How I Got Rid of My Nightmares

A technique to bravely face your subconscious mind

Nightmares are a significant and troubling issue for many. Who likes to wake up in the middle of the night, anxious, heart pounding heavily against the chest, and soaked in sweat?

But there’s a way to solve that issue. First, let me tell you about the nightmares I experienced.

The Dream

I never was one to experience nightmares. I can remember only a handful of bad dreams when I was a child. That’s it. But in 2020 things did change. I suddenly had recurring nightmares for some time. The dreams environment was different every time, but there was a recurrent pattern they shared. I always wandered around in my dream, searching for something, and usually went downstairs. Or even down into a mine shaft. The atmosphere made me feel anxious.

After I set foot on the lower level, I wandered around and finally encountered what would make me run away in panic and wake up soaked in sweat. There was a monster. I remember it looking like a big Werewolf in two of the dreams. It never followed me. It just stood there and watched me run away. After a few of those dreams, I knew I had to do something about it if I wanted to sleep well again in the foreseeable future.

Subconscious Matters

To have that out of the way: Your subconscious is your friend, not your enemy. It doesn’t want to annoy you on purpose. I believe nightmares often result from unresolved emotional trauma the subconscious is trying to resolve. In my case of recurring nightmares sharing the same pattern, I assumed that my subconscious wasn’t able to resolve the trauma on its own. So I tried to help it actively.

The Technique

It helps if you already have solid proficiency in skills like Meditation, Active Imagination, Shamanic Journeying, Self-Hypnosis, or similar stuff. Basic knowledge of how to enter a trance state (focussing your awareness on the inside instead of the outside world) is helpful. This technique is a way of communicating with your subconscious. Like every skill, it needs training. So please do not give up if it doesn’t work immediately.

Disclaimer: Doing this technique can be hard! It may lead to emotional abreaction that not everyone is prepared to face. You are confronting your nightmares and therefore probably some kind of emotional trauma. If you feel you are not grounded enough to do it alone, seek professional help!

The technique, step by step:

• Precondition: You need to remember the dream vividly. That should be easy with nightmares.
• Step One: Mindfulness Meditation (or similar) for a few minutes to calm down your thoughts, center yourself and focus your attention inwards.
• Step Two: Enter the Dream. Imagine you are at the beginning of the dream again and (day-)dream it until you reach the point where you meet/see/feel the thing that puts you under stress the most. It could be anything like a monster or a volcanic eruption.
• Step Three: Observe the thing with benign attention. You can (if it is a “living being”) even interact with it benignly. Ask it why it’s there.
• Step Four: Sit with all emotions that might come up. If you interact with a monster or similar, observe how it transforms and what it has to show or tell you.

Do not force anything with your conscious mind. Just observe with benign attention.

How it played out for me

After a short meditation to calm my mind, I went back to the beginning of the dream with my imagination. I reexperienced it until I went downstairs into a maze where I encountered the monster. As you know, in my nightmares, I always ran away. But not this time. I confronted the entity (in a friendly way!), asked what it wanted from me, and observed its reaction. That’s when the magic happened.

The monster suddenly transformed into my Ex-Girlfriend from a past relationship many years ago. Funny enough, this didn’t make me feel better. I continued my benign attention and tried to stay as relaxed as possible — and I suddenly abreacted. I started to cry, my body spasmed for a second, and I felt shivers down my spine. But only for a short time. While that happened, I interacted with the entity through inner dialogue. You could say I got some things off my chest. I finally felt relieved and free.

Because of this, I was able to recognize the issue behind everything. At the time of my nightmares, I was already in another relationship for a few years. We had just gotten engaged. I believe my subconscious decided to take that as a reason to do some emotional spring cleaning. I never experienced these nightmares again.

I hope this article helped you gain new knowledge and, if you have nightmares as I had, helps you resolve them.

Thank you to everyone reading this, especially to everyone following me.

I do appreciate it.

Cheers!