Nightmare

[violin2love]

My friend has been having nightmares lately of someone trying to kill her or that she's going to be killed. They are rather off and on, she said she can't ever tell if she's through having them or not. Can someone help me help her with what this means? Thanks!

[Howie]

Originally posted by violin2love My friend has been having nightmares lately of someone trying to kill her or that she's going to be killed. *They are rather off and on, she said she can't ever tell if she's *through having them or not. *Can someone help me help her *with what this means? Thanks! Hello violin! Welcome. I presume these nightmares your friend are having are not lucid. You may want to ask her if there has been any emotional stress that he/she has been going through latley. Or perhaps something that they would like to get off their back. Something that can be bottled up. Nightmares are sometimes a very difficult thing to asses what they mean. When they are bad it can often point to some facet of a persons life. It may not directly come out in that forn in the dream however. At least that is what I have seem to have witnesses most often.

[violin2love]

No, the nightmares are not lucid. I talked to her, and she said nothing emotionally stressing or tramatic has happened since she started having them.

[Leo Volont]

Dear Violin2love, Your friend has come to that point in life where she has become aware of her mortality. Young people rarely seriously consider the possibility of their own death, and even behave as though they were immortal. This is especially true of the young men, and so we have it that every Military Nation drafts and recruits these very young men, taking advantage of this period of foolish fearlessness. Regarding your friends dream situation, I would advise your friend to rush precipitiously into the jaws of death... in dreams, that is. No, she does not necessarily have to be Lucid. Years ago, people had no idea at all about lucidity, but were able to influence their dream behavior through various forms of mental suggestion and affirmation. Your friend needs to suggest and affirm to herself that she will confront death in her dreams. You see, if one can be killed in a dream, and then remain calm for about 20 seconds without waking up, then one comes back to life again. I suppose this is some intimation our Higher Mind gives us for supposing that there is an Afterlife. Whether that is true or not, is not entirely to the point, but it does address our immediate concern which is anxiety concerning Death in Dreams. After one has been killed in a dream and then come back to Life, these fears and anxieties significantly decrease as we would expect they would. Also, your friends dreams may contain an ordinary amount of anxiety concerning the dangers and the violence of our modern society. In this regards, her dreams may be teaching her the feel of intuitive fear. I suppose some people are lucky enough to have grown entirely up without ever having had any real fear. For these people, they need to be made afraid in their dreams, so that they will be acquainted with the feeling. Why know fear? Well, the materialists hate to admit it, but we are all a little bit psychic, especially as regards the onset of immanent danger. People walking into dangerous situations do have feelings and hunches that things are not exactly right. They become fearful and panicy. Modern Materialism and the stress for thinking rationally has indoctrinated most people into ignoring such feelings, and so we have a huge number of victims to rape, robbery and assualt who walked into situations which they 'felt' were dangerous and continued to go in anyway. Anyway, suggest to your friend that she remember her feelings of fear, as though they were an instruction, and then to keep in mind that if such feelings ever arise in real life, as unreasonable as they may seem at the time, that she should resolve now and forever to simply change her direction at that very moment -- at the onset of any rise in the feelings of fear, a momentary change in her plans might save her life, or save her a great deal of preventable trouble. I was a World Traveler, and among World Travelers it is quite a superstition -- following one's hunches and feelings. No great big deal is made of it. A feeling comes and a party of World Travelers decide on the spur of the moment to right instead of left and to go around the block the long way to the bar. Nobody argues over the irrationality of the decision, but we all get to the bar and celebrate that we had all just survived whatever it was that we sensed that was wrong. and we drink to the defiance and evasion of danger.

[violin2love]

Wow Leo, when would you say people start to become aware of their mortality? Because although my friend is very mature she's also fairly young.

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by violin2love Wow Leo, when would you say people start to become aware of their mortality? Because although my friend is very mature she's also fairly young. With men 24 seems to be about the threshold age. With women I am a bit uncertain. So few women participate in the dangerous occupations and hobbies that it is difficult to discern where they suddenly have a sea change in their attitude toward safety and survival. But perhaps I have been looking in the wrong direction. With women, the sense of mortality may manifest in the sense of vulnerability to harm. The debutante skips off alone to have fun at the Ball, but the experienced young woman considers the dangers that are very much specific to women. Women need to apply a standard of care the men can mostly dispense with, considering that, largely speaking, men ARE the danger. In this case, I would have to decide that women must indeed mature toward a sense of mortality way before men do, as the danger comes to them so much sooner. In the survival of the race, it is somewhat to advantage that young men be automatically fearless. But it scarecely helps if young women are equally careless of themselves -- we need no deathly courage from them, and the forwardness of Men more than make up for a natural reticence among the Women.

[violin2love]

Leo, that's very true...Women have to be so careful these days and she understands that...She says the only event she coulf think of that occured around when the dreams started was that she met her current boyfriend...she loves him a lot, but do you think that could have to do with the nightmares? Thanks for all your input on the subject.

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by violin2love Leo, that's very true...Women have to be so careful these days and she understands that...She says the only event she coulf think of that occured around when the dreams started *was that she met her current boyfriend...she loves him a lot, but do you think that could have to do with the nightmares? Thanks for all your input on the subject. Actually, there needs to be no specific precipitating event. Remember the book "Passages"? She may be having this dream simply because it is scheduled for her at this time of her life... part of her maturing process. Or perhaps you may be right, that the acquiring of a boyfriend has woken her up to parallel concerns -- the risks as well as the pleasures of her sexuality. the important thing to remember in all of this is that the Dreams will teach their lessons... they will be assimulated, and then her dreams will move onto other themes... other points along her passage through life. If you need further reassurance, then you can console yourself with studies that show that people who have the most number of anxiety dreams live lives that are least to be anxious about, that is, apparently these anxiety dreams act as warnings that are invariably heeded. It is the people who have the fewest number of anxiety dreams who, ironically enough, have lives that would give us happy people real anxiety attacks. They never dream of being attacked, and so they are not cautious enough to avoid being attacked. They never dream of missing classes, and so they miss classes. They don't dream of being late for work, and so they are endlessly late for work. Etc, etc. So anxiety dreams are a Blessing, if one only looks toward the results.

[violin2love]

Goodness, where did you learn to figure all that out? By the way, thank you so much for helping with the subject.

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by violin2love Goodness, where did you learn to figure all that out? *By the way, thank you so much for helping with the subject. I had a dream once in which this extremely ugly and fat young woman began to sing and play the guitar. Why, it was absolutely lovely. I had never in my life heard better. But then a group of barbaric young men came along and were wooping up a cloud of ridicule about how unpresentable this young woman was, which would have been okay by me, but they were making noise and interrupting my pleasure of her Song, and so I stepped in and quickly made known to them that they were all about to be thumped very badly if they could not keep the general peace while I listened to the music. Apparently the point of this Dream was to test me... whose side would I take? The Ugly Woman stopped playing and came forward and looked me in the eye and said "Remember, the Faculty most to be cultivated is the Faculty of True Discernment". I think it was a kind of Spiritual Initiation, because from that day, or rather from that night, I've been able to see under the Surface to the very Truth of Things. But it also may have something to do with my ability to express myself. I read only the finest literature, and a great deal of it, and I have a keen memory for the anecdotes which crop up through life and in the newspapers and such.

[violin2love]

woah, that sounds like an incredible dream.....its not common for the meaning of the dreams to be expressed so plainly....what sort of literature do you read?

[Leo Volont]

Originally posted by violin2love woah, that sounds like an incredible dream.....its not common for the meaning of the dreams to be expressed so plainly....what sort of literature do you read? Such dreams are indeed rare. They only occur where one has some rather decided Spiritual Patronage. Sometimes such words of Wisdom are provided by Wise Old Men and Guru Archetypes, or such gifts come from the Goddess Oracle Archetypes. But I have a feeling that people are not given such attentions entirely freely. I really think that a person needs to make certain efforts and pass certain tests, and then, even after all that, a person needs to have a certain Quality that would attract Patronage and Spiritual Sponsorship. It is like how people chose pet dogs or cats. Attention is paid to breeding and appearance, and then, finally, one looks to the more intangible qualities and feelings one gets from the animal. Well, we cannot control whether the High Spirits on the Other Side will feel that intangible appeal for us, but we can try to build our Spiritual Resumes -- become better people, and more accomplished... take on certain Spiritual Quests and try to live well and heroically. About literature, my favorite authors are Thomas Hardy, Jane Austen, The Bronte Sisters, and George Eliot. I can reach back to Samuel Johnson and Boswell, but the use of English there is too metered and stepped when compared to fluidity that such as Austen and the Brontes were able to establish as the new standard of perfection. Dickens is in places hurried and almost incoherent (the problem of being his own Editor is that he was too easy on himself). I know that Literature, that is, Fiction, is silly and trivial, but that judgment of offset by concerns for just pure style -- who cares about stories and plots, but it is these books which instruct one on the very height of and pinnacle of the English Language as a narrative tool. I like reading History, and have read up on Spirituality, perhaps liking Swami Vivekananda's style and content the most. Of the popular books on Spirituality and Yoga, I can best understand why Yogananda's "Autobiography of a Yogi" remains so popular. As silly as it is in places, it is very instructive as an introduction to Yoga, Meditation and much of Oriental Philosophy.