Hey everybody,
I was wondering if anyone recognizes this phenomenon I often experience in dreams...
It is a general concept of specific people you know in real life being split into two sides.
It feels very unsettling and often causes stress when this happens in my dreams, and it usually goes something like this:
I bump into someone, super random, you know how it goes in dreams.
Suddenly you're at a super random place with this super random person. (usually someone I haven't seen in a while, and also often in multiple nights the same person, even when I barely know him anymore by now). At first I don't really notice who this person is. I am just interacting with him/her as if it is the most normal thing ever.
But then suddenly I start noticing something about this person is off... at the same time I start recognizing him... but it feels very weird... mainly because I notice it's a weird version of him and I cannot pinpoint the exact difference.
Then I start doubting myself, start overthinking:
Is this really that person I think he is? Who else can he be?
Usually this is also when I start becoming more and more lucid and aware of the fact I'm dreaming because my brain recognizes this pattern in my dreams.
Because of this vague state of awareness I start questioning myself even more:
Is this the version of him I should have seen? Is this the version I saw or I hurt or helped or what version of him am I seeing? I feel like I am hurting him by not being able to comprehend his identity... as if I am doing him wrong or disrespecting him for not having a clear image of his personality/identity.
I noticed the more time passed by, the more I felt uncomfortable and also often wanted to help him to find comfort in being friendly and connecting to make sure he's alright. At the same time I am a bit scared of myself and the situation so I kind of want to avoid it and just continue dreaming about something else. But usually both the helping and the avoiding never happens. In fact, nothing really happens, it's just frozen time with an almost abstract very zoomed in focused visual way of analyzing someone... hard to explain.
Then another version appears. And already very fast I notice that this new version is so obviously everything I think of when I think about this person that's not in the first version. As if the person was literally split into two people. It still feels unsettling but at the same time it feels as if it makes quite a bit more sense suddenly.
I also don't really feel aware of my role or my own existence in this part of the dream. I mean that in these dreams the focus is solely on comprehending that person. I am almost obsessing over what's wrong with him or myself in that moment.
Also know that this part of the dream is very short... it's not the entire dream, it usually only feels like 5 minutes, sometimes if it's more intense it can feel a bit longer... maybe 15min or 30minutes max. And it also switches back and forth very vague between everything I just explained and other more neutral scenarios of the dream continuing. Better said: The intensity of this experience isn't constant, it comes in waves.
Sometimes when I wake up during or after having experienced this in my dream, I reflect over it and start thinking the person is actually me. Because I feel like it would make more sense because I know I have some very complex mental traumas and disorders.
As if I lack identity so much that I confuse myself with someone else. But then I really don't understand why it is almost always happening with the same 2 or 3 people.
I don't understand or feel the connection between me and these people. So, I don't see what they have to do with me.
Why do they always split up when I dream about them? It even makes me uncomfortable to meet them in real life now.
It is not really a problem. But I think it just so interesting to think about. That's why I wanted to share this.
I was wondering if anyone recognizes this phenomenon I often experience in dreams...
It is a general concept of specific people you know in real life being split into two sides.
It feels very unsettling and often causes stress when this happens in my dreams, and it usually goes something like this:
I bump into someone, super random, you know how it goes in dreams.
Suddenly you're at a super random place with this super random person. (usually someone I haven't seen in a while, and also often in multiple nights the same person, even when I barely know him anymore by now). At first I don't really notice who this person is. I am just interacting with him/her as if it is the most normal thing ever.
But then suddenly I start noticing something about this person is off... at the same time I start recognizing him... but it feels very weird... mainly because I notice it's a weird version of him and I cannot pinpoint the exact difference.
Then I start doubting myself, start overthinking:
Is this really that person I think he is? Who else can he be?
Usually this is also when I start becoming more and more lucid and aware of the fact I'm dreaming because my brain recognizes this pattern in my dreams.
Because of this vague state of awareness I start questioning myself even more:
Is this the version of him I should have seen? Is this the version I saw or I hurt or helped or what version of him am I seeing? I feel like I am hurting him by not being able to comprehend his identity... as if I am doing him wrong or disrespecting him for not having a clear image of his personality/identity.
I noticed the more time passed by, the more I felt uncomfortable and also often wanted to help him to find comfort in being friendly and connecting to make sure he's alright. At the same time I am a bit scared of myself and the situation so I kind of want to avoid it and just continue dreaming about something else. But usually both the helping and the avoiding never happens. In fact, nothing really happens, it's just frozen time with an almost abstract very zoomed in focused visual way of analyzing someone... hard to explain.
Then another version appears. And already very fast I notice that this new version is so obviously everything I think of when I think about this person that's not in the first version. As if the person was literally split into two people. It still feels unsettling but at the same time it feels as if it makes quite a bit more sense suddenly.
I also don't really feel aware of my role or my own existence in this part of the dream. I mean that in these dreams the focus is solely on comprehending that person. I am almost obsessing over what's wrong with him or myself in that moment.
Also know that this part of the dream is very short... it's not the entire dream, it usually only feels like 5 minutes, sometimes if it's more intense it can feel a bit longer... maybe 15min or 30minutes max. And it also switches back and forth very vague between everything I just explained and other more neutral scenarios of the dream continuing. Better said: The intensity of this experience isn't constant, it comes in waves.
Sometimes when I wake up during or after having experienced this in my dream, I reflect over it and start thinking the person is actually me. Because I feel like it would make more sense because I know I have some very complex mental traumas and disorders.
As if I lack identity so much that I confuse myself with someone else. But then I really don't understand why it is almost always happening with the same 2 or 3 people.
I don't understand or feel the connection between me and these people. So, I don't see what they have to do with me.
Why do they always split up when I dream about them? It even makes me uncomfortable to meet them in real life now.
It is not really a problem. But I think it just so interesting to think about. That's why I wanted to share this.