BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 / Dreams

**Posted by This Is The Phantom Lady** April 29, 2014 6:45 am

I know we have the Sherlock and Benedict dream threads...

But I'm sure not all of our dreams are about them. I always liked to share my dreams with others for some reason and reading about others.

My whole world is the Eurovision Song Contest right now... And last night when I finally fell asleep with my email open with a work email I had this dream.

France were in the middle of performing 'Moustache' on the stage and the beat rang through to the backstage area where I was. My boss came running to me and grabbed me by the arm and took me to the stage door. I heard the hosts welcome Ireland to the stage and he pushed me through the door and I stumbled onto the stage and stared at about 10.000 people knowing just how many people were watching from home as well... I was so confused and I just froze.

Good thing I'm just a delegation host and have to stay in the background organizing everything.

**Posted by ukaunz** February 1, 2016 10:35 pm

I rarely remember my dreams, maybe they're just not vivid enough. If I remember at all, it's usually just a fragment or an impression of a dream. I'm quite interested in the science behind dreams rather than interpretation. I listened to a podcast yesterday about dreaming, and found this part quite interesting:

"Most people use their dreams in their waking behaviour. [...] We gave the same questionaire to the group of artists, directors and screenwriters working at the [Sundance film labs] [...] It was kind of amazing how much they used dreams in their work, it was also amazing that there was a difference based on individuals' creative interest, in other words, directors use their dreams in responding to change and stress, screenwriters use their dreams in decision-making, and actors just use their dreams across the board. No one uses their dreams like an actor." (I found the bolded bit particularly interesting, and thought of Benedict when he said it - I wonder if Ben uses his dreams?)

He was basically saying that people with a creative interest (even if their interest is gardening, or listening to music) use their dreams.

I haven't been very creative lately, I used to be more creative when I was at uni but have given up my creative pursuits since then. Perhaps I should take them up again... Might make my dream life more vivid!

Last edited by ukaunz (February 1, 2016 10:36 pm)

**Posted by This Is The Phantom Lady** February 1, 2016 10:50 pm

That is very interesting!

I have used my dreams for writing sometimes... Once I wrote a short story over a particularly funny one (which was a sort of fairy tale... I had to dress up as a man to talk to the prince of the kingdom, I can't remember why I was the only one who could do it... there was a law that the prince was not to meet women before he married. I worked hard on pretending to be a man, and it seemed to work as I talked to the prince... until I was about to leave and he told me "What is your real name miss?"... In the dream I was dead scared, if his father the king found out he had seen through my disguise I would lose my head!)

The recent years I've only had dreams if I have had fevers or been sick... or I'm going through difficult times.

The last dream I had a couple of days ago made no sense at all... usually my dreams have a sort of plot... that dream was just flashing images and scenes...

I believe dreams often have something to tell us, either about what troubles us, what we wish for... and this is very controversial, and it's something I try to avoid now... but when I was younger I could predict things with my dreams. I have even had dreams that came true in the real world.

**Posted by ukaunz** February 2, 2016 2:08 am

The man on the podcast said that people have different types of dreams depending on what stage of sleep they're in. If you're interested, you can listen to it here
https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/all-in-mind-abc-radio-national/id73330911?mt=2&i=332523190
There is also an episode about Lucid Dreaming, I haven't listened to it yet. The podcast is called All In The Mind, so it's about all sorts of mind-related topics. I'm loving it!

**Posted by Yitzock** February 4, 2016 7:26 pm

Sounds like an interesting podcast, ukaunz.

I had a dream that was kind of bad the other night. Not as bad as it could have been, given the circumstances, but still bad. I dream that my mum and I were stuck in North Korea. We weren't in a labour camp, we were in a suburban neighbourhood, but we were still effectively prisoners trying to figure out how to escape. After a failed attempt, someone who saw us told the authorities on us and we were nearly publicly punished. Later in the dream I switched perspectives and I was watching the end of a film about two North Korean prisoners who ended up willingly returning to their house in that country after having fled.

That evening I thought about how it bore a bit of a similarity to another dream I had a month ago or so, where I had been kidnapped and my mum had saved me, but then, even though I was scared and never wanted to see the place again, I had to go back to my captor's house because he still had all my stuff.

I don't know whether these dreams are related to stress and feeling constricted by my stress, but because it's caused by school I will willingly walk into it again in the future.

**Posted by This Is The Phantom Lady** February 4, 2016 7:47 pm

That sounds very likely, Yitzock! What an unpleasant dream!

The past months I've been having the same dream, but different every time... It has even come as sleep paralysis sometimes. (Gosh I hate getting sleep paralysis, it's the scariest sh't ever).
And it came back again last night.

I have pretty bad arachnophobia; if I don't act and kill a spider within 10 seconds I'll freeze up with fear.
And I have dreams where I lie on me back, staring up at the ceiling and this spider will just sit there... big and gross. It's never the same spider even.
The first times I had that dream I thought it was real and searched for the spider in a panic... but didn't find anything...
Last night I freaked out. The spider in the dream was particularly huge... at first I couldn't move and then I jumped out of bed and couldn't even scream.

I feel a bit stupid really. It's just a spider! I've had much worse nightmares through my life... and today my boyfriend talked a bit about his very graphic PTSD nightmares of his accident. Brrr.
And I freak out over a dream spider.

I've had worse sleep paralysis too... the first few ones I had 2 years ago were so scary. Imagine you can't move, you can't talk and this shadow man is walking towards your bed and the more you fight to wake your body it just stays still... I am happy to know I hadn't gone mad. The very first time I had to check if my door was still locked.

**Posted by besleybean** February 4, 2016 7:51 pm

I remember when our daughter was coming up 4, she had an episode where she woke up and couldn't move.
Hubby said it used to happen to him, when he was young.

**Posted by This Is The Phantom Lady** February 4, 2016 8:05 pm

They say it's linked to stress, sleep deprivation and sometimes certain drugs... If I don't get enough sleep I just know I'll have one coming...

I was scared I had lost my mind... but apparently it's 'normal'. I watched the Netflix documentary some months back, pretty interesting.

**Posted by ukaunz** February 18, 2016 6:54 am

I needed a nap this afternoon to get over a cold, and ended up having a dream that I was pregnant again. At first I was thinking it would be cool, I could show the kids my belly and they could feel the baby moving. Then it got a bit weird, the baby was squirming around quite a lot and my skin was rippling with the movement. And then I started freaking out when I remembered I would actually have to give birth again. I was adamantly saying "Oh no! No!" It's definitely not something I want to do again in real life.
(I did watch an old episode of The X Files this morning called "Ice", with alien creatures infecting characters and crawling beneath their skin, so this probably had something to do with it!)

**Posted by Yitzock** February 18, 2016 6:38 pm

That sounds like quite an intense dream, but the X Files episode does sound like a likely culprit.

That did sort of remind me of a dream I have just read about in my journal from a year ago, where I had been pregnant and when it was time to give birth it was as if I had forgotten that there would be that pain that I had before vowed never to put myself through.

As for lately, my dreams have been kind of busy but I haven't been very good at remembering them.

Last edited by Yitzock (February 18, 2016 6:39 pm)

**Posted by ukaunz** February 20, 2016 7:39 am

I'm usually hopeless at remembering my dreams, they just sort of dissolve as soon as I wake up. I heard once that the more effort you put into remembering dreams, the easier it becomes. Actually I've just googled it, and here's what one website says:

"Possibly, all you will need to do to increase your dream recall is to remind yourself as you are falling asleep that you wish to awaken fully from your dreams and remember them. This works in a similar manner to remembering to awaken at a certain time in the morning."

But I don't know what to do with remembered dreams, they're kind of amusing but I find they don't really tell me anything useful. Maybe that's why my mind doesn't bother to remember them.

**Posted by besleybean** February 20, 2016 8:30 am

Dreaming is just supposed to be a clearing house...

**Posted by ukaunz** February 22, 2016 9:27 pm

Probably true. Last night I dreamt I was driving a car, but it soon turned into me riding a bike, which has happened in my dreams before, goodness knows why. It's weird how the logical part of your mind doesn't notice these inconsistencies or think they are strange. Whichever part of my brain is in charge of my dreams, I'm glad it's not in charge of my waking mind!

**Posted by Yitzock** February 22, 2016 11:26 pm

The explanation for dreams is that it's a bunch of stuff that's in your brain that your brain is trying to work out.
So, I just tend to consider them fun, often nonsensical, stories.

**Posted by Davina** February 22, 2016 11:48 pm

I can see how the car and bike thing would be connected (apart from the mode of transport) as both activities are muscle memory activities. Ones where you do not have to consciously think about your motor movements because they have become automatic. I guess the same areas of the brain are used and the link is kept during dreaming.

I had the weirdest anxiety dreams for a few days prior to going to Walker Stalker Con...oddly none of these involved zombies.

**Posted by Yitzock** February 23, 2016 1:24 am

Interesting connection, Davina, between the activities. That could mean something. I have also read that certain parts of your brain are dormant during sleep that have to do with motor skills, so if you try to do those things in a dream, you can't (my example is dialing phone numbers - I've had a number of dreams where I try dialing a phone number and keep messing up and my fingers won't work the way I want them to).

I hope your anxiety dreams are not depriving you of rest.

**Posted by ukaunz** February 23, 2016 5:15 am

That makes sense... I'm always a terrible driver/rider in these dreams!

**Posted by This Is The Phantom Lady** March 24, 2016 7:02 pm

I'm sick, and I always have weird dreams when I am... I had a dream about a sort of costume fashion show... first it was a woman in a Darth Vader costume... then a pink Vader costume with a tutu... and then a Darth Vader and Dalek combined costume.

**Posted by besleybean** March 24, 2016 7:46 pm

Oh I have been waiting for this thread to appear again...I have two beauties for it.
Firstly one form me and then an absolute stunner form my husband!
Me: the other night I actually had a nice dream about Benedict and Martin.
They had either been attending or taking part in some kind of presentation and they were being filmed back stage.
They were taking the mickey out of one of the speakers.
Martin stood at a lectern and said: the best part of his speech was...and then started mimicking the speaker.
Benedict was laughing hysterically and then joined in-
But I just remember thinking he took it too far and was obviously playing to the camera.
Martin was genuinely funny, but Benedict was just stupid!

But my husband(and I swear he has given me permission to tell you all this):
The other night he dreamed that he walked into a room and Benedict was lying stark naked on a bed!

Last edited by besleybean (March 24, 2016 7:46 pm)

**Posted by Yitzock** March 25, 2016 12:49 am

Wow! That's funny! Good to know he gave you permission to tell you that, and I am glad he didn't mind! That would have been a very awkward situation in real life.

Benedict was actually in a dream of mine this week, too, but not nearly as interesting. I just dreamt he had started using social media (in my dream it was Snapchat) and the photos he had posted were a photo taken in the mirror, because you could see him holding up his phone and looking at the screen instead of at the camera.