Blog Psychologist

Yes, you can die in a dream. I know because I have done it. Mind you it was a lucid dream. There was a car coming at me and I knew it would kill me, but I chose not to move. I wanted to see what would happen to die within the dream. I guess you could say I committed dream suicide.

It was actually a good dream though. After the car hit me, I saw a light, like everyone talks about, and I felt a peaceful warmth come over me. Now, that's probably because that's what I assume would happen when you die. Still, it was an interesting experience.

As far as the myth that you die in real life if you die in your dreams, I could imagine getting so worked up in a dream, or more like a night terror, that you might have a heart attack.

Night terrors are much worse than regular nightmares. Your body physically reacts to dreams much like it would if you were in fear or flight mode while awake. Your heart rate increases, you may sweat and/or scream out, etc.

I once had a night terror that rats were running over my body and I physically climbed over my husband and jumped out of bed. I was scared to death. The whole thing seemed so real. Luckily, I don't have those often. In fact, I think I only had that experience because I was on a medication that did not agree with me.

My nightmares, however, have been known to get very intense. If I had a weak heart, I hate to think the reaction I might have had to them.

Please feel free to share your experiences.

I haven't done a lot of research on how to evoke lucid dreams because they come naturally to me. However, there are tons of resources on the internet. I will try and list some resources when I find some good ones.

From what I've read so far, dream recall is very important in becoming lucid, or aware that you are dreaming. It's important because you need to learn more about your dreams and dream patterns in order to recognize within the dream that it is in fact a dream and not reality. Some sites suggest giving yourself reality check. For me, a dream can seem very real but then I'll notice one thing that doesn't make sense. For instance, I've had dreams where I wake from my bed, in my room, and everything is normal. Then, I'll notice that it's snowing outside and realize I'm dreaming because it's July.

So how do you learn to recall your dreams? Again, I don't really have this problem because I've always been so fascinated with dreams. It's like anything else that you study and learn. When you think of dreams during the day, studying them, and focusing on them, it becomes easier to recall and easier to use different dream techniques.

Now, maybe it's not that important to you, that you want to devote a bunch of time toward it. In that case, you should simply tell yourself before you go to bed, that you want to remember your dreams. I also use this time to focus on any questions I want answered.

It always helps to keep a paper and pen by the bed as well. While you don't need to journal everything in the middle of the night; when you wake after a dream, you can quickly scribble down key words. In the morning, these words will most likely trigger the dream or you'll at least get a laugh from the crazy words you're likely to write.

If it is the morning and no one is around, I like to say my dream out loud. This is extremely helpful to me if I don't feel like writing anything right away.

Hope these tips help. Please feel free to share yours. I will post more on this topic in the future.