I most definitely can read in my dreams. Not only can I read road signs, but I've also read email & hand-written journals while dreaming. I also dream in color.
I failed to mention this in this particular entry, but I do "read", but if I need to get information out of the reading alone, I cannot, because what looks like language is actually just gibberish. I have also dreamt in "Spanish", but I'm sure it really wasn't; it was just supposed to be understood that people were talking in Spanish in that particular dream. Do you have reading comprehension or are you just engaged in "pretend" reading?
Most people actually dream in color. It is very rare not to. Some people think that when people owned black and white TVs that more people dreamt in black and white then.
I have reading comprehension. Sometimes I dream and I'm reading informational books... and sometimes my dream self is annoyed because I'm trying to learn or study something but everything I'm reading is stuff I already know! Then I had this dream one time that was really neat, in my dream I was reading the scriptures, and I read a passage that just came across as a big powerful eye-opener. This dream was a few years ago, so I couldn't even tell you what it was now, but I'd read something in my dream that was worded so beautifully I continued thinking about it after I woke up. Upon waking, I even opened up to the same chapter & verse in Isaiah that I'd read in my dream, and I fully believed that I'd be able to reread the verse in my wake state. Unfortunately, it wasn't there.
Here's something for you to interpret: I CAN read in dreams, but only under specific circumstances, and words have more power than anything else in my dreams...I can "read" a novel or a book, but if I do, I am either a third person watching myself read (yes, sometimes I dream in third person), or I am looking up from a book I was just reading to talk to someone (which i wouldn't really count except to say that this is how I start most dreams, looking up from a book, which is interesting
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I dream in third person all the time. I don't think that is that rare. I can also switch between 1st and 3rd person at will once I figure out that I am dreaming.
Watching myself read in thrid person is not the kind of reading I am talking about. That's like watching a person read in a movie. For all we know, the actor isn't really reading, he or she is just pretending to; the "reading" is just a prop. Reading occurs in my dreams for sure; but if I need to comprehend the actual text in front of me, I cannot. Sometimes, I will pick up something to "read" and I will know what I am meant to understand, but I don't actually gain that information from the text. Moreover, some people, when they read fiction, see images in their head of what they are reading. Do these people see images within the images of their dream?
Do you intentionally wake yourself up? Or is that an indirect result of screaming in the dream?
I figured you didn't mean third person reading...but figured I'd mention it. I think I would be compelled to do whatever I read if I actually read in a dream.
As for intentionally waking myself up, it depends on the dream. Sometimes I know that I'm dreaming, but usually it's a result of the screaming. Actually, and I think this is weird, when I DO know that I am dreaming I will "wake myself up" in my dream, and I will think that I am awake and go through my whole morning routine, then ACTUALLY wake up and realize that I was dreaming that I was awake. So I assume then that I can subconciously control what it is I dream and change it at will, but cannot objectively tell that I am dreaming?
I'd respond to your linked post, but it's so old, I'll just go ahead and mention it here. Your "power" you mention is called lucid dreaming, is it not? When you realize you are dreaming, you have complete control over your dream. You can go to a new place, talk to whoever you want, make them say whatever you want, etc. It is, yes, a small question of willpower once you've made the realization.
If you want to practice waking yourself up, just go to sleep worried about what time you need to get up. Make an appointment for early, then stay up late and believe your alarm clock unable to wake you. You will wake yourself from your dream, thinking "I'm asleep, I need to wake up to do x." You will not just do this once, but once every few hours. Intentionally waking yourself from a dream severely disturbs the quality of rest, it's like being woken by an outside force - you.
It may not happen the first night, but after two or three nights of missing an alarm, it tends to seep into your subconcious.
Yes, I'd not heard that term -- or forgotten it -- before, but I am a lucid dreamer. However, I usually have to be dreaming and figure it out first before suddenly having the ability to change them. I also have to fight against my dream. My ability seems to be improving, but I still "lose" sometimes. So I would not say that I ever have complete control over my dreams. It is a matter of will power. It is hard to do, because I have to stuggle to maintain logical thought while still asleep.
One of the problems I have in waking myself up is that I'll wake up from a dream within a dream -- or one, two, or three withing that one.
And yes, I have noticed that I get far less rest if I am trying to wake myself.
I'm lazy while I'm sleeping, I don't want to work. :D That means that unless I come by lucidity somehow naturally, I don't force it. I do find myself in dreams where I control my own behavior. In these dreams I do not realize I am dreaming, so I explore my environment in an effort to gather as much information as I can. This is a form of lucid dreaming -- baby steps, I s'pose.
Certainly there are times where one controls their own behavior in a non-lucid state, but it's the intentional collection of data that makes that little difference, I think.
I think another difference is that lucid dreamers can change their environment and "break rules". I've willed doors to appear in walls so I can exit, for example, or decided to up and fly.
I'm lazy to; I want my dreams to be relaxing. Unfortunately, illogical anything disturbs me to the point that it no longer feels restful. It's kind of an annoying factor. Works the same way for movies with me. Screwball comedies, for example, rarely entertain me.
Just this past night, I was reading in my dream. Both 'real' text as well as a logic puzzle. I tried to solve the puzzle but I woke up first. Anyway, there was text that was read.
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Most people actually dream in color. It is very rare not to. Some people think that when people owned black and white TVs that more people dreamt in black and white then.
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Then I had this dream one time that was really neat, in my dream I was reading the scriptures, and I read a passage that just came across as a big powerful eye-opener. This dream was a few years ago, so I couldn't even tell you what it was now, but I'd read something in my dream that was worded so beautifully I continued thinking about it after I woke up. Upon waking, I even opened up to the same chapter & verse in Isaiah that I'd read in my dream, and I fully believed that I'd be able to reread the verse in my wake state. Unfortunately, it wasn't there.
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I wake up with songs in my head that I had been dreaming about, but never text.
How do you think when awake? In images? in words? in text?
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Watching myself read in thrid person is not the kind of reading I am talking about. That's like watching a person read in a movie. For all we know, the actor isn't really reading, he or she is just pretending to; the "reading" is just a prop. Reading occurs in my dreams for sure; but if I need to comprehend the actual text in front of me, I cannot. Sometimes, I will pick up something to "read" and I will know what I am meant to understand, but I don't actually gain that information from the text. Moreover, some people, when they read fiction, see images in their head of what they are reading. Do these people see images within the images of their dream?
Do you intentionally wake yourself up? Or is that an indirect result of screaming in the dream?
The stop sign dream sounds fascinating.
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As for intentionally waking myself up, it depends on the dream. Sometimes I know that I'm dreaming, but usually it's a result of the screaming. Actually, and I think this is weird, when I DO know that I am dreaming I will "wake myself up" in my dream, and I will think that I am awake and go through my whole morning routine, then ACTUALLY wake up and realize that I was dreaming that I was awake. So I assume then that I can subconciously control what it is I dream and change it at will, but cannot objectively tell that I am dreaming?
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If you want to practice waking yourself up, just go to sleep worried about what time you need to get up. Make an appointment for early, then stay up late and believe your alarm clock unable to wake you. You will wake yourself from your dream, thinking "I'm asleep, I need to wake up to do x." You will not just do this once, but once every few hours. Intentionally waking yourself from a dream severely disturbs the quality of rest, it's like being woken by an outside force - you.
It may not happen the first night, but after two or three nights of missing an alarm, it tends to seep into your subconcious.
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One of the problems I have in waking myself up is that I'll wake up from a dream within a dream -- or one, two, or three withing that one.
And yes, I have noticed that I get far less rest if I am trying to wake myself.
Are you also a lucid dreamer?
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Certainly there are times where one controls their own behavior in a non-lucid state, but it's the intentional collection of data that makes that little difference, I think.
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I'm lazy to; I want my dreams to be relaxing. Unfortunately, illogical anything disturbs me to the point that it no longer feels restful. It's kind of an annoying factor. Works the same way for movies with me. Screwball comedies, for example, rarely entertain me.
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