Do you remember your dreams? Any recurring themes?

[SassySnivy]

Interesting question! Some people recall their dreams very well while others don't.

I guess I'm the former, because there is hardly a night in which I don't remember my dreams. Now, depending on how much of a mental impact the dream left on me I may or may not remember it in full detail throughout the day. Usually as the day goes on, the details fade away from my memory as to only leave the major events in said dream.

I have lots of recurring themes too, meaning that most of my dreams meld together into one big amalgamation when I go to try to recall them. I remember a lot of my dreams from YEARS back ago, even.

I know some common themes I have are video games (finding shiny Pokemon, new Chao Garden games, finding hidden areas in the original 3 Spyro games, playing new games that follow the style of the first 3 Spyro games, etc), amusement parks (mainly Six Flags and similar parks; and at that a lot of the time the rollercoasters are shoddily-made and rather hazardous to ride on), flying in a plane (I guess I just really love the feeling and it doesnt happen much? Idk.), crushes (whenever I have a crush that I haven't acknowledged to myself yet this happens), the ocean / beach, etc. Does anyone else have recurring themes they'd like to talk about? Why do you think you get these recurring themes?

Are your dreams incredibly vivid? I know whenever I'm going through an intense event in my dream, usually when I'm feeling seething anger, I end up flailing in the waking world much to the chagrin of my husband.

I really ought to start keeping a dream journal of some kind. My dreams are really odd but at the same time there's just some bizarre wonder about them. I love my dreams...they're all just. So. Weird.

[AD]

I don't remember much about my dreams, if at all. I only have one recurring dream and it is a nightmare.

Without going into detail, it is basically my friends helping the grim reaper kill me. I've had that since i was 5, though in the past 2 years I haven't had it.(3years if you count 2017)

[Caite-chan]

I've had several dreams with Petey Williams in them. But instead of being a fan of his like I am in real life all of my dreams I have been friends with him. No hint of fan girling what so ever.

I've also had dreams of my Dad (who has since passed away for almost 9 years.) They are always of him coming back from somewhere and me always asking him when he's coming home and he always tells me that he can't for some reason. It's almost as if my parents had gotten a divorce and Mom wants nothing to do with him. And I know that's not the case at all. They never got a divorce and they loved each other very much. So it's almost like this dream is a total opposite.

[Neo Emolga]

My dream last night was definitely heavily influenced by Fallout. There wasn't any chronological order to it, at least not in a way I remember, but I remember scavenging around a military airforce base. At one point, I also got attacked by wasteland insects, but had some kind of ridiculous perk where my blood was horribly poisonous to them and the swarm croaked in the process. It was... kinda awesome! And yes, Fallout is loaded with nasty buggers like that, so this was satisfying. >:3

I've also had dreams of my Dad (who has since passed away for almost 9 years.) They are always of him coming back from somewhere and me always asking him when he's coming home and he always tells me that he can't for some reason. It's almost as if my parents had gotten a divorce and Mom wants nothing to do with him. And I know that's not the case at all. They never got a divorce and they loved each other very much. So it's almost like this dream is a total opposite.

This is interesting because I have dreams about my mom from time to time, who passed away about three years ago. In those dreams, she seems very much alive and the whole incident was just a simple, meaningless thing of the past, as if death is something you just get over like a cold or fever.

[Coru]

I am a bit hit and miss with dreams, some stick with me but some fade as fast as it takes me to get out of bed. From the ones that I can remember, there does tend to be a recurring theme. The only way I can describe it is Adventure. I'm always in some unique place exploring and usually running from some sort of creature/villain/thing. Usually people from my waking life are there and the places I am in are an combination of many places I have been mixed together into one area. So I can be in a park I went to when I was a child then suddenly, I can step through a door and be in my childhood school. I also usually get that weird thing where I am running from something but when I try to run, I am going slower than a tortoise, so one thing I have subconsciously learned to do when in a dream like that is to hop for a few seconds before I begin to run so I can run at full speed then.

I don't have them as much now but I used to have a whole tonne of Lucid Dreams. I think I dreamt more Lucidly than not when I was younger really. What I can mostly remember from my lucid dreams is that whenever I was being chased by something and it was catching up, I would use my fingers as if they were a gun and make gun noises, and that would actually work as a functional gun and allow me to escape, I also had a word that I could say that would wake me up out of a dream instantly. The only trick with that was, that in my waking life, I could not remember the word, but when I was dreaming it was as if it was always imprinted in my mind, so I would always say it as an emergency out switch in a nightmare. I haven't had a nightmare in maybe 10 years now though so I think I have lost that magic word to allow me to jump out of my dreams whenever I please.

One recurring dream I would have when I was younger was always weird. It wasn't a dream in itself, however it would always happen at the very start of any dream I had. I would be dreaming that I was falling down the stairs and it would be so vivid, I could feel the pain whilst falling down and I could feel the pull of gravity on me whilst it was happening, that part of the dream itself woke me up many times due to the vividness of it.

[Otter Mii-kun]

Whenever I had a dream that was vivid enough to remember long after waking up, it would usually revolve around school, in such a dream where I would get really frustrated over an assignment or test, and make a huge outburst. In several of these, I would say that I wanted to go back in time, usually somewhere in the 1940s-50s.
Another set of school-related dreams involve my experience at what was then the GASC Technology Center in Flint (now Genesee Career Institute) - the most memorable ones being the school being closed because of a shooting that I was eventually accused of (even though I didn't do any such thing-the last part of that dream turned into a Matlock-like story), and getting frustrated at staff at an IEP meeting held at the vocational school, saying how mad I was at them and that I wished I could go to the Lapeer County Education and Technology Center (which is actually closer to where I live than GASC/GCI, even though I live in a school district that is aligned with GCI).

I have also remembered several Pokémon-related dreams, one of which I had in early 2000 when I was new to the Pokémon games; in that dream I was finally able to get to the strips of grass on the sides of Route 1, finding rare Pokémon in the process. (Needless to say, though, a few years later when I actually tried to access the side grass via a cheating device, the game froze.)

[Chibi Altaria]

I suppose I'm one of the lucky ones that constantly remembers my dreams. Or unlucky? xD Probably more of the latter because my dreams are rarely actually nice. I'm the kinda warped person that usually has dreams about people killing me, or I get myself into dangerous situations, or a lot of bad **** just happens. I blame the video games I play too much lol. I envy people that have dreams about being late to work and call that a bad dream, haha. So generally I can remember them with perfect precision when I wake up, but the more time passes, the more they fade. After about a couple of days I tend to forget everything except for key points.

I've had quite a few recurring dreams, and I do remember the last time I had one it blended itself with another (new) dream. That was weird. Best dream I ever had was when I was literally Shadow the Hedgehog. THE POWER! XD I can also lucid dream, though not always. This is particularly helpful, though, when I'm having stupid nightmares and things try to kill me. xD I can block out all pain and "transport" myself to another "scene" by just closing my eyes in the dream. That kinda proves to myself it isn't real and nothing can actually harm me.

My dreams also aren't usually vivid. They kinda show up as blurred. Or I see people and know who they're supposed to be, but I can't see their face clearly. I'm not sure why this is, but the more important dreams seem to be in relative clear detail so that I can sense everything.

And that's actually a REALLY cool idea, Speedy! Keeping a dream journal. However most of my dreams are either warped (or private) so I'd rather not have anyone accidentally pick that up. :p

[Neo Emolga]

Whew, yep, I definitely still have dreams. The whole sleep on your back and be well-hydrated trick worked again.

I just had a dream where I was doing a lot of outside walking while looking up the news on my smartphone. Now here's a crazy idea for an app. The news paired with Google maps. Tap on the location where the news is happening and fast travel to that spot in an instant! It's actually kind of freaky if you think about it. But I was doing this to check out several things, including where Trump had put up the Mexican border wall. And this wall was huge. Massive, metal barriers erected from the ground and slanted inwards to prevent anyone from getting over them. Then, using the app, once I figured I had enough traveling for the day, I decided to head home.

Things didn't get any prettier there. And it was weird because it wasn't my house either. As soon as I step through the front door, someone tries to follow behind me, but I see he's been attacked by what looks like mountain lion or puma. I only catch a glimpse of it before it darts away. What's weird is that they are in New Jersey, but I've never actually seen one before.

I let him in to take cover inside and I grab my shotgun, quickly calling animal control about the situation and that I need them to take care of this situation with the wildcat, but that I will have to put it down if I think it might attack again. The weird thing with the shotgun was something about it felt loose, and it was in some old brown leather wrap covering that felt like it was falling apart due to age. It's weird because I don't have anything like that at all with the shotgun I have. Meanwhile, everyone else is nervous about me handling the shotgun. I confidently tell them I know what I'm doing, the safety is still on, and I don't have any intention of taking it off unless the situation becomes too dangerous and I have to fire. Regardless, I load it up with the deer slugs and head toward the backyard. Oddly enough, it's definitely not my backyard either. I have no clue what I was doing at someone else's house, but it didn't change the fact there was some dangerous animal going about and it had already attacked someone.

In the backyard, there was some older man there who again, wasn't anyone I knew. It seemed like he wasn't even aware of the situation with whatever wildcat was running around. Still, I keep a sharp eye, look around for anything out of the ordinary, and stand guard hoping I don't actually have to kill anything today.

...And that's when the dream ended. Sorry to end it on such a suspenseful moment, but I woke up before anything happened after that.

To reflect on the dream, it's a good reminder of why I sleep a bit better at night knowing I have firearms ready in case something like this happens. Thankfully, we have never had a situation like this that would call for me to load it up with ammo anywhere else besides the range, but it's there in case the worst happens.

[Scytherwolf]

I also have really vivid dreams, and I remember dreams pretty much every night.

It's funny, but theme parks are a common theme in my dreams too. Except it's usually Disneyland (or a weird dream version of it) or dream-made theme parks. Or water parks. My stories end up in my dreams a lot too. I have a lot of dreams of fantasy creatures/landscapes.

Also, does anyone else lucid dream?

[SassySnivy]

@Chakramaster: maybe, but what you dream isn't anything you can help!

Next time I have a super vivid dream, I'm going to try to post a blog here. And that's the hard part but also the fun part of writing down your dreams: because it all plays out as imagery that can only make sense if you could draw it out visually...with perfect accuracy. xD So painting a dreamscape with words is very challenging. But definitely worth the challenge! Especially if you ever want to look back and reminisce.

Oh! Another recurring theme I just remembered is being late to college. Yes, college; the place I haven't attended to for over a year or two now. :p For some reason I always have dreams where I forget about a class I was taking (usually a class pertaining to math, pffffth) and go the whole semester in ignorant bliss until one day it just hits me. They're very, very frustrating dreams of mine and I have NO idea why it's commonly a thing. X_x

Oh! And sometimes I have dreams about finding "hidden" Pokemon that are from generations in the future. It's weird: I'll have one of those Prima ultimate pokedex guidebook things and I turn to the back and suddenly OMG WHAT ARE THOOOOSE? Usually they're Pokemon that exist in whatever the newest generation of Pokemon is at that time that literally have NEVER been revealed before. Not your BS with Pokemon like Hoopa, Volcanion, Genesect, and the like. None of those guys that are hidden in plain sight (JUST ISNT OFFISHULLY REVEELED GUYS LOLOL!), like, they actually reveal ones that have never. Ever. Been. Revealed. Kinda like how the Pokemon fandom discovered Diancie, Hoopa, and Volcanion on accident. :o

Anyway I'm loving these responses, guys! :D

Ah, of course, Neo. I'm all too familiar with sudden changes of setting too! I mainly experience changes in characters. For instance, I could be referring to one person as Bob and then the next time I see them they're physically a different person, but they're still Bob to me.
@Scytherwolf: YES!!! EXACTLY!! Oftentimes mine are completely fabricated theme parks, yet my mind still associates them with theme park names I'm familiar with. :o

Water parks are the worst for me! Oftentimes I get there like, an hour or half an hour before the water park closes. SO. FRUSTRATING.

I cant really say I've lucid-dreamt before...not to my knowledge anyway.

Well, I mean...I guess I KINDA have before? In my dreams sometimes I'll have supernatural abilities like being able to rewind time. It takes a lot of energy out of dream-me, though? Someone just died? WELP TIME TO GO BACK IN TIME. Or just make myself wake up because that **** ain't happening on my watch. Also, I'm not sure how typical this is but I DO have full control over my actions while dreaming. I've heard that some people dream as if they were watching themselves from a third-person perspective.

I find it so hard to force myself awake from a dream, though!

I also experience this weird dream-like state in my early stages of sleep. The dream is usually really shallow, and I often find myself jolting awake because I fell on the floor or something jumped at me in said dream. Doesn't happen often, though.

One more thing that used to frustrate me but I'm pretty sure I've overcome now: as you guys probably know, I'm married. Even so, I still fantasize about other guys--both real and fictional. That's just how I roll. I used to have this thing in my dreams in which I'd hook up with a guy I liked and was like, OH WAIT LOL SRY I CANT IM MARRIED.
Which is just, like...REALLY annoying because I want to be able to live out my fantasies in my dreams, you know? :P But with the past several dreams this doesn't seem to have been a problem...thank god