About Dreaming

What Do My Dreams Mean?

Dream Interpretation by Sigmund Freud -(The Meaning of Dreams) (Great AudioBook!) If you are interested in Sigmund Freud or dream interpretation, this is a must-have text for your collection. As one of Freud´s earliest books, the theories ...

How to Interpret Dreams and Visions: Understanding God's warnings and guidance by: Perry Stone publisher: Charisma House, published: 2011-05-03 ASIN: 161638350X EAN: 9781616383503 sales rank: 46476 price: $8.74 (new), $6.40 (used)

There is no question that every person will have a dream at one point or another. Some will even have visions. But both experiences often leave people searching for interpretations. What did the dream mean? Is it a warning? Is it advice? Is it preparation for things to come?

In this book, best-selling author Perry Stone will answer these questions and cover topics such as: The purpose of dreams and the revelations they bring Why dreams use symbolism and why they aren’t simple and plain Learning to listen to your partner’s dreams and warnings

Why some dreams are delayed in coming to pass The significance of nightmares and dirty dreams True dreams versus false dreams The difference between psychic voices and prophetic voices What it means when you dream of a departed loved one What it means when you have the same dream more than once The possibility of a warning dream being changed through prayer

The book will also include an extensive list of symbols found in dreams and will discuss what it means when you find these object in your dreams: Doors, oil, and lamps Animals such as bulls, cattle, pigs, swine, snakes, and birds Trees and rocks Wind, water, ocean, fire, tornadoes, earthquakes, lightning, and storms Fields, wheat, and flowers Swords, arrows, and chains Various food items 

What Do My Dreams Mean? For centuries society has been using dream interpretation to determine the meanings behind dreams. There are a lot of different theories about how to interpret dreams and what they mean.

From the ancient Greeks and Egyptians to more modern psychological theories, dream interpretation has been around a long time. Dream interpretation started in ancient times when the Greeks and Egyptians believed that dreams were supernatural and only those with “certain powers” could decipher the meanings.

The ancient Greeks tried to use dreams to cure their sick. Sick individuals were sent to temples called Asclepieions to incubate dreams. Incubating refers to the belief that one can will himself to dream a divine dream and thus cure himself of any ailments.

The ancient Egyptians used priests to interpret dreams as it was believed dreams came from God. In today’s world most people refer to psychology to interpret dreams. Sigmund Freud believed that dreams were simply a visual representation of wish-fulfilment.

Freud’s works on dream interpretation, The Interpretation of Dreams, was published in 1899. He argued that dreams occurred the day after humans experienced a desire for an object or idea. According to Freud, children’s dreams reflect exactly what they desire without the need to mask it with symbolism.

Adults’ dreams, however, become distorted. The original meaning of the dream is lost in imagery and symbolism making dream interpretation much harder. Freud’s theory on dream interpretation takes into account the ego and super-ego.

The unconscious mind is thought to hold desires that never make it to the conscious mind thus emerging in dreams. Because the unconscious does not necessarily want the waking mind or the conscious mind to know its true desires, the dreams’ original “latent content” is hidden using symbols and other images to represent the true desire. Freud’s former student, Carl Jung, disagreed somewhat with Freud’s theories on dream interpretation citing them as “simplistic and naive.”

Jung believed that dreams could represent some wish-fulfilment, but also represented attitudes held by the unconscious that the conscious mind was not aware of. He felt that it would be difficult to thoroughly interpret someone’s dreams without understanding what they were experiencing in life at that moment, since people’s attitudes can change based on their current situation.

Calvin S. Hall offered a different meaning to dreams. He felt that dreams were a collection of thoughts or just one thought that occurred during sleep. Dreams would be a representation of this person’s perception of that thought or group of thoughts.

Yet another opinion on dream interpretation comes from Ann Faraday who in the 1970s published several books on dream interpretation and how to do-it-yourself. Faraday believed that dreams served as warnings of future events or prophecies.

People today seek meanings to their dreams often. Many people feel that there is definite meaning to their dreams and often find guidance in this meaning. There are many published books on dream interpretation that help individuals determine what their dreams mean according to the symbols in the dreams. In addition to books there are several websites and blogs dedicated to dream interpretation.

By: Keith Ward

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

 

Keith Ward is the Founder and Director of the Circle of Professional Clairvoyants, which offers Psychic Readings with fully qualified Senior UK Clairvoyants and Psychics.

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Discover What Your Dreams Reveal about You and Your Life

The Complete Dream Book: Discover What Your Dreams Reveal about You and Your Life
by: Gillian Holloway
publisher: Sourcebooks, published: 2006-07-01
ASIN: 140220700X
EAN: 9781402207006
sales rank: 24193
price: $8.64 (new), $7.19 (used)

The average person will dream over 150,000 dreams in a lifetime–each one a complex web of imagery and deeper meaning. The Complete Dream Book uses the interpretation of 28,000 actual dreams from contemporary dreamers, just like you, to help you access the substance and meaning of your own dreams.

Discover:
–Who’s who in your dreams
–Which dreams recur during certain life stages
–The true meaning behind your nightmares
–Why you have certain dreams again and again
–How to tell if a dream is worth interpreting–and if you’ve done it correctly
–The phenomenon of precognitive dreams

The Complete Dream Book is the only dream interpretation book based on concrete data about real people’s dreams and how the real events in their lives relate to their nighttime visions.

10 Amazing Facts About Dreams
This list contains ten fascinating facts about dreams. They will definitely tell you more about dreams. What special experience do you have with dreams? Let …

 

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At Apr 18, 2013 17:52 alexpage13 (Alex Page) said: RT @Kelsey_VP: Look out world, @alexpage13 is creepily good at interpreting dreams

At Apr 16, 2013 17:12 Juanita_Francis (Juanita Francis) said: RT @k_i_n_g_6_9: First time listening to @Juanita_Francis radio show, talking about interpreting dreams. Great job : )

At Apr 20, 2013 17:13 newsextips (Alvin Combs) said: Unlock The Power Of Your Mind By Interpreting Your Dreams http://t.co/dYgu2aoYdH

At Apr 18, 2013 00:20 busanring (paula ･ω･) said: today we were interpreting dreams in psych and its anonymous and mine was read and it really got me thinking omg

AJ asked What is the best way to interpret my own dreams?

There are various schools of thought on how to interpret dreams. What is thought to be the easiest and most accurate way to do it?

And got the following answer:

Keep a journal of your dreams. note key words. You won't interpret them instantly or even in the same week, month or year, but when you periodically re-read your dream journal, the interpretations will become clear because certain things will have come to pass, making the dreams more relevant. That is the most accurate way to do it. Stay away from these stupid book about dream interpretation and know that NOBODY can interpret your dreams except for YOU. It just takes time and patience.

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Some Interesting Examples Of Dream Interpretation

Dream Sight: A Dictionary and Guide for Interpreting Any Dream by: Dr Michael Lennox publisher: Llewellyn Publications, published: 2011-02-08 ASIN: 0738726028 EAN: 9780738726021 sales rank: 36841 price: $9.49 (new), $9.45 (used) Most dream dictionaries contain brief, overly generic meanings of the universal symbols that appear in our dreams. Dream Sight is different. With in-depth, classic meanings and an empowering technique for personalized interpretation,

Dream Sight is the most complete and balanced guide to understanding your dreams. Based on twenty years of experience, psychologist and renowned dream expert Dr. Michael Lennox presents his easy and practical three-step approach. Begin by reading the universal symbols in your dreams, then consider the context, and finally pinpoint your unique personal associations.

This method leads to deeper, more profound interpretations that will unlock the mysteries of your unconscious mind. You'll also get insight into common types of dreams—recurring, precognitive, nightmares, and more—plus advice for remembering your dreams and looking at them objectively.

Combining warmth and a touch of irreverence, Dream Sight is both a unique teaching tool and a fun reference guide that gives you everything you need to understand your dreams and your innermost self.

Features an alphabetized list of over 300 dream symbols and images with classic meanings Praise: "Dr. Lennox is a brilliant alchemist with wisdom, vision, and skill. He masterfully directs his clients to the world within to gain access to their power and redirect their lives with precision."—Dr. Alex Charish, creator of the fitness program Exercise for Real People™ Dream Interpretation with Jane Teresa Anderson - remembering dreams, precognitive dreams, psychic ability, the purpose of dreaming. Dreams - remembering dreams, precognitive dreaming, psychic ability & the purpose of dreams - discussed by Jane Teresa Anderson of www.dream.net.au, author, ...

A Step-by-step Example Of Dream Interpretation

This article is an example of Dream Interpretation. It is presented in a step-by-step manner. Before we begin, there are some tips to take note while doing Dream Interpretation. They are: 1. Although not always the case, the people that we encounter in the dream usually represent the different characteristics of ourselves.

For example: a child may represent a childhood or childlike aspect of oneself. Much of our repressed tendencies also tend to manifest themselves as characters in dreams as well. Dream offers an outlet for us to be 'somebody else' that we never had the opportunity to be in our waking reality.

2.Usually the emotion we felt during the dream reveals and conveys much about the meaning of the dream symbols.

3. The dreams are often symbolic representations of what we are experiencing or are about to experience in the near future. I have found that my dreams often convey messages of occurrences that will most likely happen within a month or so. OK, let's get on with the Dream Interpretation. Scenario of the Dream Jack(the dreamer) opens a door and is walking into a room. He senses an invisible presence.

He cannot see it but felt and heard its eerie presence. The following Symbols are found in the dream scenario Door represents opportunity. Open door may mean the opening of an opportunity. Room represents certain part of Self. Invisible Presence is a tricky one. It may be representing an aspect of self that is still not fully known to the conscious personality of the dreamer (Jack). The following is the interpretation of the dream Jack entering a room indicates that he is accessing an aspect of himself.

He is still not fully aware of this part of himself (as indicated as the invisible presence). His opening of a door however indicates that an opportunity to know more about this aspect of self is now becoming available. True enough, weeks after this dream, Jack has a corresponding occurrence in waking hour reality.

We can now see how understanding our dream can be of good use. Dream serves as a mean for us to discover the part of ourselves that under normal circumstances will go un-noticed. Below is the description of a useful practice: If a waking hour drama unfolds not long after the dream has occurred, compare the reaction that one has during the occurrence to the content, feeling and emotion of the dream.

Harnessing one's innate intuition, the links from waking hour drama to dream symbolism can be discovered. Once the links are discovered, one can realise the rationale within us that triggered certain emotions which in turns triggers certain reactions and behavioural patterns. I hope this article has been useful. Thank you for reading.

By: Shen Gerald

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

 

The author runs a selfgrowth website featuring a low cost yet excellent dream interpretation software for self development.

 

Dream Interpretation: Fiend, Fish, Friend

Dreams can be interpretated in so many ways. The best way to figure out dreams is as soon as you wake up you have a notepad & pencil ready so it can be fresh in your mind exactly what it is your dream was about. Then you can go on to interpretating your dream accordingly.

 

Random Thoughts: Dream Interpretation: Fiend, Fish, Friend

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To see fish swimming in your dream signifies insights from the subconscious. To catch a fish represents insights which have been brought to the surface. Also, a fish swimming may symbolize conception. Fish is also an ancient symbol of Christianity and its beliefs. It may also imply an elusive situation. It could also mean the old adage "there are plenty of other fish in the sea" with regards to some relationship issue.

 

Friends in a dream signifies aspects of your personality that you have rejected but are ready to incorporate and acknowledge. It could also mean positive news. Alternatively, it signifies regression into your past where you had no responsibilities, where things are much simpler and carefree. You may have been wanting to escape the pressures and stresses of adulthood.

It never gets boring analyzing dreams, I love it. If your looking for more in depth info on dream interpretation go here now!

 

The Wonderful World of Dreams

Soul Journeys: The How To Guide for Dream Interpretation - 5 Star Rating!

The dream world is fascinating full of speculation, hope, and sometimes even fear.  We can wake up from a good dream feeling refreshed and hopeful.  On the other hand, we can wake up from a bad dream feeling tense and apprehensive.

Ever since Freud's Interpretation of Dreams was published, there has been recognition of the importance of dreams. But even before that there were dream interpretations. People had superstitious notions about dreams - for example, "Something is going to happen because I dreamed it was going to happen."

This is a common misconception.  Regardless of what some people might say, if you dream you are falling and don’t wake up before you hit the ground in your dream, you will not die.  If you dream that someone close to you dies, that’s not an omen to warn you of their death.  Dreams do not predict the future.

What dreams can do is provide a sense of insight into ourselves.  They can help us cope with situations we’re unsure about.  They can guide us in a certain direction when faced with uncertainty.  They can simply give us an overall good feeling as we dream of something pleasant.

The dream state is an experimental playground which gives you a chance to explore and express emotions without the usual inhibitions you may display in your waking life. Dreams provide an avenue of expression for that part of yourself that knows both your history and your potential as a spiritual being.

They are another way the universe provides guidance about relationships, careers, and health problems. Through dreams you may find answers to your spiritual questions and even receive encouragement to some challenge in your life. While some dreams may allow you to release bottled emotions from your day's activities, others can lead to profound insights in a psychological or spiritual way.

Acquiring the ability to interpret your dreams is a powerful tool.  In analyzing your dreams, you can learn about your deep secrets and hidden feelings.  No one is a better expert at interpreting your dreams than yourself

Article Written By J. Foley

Click Here For a Great Resource On Understanding Your Dreams!

 

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Dream interpretation - Remembering Your Dreams

Dream interpretation becomes quite difficult, as normally 50% of dream content is lost within 5 minutes of your waking up and 90% of the content in next 10 minutes.

A great way to remember your dreams is by developing a habit of writing them down every morning immediately upon waking. This way you can maintain your own dream journal. Based on the pattern emerging from your dream records, you can make your own dream interpretation.
Maintaining Your Personal Dream Journal

One can keep a track of all the dreams, which will go a long way in making serious research in dream interpretation. Look for a pattern that may emerge and analyze your dreams. Such patterns will start emerging once you start maintaining your journal regularly for some nights. The following things should be kept in mind while maintaining your dream journal.

·    Immediately after getting up in the morning, try to recall your dream and make a record of all the events and objects. If you cannot remember the entire dream, jot down few words, or even an impression of the dream will do.

·    Focus on the key symbols, location, context and theme of the dream.

·    Look for a place where no one disturbs you and start analyzing and interpreting your dream.
·    In order to capture the deeper meaning of your dream, try to concentrate and meditate for a while.

·    As you review your dream notes, pay close attention to your feelings that emerged while in dream world and or upon waking.

·    Remember that the dream as well as the dreamer is unique.

·    Look for meaning of each and every symbol, surroundings and objects. This will make dream interpretation a really fascinating job filled with lot of fun.

Those who wish to analyze their dreams can make use of the information. Dream interpretation can help them in taking decision or gaining control over issues in their normal working life. They simply need to follow some simple guidelines. You will soon realize that dream interpretation is an interesting and fun way of leading a better and successful life.

 

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Dream Interpretation - Common Symbols And Their Meanings

Dream interpretation has many forms; it can be done be done for the sake of fun, hobby or can be taken up as a serious career. Psychologists and therapists are already incorporating dream interpretation into their practice. They find it as a very useful tool to gain access to hidden desires and deep-rooted personality issues of a dreamer.

Symbols and objects frequently encountered in dream state facilitate dream interpretation.

Here is a summary for ready reference.

1. Dreaming of Colors:

·    Red – symbolizes either passion or anger.

·    Pink – denotes healing power of love.

·    Black – symbolizes fear of death or aging.

·    Grey - symbolizes confusion or fear.

·    White – signifies fear of death or new surroundings.

·    Green - symbolizes healing.·    Blue – stands for sadness.

·    Yellow - symbolizes peace, calm and hope.2.  Dream about numbers: Dream interpretation has helped in assigning meaning to some numbers.·    One - stands for unity.

·    Two - symbolizes equality, spiritual or gender balance.

·    Three - stands for unity, harmony or spiritual fulfillment.

·    Five - stands for a change both in positive or negative context.

Likewise, dream interpretation for remaining numbers needs to be evolved on your own experiences.

3. Dreaming of a baby or a pregnancy: Dream interpretation of such dreams often points to new experiences in life.4. Dreaming about various other objects:

·    Accident - represents fear of physical or mental break down.

·    Awakening - symbolizes openness to new ideas or experiences.

·    Brother - signifies betterment or strained relationship.

·    Climbing - stands for attaining new mental, spiritual or physical goals.

·    Desert - dreaming of a desert or being lost in desert stands for  loneliness.

·    Door - symbolizes better opportunity. If you are afraid of opening a door in the     dream, it means that you are afraid of new challenges or trying on new things.

·    Eating – stands for nourishment or need to be taken care of.

·    Falling - means loss of control or being unable to maintain position in life.

·    Jumping - stands for achieving higher goals.

·    Ladder – symbolizes growth.

·    Military - denotes desire for authority.

·    Rain - represents depression.

Thus, you can now see how dream interpretation becomes even more fascinating by analyzing the symbols.


Article Written By J. Foley

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Unlock The Secrets Of Dream Messages

Maintaining a personal dream journal is one of the best ways to do dream interpretation. You can use the amazing knowledge experienced from your dreams to solve your current problems and issues and to make decisions with greater care. You get peace of mind, increase your self-awareness, create relationships that are more loving and therefore lead a fulfilled, rewarding and joyful life.

TTAQ technique, of dream interpretation, created by Savary, Berne and Kaplan-Williams, is a simple but powerful way to inspire new thinking. Its approach is sparked by the dream rather than solving the mystery of dream. Your dreams are a dialogue between your inner self and your waking self, that is to say your subconscious and conscious self. Your subconscious already carries all the knowledge you need to lead the life you were meant to live.

You have a destiny and a purpose and you have the power to direct the course of your lifetime. Your life journey cannot fail without your approval. All you need to know is how to access the incredible information already stored in you. You can do this by understanding your dream messages. This is one powerful way to make your subconscious communicate directly with your conscious self. Your dreams are giving messages about you and can be highly beneficial in providing you with powerful and often life-changing hints.

Your dreams can give you hints about.
·    How to solve problems? 
·    What opportunities you may be missing?
·    How your emotions are affecting your life?
·    How your behavior may be blocking your progress?
·    And much more

The key to TTAQ is a four-step process comprising title, theme, affect, and finally question. Give your dream a title; describe theme of your dream, note down the emotional effect or impact of your dream. Then try to make out what important issue is the dream addressing.

Dream interpretation can be more accurate and meaningful if proper care is taken in maintaining the records of the dreams as per specified guidelines. If the details are recorded sincerely, a person can gain control over day-to-day issues and lead a very successful life. 

Article Written by J. Foley

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Dream Interpretation - Day Dreaming

Dream interpretation has proven that dreams come from our internal unconscious mind, which is a storehouse of feelings, experiences and images. These dreams give us valuable information about what is going on in our lives, directly or in symbolic form.

Day Dreaming – Importance

Daydreaming allows the subconscious mind to work in its own imaginative ways. It brings pleasure as well as solution to problems, which otherwise with a rational thought can never be achieved. Daydreaming is quite valuable as it provides an escape. It also brings solution to our unsolved problems, inducing a creative thought form sometimes leading to inventions.

The key to daydreaming is the right state of mind. If you want to practice daydreaming, you can visit various web sites that offer free self-hypnosis session or one can join self-hypnosis master classes audio programs.

When you dream or daydream, note down the happenings and then review the story of that dream. Remind yourself of the events, pictures, sensation and the sensory information it involved. Many people now want to start dream interpretation because of its growing demand. More and more people want to learn as to how to go into daydreaming.

You Can Also Cultivate And Experience Daydreaming
You have to first underline a pattern of circumstances that brings you in particular day dreaming state. First, you have to find as to what helps you daydream, then you have to use this process regularly and imagine that you are in that experience, re-create those circumstances inside your mind. Once you start daydreaming you are bound to get best ideas and inspirations from such experiences. Next time when you have to make any decisions, solve a problem or overcome a challenge, you can set up the circumstances so that you can trigger your day dreaming state. This will allow you to explore your problems and find a decision. After the daydream gets over, make notes of what you experienced and discovered.

Get up! Forget conventional dream interpretation and learn to cultivate your daydreams in order to find solution to your various problems. This improves your mental caliber and you become successful in life.

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Dream Interpretation –Interpreting Your Dreams

Your dreams are full of symbols and allegories and in order to attempt dream interpretation you need to decode your dreams to find appropriate meanings. It is important to capture your dreams as precisely as possible. Maintaining a dream journal will help you to keep a track of your dreams and recognize a pattern.

Dream Interpretation

Yes, you can interpret your dreams by following certain tips. When you venture into dream interpretation, you need to develop your own method of interpretations for the symbols that are pertinent or related to your personal life experiences. Using a dream dictionary can be misleading, as it is based on somebody else’s experiences.  Other’s experiences do not create the same symbols that your own mind has created.

Some of the basic components in most dreams are you, the location, the scene, the action, various forms or actors, object and the result, which is normally not seen or remembered by the dreamer. Thus keeping all these aspects in view, you can attempt dream interpretation with confidence.

Key To Analyze And Interpret Your Dreams

Dream interpretation is undertaken by the process of divide and analyze. You need to dissect your dreams into separate parts or components and examine each part for its particular meaning. Each one contains the small view of the whole picture. As such, you need to take every part of your dream into consideration and separate it from the rest.

Use separate pieces of paper to record your observations. With each part, note down from your memory, what feelings this part has for you, what memories does it evoke, who and what does it remind you of and what impression do you have for it. Add every notion that comes to your mind. Restrict your analysis to each individual part and not how it played a role in the dream.

After you have done this with all the parts, review what is going on in your life now. Now you are ready to fit the puzzle together. Remember you are the only one who has the information to make the final dream interpretation. It is all stored in the memory bank of your brain.

For More Info On this topic ---->Go Here!

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Do Cats Dream of Catching Mice?

Sleepless in America

Healthy rest, problem sleep, and the dreams and nightmares therein.

by John Cline, Ph.D.

Do other creatures dream as people do? 

Philip K. Dick's 1968 novel, "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" explores a number of philosophical issues related to the nature of being human. It became the inspiration for the influential 1982 movie, "Blade Runner." The title of the novel indicates the importance we attach to dreaming as an important characteristic of the human experience. As we move toward what some futurists such as Ray Kurtzweil call the technological singularity we may ask: Will intelligent or even spiritual machines need to sleep, to dream? While this question may still lie in the future it is also possible to ponder whether other creatures, the animals already in our world, also dream.

REM sleep is associated with episodes of vivid dreaming was and first discovered by Aserinsky & Kleitman in humans during the 1950's. Awakening people during REM sleep typically results in a report of vivid dream imagery and a complex associated story line. Dream imagery can occur in other sleep states but is typically less vivid and complex. After the REM state was identified in humans, a similar state was discovered by Dement a few years later in cats. As in humans, cats in REM sleep show a low voltage EEG with characteristic eye movements. There is also a loss of muscle tone (atonia), presumably to prevent acting out of the dream content. This striking cross species similarity of brain states and behavior indicated that dreaming may not be limited to or be a uniquely human state of consciousness. In fact, much of the initial work on REM sleep was done on cats and the underlying brain centers involved in REM sleep were discovered in the cat.

Further research quickly revealed that REM sleep was not limited to humans and cats. On the contrary it was found to be widespread among animals. With only a few exceptions REM sleep appears to be nearly universal among mammals and birds. An unusual anteater found in Australia does not show any evidence of REM-like EEG patterns. More recent investigations, however, indicate that there may be patterns of brain stem activation that are similar to those seen in REM sleep in other animals. Certain marine mammals such as dolphins have evolved unihemispheric sleep so that only one side of the brain shows evidence of deep sleep at a time. The other hemisphere remains alert allowing these creatures to keep swimming and responding to the environment. It is unclear whether or not dolphins have any REM sleep at all and if they do it is less than 15 minutes a day. Birds show REM sleep but in small amounts that occur in brief episodes that last only a few seconds at a time.

The purpose of REM sleep remains unclear but does seem related to the degree of maturity of an animal at birth. Animals that are very helpless at birth, such as ferrets and armadillos, have large amounts of REM while more mature animals at birth such as cattle and horses have relatively little. Humans are born intermediate between the most helpless and most mature animals and have moderate amounts of REM sleep at birth. It may be that REM sleep has a role in the development of the brain. For unknown reasons animals that have a lot of REM sleep at birth also continue to have a lot of REM sleep as adults.

Of course, having REM sleep does not absolutely indicate that the same subjective experience of an alternative world of dreams exists in other animals. Yet-anyone who has seen a cat or dog sleep and have some loss of the muscle atonia associated with the REM state must be struck by what looks like an effort to run and move that certainly suggests an ongoing dream.

While we still do not know exactly why we sleep and dream, it seems to have served an important role in the evolution of animal brain function. Whether or not it is somehow necessary to awareness or consciousness is not known. We will have to await either for the emergence of intelligent machines or contact with some complex extraterrestrial life to have a better answer to this question. It does appear, however, that we can answer the question of whether cats dream of catching mice - in the affirmative.

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5 Telltale Dreams About Adulthood

Well, as long as everybody's now talking about sleep as the next feminist issue, I thought I'd tap into what actually happens when most of us sleep: we dream.

Not all of us, I suppose. An old boyfriend of mine used to maintain that he dreamt mostly in images: i.e., he'd be standing out in the middle of a field or perched atop a mountain. "Huh?" I thought. "You mean you don't dream that someone's chasing you around your kitchen table with a knife?"

Not only are my dreams hopelessly plot-driven and transparent, they are also recurrent. There are four or five dreams that I must have at least once a month, and every time, I wake up bathed in sweat. But once I began to reflect upon these dreams and analyze them more closely, I realized that they are all - in one way or another - telltale dreams of adulthood.

On the off-chance that you've had them - or similar recurrent dreams - I present them here so that we can all get a better handle on our collective demons:

1. Test Anxiety - I frequently dream that I'm back in High School - invariably in a Math class. I learn that there's a test that very day, but I freak out because I haven't been attending the class regularly or doing the homework. According to this list of top 10 recurring dreams, dreams about "preparedness" are very common and signify - ding! - that you feel "lost or unprepared about something in your life." Since I recently posted on why not being able to conceptualize a "forever house" may be a sign that I still haven't grown up, I think I'd have to say: Bingo.

2. Haven't Learned The Lines - In a similar vein, I often dream that I've been cast for a part in a play but haven't learned the lines. I did quite a bit of theatre as a child and there is a visceral, gut-level dread that comes with not knowing your lines. The odd thing about both this dream and number one is that I've never been unprepared for a test in my life or failed to learn a set of lines I was given. Despite that, I clearly live my life fearing that I won't one day be prepared for something. (This reminds me of a friend here in London who always shows up five minutes early to appointments because he's afraid he'll be late.) The moral of the story? Mastery doesn't negate anxiety.

3. The Elevator Dream - No, this isn't about being trapped in an elevator. It's about getting in an elevator, pushing the button for a certain floor, and then having the elevator start moving in all sorts of directions, veering wildly from right to left, up and down...even diagonally. (And, yes, I have read Roald Dahl's Charlie and The Great Glass Elevator.) I think that this is fundamentally a dream about goal-directedness, which strikes me as an apt thing for someone with a kaleidoscope career to worry about.

4. Naked in The Office - This is also apparently a very common dream and is thought to suggest a fear of public exposure. Since I blog about my personal life several times a week, I'm going to over-rule the experts and say that this is really a dream about legitimacy. When you work at home - as I do - you are wracked with worry that by not having the requisite water cooler, business card or Friday bagel brunch, you are somehow less legitimate as a professional. And that is the exposure which you fear will be revealed - that you're really, deep down, a phony.

5. Childhood - I often dream that I'm back in my childhood, witnessing something that upsets me but which I am unable to stop because I am too small or too young or too afraid. I think this is fundamentally a dream about powerlessness, which is of course a central theme of adulthood.

Oh dear. I fear I've (once again) revealed a tad too much about my psyche. No matter. According to this study, dreams aren't really about your psyche. They're just exercise for your brain.

Phew. Boy, do I feel healthy now.

How about you? What are your recurrent dreams?

 

Follow Delia Lloyd on Twitter: www.twitter.com/realdelia

Read More: Brain Exercise , Charlie And The Great Glass Elevator , Delia Lloyd , Dreaming , Dreams , Elevator Dreams , Elevators , Forever House , High School , Interpreting Dreams , Kaleidoscope Careers , Learning Your Lines , Legitimacy , Math Class , Naked At Office , Recurrent Dreams , Roald Dahl , Sleep , Stress , Test Anxiety , Living News

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Mollen: To sleep, perchance to bad dream

As my back sank against the cold tile wall, my arms flailed madly in a final, futile effort to keep IT from getting me. My heart, pounding on the door of my chest, wanted to be let out. I looked up into the harsh light and cried out the answer the thing was demanding of me. "Gerald Ford! Gerald Ford!"

There was a pause. "That's right, Timmy. And where are you now?" The questioner's voice was transforming from demonic to dad-like. "The bathroom?" I said, looking confusedly around me. Why was I crouched in the bathtub, wearing my plaid flannel PJs? Why were my bleary-eyed parents standing over me, wearing their PJs? Why had the snarling, yellow, face-feasting fiend disappeared? (Had peer pressure sent him searching for his own PJs?)

That was last night. I've had lots of bad dreams before, but that one was a doozy. My older brothers said this one was in the all-time top 10 of "Timmy freak-outs." All the bad ones end with a debriefing by my dad. He has a really deep, comforting voice, and it brings me back to Earth pretty quickly.

Now, I'm angry at myself for last night. I forgot to use a very useful trick I picked up a dozen dreams ago. During another recent visit from the Yellow Thing, it occurred to me that I was having a nightmare, and that I could simply choose to wake up. I remember smiling at the disappointed face of my corn-colored enemy as I melted from his grasp. "So long, sucker!"

I think my main monster spent the intervening waking hours coming up with an effective counter-attack. Last night, he pursued me with such screeching, full-throttle persistence that I didn't have time to think about my state of consciousness. Next time, I'm going to stop him with a stiff arm right away and say, "Alright, hang on a second there, Sparky." That'll give me time to pull a sweatshirt over his head that says, "Kick me - I'm a figment."

That will still leave me with the problems posed by my other recurring nightmare. I'm not sure it's really a dream, though, because it doesn't consist of sight and sound. It's more of a "touchmare." Sometimes when I'm lying in the dark, I feel the things around me getting bigger and heavier. My blanket suddenly feels like a thick slab of concrete, and everything in my bedroom starts to loom over me. This isn't something that I see, but I always get the mental image of a single hair exploding out to the size of a tree trunk. It's hard to breathe because I feel like the whole world is crushing me.

Yeah, that one is worse. I'm trapped under all that weight, so I can't get up and slam around the house until my parents wake up. I can't even make a sound. I guess I could try the whole "I know this is a dream" thing, but I'd already be in my bedroom, so there'd be nowhere to travel back to. Plus, I'd need to bring a much bigger sweatshirt.

Another weird thing is that I can't remember how that dream ends, or how I wake up. Maybe I finally manage to get out a single word: "Ow."

Lost Journal runs Sunday. Mollen is a freelance writer and actor. To contact him or to read more of his work, visit www.timmollen.com

Dreams and Fantasies During Conscious Dreaming

Also called lucid dreaming, conscious dreaming is a state where you are aware that you are in the middle of a dream and can then start to control the goings-on of the experience. You can do anything that you can imagine while having a lucid dream, as soon as you understand that you are dreaming.

While having the ability to control your dreams may sound farfetched, it’s actually something which is within your reach. Lucid dreaming isn’t that hard to do and these dreams are a great place to express your true self and your desires. There are techniques which have proven effective at producing lucid dreams.

To begin you need to think about what you want to gain. Do you want to have fun and live out your fantasies, or do you want to use lucid dreaming to help solve problems in your life. Maybe you are just curious about what the experience is like. It does not matter what your goal is as long as you keep it in mind and stay confident that you will achieve it.

Once you have a clear idea of your goals, you are ready to start practicing the techniques which lead to conscious dreaming. The first step for many is dream recall, which involves training yourself to remember you dreams in detail.

This ability is the best way to condition your mind for lucid dreaming. You can start by keeping a dream diary, which you keep at your bedside. Right away after awakening, write down each and every detail you can remember of your dreams of the night.

Keeping a dream diary trains your mind to recall and recognize dreams; this makes it easy to “awaken” during a dream and start asserting control over it.

Hypnosis is another widely used method for lucid dreaming. It is a good way to get into the state of mind you need to begin lucid dreaming. A hypnosis session works quickly to help people to recall the tiniest details in their dreams. This can be done in only a few sessions. Once you have this level of dream recall, you are ready to proceed with conscious dreaming.

You may wake up suddenly when you are having a conscious dream in the beginning. This is not unusual. Go over the events in your dream as you drift back to sleep. If you focus on them hard enough, you will go back into the same dream and perhaps control the events and the outcome of them.

A third way to train yourself to conscious dream is to awaken yourself a couple of hours earlier than normal, then falling back to sleep. You are able to stay more aware in your dreams in this period of sleep, in fact you may feel you are half-awake and half-asleep. You may feel as if you are lying in bed thinking or daydreaming. If you are able to do this regularly, you will find lucid dreaming will come easily.

Figure out your sleep patterns, as this will help you to figure out when the best times for you to have conscious dreaming experiences are. Don’t short yourself on sleep too much though; being sleep deprived makes it harder to have lucid dreams.

However, you may be glad to find out that lucid dreaming can help to alleviate insomnia and other sleep problems. When you learn how to use the ability of conscious dreaming, you can train your mind to stop the worries which keep you up.

You may think that learning lucid dreaming takes years of practice, but in fact it’s not so hard at all to learn – with just a little practice, you can be a conscious dreamer too!

In fact, conscious dreaming is something that everyone can do. Just practice and use these techniques to develop your own lucid dreaming abilities – you’ll find that it has a lot to offer.

Decode My Dream: I’m A Woman, But I Have A Penis!

Posted by: Ami Angelowicz Filed in: relationships
8:00AM, Tuesday October 27th 2009

Comments (8)

So this is by far the strangest dream I’ve ever had.  I’m going to preface it by telling you that I’m female, which is the main reason why this dream was so disturbing. In my dream I was in a small bathroom, one I’ve never seen before. I was sitting on the toilet, and when I looked down, much to my shock, I had a penis.  I remember being briefly confused, and then amazed as I thought to myself, “Wow, for never having a penis before, mine is really nice!” The shock and confusion gave way to a feeling of pride. I was impressed with my newest body member.  Then for some reason I had a condom in my hand that I needed to put on.  Not quite sure why, seeing as how I was alone in the bathroom.  I spent the rest of my dream trying to figure out how to “get my penis to work” because, to my dismay, I had no idea how to use it or make it function properly.  When I woke up I was very perplexed by the dream, I’m still not sure what it means. —Chick With A Dick

First let me say that I am glad you woke up with all your lady bits in place! Phew! We all have a male and female part of ourselves. Carl Jung often referred to them as the Animus and Anima. The Animus is the masculine part of the female psyche and the Anima is the feminine part of the male psyche. Our eventual goal as healthy and whole adult human beings is to find an appropriate balance of our masculine and feminine sides. And let me just say … that’s no easy task. The Animus or Anima can often show up in our dreams as genitalia we wouldn’t normally have or as someone of the opposite sex who we don’t seem to know in real life. 

So let’s chat about your Animus (aka your masculine energy). The fact that you have a penis in your dream lets me know that you are probably just beginning to get in touch with your masculine nature. This is really important for women. The Animus represents some male qualities such as self-confidence, creativity, determination, willpower, self-control, purposeful action, energy, and activity. The full development of our masculine side helps us protect ourselves, take charge of our careers, provide for ourselves, and go out and get what we want from life. Cultivating these qualities can be challenging, but very necessary to being a strong and well-balanced woman. In your dream you have this really nice masculine energy that you are starting to appreciate, but you don’t yet know how to “make it work” for you in your life. Because your dream takes place in a bathroom, I’m thinking this energy is only something you are thinking about in private. You haven’t yet put all your masculine gusto into practice in your life. But being aware of its presence is the first step towards personal growth and balance.

A word of advice: It’s time to get to know your man side intimately. Explore it and experiment with it in your daily life. No need to be scared or confused. You will only learn how to harness your power if you learn how to use it and make it part of your life.

Have you had any crazy dreams lately? Dying to know what their hidden meaning is? No need to rush to your therapist’s office. The Dreamweaver is here to help. Email me your funniest, weirdest, wildest, and wackiest dreams and I’ll tell you what’s going on.

You might like:

• Decode My Dream: Late To Class!
• Decode My Dream: I Am A Vampire!
• Decode My Dream: I’m Scared Of Falling!
• Decode My Dream: I’m Dreaming But I Feel Awake!
• Decode My Dream: My Ex Is Trying To Kill Me!

Daily News expert Lauren Lawrence interprets your dreams

Sunday, October 11th 2009, 4:00 AM

I often dream that I am back in school being tested ... and sometimes I am even tested by my mother, who is asking me a million questions.

T. Banks, Manhattan  

Dreams of being tested reveal performance anxiety and the perfectionism of the dreamer, who does not want to be caught off guard. It is a preparatory measure, a safety net for not slipping up.

Being quizzed by your mother is an even harder test to take. There is the wish to measure up to her expectations.

Facing down a hurt

I dreamt that my 5-year-old daughter was alongside me on a neighborhood street when she started skipping near the curb of a driveway and fell with her head in the street and the rest of her body on the sidewalk, perpendicular to me. I ran to help her up, but a mini- van out of nowhere was backing up to park and it ran over her face, flattening it out. She didn't die, but when she got up her face was flat on one side and there was one small bloody skid mark on her cheek.

I woke up screaming and have walked that street with her to shake it from my head. What does this mean?

Stephanie, Ridgewood, Queens

When your daughter skips ahead, it symbolizes that she is in another space in time, and this triggers the maternal worry that you will not be able to protect her. Similarly, to fall in a dream indicates there are issues with loss of control.

Yet your dream is far more complex: Remembering that your daughter lay perpendicular to you brings a whole new interpretation to your dream. Taking this lengthwise position into consideration, she is you to a T. This means that someone ran roughshod over you and you wish to rid yourself of this painful memory, to squelch, squash or flatten its effect. Whatever happened left an imprint. So when you say you want to shake this dream from your head, you really want to steamroll over this memory.

Door to the past

In a recurring dream, I go back to the house in Havana where I grew up. I'm knocking on the door but I cannot go in. Sometimes I dream I'm in the house, up in the nursery rooms, wandering around in that area, and it is bittersweet. What does this mean?

E. Fanjul, Manhattan

There is a desire to gain perspective on the past and reclaim what time has taken from you. But knocking on a door is confrontational in nature; it involves a fist. It is a declarative statement that wishes to be heard and responded to. So the door that remains shut represents something you are barred from, childhood memories perhaps.

When you are in the house, the room defines you - it is viewed as a representation of the self; wandering around in the nursery expresses your sentimentality and the wish to be cared for.

Victory dance

My college had a "Funk Night" of music and dancing that was held downstairs in a courtyard. Because of a muscular problem, I am slow getting up stairs. So in my dream of this event, everyone but me had already left. I was at the bottom of the stairs when the deejay said over the microphone, "She's not ready to go yet, she still wants to dance." I had to dance by myself with everyone watching. The music was so fast I danced on every third note to accommodate my muscular problem. When the music ended, someone yelled down to me, "Hey, what's your culture?" This was wonderful to hear.

Tatiana, Manhattan

This self-empowerment dream focuses on self-acceptance: A personal difficulty is embraced as a favorable part of your identity. Your muscular problem is instilled with cultural heritage - it becomes exotic and provocative, a component of rhythmic style rather than a physical hindrance. Your disadvantage is perceived as an asset - an ultracool style of dancing.

Movement is not feared but indulged in and validated by those who watch you dance. Your fast thinking - dancing on every third note to slow down the music - proves that the cerebral dominates the physical. Dancing to certain notes and not others reveals your independent spirit. You dance to your own beat.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/lifestyle/2009/10/11/2009-10-11_daily_news_expert_lauren_lawrence_interprets_your_dreams.html#ixzz0TvKKLIKj

Animal dream series: Course with Lynne Ehlers, Ph.D. at The Psychotherapy Institute in Berkeley

August 27, 3:02 PMSF Dream Research ExaminerLinda Mastrangelo

 Please join Jungian psychologist, Lynne Ehlers, PhD as she delves into the rich, potent and transformative energy found in animal imagery in dreams. The course is being held Saturday, October 24, 2009 from 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. at The Psychotherapy Institute located on 2232 Carleton Street in Berkeley, CA 94704 and is designed for those interested in dreams on a clinical and personal level. Continuing Education of 6 Units approved for MFTs, LCSWs, Ph.D.s and Psy.D.s is available. Dr. Ehlers is one of the Bay Area's resident scholar and her passion for dreams and art history make this an event not to be missed. 

Of the Course: Animal imagery in dreams can reveal powerful forces in the unconscious of which the client is unaware. Brought to consciousness, they can be worked with and transformed. This course will study in depth the instinctual drives and energies symbolized by the dog and cat, horse, bull, cow, goat, lion, bear, elephant, whale, eagle, owl, raven, alligator, turtle, frog, and spider. Since dreams are visual, beautiful slide images from nature and art history are the teaching medium, amplified through biology, mythology, cultural anthropology, literature, religion, poetry, and the arts. Relevant examples of animal dreams from clinical and personal experience will be presented and discussed.

Photograph Courtesy of Lynne Ehlers

LOCATION AND TIME: This class will be held Saturday, October 24, 2009 from 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. (lunch on your own) at The Psychotherapy Institute, 2232 Carleton Street, Berkeley, CA.

FEE: If Registration Completed: by 10/6/09 after 10/6/09
Members........................................$100.................................$110
Nonmembers...................................$120.................................$130
Students/Interns...............................$60...................................$70
 

CONTINUING EDUCATION CREDIT: The Psychotherapy Institute
is accredited as a provider (PCE 433) by the BBS to offer continuing educationcourses for MFTs and LCSWs. The Institute has also been accredited as an MCEP provider (PSY005) for psychologists. The MCEPAA requires a
$7.00 fee per course per psychologist registrant.

ONLINE REGISTRATION: You may register for this continuing education
course on the TPI website at www.tpi-berkeley.org. We accept Visa and
Mastercard.

RECEIPTS: To save postage and administrative expense, your registration
will be acknowledged by email to the address you provide on your registration
form.

PARKING AND ACCESS: Parking is free (under the building) at The
Psychotherapy Institute on Carleton. All classes held at TPI are wheelchairaccessible;
please call 510-548-2250, x. 107, in advance of the course start date
if you will need to use our lift.

CANCELLATION POLICY: To cancel your registration, please leave
voicemail at 510-548-2250, ext. 107. If cancellation is made at least 14 days
prior to the beginning of the course, a full refund will apply. If made 7–13 days
in advance, a refund minus an administrative fee of $35.00 will apply. If made
less than 7 days in advance, a refund will not be made.

Photograph of Lynne Ehlers, PhD

Lynne Ehlers, Ph.D., is a Jungian oriented clinical psychologist in private practice in Berkeley and San Francisco. She has worked intensively with dreams for over 40 years. She weaves together her lifelong passion for myths, dreams, and archetypal symbols with her strong background in art history to create a rich tapestry of slide lectures called “The Language of the Dream.” She has served on the Dream Studies faculty at JFKU and lectures and leads workshops on dreams, psyche, sandplay, and the symbolic process at Sonoma State University and at numerous other venues in the Bay Area.

 

For more info: The Psychotherapy Institute
2232 Carleton Street, Berkeley, California 94704
Phone: 510-548-2250; Fax 510-548-3086; e-mail: tpi@tpi-berkeley.org

Sharing a Bed? Share Your Dreams!

In the beginning of any relationship there are habits to adjust to, personality quirks to discover, and systems to be worked out. One of you may prefer to share the covers at night, for instance, while the other may want them all to himself. It is important to talk about these sorts of things, because they can lead to a deeper understanding of the person now sharing your bed and your life, and they help us realize just what we have gotten into.

I am not a big fan of relationship advice columns, but I do have a suggestion for everyone who is currently in a relationship or thinking of having one in the future. If you share a bed with someone at night, try sharing your dreams with each other in the morning, too.

Think about it: you have both gotten up early, it's time to make some coffee and head off to work. The night before was so special (for reasons I don't have to go into here), and yet as you glance across the table at your partner you can't think of a single thing to say that doesn't involve money, schedules, or what to cook for dinner. There has got to be something more interesting, more romantic even, to start the day off with.

Then you remember a little snippet of a dream from the night before. The two of you were

Behavior: Better Performance After a Dreaming Nap

By NICHOLAS BAKALAR

Published: June 22, 2009

Have to solve a problem? Try taking a nap.

ut it has to be the right kind of nap — one that includes rapid eye movement, or REM, sleep, the kind that includes dreams.

Researchers led by Sara C. Mednick, an assistant professor of psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego, gave 77 volunteers word-association tests under three before-and-after conditions: spending a day without a nap, napping without REM sleep and napping with REM sleep. Just spending the day away from the problem improved performance; people who stayed awake did a little better on the 5 p.m. session than they had done on the 9 a.m. test. Taking a nap without REM sleep also led to slightly better results. But a nap that included REM sleep resulted in nearly a 40 percent improvement over the pre-nap performance.

The study, published June 8 in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, found that those who had REM sleep took longer naps than those who napped without REM, but there was no correlation between total sleep time and improved performance. Only REM sleep helped.

“Dreams are fanciful,” Dr. Mednick said. “They incorporate strange ideas that you would never have put together in waking life. In REM sleep, it becomes more likely that ideas might come together in a solution.”

Psychic Piracy [Part 3]

Gyrarr. Yarrr. Etc. Etc. Dr. David Luke returns with the third part in his exploration of psychic piracy. This week the venerable doctor examines 'the unconscious reservoir of psychic information'. Oh yes.

Read Part 1 here

Read Part 2 here

What many people may not be aware of is that much of the recent research in parapsychology adumbrates psi as a genuine, albeit subtle and largely unconscious phenomenon capable of escaping our conscious detection, even though our nervous system seemingly picks up the psychic information and responds to it.

To illustrate, using brain mapping technology such as EEG a person in one room has their brain monitored while a person in a distant room has their brain randomly stimulated, usually through visual stimulation, such as a flash of bright lights. These visual stimulations are known to reliably cause easily observable reactions in the brain of the person directly perceiving them.

What is not generally known is that these stimulations can also be observed somewhat more subtly in the brains of a distant person sealed in another room, well out of sight of the flashes. Some successful experiments even found this effect to occur in the visual cortex, the brain region where the effect might be expected if their brains were being stimulated directly [11]. The same effect was also found using

How to: Talk to your son about 'wet dreams'

Donna Hussey-Whyte

Monday, June 08, 2009

NOCTURNAL emissions, commonly called 'wet dreams' are uncontrollable emissions made by a male during sleep. They are also referred to as spontaneous orgasms.

Since boys begin to have wet dreams when they reach puberty - usually between the ages of nine and 15, it is important that as a parent/guardian you arm yourself with the necessary information to impart on your son by age nine.

Remember the first rule - ensure that you look and feel comfortable when talking to him. If you are able to have this talk, over time it will be more natural for both of you. If you are comfortable talking, your son will believe that this is indeed a natural part of growing up and nothing for him to be ashamed of.
Important information to tell your son:

. Explain to him that a wet dream is the uncontrolled ejaculation of semen from the penis during sleep, which is caused by sexual arousal and orgasm from dreams and/or physical stimulation like rubbing against blankets, the bed or a full bladder.

. His first ejaculation may occur during a dream and when he wakes up he may not realise what happened, therefore tell him he should not be alarmed, as this is something experienced by most boys his age.

. The fluid is sticky, creamy or clear in colour, not like urine.

. Tell him he can't control them, and that ejaculation is just a physical sign that he's growing into manhood.

. Explain the whole concept of an erection to him so when his friends make reference to it or he notices the erection of other boys (even babies), he will not wonder about his own erections and physical responses.

. Explain what will cause an erection to occur.

. Let him know that wet dreams are most common during teenage and early adult years. However, it may happen anytime during or after puberty. The emission may happen with or without an erection, and it is possible to wake up during, or to simply sleep through the ejaculation.

. Explain the chemistry, that wet dreams begin during puberty when the body starts making more testosterone, the major male hormone. Explain that when boys enter puberty a lot of hormonal changes occur. These changes can result in spontaneous erections during sleep, even sleep during the day.

. Although some boys may feel embarrassed or even guilty about having wet dreams, they can't be controlled and he can't stop them from happening.

. Tell him too that generally, males have fewer wet dreams once they start masturbating, reach the end of puberty or become sexually active (but be certain to talk to him about responsible sexual behaviours).

Psychic Piracy [Part 2]

Posted by davidluke

Yaaaar! We be back with more brain piracy, psychic mularkey and general cerebral oddity. This week, Dr. Dave looks at (amongst other things) the rather curious history of EEG, why certain tribes survived that Tsunami and several women through a telescope.

The Science Of Magic?

Slouching towards 2012 there's a hopeful fervour brewing in the New Age and psychedelic cauldron that the end of the Mayan calendar will force us to leap spectacularly into an era of realised panpsychism, where telepathy no longer requires telephones and we can plug directly into the Gaian internet or Vernadsky's noosphere (a kind of human collective consciousness). As a contemporary spokesman for this view Daniel Pinchbeck has borrowed generously from Rudolf Steiner, who foresaw the coming of the Age of Michael and the development of universal telepathy, as did Steiner's contemporary Teilhard de Chardin.

Pinchbeck [7] supposed that, "...many people, myself included, seem to be experiencing an almost exponential increase in synchronicities and other types of phenomena that suggest that the psychic and physical realms are approaching each other at a high speed". This is something that I once accidentally

Psychic Piracy [Part 1]

(image by Lazlo-photo, used under a Creative Commons sharealike license)

In the first of a new series of articles, long-term Blather.net collaborator (we've been collectively barred from every pub in Hackney) Dr. David Luke gives us the skinny on the extraordinary abilities that may lie just within our cerebral reach. So, sit yourselves down, strap yourselves in and get ready to have your third-eye squeegeed clean...

'I woke up this morning...'

I woke up this morning with a psychic advert left lingering in my dreaming mind. It was some kind of oneiric flyer for a new type of yoga, it even had a telephone number on it to call. This fanciful hypnopompic intrusion brought me back to the idea that if science can identify techniques for reliably producing psychic abilities (termed 'psi') then PR executives will soon be pumping millions into pumping adverts directly into our minds.

Forget the television, tube trains and pub toilets, we'll have adverts (or perhaps 'psiverts') sneaking rudely into our subconscious and marauding around our dreamscapes at all times of night and day. We won't even have to open our ears or eyes to be lured in by the

New York Daily News expert Lauren Lawrence interprets your dreams

 

Analyst Lauren Lawrence interpreted our readers’ dreams and explained their meaning below. She can interpret YOUR dreams too. Simply send your name, address and dream details to yourdreams@nydailynews.com

(Submissions may be edited for clarity or content).

Dream: Veiled in burgundy

"I dreamt I was in an elevator with someone from work. I was extremely conscious that I carried a burgundy blouse on a hanger (as if it were a purchase or a showpiece). The color of that blouse was strong! What was strange was that this blouse was somewhat sheer. The blouse had an additional piece that changed three times on the hanger like a magic trick during the elevator ride. At first, it had a matching burgundy bra. Then this changed into a matching burgundy camisole with thong underwear, and then into a burgundy hat and scarf. The star of this dream was the color BURGUNDY and the blouse that changed its inserts."  - Lucia , Secaucus, N.J.

Either the color burgundy has specific meaning to you - burgundy wine, perhaps - or you are a synesthete for whom color is of more interest than substance.

Meaning: The burgundy blouse is indeed the "star" of your dream. But such strong focus on the impersonal indicates a certain

Presidential dreams

Local woman’s Obama visions undergo an expert’s scrutiny

Jaclyn Youhana

The Journal Gazette

"Which one should I start with?" Kim Siratei wondered in her e-mail. The Fort Wayne woman was responding to a call for dreams of Barack Obama.

She's had at least three.

I Dream of Barack is a blog that features dreams people have had about the president. Sheila Heti, who edits the blog, is putting together a book about Obama dreams because, she noticed, they seemed common.

New York Times columnist Judith Warner noted the same trend in a February column.

What is it about Obama that lends itself to dreamland?

Robert Van de Castle, a dream expert and former director of the Sleep and Dream Research Laboratory at the University of Virginia Medical Center, worked with Heti on dreams she has collected, and he analyzed them.

"Obama is certainly a wonderful symbol representative for many, many unfinished global issues," Van de Castle says. "He's not just one point of view. In some ways, he's kind of a