Lucid Nightmares - Submit Your Dream

I’m preparing for my upcoming lecture on lucid nightmares, coming up in three weeks in Chicago at the annual conference for the International Association for the Study of Dreams.

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Nightmares Linked with Multiple Suicide Attempts

A study from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden reports that suicidal patients are more likely to attempt to take their life again if they have nightmares following the first attempt. In fact, the data suggests that gender and psychiatric diagnosis is not a factor in these results.  From the original article,

“Those who were still suffering from nightmares after two months faced an even greater risk. These people were five times more likely to attempt suicide a second time,” says author of the thesis, Registered Nurse Nils Sj str m.

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Sleep Paralysis and Spirits

Are spirits real, or are they just irrational stories meant to explain things that science now explains better” This is the way the question of spirits is framed by many. According to many recent polls, belief in ghosts in the West hovers around 60%, and one British poll found that more people believe in ghosts than God. These statistics are then typically melded to reinforce the idea that “we hold irrational belief despite all the math we”ve done,” such as this statement from Live Science:

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Lucid Nightmares - Fear, Initiation, and Beyond

This is my final post on scary lucid dreams, also known as lucid nightmares. So far, we have looked into attitudes about nightmares, and some of the stumbling blocks to appreciating lucid nightmares at face value. Now, in part V, we’ll explore some alternative ways to frame these important experiences.

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Lucid Nightmares & Frightening Near Death Experiences

Today I want to talk about lucid nightmares using the metaphor of frightening Near Death Experiences (fNDEs). Both of these states of consciousness are under-reported, most likely due to the taboos I explored in Part I of this series.

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Delving into the Cause of Nightmares

This is part two of my series on lucid nightmares. But first we need to take a sweeping look at how the nightmare in general is discussed and treated in contemporary psychology.

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Lucid Nightmares - Participate in Dream Research

Want to participate in dream research” I”m now officially collecting dream reports for lucid nightmares, a type of lucid dreams that is often not discussed in the field of dream studies. I will present my findings next summer at the annual conference for the International Association for the Study of Dreams in Chicago.

This is the first post in a series in which I will explore nightmares and lucid nightmares in depth, so stay tuned. Read more

Calling All Dream Warriors

I had a really unsettling moment this week when I realized I”ve been unconsciously living out my life according to the plot of A Nightmare on Elm Street III: Dream Warriors.

As I was reminded in this hilarious post about the 1987 horror movie, the main character Kristen leaves her hometown to study dream research after suffering from realistic nightmares starring, you know, Freddy. She then returns home, and begins working in a psychiatric hospital to help others who have powerful but destructive imaginations. That’s when the nightmares begin again….

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Why do Nightmares Happen?

I missed this excellent podcast about contemporary nightmare research when it was released last fall. NPR interviews New York Times science journalist Natalie Angier and dream researcher Kelly Bulkeley about the whole mess: theories about the cause of nightmares, common nightmares, as well as how to deal.

Here’s the link for NPR”s Anatomy of your Nightmare.

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REM is not the Man Holding Us Down

It’s been roughly 54 years since a young graduate student discovered and named REM sleep, which is commonly known as the “dream state.” While it is true that dreaming can occur in all of the sleep states (as cognition, mental imagery, and uncanny kinesthetics), it is REM that grants us the long dramatic dreamy narratives that we usually remember in the mornings.

REM stands for Rapid Eye Movement, and was named by young E. Aserinsky because, in this sleep state, every voluntary muscle in the body is in motor paralysis, except for the eyes. They roll back and forth wildly while the rest of the body remains frozen.

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