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Falling dreams

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A number of dreamworkers and researchers say that falling dreams, even nightmarish ones, may be precursors to flying dreams. I'm not sure this is universal, but if you've been having a lot of falling nightmares, it's worth a try--push things along a bit! Ask your dreams, just before sleeping, for even more falling dreams, and tell yourself you'll fly in them. It's worked for me.

Though, I admit, I don't mind an occasional falling dream anyway. In my dreams, they often seem to bring, or predict, big revelations... Worth a little shock. Even if you hit the ground and die, so what? Dream-death is quite educational.

On the other hand, some falling dreams are literal warnings of real dangers--everything from weak railings to less physical support systems--jobs, lovers, jets, investments, nations--that your dreams think may soon fall apart. If you have plausible falling dreams, or recurring dreams of falling in similar circumstances, better look hard at those circumstances. Not all fears should be mastered. Sometimes loose railings need fixing, loose impulses need self-control, loose leaders need tighter supervision, or ejection...

RELATED TOPICS: death in dreams - flying dreams - nightmares - dream advice - psychic dreams - See also the full INDEX OF SUBJECTS.

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ANTI-LUCID FLIGHT: by Wayan, 2016/8/30, a friendly nightmare begging me to go lucid.
I fear falling? The drop increases. Want a softer surface? The rocks turn to dirt, then water.
Want help? Here comes a flying dolphin. Oh, but I'm not dreaming...
APOCALYPSE OF THE MOON: by Carl Linkhart, 1997 or before; dream poem/painting
The far future. The moon falls to Earth. But then... the moon unfalls!
Golden light nurtures a rebirth of our dying ecology & civilization...
BALLOON DIVE: by Wayan; 2007/6/17, a nightmare saying I made the least bad choice
A boy leaps from a runaway balloon, falls 100' into a pond, and floats face-down.
I'm sure he's dead, but when a woman fishes him out...
BROKEN GLASS by Nancy Price; 1948, a dream of working to death.
Helping out talking animals until I'm exhausted, I suffer a fatal accident. What am I being warned of?
CABIN IN THE SKY: by Wayan; 2005/7/25, a nervous, guilty dreamlet of escape
Bart Simpson leads me down from the Cabin in the Sky back to being... grounded?
CATFISH RESCUE: by Nick Munford, art by Jesse Reklaw; pre-2000; a dream of shamanic kindness
I run away. A car nearly hits me and I fall into the lake. But
a kindly catfish drags me to an underwater phone booth...
CHASM by Nancy Price; 1948, a telepathic nightmare.
The scenery's so lovely my mother walks off a cliff! As I wake, a neighbor falls out a high window...
CHEAPSHIP!: by Wayan; 1996/8/6, a nightmare on trained stinginess.
Why did I sign on as a crewman on the Cheapship, a freighter
that's falling apart? And yes, I do mean that literally...
CHOREOGRAPHY: by Wayan; 2006/9/7, a nightmare of murder in plain sight.
At a beach, a mob of kids stage an intricate practical joke full of coordinated “accidents.” How many of the jokers knew the end was death?
CAUTION: MALICE
CINCINNATI HUNCH: by Anonymous #56, 1969/9/8, predictive hunch & clairvoyant dream
My husband had to go to Cleveland. I FOUGHT to keep him from flying out of Cincinnati; he took a night train.
I dreamt I was flying, falling, and woke feeling the house shake. Later that day, my sister called to tell me...
CAUTION: DID SHE SAVE HIS LIFE? WIKIPEDIA CASTS DOUBT.
THE COMING DARK: by Jenny Badger Sultan, 2002/3/2; a dream on one disaster averted, and one... not.
I climb down a cliff before night strands me; but in town, risky adolescent games cause a crash...
COMING TO THE JUMPING OFF PLACE: by Jenny Badger Sultan, 92/5/1, painting of an escape dream
Trapped on an island, spied on and controlled, we decide to jump off
a cliff and die; but as we jump, a spirit sneaks us off be reborn...
THE CONDEMNATION: by Georges Perec; Feb. 1972, a dream of cults, persecution, and timeslip. Dream #105
I'm on vacation, but cultists lick my feet--then turn on me, casting stones. But they miss.
So I wander the steppe for centuries, until I come to the City of Texas...
"CRY, BABY!": by Wayan, 1985/8/17, dream-farce with a warning.
The only man in the Miss America Japanese Tea Ceremony Swimsuit Pageant, I learn a tearful lesson...
CAUTION: DYSFUNCTIONAL FLIRTING
CYCLONE REPAIR: by Anonymous #36; pre-1961, a forgotten warning dream
Months ago, I dreamed of that exact wall--I fell and was hurt. So today I told my foreman
I'd rather work on the ground. But by 11, I forgot. I climbed up to nail in some blocks...
A DIFFICULT PATH: by Anna Kingsford; 1877/11/3, an advisory dream.
I lead my daughter up a thorny path; she’s getting scratched. She'd rather stay in that fishing village below...
DOG THIRST: by Cecy and Wayan; 1991/10/7, shared or telepathic dreamlets
CECY: In a desert, a thirsty dog jumps out of a tree--the first known dog suicide...
WAYAN: I'm a talking dog. Our owner denies us enough water, so we protest...
DON'T GET UPSET: by Wayan; 1996/4/10; a warning-nightmare comic (small screen, slow loading? Illus. text)
A mob chases me chanting "Lyin' Wayan!" I get dizzy, fall off a bridge, and wake. Then comes REAL trouble!
CAUTION: FATAL FALL
DREAMKU, JANUARY 2007: by Roswila; various dates up to January 2007; 31 dream-poems--mostly haiku
A month of dreams full of science fiction: galactic navigation, spacedragons, oppressed fairies, alien love...
EARLY MORNING DREAM: by Brian Cronwall, c.1986, a surreal dreamlet turned poem
Night. Heads shaved, in loose-fitting gray robes, the young men swing from eave to eave. Two lose their grips.
Hard fall. Blood. Assistants call ambulances. Others swing on, house to house, before dawn...
ELF RANGERS? NO WAY!: by Wayan; 1995/3/25, a dream on repression.
A logging war in the northern forests is confused by subjective realities. Am I sure what I see is real?
FAKE IT!: by Electra Johannes and Patagia; 2007/9/22 and 2007/9/23, linked dreams.
Patagia dreams she fakes a Hindu rite, causing Electra to dream she fakes leadership in a refugee band. But are they faking?
FALL AT THE RIGHT SIZE: by Wayan; 2018/7/14, a dream shape-poem on a lifesaving indecision.
I fall off a tower, but I can change size. Tiny things fall slower, but they also tempt the local falcons!
Be big & hit hard, or tiny & be eaten? There's a third choice, but I sorta fell into it...
FALL FROM A STAR: by Edwin Muir; 1920, a hypnogogic shamanic initiation
Escaping the tiny red plush room inside a star, I dive back to earth. Oops. A beast eats my broken body. My soul waits...
FALL INTO FEAR: by Brenda Ferrimani; 2001/9/12, a 9/11 nightmare transformed by lucidity
I’m falling into endless darkness. I feel like screaming, but then I remind
myself I’m dreaming. “What is for me here?” I demand. “SHOW ME!” I begin
rising toward the stars. Huge metal discs with alien writing rise with me...
FALLING INTO A TESSERACT, and Meeting a Being of Pure Energy: by Dustin Latham, 2019/11/7
I knew I was on my bed, yet I felt myself falling into a tesseract--huge, crystalline, colorful.
Inside I met an energy being who explained I'm not meant to die yet; this was just training...
CAUTION: UNCONVENTIONAL GOD
THE FEARFUL INSECT by Nancy Price; 1948, an episodic circular nightmare unified by a leitmotif
A bug with a horse-skull face reappears all through this nightmare of betrayal. I only know I feared it...
FILL IN THE PIT: by Wayan; 2018/8/18, a political/practical advisory dream
The boarding school needs to fill in the old Punishment Pit. Not just archaic,
but a threat to every student. So let every student dump clay in & dance on it...
FLY OVER THE RIVER CANYON: by Linda Magallón; 1984/9/18, a joyful flying dream
A man leads me to a cliff looking down on a canyon. Men dive into the river below, but
often hit the canyon walls. The two of us soar upwards though, across the canyon...
FOR THE FIRST TIME: by Jack Kerouac, Nov? 1954, a lucid dream of escaping a rut
I've climbed a cliff and cower on the brink; but for for the first time I need not
fall or retrace my dangerous path down. I know I'm dreaming, and wake...
HEADING FOR A FALL: by Wayan; 1993/11/2, a dream of drastic shortcuts.
I crash my car on the way to therapy. I ask my dream why. And it tells me! Deliberate, but not suicidal...
HELL HALL: by Anonymous #3; c.1920?, a dream of initiatory cannibalism
A revival meeting goes bad--suicides, 'long pig', a hell-pit. If you sup with the devil, carry a long fork!
HOW TO BE A WOLF: by Wayan; 1987/3/15, a dream of a trickster-mentor
We're hiking in the Sangre de Cristos when a girl offers to show us how to be a wolf. We're
eager--until she turns wolf, bites us and leaps off a cliff! Furious, we stupidly follow her over...
CAUTION: NUDE FLYING WOLVES
I DIDN’T DIVE IN: by Herbert Read; before 1938, a dream-poem experiment.
I watched her dive into the lake... and fail to come up. Her golden cloak
floated on the water. I hesitated just a moment, and...
"I SHALL HURT YOU WORSE": by Mrs B. when young, c. 1760; a predictive dream semi-heeded
At 14, B. dreamt a stranger attacked her and hurt her badly. She said "but I'll hurt you worse." She did:
a week later that man attacked and nearly killed her. She survived to identify him--and get him hanged...
CAUTION: HARSH JUSTICE
IF ONLY I COULD: by Rick Veitch, c.1995, an eerie underground dream
Soil turns to air for me; I float in the dark between tree roots
and stones, thinking "If only I could remember my name"...
JESSICA THE MERMAID: by Jessica, mid-1977, dream-provoked dream
At a dream workshop for kids, James's trickster dream-figures provoked Jessica to dream one chased her;
fleeing, she jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge, became a mermaid, and married the trickster...
JETCATS: by Wayan; 1990/5/24, a surreal dream hiding a message about others
Our black cat Purr and our new blonde kitten fly around as if jet-propelled
dive-bombing the roof. Alarming, but their cat-reactions aren't like mine--
fast as a test pilot! For me it'd be suicide; for them, just playing...
JOURNEY IX: by Gary Snyder, 1970 or before, a dream of ascending through death
Ko said "Now we have come to where we die." I thought it looked just like the land we'd been traveling,
and couldn't see why we should have to die. Ko grabbed me and pulled me over the cliff...
CAUTION: DYING IN DREAM
JUMP OVERBOARD: by Graham Greene; 1925/12/11, a possibly psychic nightmare.
Wednesday night I dreamed I had to jump overboard... that night there was a wreck
off the Yorkshire coast in a storm and the captain ordered his men to jump into the sea...
THE LAUGHING GIRL: by Gordon Wagner, c.1977; a strong anima helps heal a trauma
I was one of just three to survive a roller coaster crash. I dreamed of a playful, laughing girl who drove off a cliff.
Dead, she lay on a bier in a surreal cemetery. But she woke and looked at photos of her old self with curiosity...
LAURA: by Jenny Badger Sultan; 2009/10/24; painting in the Box of Dreams
As we climb down the steep mountainside, clutching bushes to keep from falling,
I ask Laura "Do you want another child?"
LET GO THE SAFE: by Wayan; 2014/2/6; poem of a lucid flying dream
I'm pushing a safe off a roof in Berkeley so it won't be pushed off the roof
(yep, you read that right) but it pulls me with it! Either die, or go lucid and fly...
LONG ROAD TO HEAVEN: by Edwin Muir; 1920, an epic hypnogogic shamanic initiation
Creatures in the primal sea touch my third eye, dragons cry their eyes out, I fight the Sphinx, and arrive at last in...
MARK ROLLS THE MELON: by Wayan, 1990/7/4, an Independence Day dream-comic
My friend Mark and I climb the Path of Righteousness to the summit where he finds a big red watermelon.
He rolls it down the Path of Righteousness, knocking businessmen aside like bowling pins! Why? Well...
MARTHA'S FALL: by Barbara, Martha, and Wayan; 1977/5/18. 3 linked warning, sex, and flying dreams
Wayan makes love to Martha's double, then sees her soul watching from the shadows...
Barbara can't reach Wayan to say farewell...
Martha falls off a mountain and decides to let herself die, just to see what happens...
CAUTION: SEX, ABUSE ISSUES
MARTIAN TIME-LOOP: by Wayan; 1994/5/2, a dream of the future shaping the past.
I'm a small boy in a ship docking in Mars Orbital Station. I meet a strange man: myself as an adult! Uh-oh...
MEGALITHIC BREAKOUT: by Wayan, 2019/8/29; a half-lucid dream that needed to be
I'm a kid imprisoned in an empty stone castle. Squeeze through a stone slit, and prepare to drop ten feet
down the face of a great stone gate. But I go lucid, and my dream and waking body-senses conflict...
MEOPHAM AIR DISASTER: by G.H.M. Holms; 1930/7/18, a surreal predictive dream
Suddenly, out of the clouds, a man came shooting down, head first, at a terrific pace. He landed on his head with a sickening...
CAUTION: GRISLY
THE MIX-UP: by Marilyn Stablein; 1968, an early comic dream of human-induced climate change
Tibetan prayers for good weather are answered too well. Heat wave! Tourists fly in, but planes can't land--
melting glaciers flood the airstrips. So tourists eager to sunbathe in Tibet strap on parachutes, prepare to jump...
THE MOUSE BANNER: by Wayan; 1986/9/4, a dream fable.
I'm a mouse with a protest banner saying "FREEDOM!", having a slight argument with a cat...
MY DREAM NIGHTJOB: by Jack Kerouac, late 1956 or early '57, an outa-the-mouths-of-babes dream.
I commute to my dreamjob on a four-story bus; then my baby brother
(who I wouldn't let eat any chocolate pudding) utters a new poem by William Blake...
NEUTRALITY'S ROOMMATE: by Emily Joy; 2007/4/19, a spooky dream.
At our commune's new house, pandemonium breaks out when
our matriarch meets a spook. Can we live together in peace?
THE NEPALESE DROP: by Wayan; 2000/4/20, a predictive nightmare.
I climb a crumbling slope to a cliff with a Himalayan view; I slip, and no one lifts a hand to help as I...
NINA'S RING: by Nina's clown, 1955/4/20, a lifesaving intuition
While rehearsing our circus act I mentally saw Nina's ladder breaking loose.
Next day, a supporting ring snapped. Being forewarned, I pulled hard...
THE ONION: by Sunshine; 2015/3/16, a magical dream voyage
My love and I steal the only onion in the world! To make our getaway we sail off the edge of the earth...
ORCA TOWS: by Wayan; 1984/5/25, a dream with impact.
I show an Ohio friend the latest California sport. But
we haven't quite worked out how to land just yet...
PARROT SITTER: by Wayan; 2021/11/19, a flying-pulp-fiction-babysitting dream
A girl becomes a raven to cross a pond. Asks me to fly across carrying her (flightless) pet parrot
in a bag. I do, but later the parrot falls downstairs. So yuppies call me an irresponsible pet owner...
PINKIE CLEANS THE WINDOWS OF PERCEPTION:
by Wayan; 2017/2/5, an advisory dream fusing Aldous Huxley & My Little Pony.
My new housemate Pinkie is a party animal, but she's really nice. She climbs a high ladder to help wash my
Windows of Perception. Then our unicorn friend Rarity walks in. She warns me to pace this renovation project...
CAUTION: PONIES
POLE OF THE EMPIRE STATE: by Wayan; 2002/3/26, a 9/11 nightmare about... suspension?
I find myself clinging to a pole as tall as the Empire State Building. Can I slide down
without falling? Or burning from friction? And... what's down there?
PRESIDENTIAL TACO: by Robert Adams, art by Jesse Reklaw; pre-2000; a dream farce
I botched President Clinton's taco. And on the way home, I fell in the river.
Luckily, Jesse Jackson happened by and pulled me out, restoring my faith in...
RAIN OF PLATONIC IDEALS: by Wayan; 2015/1/20, an absurd dream image done as a short poem
Strange beings from the realm of Platonic Ideals rain down like meteors on San Francisco.
I work as a tour guide, teaching the newbies not to step in front of a bus...
CAUTION: CRUSHED IDEALS
RAIN OF WOMEN: by Wayan; 1999/6/11, a warning nightmare.
Women rain out of the sky. People shrug "Suicides." I don't believe it--and what if one falls on me?
CAUTION: SEXIST BLINDNESS TO VIOLENCE
RORAIMA JUMP: by Wayan; dreamed 2016/9/18, a surreal dream of deadly outrage
I'm a Brazilian in the Olympic waterfall-jumping finals. The Russian & American cheat--threaten my family.
I snap! Fight recklessly, knocking them off their ropes. We all tumble down the cliff...
CAUTION: BULLYING, VIOLENT REVENGE
RUNNING BIRD: by Alder; 1953, a kinetic nightmare with double selves.
I'm a flightless bird hopping down a line of marble columns rising from the sea, as they topple behind me...
SEPTIC: by Steve (age 6), pre-1961, a recurring predictive nightmare
For three weeks he wakened screaming in fright; he said he "fell in a hole." Then, one snowy day...
SHOVED OFF A CLIFF: by Wayan; 2017/9/7, a nightmare-warning (I'd asked what to do next).
Atop a sea-cliff, I meet a young couple in love. One look at me and they
push me off! When I see I can't save myself, I try to take them with me...
CAUTION: NIGHTMARE BARING UGLY TRUTHS
SILKY'S BRIDGE: by Wayan, with brief parallel dream by Liz; 1987/5/7, apparent shared dreams
WAYAN: I'm a cat climbing on sea-cliffs. Fear I'll fall. Run into Silky, an archer firing
a line across to an islet. Now the Deer People can build their gossamer bridge...
LIZ: I was hiking along a trail atop sea-cliffs. But I feared I'd fall...
SING TO SUMMON COURAGE: by Wayan, 2019/4/21, a surreal dreampoem
Day: an exhibitionist teen uses sex to sell charity cupcakes, while her mom glares...
Dream: I date the exhibitionist, but her dad imposes weird trials, as I sing for courage...
A SIRIUS MISSION: by Wayan; 1983/9/21, a nightmare predicting a painful fall
Exploring a planet in the Sirius system, we raft down a river. A local guy warns
there's a waterfall ahead, but my raftmates won't believe him! Over we go. Ow...
Next day, glad my druggy housemate's leaving, I learn of a big letdown...
SIT ON A CLOUD: by William S. Burroughs, 1990?, a big-city flying dream
A thousand feet above New York. I meet two naked angels who say it's their first flight, but I
got no fear of falling anymore; got no body to fall. Sit on a cloud. Just me and my shadow...
SNOW STALLION: by Wayan; 1994/6/4, a tangled political/spiritual dream.
I'm a peace terrorist trapped in Squaw Valley, herded like a mare by a huge stallion made of snow...
And then the dream shifts. I blurt out the truth behind our idiotic waking world! And wake believing it...
CAUTION: MERMAID AND HORSE NUDITY
SPECKLED EGGS: by Starvibes; 2008/6/16, a dream of intrigue.
I dreamed of speckled eggs, Caribbean drug traffickers and of
almost drowning near a sinking boat...
SPIRAL LAUGHTER: by Alder; 1953, a child's feverdream
The world is a whirlpool, a black and white spiral pulling me down toward a black hole, and it’s laughing...
SURVIVOR'S CURIOUS: by Wayan; 2010/7/7, a dream of an inner guard relaxing
As we cross a scary ledge, my tough survival-guide, always no-nonsense before,
finally willing to consider... intellectualism, dating, ethics... fun?
THREE DREAMS: by Al Davison and two friends, 1985, a shared nightmare
I dreamed I checked my neighbor's flat for prowlers; I got shot and fell out a window. The same night
my neighbor dreamt she asked me to check her flat, I got shot and fell out a window; the same night
her best friend dreamt she came by and saw from street level the gunmen and my fall out the window...
CAUTION: VIOLENT ATTACK FROM THREE VIEWPOINTS
TINA FEY TRIES TO FLY: by Wayan; 2017/4/24, a mystical feminist farce of a dream
In a world where speech is in Mayan glyphs, comedian Tina Fey (dressed for prom night)
climbs a Tibetan peak to learn levitation. But the flying monks are scared of women...
CAUTION: COOTIES; ROWDY JESUS; MAY FLUNK THE BECHDEL TEST
TO GET DOWN FROM OUR APARTMENT: by Jack Kerouac, ca. Halloween 1957, a telepathic nightmare?
My mom had to climb a ladder down the side of the Empire State Building; I'm told she fell and died...
TOO MUCH TO BEAR: by Wayan; 1997/4/28, an alt-world 10p. dream comic or text w/pics
I dreamed that huge nouveau-riche polar bears invaded San Francisco, evicting us locals...
CAUTION: CORRUPTION, URSACIDE, MATH!
TRUE LOVE = CHOICE! by Ms. Mira; Jan. 2008, a dream-lesson on compassion and free will.
I'm on an alien world inside the minds of two women and a child struggling with moral choices in a civil war...
CAUTION: DEATH, LOSS
TYPEWRITER: by Kevin King, before 1983, an ink-noir nightmare
I dreamed my mouth was full of typewriter keys and a typewriter ribbon issued from the back of my head. Joan
was hanging out the window by the ribbon. I reached for her, but my hands kept hitting the space bar, and down...
THE TYRANT'S WIFE: by Wayan; 1980/6/9, a dreamtale.
In our plot to kill the Tyrant, we used his wife. Or... did she use us? She goes mad, but--she's HAPPY...
VOLITION ON THE BRINK: by Dr William Hammond, c.1867.
I'm on a mesa, looking down in terror. I try to pull back but a compulsion
overrides my will--I crawl helplessly forward until I go over. As I fall...
CAUTION: PRE-FREUDIAN DISMISSAL OF WARNING
VULTURE PEOPLE: by Jack Kerouac, 1962, a gross-out nightmare--and a warning?
The vulture people are fucking in the city dump. I end up their guest, given putrid food
in their cold stinking house of rancid grease. I'll become a vulture too...
CAUTION: UGH!
WHARTON TOWER: by Wayan; 1985/7/24, 3 surreal dreamlets on gender & class?
1940s reporters almost trap me in a mob shootout. I shelter in a gender-segregated hotel.
The owner of Wharton Tower shakes the hotel so it swings between its butch & femme halves.
I fall off the Hudson Palisades, but I land safely on the Glass Ceiling...
WILD W.I.L.D.: by Dream Junkee; 2008/1/19, an epic lucid frustration dream?
I'm lucid but paralyzed. A weird child spies on me; is she controlling me?
Then I'm having sex--but if I come, I'll wake up! Then some thugs jump me.
I make sure they won't bother me again, but... is everyone in this dream out to distract me?
CAUTION: SEX, MUGGER-STOMPING


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