Dreaming and Fear.

I’ve been dreaming more often than not lately, for the first time in my life. Now I’m having dreadful thoughts of dying. I wake up at 4 in the morning and think about nothing but death until I am asleep again. I wonder what it’s like to no longer exist. I wonder if more active dreaming can trigger this kind of thinking? It’s been really hard on me, I’m literally crying just out of nowhere it’s so intense. If this has happened to anyone else after increasing their dream-awareness I’d really like to know, thanks!

I didn’t have a fear of death but I had an INTENSE fear of something else.

Actually I posted it on this forum. It actually started right after I started writing in my DD. I had a fear of the old hag. Well one of my dreams I had SP and the hag was on my chest. I wasn’t scared and I just told my self it wasn’t real and when I opened my eyes it was my dad crying.

The fear is gone now… like it’s no longer there. When I go to sleep it seems like somethings missing in fact. The fear was so intense that I’d sleep with all the lights on and I’d cover my self with my blanket and curl up in the fetal posistion and shut my eyes as tight as I can… this happened for two nights.

On the second night I had the dream and the fear left, it felt like part of me had died but actually I was on cloud nine the next day.

You can overcome your fears by dreaming.

This fear is everyday, it is always with me. It’s like that kansas song ‘Dust in the Wind’. I don’t feel like anything I do ever matters anymore. I want it to go away. Maybe I’m in too deep. Why do people want to expand there minds when it expands their awareness of things outside of their control? I feel like I’m leaving this world already, I need something or somebody to recall me to life.

I have been getting this every now and then all my life. It seems to always be very intense when it happens. I just try to ignore it and think of something else since I can’t really do anything else about it. It’s a matter of controlling the fear instead of letting it controll you. I can do this and if I’m playing some scary game I can sort of “choose” if I wan’t to get scared or not when a huge monster attacks. I noticed I could do this when I was playing Quake 2 a few years ago.

HousesOfApollo,

You wonder if dreaming can trigger death thoughts. But without some precisions concerning your dream practices, it will be rather difficult to me to answer to your question.

What you describe happend to me too. In a way, I think that fear of death is normal. But it has to be constrained in certain limits. And you can turn it into something constructive, since you know you’re not immortal. Knowing that, you know you have to do what you are very keen to do.

But what seems to me less healthy is to daydream about death and sad things in general. Daydream, and specially when just waking up, seems to me very near of suggestion.

An example. Some years ago, I was in a rather difficult period of my life (heart, work, etc. ) At this time, I tried to analyse my dreams : in this intent, I needed to have the best dream recall. After waking up, I remained very long in my bed, recalling every detail of my dreams. It became a bad habit and, as I was a little depressive, :sad: I ended laying in my bed for an hour, half awake, ruminating on horror of life and such funny stuff. Often, I was crying in my pillow. :crying:
It didn’t fix my problems at all ! I sort of became addicted to sad thoughts and feelings. End of the story. (I’m better now. :wink: )

Now I think daydreaming is not healthy if it is not controlled. We’re not our mind. There is just consciousness and perception. Consciousness of thoughts, emotions and feelings. The problem is that everybody identify with thoughts. This vicious circle has to be broken and that’s why I advise you against daydreaming in your bed.
Moreover, if you try to practise WBTB, it’s better to go up, wash your face with fresh water, do something during half an hour and go back to bed. The same thing applies if you’re waking up because of insomnia.

Phew ! What a long post… :smile:
Hope you will go better soon. All is transient… :om:

I’m not very keen on being so upset everyday that I throw up. I am not keen on living everyday in absolute abominable terror. I used to think of death as something long off that I would be ‘ready’ for. Now I just don’t know. This is now way to live, I know that. I don’t want to be aware anymore, I just want to have fun again without being upset about it.

I’m not very keen on being so upset everyday that I throw up. I am not keen on living everyday in absolute abominable terror. I used to think of death as something far off that I would be ‘ready’ for, that I would be old. Now I just don’t know. This is no way to live, I know that. I don’t want to be aware anymore, I just want to have fun again without being upset about it. I remember having fun, now it’s just no fun anymore.

I hate teenage hormones, most likely thats all this is.

But I believe that there is life after death and depending on whether you have accepted that Jesus died on the cross for you, you will not get to expirience eternal life.

I believe that Jesus died because he believed in something. He died for his people. Somehow I knew someone was going to say something Christian. Usually I’m quite hostile, but I’m jealous of these people now. They’ll never understand what it’s like to believe in NOTHING. The only thing that’s bringing me comfort right now is to know there was no pain before I was born, and that’s what I shall return to. Jesus couldn’t help anyone anymore, after he was gone.

But he came back to life, and can help you.

And he is still alive today.

Believe in nothing ? I tried wildy for many years. It’s humanly unpossible. When you believe you believe in nothing, you have negative beliefs indeed : " I don’t believe in such thing". It’s a belief too.

I think now that having beliefs is “hard-coded” in human brain. It’s just like a sort of economizer of CPU.

I must not fear.
Fear is the Mindkiller
Fear is the little death that brings total obliteration
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when the fear has gone, I will turn to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

It’s sort of like believing in all things, and then believing that what you believe in isn’t true; and changing that in rapid succession. I’ve been trying for almost an entire year to have a ‘break through’ inside of my mind, and I think that I just may have done that. But now, knowing where it’s gotten me, I don’t think I should have done it. Now I’m getting obsessed with blankets and warmth. Being cold now terrifies me. Cold like Death. I want to be old, I want to already be at least a little bit severed from the world. It’s hard when you’re young, unless it is quick and unexpected. When you go out in a spit-second, that’s the way I always wanted it. Huge explosion.

that’s one way to look at it.

Topic starter, how old are you? This is normal, everyone has to cope with their mortality and the fact that at any moment they or someone they care about could die.

I’m okay about the ME dying not so much others, I have not even begun to have dealt with all the feelings I have related to that possibility yet.

But it’s normal, you’ll get through it.

I might recommend chakra work, see this thread.
https://community.ld4all.com/t/chakra-in-line/10717

Look at it on the plus side, because you believe in nothing, that makes you free to choose your own beliefs, instead of having someone else (namely your parents) choose them for you.

It’s a hard road to go down, it’s easier to let religion do all your thinking for you… but that isn’t any way to live for me, now that I’ve already broken through, I don’t at all want to go back.

You’re born, parents say (to not offend christians so much i’ll use another religion) Vishnu created you baby, he loves you so much, don’t you love Vishnu?
Yes mommy!
How much do you love him?
Thiiiiiiiiiiiiisssss muuuuuuuuuch _______________________
Well he loves you milions of times more!

10 years later, suffering from teenage Hindu angst.
Why does Vishnu do this, why does Vishnu do that??
ARghhh… I mustn’t question!

This poor chap doesn’t have HIS own beliefs, he thinks he does, but in reality his parents and/or church are just telling him what to think.

If you tell your child Beavis and Butthead are evil and responsible for many acts of child stupidity, they’ll hate Beavis and Butthead for a while until they know better.

But religion is not something that can be disproven, hence, it’s much harder to shed yourself of.

I’d recommend taking a look at various religious texts, maybe some new age spiritual stuff, just kind of borrow what you like, try and form your own belief codes, stay open minded.

There may not be answers at all out there, maybe this is it, our only life… I don’t think so… but if there are answers I think you/we’ll find them, especially those willing to look outside the box, rather than be content with what the current fad in society is (ala Christianity in America, for the most part).

Question everything… it’s hard, but it’s how the identity is formed, to just say ■■■■ it and choose a religion is taking the easy way out… identity foreclosure… it works, but not too well, since you weren’t raised that way you won’t be nearly as “faifthful” as people who have deep seated childhood convictions that said deity exists… you won’t have that… they will.

just remember that for every zealot and door to door religious salesman that tells you HE has the answer, there is another zealot or door to door religious salesman that swears on the life of his family that that man is wrong, and HE has the answer.

It’s all just circumstance, born in the middle east, you’re a muslim or a jew. Born in Africa, unless missionaries get to you, you’re… whatever they believe in… born in America? Christian, or atheist, probably.

They all think they are right, they think everyone else is wrong. They think they are special because they were born into a religion.

I don’t think anything related to a higher power or a “God” is THAT simple that one of these contradictory religions is RIGHT and the rest are horribly WRONG.

How do you choose which one?

They all have their good teachings, they all have good examples, they all might be on to something, they all have value. None of them are right, and none of them are totally wrong.

That’s the way I look at it.

agnosticism, yay!

I don’t care if it’s an illusion, if it makes this life tolerable that’s all I desire. All I want is to live my life thinking about the day that I live in, that’s all. I think it’s folly to say that we know anything about Death. All my life I never believed in Religion, yet I’d always use the imagery contain in them. Our whole lives could be an illusion, why should I know that? It’s like a magic trick that’s ruined once you know the secret. Our memories, they’re all that hold us in this moment. Our concept of the future, it’s all that’s sane. Sometimes I believe that my life really isn’t my own, and I’m just part of a bigger structure. Like a cell in a large body, it does what it does, and knows now what it’s made of. If all our minds could hook up into a giant global computer, and our knowledge all would commingle together, that Being would be completely conscious. It sounds just a little like Nirvana, doesn’t it? Thing is, I can’t think things like that and be a true Atheist, and I couldn’t say for sure any other way and be a true Agnostic. Why do we always feel there’s something more? Used to say the meaning of life was to find the meaning of life, I don’t really say that anymore. The only thing that makes me feel even slightly better, is that the time that is passing that is bringing me all this dread, will bring an end to this dread as well, for now. Sometimes I feel like we’re just little bottles of hot water, cooling down. The ultimate Death for me is that which takes place over a 115 years, when eventually they replace everything that I am, and I fade into something new. I thought about this with stem cells, if they could just keep it going you would ‘die’ anyway, but it would be slow and merciful. And people change so much over so many years, we sort of ‘die’ metaphorically a few times before the death of the body. It could be just a delusion that we swear we’re the same person we were last year, or the year before. Our memories change, and we never have the same energy just on a circuit in our heads. When I expanded my mind this year, I never imagined I would get here, It’s like I struck oil and it just keeps bubbling up and up and there’s no way to stop it. I’m scared to dream right now.

I’m Eighteen, but I’m going to be Nineteen in September.

You should look into Zen … the whole concept of it is to pay no attention to anything but the now, as the now is all that will ever be and all that matters.

If done right supposedly it brings “inner peace” in a way that other meditations (that aren’t centered arond the concept of “no mind”) cannot.

It doesn’t require you to really believe in a lot, either.