New Member - Long Question

Hi, The Forum.

My name is Michael, 56, and I am from the UK.

As an initial post I thought I would get right into it by asking about a particular kind of lucid, (not Lucid), dreaming that I have undertaken for some years, with spasmodic occurance; for which I cannot find any kind of name or explanation.

*****

This one is oft recurring but in different locations, (same country), and in different bodies, both male and female.

I am in North Korea, in a crowd of frightened people, trying to get away from a troop of approaching soldiers.
As we are trying to depart, the soldiers move among us and commence to grab people and pull them away from the throng.
I am beyond terrified; I know that if I am taken I will disappear into one of the Camps.
The terror mounts and I am weeping; I can hear and feel myself and the tears coursing down my face; I am not watching this, it is ME to whom it is happening.

Suddenly a hand grasps my arm, I look down and see a military sleeve and feel my arm being tugged...

At this point I stop and as I do so I am completely calm.

I am now standing and, silently, watching somebody, (sometimes man, sometimes woman), who is crying and calling out as they are pulled away from me: not from left or right, from front or behind, but FROM who I am.

I am now an observer.
I know I am there watching the events, from among the events, but that I cannot be seen.

I awake.

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I am in some kind of large warehouse, moving among the racking, piled with products, and I am attempting to hide from some men who are seeking me; I know they are Mafia, as am I.
I am carrying a heavy, automatic pistol with a silencer attached. I can feel the roughness of the grip and the hardness of the trigger under my finger.

A man appears on the opposite side of the racking from me and as he turns he sees me through a gap.
I am unafraid and I raise the pistol and point it at his face.
He tells me, "You don't got the f**king b*lls!".
I pull the trigger and shoot him in the face and he falls away from me.
At this point a man runs from ME, (moving FROM who I am, like the Korean dream).
I am, once again, quite calm and invisible to the others, and now find myself looking down at the shot man laying on the floor showing all the details of one who has been shot in the face; I never recall how I got to the other side of the huge racking, I'm just there, looking, as his associates gather around him.

I awake.

In a similar scenario my pistol jams and I run through the warehouse attempting to escape from the man who saw me.
I am taken off of my feet by a massive impact that hits me from behind, I know I have been shot; it strikes me in different places, at different times.
I don't separate this time; I just awake.

However, on these occasions, for about 24 hours, during my normal, conscious day, I can feel a defined ache EXACTLY where I was 'shot'.
I did wonder if this was some kind a nerve cramping while I was asleep but if I press upon the area it exhibits no pain; the ache is constant and 'inside'.

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Last night, 22 Feb 2017, I was in a plane crash.

There were two pilots and four of us are in seats behind them, set two behind two.
It was a military type aircraft and we are wearing the 'full body' type harness; but I was not in the military.
As the dream started we were already in the act of descending to crash; I can see the ground approaching, we are mere feet above it and there are small trees and bushes ahead of us.

The aircraft hits the ground and the noise is deafening as we slide along the ground, with everything shaking and vibrating around us.
I know I am still alive and although, (for some, unknown, reason), I am not overly scared I do realise that things are shooting across the cabin and coming through the broken windscreen, and the biggest risk is something hitting me in the face: I raise my arms to shield myself.

When everything comes to a halt and it is quiet somebody goes to the door of the aircraft and tries to open it.
They call out that the door is against a tree and cannot be opened, and a fire-axe should be found to try and smash a way out.
At this point a man moves away FROM me to join the fray at the front of the aircraft; I become absolutely calm as I watch them, unseen, commence to start hacking at the side of the aircraft with the axe.

I awoke.

*****

I apologise if this is a long, convoluted initial post but these dreams are quite intriguing to me.

It is always ME to whom things are occurring; until the separation, and then I become an invisible onlooker.

Many thanks for your patience.

Postscript:

These dreams do not have the usual, what I would call, air of vagueness, about them, at the time; no doubt, no 'fluffy edges'.

I am there; it is me; I feel the physical contacts; until the separation when I become an unseen onlooker.

In the dreams similar to the Korean version, I may awake almost immediately, but then I have stayed and moved, unseen, among those that remain, for several minutes, as they cry and lament their loved ones who have been taken.
I say nothing; can say nothing, but I also know that they have nothing to really worry about if they can find the calm that I now have, since the separation.

Hello Mikerlay: Unfortunately I don't know anything about dreams. So I cannot be of any help with regard to this. There are other members here on PC who are knowledgeable though. Hopefully some of them will reply to your post.

I see this is your first post here on PC. So... to PsychCentral… from the Skeezyks! May the time you spend here be of benefit.

PsychCentral is a great place to get information as well as support for mental health issues. The more you post, & reply to other members’ posts, the more a part of the community you will become. Plus there are social groups you can join & chat rooms where you’ll be able to connect with other PC members in real time (once your first 5 posts have been reviewed & approved.) Lots of great stuff! So please keep posting!

Your dreams seem to be mirroring your real life situations you are in. Characters in the dream can mirror yourself. Such as the man with the gun. Hacking out of the plane wreckage may mean hacking your way out of a real life situation.

Hi Michael. Those sound like quite intense dreams. I don't know what they mean, but I've had similar dreams myself.

Some I would classify as past deaths. One example: I was with a bunch of other people who were standing all around me. I was getting a belly piercing, only for some reason this one entered at my spine before exiting in front. Once awoke, I knew I had been captured by a patrol and run through with a sword for spying and betrayal. Awake, I also felt shame, which I had not felt in the dream. Was that dream a memory of a past death? Who knows? I'm Buddhist; the possibility is not shocking to me.

But I've also had dreams that were like sped-up, full-on life experiences of other people in contemporary life. Like being a foster kid who was sexually molested in a group home; the molestation was covered up and the kid was moved to another group home where, having lost everything they cared about, they committed suicide. I woke up crying after that one, but, while some points of the emotional history matched with my personal issues, most didn't. So where did THAT come from?

Could that have been a past life/death dream? Given my age and what I know of the history of the child welfare/foster care system, I don't think so. Some kind of psychic leakage? Maybe. Who knows? As far as what did it mean, it means I am now motivated to have a great deal more compassion and understanding about a situation I had never really thought about much before.

Hi Mikerlay,
Dreams are dreamt to respond to what happens during the sleep.
My guess is that you have a chronic pain come on during sleep that is brought on by sleeping in a certain sleeping position.
I ssume you're implying that sometimes your "soul" seems to walk away from you.
This usually happens when a sleeper moves from the usual bad sleeping position to a more comfortable one.
Were someone watching you during these dreams, he/she would notice you actually change sleeping positio: turn over, stretch, or curl up.
Everybody dreams in a personal, individual way and your dreams are quite normal.