knee will tend to do that.;)
Sounds pretty sweet to me Sir. I wish I experienced such dreams.
It was horrible!