Philosophy Of Nightmares Essay, Research Paper
Philosophy of Nightmares
The best way to understand why we have nightmares is to think of them as an early warning system or an alarm that alerts us that something is wrong in our lives and is hurting us. We need to focus our attention on the dream, and fix the problems so we can overcome them and clear our mind.
Being human, we do not always pay attention to the subtle hints or little nudges that tell us that we need to change something. We keep procrastinating instead of working out the problems, or we are so preoccupied with other matters that we miss the big issues, and that’s when nightmares occur to help alert us. Some nightmares are like practice sessions that test our abilities and outlook on a given issue, to prepare us for going through a painful lesson in life such as the break-up of a relationship, loss of a loved one, fears of death, loss of health; any number of situations. At first the nightmares on these issues are a shock, but as we understand the issues that are being brought to our attention and change our perception, the nightmares lessen in their severity and we achieve a sense of inner peace or calm.
Nightmares are like a last ditch effort to scream for your attention. There’s nothing like a heart-pounding, terrifying nightmare to get our attention and say, “Hey! What’s going on, here? ” They are actually sometimes helpful, the same way that pain alerts us that something is wrong with our bodies, nightmares are a helpful warning to alert us that our emotional and mental state has a glitch that needs to be fixed, because it’s somehow making our lives harder and more painful.
Dreams prepare you for current and future events in your actual life. They also point out to you the areas in your life that need to be healed, or worked upon. Nightmares are often your deepest fears symbolized by frightening, horrifying images. If you learn to face your fears instead of running away or ignoring them, then the nightmares will disappear or change into non-threatening images. Nightmares are wake-up calls to the problems you need to solve in real life. Why are they so frightening or graphic? Because that’s what most effectively gets our attention.
Unfortunately, we do not usually pay attention to our dreams until they reach this point, and then we sit up and take notice. It’s similar to the way in which we pay attention to our bodies…pain may be unpleasant, but we finally realize that there is a health problem or injury that needs to be tended to, and then we take care of it. The pain may start out mild, but the longer we ignore the problem, the worse it gets until we simply must take care of the problem. It’s the same situation with dreams; we may get numerous messages in regular, non-frightening dreams, but not pay attention. Finally, when the situation gets to a vital point in which a problem must be taken care of pronto, we will get the nightmare.
As to how to fix the problem completely? I do not exactly know for sure. The nightmare is yours and it is up to you to fix the problem in your real life, so that you dream life is a bit easier on you. Nightmares can be very scary and disturbing sometimes, but if you can work through the problem to the solution, you will end up a better person on the outside, as well as on the inside.