One crazy dream!! Someone please inform me of a meaning for those who know.

I had a dream that I was laying in bed with my wife, and my dream was of me sleeping... My dream was about me sleeping and having a dream (in my dream). It was very scary and in my dream I was screaming for my wife to wake me up. When she finally woke me up, I stood up in my dream, and that is when I woke up for real!!

I asked my wife if she woke me up, or heard me screaming and she said no!

Has anyone else ever had a dream within a dream like this before? Very creepy and scary.

I couldn't go back to sleep after this, and the weirdest thing is, you know how it is usually different people in your dream with the same name as the people you are thinking about? In my dream I could see myself and my actual wife and we were laying on the same bed as ours in our room!!

Can anyone explain what this may mean, I know there are a bunch of people who know what dreams mean and all, I was just curious and to see if anyone else has experienced this before??

Thanks faithful ATSers, I appreciate any help or stories..

reply to post by Chrisfishenstein

I've had dreams in dreams before. They usually are nightmare-ish and because of that I realize that I'm dreaming (or at least don't want to be there so strongly that I "wake" out of it). I then "wake" out of my nightmare, am usually relieved and glad that I had such control over my dreams, but then things start getting weird again. And then I wake up for good. I don't think a dream in a dream is a weird thing, but they are kinda rare for me.

Your dream in a dream sounds similar to sleep paralysis... maybe you've been reading about it a lot and had a dream about it. Maybe...

reply to post by MikeyBones


Actually that whole side of the paranormal stuff doesn't get me excited. I never even look into that stuff...At least I have another person who had this happen to them also!! Makes me feel more normal.

Aliens I read into a good bit and I have heard of sleep paralysis, but I never really associated it to anything I have ever experienced...

OP,
I once had a dream where I was laying in the bed and the surroundings were exactly how it was when I fell asleep. Hallway light was left on, cat was in her bed, and the top dresser drawer was open. In my dream, I was in bed but looking at the open bedroom door, and I saw a shadowed figure standing there. Very tall, but very much human-like, nothing that should be thought of as alien or whatnot. As I saw the figure, I screamed, and as I screamed, the figure said something to me. That dream still haunts me..I will never know what the figure said. This was 7 years ago. That was quite possibly the scariest dream-in-dream I've ever had, maybe even the only one.
Have you been worried about anything, or maybe stressing at work? I know it seems cliche', but it's very possible that is what could have set you off. Screaming is a universal sign of worry, fear, stress, etc.

Oh yes, that's happened to me before. In my case it was when I was in college and living alone, while I was dreaming I suddenly became convinced that someone was standing over me and was about to stab me and I needed to wake up and stop them. Every time I "woke up" I realized I just woke up into another dream though. I was frantically trying to wake up and finally I did, but I was in a very strange half-asleep state (and totally freaked out by the whole ordeal). I turned on every light in the apartment and stayed up a while, but could not clear the fog out of my head. I finally went back to bed and slept fine after that. That was over 25 years ago, but I remember it quite vividly!

reply to post by Chrisfishenstein


Perhaps you fear not being in control of your life, because that was this dreams sounds like to me. Fear of a lack of control. The fact that you woke up and realized it was a dream but still didn't couldn't go back to sleep could mean that if you do believe in what you dreamed then you are afraid to face your fears. This can only help to generate more dreams like this by feeling this way. IMHO

reply to post by Vanna


I don't have anything in particular that is overly stressful on me...I am a pretty laid back person, but we are trying to buy a new house right now...I don't know if that might be a sign I am actually stressed and just don't really feel that way...Who knows?? I can agree though, this was the weirdest I have ever felt while I was asleep!!

reply to post by iLoGiCViZiOnS


Great information so far everyone!! I don't know about the whole control of my life thing...Maybe when I was 20 or so, but now I don't see that being a real issue...Like I posted with the other person on here, my wife and I are looking into buying a new house...Maybe stress?? Don't know??

You simply went lucid and you dreamt that you were dreaming and actually being in the very room as you were actually sleeping. It is uncanny, but soon you will wake up from that dream, walk around the house and then realize you are still in the dream; this will carry on over and over to what will seem like hours of waking from a dream into a dream until you finally do "wake up".

The only trouble is, will you know when you have reached reality?

Perhaps what you need to identify is not the meaning of the dream but the experience. You may well of experienced an out of body encounter and because you have no reference to what this experience should or shouldn't feel like, you are querying if it was indeed a dream or a dream within a dream. I had some expereinces like this when I was younger, and now having read some posts on this forum where people who practise astral travelling feel vibrations or hear a loud whipping snap prior to leaving their physical body is quite an eye-opener to me because I also use to feel the vibrations a lot. Did you have any of these sensations? Can you recall your dream and note things you saw that suggest you may have well been outside your body? For your consideration.

I've never had dreams like this, but it sounds pretty amazing. Maybe you are stressed, because of the house you are going to buy. Or you saw something that day, that caught your attention.

It sounds like you had a very "lucid" dream. From what I have read the ability to realize in your dream that you are dreaming is a sign of an ability to have deep, lucid dreams that you have great control over. You can actually start to direct and control you dreams with this ability--something a lot of folks cannot do. I have on occasion realized, and said to myself "this is just a dream." I think you should work with this and maybe keep a dream diary.

reply to post by surrealist


No it happened pretty quickly as I recall. All I remember was screaming for my wife to wake me up and I stood up in my dream, and then I actually woke up. I wish I knew more about this stuff, but this is the first time anything like this happened, so I wanted to ask my faithful ATSers!! Thanks for the input..