Shadowfiend23 @ Wrocław

This was a very bizarre dream that I had last night, but I’m grateful for having had it. I could’ve done without the nested dream levels, but what dream is perfect, right? Let’s get started.

The dream began with me standing at the back of my mom’s house, looking out into the small forest extending back towards the corn field. I noticed in the corner of my eye that there was a stream flowing out from the swamp and into the forest about 50 yards south of me. I started to get excited because this is one of my many recurring dream tropes – the landscape near my mom’s house is changed drastically, becoming a place of wonder and exhilarating discovery. I’ve been having dreams like this for as long as I can remember.

Anyway, I followed the stream into the forest, and the landscape immediately began to change. I walked underneath a grand rock archway that resembled something out of Canyonlands National Park (from 127 hours). I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was. I knew that I was in a dream already, and I wished more than anything that I had a way of recording what I was seeing. After following the river for about half a mile, I realized I had slowly been climbing up a gently sloping hill. I turned around and was awe-struck by what I saw.

Off in the distance was a structure that…was ten times more beautiful than the arch. It very well may be one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen in a dream. It was a giant mountain made of a mixture of ebony rock and bleached marble. Even though it was obviously a naturally occurring formation, its perfection was baffling and immediately apparent. It resembled a gothic cathedral with intricate arches, columns, and sculptures, but yet completely natural. Almost as if one were to take a cave, turn it inside out, and curve it masterfully around a mountain, together with other caves, to create a non-repeating mosaic of geological splendor. Not only was it pretty, but it was BIG. Thousands of feet tall, looming into the clouds above. I don’t know how I could ever capture its apparent beauty in words. It was simply breathtaking.

Here was where the dream started to get interesting.

Suddenly, I woke up in the dream, but into another dream. In this dream, I was in a log cabin somewhere deep within an evergreen forest. In the cabin were all my friends and family, and I was grateful to be greeted by such a welcoming group of people. (I’m positive that I dreamt about such a place because of my current feelings here in France. What I wouldn’t give to be around people who WANT to be around me.) I got up out of my little wooden bed and proceeded to tell a nearby friend about the dream I had been having. He was super interested to hear about it, and he couldn’t hear enough about the mountain structure I had seen! I was grateful that he cared so much – I’m so used to people in waking life not caring very much at all about dreams (mine or otherwise). (Of course, that’s their prerogative not to care, it’s just how people are) Anyway, after I finished telling the man about the dream, he leaned his head on his fist, furrowed his brow, and squinted his eyes – he appeared to be deep in thought. After a moment, he lifted up his other arm, and while waving his finger at me begin to say, “You know what? You can go back into the dream if you want. You always can. It sounds like you want to. I would if I were you.” I smiled widely and began to thank him, telling him I wouldn’t forget how happy he and the others had made me. “It’s nothing,” he said. “And from now on, I just might want to visit the same mountain you did in my own dreams.” I lied down on the bed, pulled the covers up to my chest, and drifted back into sleep.

Then, I awoke back in the beautiful land I had left before. The mountain no longer loomed in the distance, but I was almost happy it wasn’t there. That meant that the terrain was new and that I had even more ground to explore. I was excited to see what I could find. I trekked deeper into the forest, passing by wide gorges, gushing rivers, and looming cliffs along the way. Everything seemed otherworldly beautiful to me. Not because it was flashy, but instead because it was seemed raw and untouched. After marveling at the sights around me for what seemed like hours, the path I was walking on abruptly ended next to a clearing surrounded by giant sequoias.

Just as I noticed a massive Aztec stone temple that was looming in the distance, a knife whizzed past my eyes and was embedded into the side of the sequoia to my left. I spun on my heels and saw that a man cloaked in white was crouched on the ground, several throwing knives clutched in his right hand. I knew at once that an assassin was after me (though I knew no reason why he would be). He threw another knife at me with a flick of his wrist, and I knew that this time, he wasn’t going to miss. Before I had time to think, I squinted my eyes and wished for time to stop. As it did, my vision became black-and-white, and objects seemed smeared into existence, as though their sharp boundaries had been replaced by smooth transitions. The knife stopped a mere foot from my face, the tip poised to sink itself straight into my temple. I strained my body, and made another wish that was promptly granted: I wished for the knife to disintegrate and for the man to become inanimate, to become as a puppet whose strings have been cut. The man fell to the ground in a kneel, and his eyes slowly closed. His head drooped onto his chest and his arms fell to his sides, crunching the dead oak leaves that were lying beneath him. I wasn’t happy about the way the fight had turned out, but I didn’t know what else I could have done.

I turned my attention back to the temple in the distance. I knew that more darkness was to come in the dream, and I wanted a better way to fight it. Suddenly, I noticed that to the right of the temple was a graveyard, bathed in golden sunlight, the desert ground cracking in the dry summer heat. (Pretty crazy terrain around here, I know). I closed my eyes and willed myself to teleport over to the graveyard. I opened my eye an instant later and was pleased to find that I was there, standing in the sunlight. All at once, I realized that I was there for a reason, and that I needed to collect the holy power that had been buried here centuries past. (Pretty cheesy, but…I loved it in the dream) I held out my arms and felt the warm sunshine beating down on me, willing the power to come to me. Suddenly, I felt confident and powerful. I started running back to the clearing (incredibly fast, I might add) where I had fought the assassin. I passed by him and was both saddened and relieved that he hadn’t moved from his resting spot, stuck in an eternal state of reverie. (I say this because he wasn’t really dead, just…not alive anymore. As a doll, like I said) Just then, I heard a ferocious growl from behind me. I spun around just in time to see that a pack of…giant grizzly bear/koala hybrids were bounding towards me! Imagine grizzly bear-sized koalas with light brown fur running on all fours while baring their huge razor-sharp teeth and salivating profusely. They may sound comical now (being giant koalas), but in the dream they were terrifying. I knew there was no place I could run to, so I knelt to the ground and decided that I would sprout giant angel wings (which is strange for me…normally in dreams I just fly. Without wings) and fly out of the forest. I thought that I would be safe in the sky, but it turned out I was very wrong.

I started flying back towards my mom’s house, retracing my steps from the clearing (which was actually pretty hard, given how randomly I had gotten there in the first place. I had to follow many landmarks). Rather than me outmaneuvering the koalas by flying, they quickly proved to be outmaneuvering me. Everywhere I went, they were right beneath me, licking their lips in anticipation of me falling back down to Earth. (Another quirk of this dream…normally I never tire in the air, but in this dream it was incredibly strenuous to continue flying. It started to feel like agony after a few minutes) Everything I tried to do to outsmart them failed horribly. Every river I flew over they crossed, every canyon I passed they leapt over. In fact, other herds seemed to be converging on me, joining together to form a larger pack. “What could I possibly do to stop them??” I asked myself frantically. It came to me in a flash. I knew what I needed to do: the monsters seemed evil, so I needed to go where evil could not; I needed to go back to the holy graveyard. I pivoted hard and with my last ounce of strength flew back to the graveyard. 

After landing in the graveyard, I looked back to where I had come from and noticed that the koalas were prowling at the edge of the graveyard, eyeing me longingly. But they seemed not to be able to enter the hallowed ground. I turned around to face the temple behind me and noticed a small, dark tunnel at the edge of the graveyard that I presumed led deep into the temple. I walked over to it. As I approached, I noticed a dark humanoid shape leaning on tunnel wall, mere feet from the tunnel’s entrance. The man kicked off of the wall and started walking towards me. I saw that he was wearing a black and red regal robe –  he seemed to be an ancient king. He started speaking to me: “I’m glad that another insect has wandered into my web. How I will enjoy – ” He abruptly stopped just as his foot left the darkness of the tunnel and was placed onto the bright graveyard sand. He looked up into the sky, shielding his eyes with his right forearm. “Ah…night has not fallen yet. It is of no consequence. You shall not escape me.” His eyes began to glow red, and suddenly we were both teleported to the interior of the temple.

We were standing in what seemed to be an ancient store, complete with stone aisles filled with generic goods. I saw a teenager and two adults (whom I presumed were his parents) walking into the store. The teenaged boy was wearing a white apron with a little name tag on it. He said, “Hey, *****. (I wrote ***** because I don’t remember the ancient king’s name…) I’m reporting here for work, just as you wanted.” The king replied, “Yes, but I’m sorry to say that you won’t be doing ANY work. All of you will be drained of life to sustain my own!” With a wave of his arm, the three strangers fell to the ground, their eyes glazed and their faces devoid of expression. As this was happening, the king rapidly reached out with his other arm and thrust down a nearby aisle, sending it crashing down onto me.

I regain consciousness in another nearby room. A woman was wrapping me in bandages. I saw that they were about to embalm me alive! The king walked into the room, smirking broadly. “I had thought that you would pose more of a challenge to me. Oh well. Now you will provide me with sustenance. Neither of us will see the other ever again. How fitting.” He spun around and began to walk out of the room. I decided right then and there that I was going to save my own life and put an end to the evil king’s centuries-spanning genocide. I jerked my arms over my head, breaking off all the bandages that had been wrapped around me, and flew upwards with incredible force. I broke through the brick ceiling above me and landed on a new level. I heard the king release a murderous bellow from the floor below, and then he appeared in right in front of me, his eyes glowing a scarlet red!

His hands began to “glow” with darkness, each hand encased in a shell of black nothingness at stark contrast with the already dim lighting around us. He screamed as he ran at me with hands raised at shoulder-length, hoping to plunge me into an unknown personal abyss. (Not sure how I knew he was trying to do that, but in the dream I did) At that moment, I knew that there was only one way to fight him – by giving myself the polar opposite of his power, to encase my hands in light and drive off the darkness he was wielding. I could describe the fight in detail, but I’m not sure how interesting it would be for readers. What was interesting was the background event.

Essentially, as I was fighting him, I had simultaneous visions of how my body was reacting in waking life, except that this “waking life” was yet another dream! I saw myself sleeping on an unknown couch in a strange house with strangers sitting around me. As I battled for my life with an undead ancient king in one dream, I was groaning and convulsing on a couch somewhere else. I hoped above all else that those around me wouldn’t wake me before the fight was over. For although I knew it was just a dream, it felt…significant that I triumph over this man. After minutes of fighting, I pinned him to a wall with one arm, and slowly plunged the other arm deep into his chest. I sent waves of light pulsing outward from my hand, and the light seemed to flow through his cursèd veins, destroying him from the inside out. With a final pained scream, he exploded in a fiery corona of light.

I awoke in the “other dream” panting heavily. The rest of the dream was less interesting, but essentially it consisted of me discussing the dream with the other people in the room and eventually turning the TV on. I ended up jumping into the TV and acting out the show we were watching, but it wasn’t as fun as it sounds. The show was about the obstacle courses marines need to go through (well, my rendition of them, at least), so I used my super powers to blow through the courses with ease.

I genuinely feel that lucid dreams are important – for me and for everyone – because I think that having pleasant, empowering dreams will lead one to feel more confident in waking life. While this is just speculation (not to say anyone about the correlation/causation issue…), it is my own experience that I am happier after having had lucid dreams, especially those where I accomplished a monumental, useful task. Prepare to hear about just that kind of dream:

When the dream began, I was standing in the middle of a suburban cul-de-sac near the end of the afternoon. There was a row of white houses with white picket fences – it was simple americana at its finest. I spent what felt like hours wandering around the neighborhood, feeling like an obsolete machine, unwanted by all. Feeling alone even though I was surrounded by kids at play and adults spending a quiet evening on their porch, enjoying ice tea while talking about their day (honestly, I remember those details, I’m not embellishing here).

Just when the sun started to set, I saw a blinding flash emanating from behind me. I whipped around just in time to watch a mushroom cloud grow on the horizon! Shock waves rolled outward, galloping forward towards the quiet neighborhood I had landed in hours before. Just before the shock waves reached me, I held out my arm and squinted my eyes shut, wishing for time to freeze so I could react – so I could do anything! Being a dream, it worked perfectly!

After freezing time, I walked around the neighborhood and took in my surroundings at length. But now something was different; this time, I knew that I had a purpose. I was here to save these innocent people. What else could I do?

I closed my eyes and willed myself back in time, back to when I landed in the cul-de-sac in the first place. I opened my eyes, and there I was! Back in the afternoon, back when the neighborhood was intact! I contemplated leaving the area all together and forsaking the citizens, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if I did that.

To make a long story short, I failed again at stopping the explosion. I made it to the detonation site, but I was unable to pinpoint the bomb’s location/origin. So I did it all over again. Then I failed again. And tried again. Over. And. Over.

All in all, I believe I went through the dream three or four times. Maybe more, I’m not sure. I could describe each attempt at length, but that might be a little too boring for readers. Suffice it to say that I did eventually find the bomb and the terrorists who were trying to detonate it.

I realized at the end of the dream that I could only close the time loop with a Donnie Darko gambit – I needed to sacrifice myself to save everyone else. So I barged into the room with the bomb and froze time just as the terrorists were putting my head squarely in their sights. I started screaming, and my eyes began to pour forth yellow light like tiny lighthouses. I held out my arms and slowly brought my hands together into a ball – I was using telekinetic powers to pull the bomb, the terrorists, and myself into the rip in space/time I had caused by jumping back in time. The dream ended with my vision being clouded with a sea of shimmering white and yellow. I had died. But I was dying happily, knowing that I had saved countless others.

This was a bizarre dream – it was a dream about an apocalypse here on Earth, but it didn’t end when the apocalypse transpired. Not only that, but I didn’t use my lucid dream powers to turn back time, reverse the effects, etc. No, I just watched as events unfolded. Now you can too!

The beginning of the dream was innocuous enough. I was back in my dad’s old house – a house that I lived in for about three years after my parents first got divorced. (Since I was inside a dream, of course I didn’t question the impossibility of me living there again) Night had just fallen, and I had the house to myself. I went upstairs and looked through the fridge for something to snack on. Nothing promising. I slammed the fridge door in dejection and flopped down on the couch, looking out onto the street out of hunger and boredom.

Suddenly, off in the distance, I saw a huge wall of fire, thousands of feet tall, rushing towards the house! It was vaporizing everything in its path: trees, houses, clouds, people. I was horrified! I ran into the bathroom and jumped into the tub, hoping that I could survive by some freak fluke of nature. I did not. The flames seared through the house, and I screamed as I was blinded by swirling gray, crimson, and gold. For me, everything was quiet for a moment.

Soon, I appeared to re-materialize as a disembodied consciousness, a silent sentinel wordlessly watching survivors suffer and struggle to rebuild. With time moving at a blistering pace, I watched as three generations of survivors slowly began to rebuild civilization in small, localized communities. But huge stretches of land were left uncolonized, left to the devices of marauders and scavengers. This is where I was reincarnated.

I regained consciousness suddenly. I was in the body of a four-year-old boy, walking alongside another four-year-old. (I was struck by the sensation – it was unsettlingly close to my very first memories in real life. In real life, at around age four, I remember suddenly having consciousness, having an identity, having memory. I remember it being confusing and unpleasant. I felt like I had been in a pleasant daze until that moment, and then I was jolted into really BEING.) I was carrying a toy around and explaining to the other boy that we knew little about the gods that had lived here before us, about those who had made colossal structures and crafted fine arts. All that we had left of them were scattered trinkets, mere echoes of greatness long since passed. I showed him that the gods were still able to talk to us, to teach us lessons about how to live our life. In fact, the lessons they had for us were essential for survival in the post-apocalyptic society we were born into.

I held up the toy and pressed one of the buttons. A dopey-sounding masculine voice started to say something to the effect of,”Friends are important! Make sure you stick together!” I told the other boy that it was of the utmost importance that we heed this man’s advice – lone wolves die in the wild.

There were other lessons, but I’m sure you already get the picture. I was living proof that humans no longer had any idea who had come before them; in fact, they worshiped the ghosts of the past, misinterpreting them to be gods.

This was one of the most satisfying lucid dreams I can remember having.

The dream began with me lounging around at my mom’s house at sunset. (I now realize that a lot of my dreams take place at sunset…I wonder if there’s any significance to that. Fear of death? Research will ensue…) A lot of my family and friends were there with me, and we were just having a wonderful time – talking, laughing, eating. Anyway, I went upstairs to the master bedroom to use the bathroom because the downstairs bathroom was occupied. While I was up there, I heard a noise coming from above the house that began as a low whir and slowly grew in intensity until it became a thunderous rumble. At this point, I noticed that the entire house was being bathed in a sea of sunflower-yellow artificial lights. I heard crackling noises coupled with screams from below, and I knew (somehow) that everyone that had been at the party was being abducted!

I looked out the window and craned my neck just in time to see a UFO above the house as it began to pull away from the ground and towards the cul-de-sac, away from the house. Suddenly, I realized I was in a dream and started to feel overcome with rage! I couldn’t believe that some punk aliens barged into my dream and ruined the wonderful time I had been having!

I broke open the window I was standing next to and jumped out of the top-story window, all fear of death long gone from my psyche. These aliens were going to pay. I ran up to the cul-de-sac and watched as the UFO began to fly far into the distance. “No way in hell am I letting these bastards get away with this!” I thought as I raised up my right arm and began to concentrate on giving myself telekinesis. As I did so, the UFO froze in place. Then, I pulled my arm back to my chest; similarly, as if being manipulated by a puppeteer, the UFO flew back towards me and the cul-de-sac impossibly fast. Just as it was 50ft from the ground and about 100ft from me, I held out my left hand with an open palm and stopped the UFO cold – as I had done before. I wished for everyone inside to be back down on the ground, and poof! There they appeared. I proceeded to grab the UFO with my mind and thrash it wildly into the ground nearby, watching with satisfaction as each resounding crash crumpled it further and further. Finally, I sent out a hadouken-like fireball with both my hands pressed together flying straight for the levitating remnants of the UFO. A slow smile spread across my face as I watched the UFO explode gloriously in the dim evening sky, the billowing blacks and reds contrasting starkly with the soft pink and purple sunset in the background.