The Benefit of Nightmares

As a Dreamwalker, I can control my dreams. Sometimes that means maneuvering a bad dream into better waters. Other times it means stopping a nightmare dead in its tracks.

But mindfully? It often means choosing intentionally to face into the darkness and deal with what’s there. Because there is a tremendous benefit in having nightmares.

It shows you where your weak spots are.

Nightmares: some mechanics

Fears, attitudes, and most every anxiety trigger you have will likely show up at some point in your dreams. When they do it’s no different in the Dreamlands than it is in the waking world. You have the exact same reactions based on the same mental and emotional conditioning.

So why are the nightmares so doggone intense?

Your fears and other triggers are under the jurisdiction of your subconscious mind. That mind has full expression in your dreams. So the trigger is amplified to cause the biggest response in you. You are on its turf.

Afraid of spiders? Suddenly you’re in a room full of them. Scared of falling from heights? You’re at the top of the Eiffel Tower and it’s stupid windy. Don’t like being humiliated? Probably should’ve got dressed before giving that big speech at work; oh that’s right, you didn’t get that luxury: this is a dream.

Whatever your anxiety trigger is, it will be given the overblown IMAX 3D THX sound Director’s Cut treatment in a nightmare. (By the way, IMAX 3D and THX are trademarked brands that I do not in any way claim or own, but are super awesome.)

So we experience that anxiety or panic or anger or whatever, and we wake up wishing we hadn’t eaten that jalapeno ice cream so close to bedtime. The next day we can feel drained or even have lingering flashbacks that re-trigger the emotional responses.

This is good stuff. No it doesn’t feel good. You’d pay to have the effects and the dreams that cause them go away.

But you may not need to pay anyone. This is a fantastic Do It Yourself project.

Get the hammer and caulking gun honey!

By hurling disturbance at you while you sleep, your subconscious mind is hoping you’ll take charge and help. Your mind doesn’t want to torture you with nightmares: shoot, it suffers right along with the rest of you. All those brain chemicals and stress reactions don’t do it any favors. It doesn’t want you to hurt; it’s asking for your help.

Whatever is causing you anxiety, you may be in Avoidance Mode while you’re awake. Hey, that’s not always a bad thing: sometimes just doing your best to stay out of triggering situations or environments is your best strategy. But if your mind won’t let the matter drop and brings it up in casual dreamtime conversation, it’s probably time to square your shoulders and face the challenge.

Will it be easy? Not usually, no. It may take many tries, most of which will probably be unsuccessful. But so much of what you accomplish in life rarely takes only one try unless you have done a lot of preparation beforehand. Like fixing something in your home, it might take hammering on this, caulking that, and generally troubleshooting the problem until you find it and make sure it's really fixed.

Dream Control (called Lucid Dreaming by some) just means that you get to make conscious decisions and take an active role in your dreams. Your subconscious mind gets to intrude on your conscious thoughts all the time. Why not return the favor and consciously, intentionally dream?

However you get to that point, you will notice the need to really apply Mindful techniques. (I know these strategies have different names in different philosophical and psychological realms. I’m just sticking with Mindfulness because she’s the one that brung me to the dance.)

Acceptance comes into play because much of the anxiety you’re feeling has to do with struggle. As you struggle to avoid the feelings or the triggers, you develop an anxious response that can take on a life of its own. So learning to accept that the trigger will occur no matter what you do will free you to choose a healthier response.

So you struggle not to get too close to the edge of the cliff, then you struggle to maintain your footing, then you struggle to not fall over the edge, then you struggle to hang on to the thin thread of hope that keeps you from dropping. Motion pictures use this kind of tension builder so often I’ve started laughing at some of them. Filmmakers know that people have an anxiety reaction to this kind of inexorable edging towards disaster, so they use it to get you on the edge of your seats.

Of course, like any tool, it gets overused. And if a filmmaker turns the screws too tightly, it crosses the line from tense to ridiculous, and I laugh. (Hey Hollywood: if you don’t want me laughing at crucial tension-filled moments, get a clue and stop tightening it beyond that point. Thank you.)

Accept and dare

So if I’m struggling so hard to not fall over the edge and it seems that no matter what I do I get closer to the edge, there’s my first moment of enlightenment. By accepting I am going over the edge regardless, I stop the unwinnable struggle. You can’t prevent it, so trying to do so will deplete your mental energy and deprive you of rest and peace. You’re going to plunge; as comedian Christopher Titus said once, if you keep struggling “you’re just gonna die tired.”

Now that you’ve accepted you can’t change the situation, develop a strategy to face the inevitable and unavoidable. “Man up,” as a certain generation says. “Grow a set,” as another generation is fond of saying. Or “Put your big girl panties on”: same generation, slightly different gender.

The point is to know the difference between what you can change and what you can’t. Once you recognize you can’t do anything about a situation, you are free to not keep wasting resources struggling and save them for dealing with the consequences. Not only will you have more rest and peace, you will be in a way better frame of mind to deal with what comes next. The best news: the consequences are often way less horrible than our imagination led us to believe.

Dare yourself to confront your fears and doubts. Identify your triggers and figure ways to accept and deal with them, whatever that will mean. Have faith that you can do this.

And remember the value of the nightmare. It may have scared you and woke you up at 2:30 in the morning in a sweat, but it was also a cry for your assistance. Be a superhero and answer this distress call from your subconscious mind. When you do, you will learn more about yourself, along with practical strategies for reducing your anxiety reactions to certain triggers.

And that particular nightmare will probably be gone for good.

Now to tackle the one about being lost and late for an appointment.