Recurring Demonic/Evil Dreams

[WildHairedWoman]

Originally Posted by victoria

Hi All!

I want to preface this by saying that to me these dreams feel different from nightmares. I do have nightmares but in these dreams it isn't simply something scary happening that makes me feel stressed. It's a very specific icky/overwhelming feeling of horror each time. Normally (99% of the time) the bad feeling is associated with exploring a house, and it feels like there is a demonic/dark presence in the house. Sometimes there is a character that I interact with that feels like the source of the evil. A lot of the time though the presence goes unseen.

To give some background that may help this make sense, I made some dark spiritual attachments as a child when I was going through sexual abuse. Whether or not you believe in that kind of thing, I've done a lot of work to get rid of them and don't feel their presence in my waking life anymore. I'm not sure if I'm getting attacked subconsciously or if this is just the effects of my PTSD.

Anyways if anyone has any insights or advice for me it would be much appreciated. Mostly I just wanted to voice something that's been burdening me for a while.

Typically when you dream of exploring a house, the house represents your physical body. If you are finding icky, scary things in that house you need to go to a doctor and get a physical. Your sub conscious is probably telling you that you are ill, OR it may be some mental aspect of yourself that you need to "clean up", attitudes, fears, etc. Make sure you are honest with yourself about your fears. It is very easy to lie to yourself about fear and anger and any thing you fell is unpleasant.

If you feel the house is possessed then it is possible you are allowing someone to manipulate and control you, and like a demon possession the only one who can exorcise that is the person being used by the demon. So, maybe you need to examine your relationships honestly as well.

[TheTruthIsOutThere]

Sometimes I'm afraid to say that scary dreams are visions of murders. I found it interesting that people have mentioned spiders. I often see shadow spiders in my life when I wake after a strong dream. I woke another time to a real spider, dead, in the light above me. I know I have visions and thoughts of others in my dreams and have found they match reality in terms of addresses and places and objects.

Follow the dream clues to find places and missing people. A celebrity could be a street name or a stranger's name. Look them up and you may visit places you have already visited before.

Dream Prophecies dot com

[psychoslice]

Originally Posted by victoria

Hi All!

I want to preface this by saying that to me these dreams feel different from nightmares. I do have nightmares but in these dreams it isn't simply something scary happening that makes me feel stressed. It's a very specific icky/overwhelming feeling of horror each time. Normally (99% of the time) the bad feeling is associated with exploring a house, and it feels like there is a demonic/dark presence in the house. Sometimes there is a character that I interact with that feels like the source of the evil. A lot of the time though the presence goes unseen.

To give some background that may help this make sense, I made some dark spiritual attachments as a child when I was going through sexual abuse. Whether or not you believe in that kind of thing, I've done a lot of work to get rid of them and don't feel their presence in my waking life anymore. I'm not sure if I'm getting attacked subconsciously or if this is just the effects of my PTSD.

Anyways if anyone has any insights or advice for me it would be much appreciated. Mostly I just wanted to voice something that's been burdening me for a while.

Hi Victoria, I think I have had the same experience with dreams, I had bad dreams for many years, especially after I was put on to anti-psychotic medication, I also suffer from PTSD after I was shot by someone. My dreams were evil and I always awoke in panic, with someone cornering me in a room with a gun.
For the last couple of years my medication has been decreased, I no longer have these bad dreams, in fact the dreams I have now are beautiful, and I awake feeling fresh, what I am trying to say is that medication can cause bad dreams, especially anti-psychotic medication.

[Mander7]

Hi Victoria,
I'm new to posting in this site, so let me start by saying I am in no way am I an expert in anything. I can only share my experience, viewpoint and intuitions.
At some point in my own journey, I would say I was in my late teens early 20s I too started having a reoccurring dream about a shadowy figure chasing me. Like you, I was in a house and this shadow was formless, always morphing, flying along the walls and across ceilings , chasing me from room to room. There was a bit more to it, but the premise was about the same. In my day to day waking life I was going through a really rough experience and started making an honest effort to try and put right what seemed to be going wrong in my life and draw closer to a higher power, healing, etc. Yet at night, I fell asleep and kept waking up terrified like, " what the heck man". My entire life as I had known it up to that point was changing and morphing and what happened in the progession of this dream was empowering beyond belief in retrospect and at this point in my life, almost 20 years later, I recognize confronting this and getting past it was THE turning point in my journey. I will share with you the thought process of how it went for me:
I believe that we are all born "Tabula Rasa" - a blank slate (consciously anyhow) innocent and pure until we start to interact with the outside world. First our parents and family, then our peers and the world at large all make their mark. We filter our developing personalities through the lens of what we are told we are, what is expected of us, what actions bring reward and keep us safe, which ones bring us punishment ,shame,pain and make us feel unsafe. I feel that every time that we experience a mixing of wires, when as children those that should embrace and protect us ,fail us and we are left vulnerable, afraid and feeling powerless, when we experience trauma - our soul, our personality becomes fractured and those fractured pieces get tucked away somewhere in the deeper recesses of our mind and overall life experience. It is a protective, survival measure. We run from those pains, develop calluses over them, busy ourselves, practice and perfect all the mechanisms, healthy or not,that help us keep on keepin on. It is in the dream state, where the threat of actual physical danger doesn't exist, where all of these fractured parts have the freedom to come forward and work themselves into awareness - if we consciously allow ourselves to hear what they have to say. I think that the dream reality and other aspects of non physical reality - they don't tend to speak to us in literal ways though- all of it is HIGHLY symbolic and emotionally charged. I think every person has their own personal collection of symbols, ones that carry meaning for them and them alone, the meaning of which is usually tied to what emotions those symbols bring up- BUT I do feel SOME dream symbols are largely part of our..collective consciousness. As I said, I am no expert, I have had almost nightly dream recall for the past 20 years or so and not to sound like a walking dream dictionary but -Victoria - Dreams of being in a "house" - houses almost always represent the totality of …well," yourself" in dreams. What is the condition of the house? Is it dark, scary, falling apart? You might feel like things are out of control and "falling apart" in your waking life and you are "in the dark" about what to do about it. How many rooms does it have? Does it have 100 rooms, feeling like an overwhelming maze, every hallway cracked with chipping paint? In your waking life you may struggle with knowing yourself or being authentic, worry that people are going to "see through the cracks" so you run around in circles trying to please everyone else. These are just examples. Again, only you can really know the specifics, what emotions they call up and what it personally means for you.
As far as the shadowy thing chasing you, I agree with a previous poster- that is your "shadow self". I believe it would be a representation of what Freud called the "id" . It is the unknown part of yourself, a part that you run from because you are afraid. I think that having experienced trauma, it makes it that much harder to convince ourselves we are safe, loved, protected, when there are fractured pieces of ourselves that it seems to have been proven the opposite is true. Really the only way out is through. You have to find a way to consiously..build your armor so to speak, in your waking life. I have found meditation to be a great tool. Find a physical place where you feel comfortable and safe and won't be disturbed for 30 min or more. If you have anxiety or start to feel triggered, I've found weighted blankets helpful, or cacooning gently in a blanket if it feels good and is calming. If you are religious say a prayer, ask to be surrounded with your higher power's light and love. Take a few moments of just paying attention to your breathing, the way it fills your lungs.Spend some time visualizing being wrapped in a soft warm blanket of the light, love , and protection of your higher power(or whatever is most comforting of a thought to you). The key is to really feel and understand that you are safe, loved and protected and then from that space - begin to explore the house- awake, protected and in consious control of the experience. Look in its rooms, find the small scared part of yourself- and give that part of yourself the love and protection it needed but didn't get- whatever that may be. Allow yourself to be fierce in that moment if you need to and embrace any emotions that come up. Express them, give them space and know it will pass once it's felt and soon be replaced with another if you allow it to be without judgement. You might have to scream, or rage or sob like a child, do it without abandon and know it's safe to do that in that moment. When you are ready to leave, let that part of yourself know you will be there for her/ him whenever it is needed, thank your higher power...the point is to sort of practice retroactively giving yourself the grace you may not have been given, to imagine your past as having a different outcome so as to change your perspective in the present. If it gets too intense to do alone, try to find a professional that can maybe walk you through it, or a group meditation can help sometimes too. Once you've built up that armor and have full faith you are indeed currently safe, worthy and protected, no other force on the face of this world, or any other has the ability to have or harm you. If anything it's our own fears, when given free reign, that can do the biggest damage to our overall well being. There may come a point in the dream state where you encounter this "shadow figure" again, and if you've practiced integrating, building your armor in the waking state- you will have the tools to turn around and confront it, once the fear is dissolved you just might find an entirely new healing experience behind it.
At any rate, that's is just my personal perspective on it and I hope any part of it can be useful. Take what you can use, leave the rest :)
Highest Love
Mander

[Mander7]

Hi Victoria,
I'm new to posting in this site, so let me start by saying I am in no way am I an expert in anything. I can only share my experience, viewpoint and intuitions.
At some point in my own journey, I would say I was in my late teens early 20s I too started having a reoccurring dream about a shadowy figure chasing me. Like you, I was in a house and this shadow was formless, always morphing, flying along the walls and across ceilings , chasing me from room to room. There was a bit more to it, but the premise was about the same. In my day to day waking life I was going through a really rough experience and started making an honest effort to try and put right what seemed to be going wrong in my life and draw closer to a higher power, healing, etc. Yet at night, I fell asleep and kept waking up terrified like, " what the heck man". My entire life as I had known it up to that point was changing and morphing and what happened in the progession of this dream was empowering beyond belief in retrospect and at this point in my life, almost 20 years later, I recognize confronting this and getting past it was THE turning point in my journey. I will share with you the thought process of how it went for me:
I believe that we are all born "Tabula Rasa" - a blank slate (consciously anyhow) innocent and pure until we start to interact with the outside world. First our parents and family, then our peers and the world at large all make their mark. We filter our developing personalities through the lens of what we are told we are, what is expected of us, what actions bring reward and keep us safe, which ones bring us punishment ,shame,pain and make us feel unsafe. I feel that every time that we experience a mixing of wires, when as children those that should embrace and protect us ,fail us and we are left vulnerable, afraid and feeling powerless, when we experience trauma - our soul, our personality becomes fractured and those fractured pieces get tucked away somewhere in the deeper recesses of our mind and overall life experience. It is a protective, survival measure. We run from those pains, develop calluses over them, busy ourselves, practice and perfect all the mechanisms, healthy or not,that help us keep on keepin on. It is in the dream state, where the threat of actual physical danger doesn't exist, where all of these fractured parts have the freedom to come forward and work themselves into awareness - if we consciously allow ourselves to hear what they have to say. I think that the dream reality and other aspects of non physical reality - they don't tend to speak to us in literal ways though- all of it is HIGHLY symbolic and emotionally charged. I think every person has their own personal collection of symbols, ones that carry meaning for them and them alone, the meaning of which is usually tied to what emotions those symbols bring up- BUT I do feel SOME dream symbols are largely part of our..collective consciousness. As I said, I am no expert, I have had almost nightly dream recall for the past 20 years or so and not to sound like a walking dream dictionary but -Victoria - Dreams of being in a "house" - houses almost always represent the totality of …well," yourself" in dreams. What is the condition of the house? Is it dark, scary, falling apart? You might feel like things are out of control and "falling apart" in your waking life and you are "in the dark" about what to do about it. How many rooms does it have? Does it have 100 rooms, feeling like an overwhelming maze, every hallway cracked with chipping paint? In your waking life you may struggle with knowing yourself or being authentic, worry that people are going to "see through the cracks" so you run around in circles trying to please everyone else. These are just examples. Again, only you can really know the specifics, what emotions they call up and what it personally means for you.
As far as the shadowy thing chasing you, I agree with a previous poster- that is your "shadow self". I believe it would be a representation of what Freud called the "id" . It is the unknown part of yourself, a part that you run from because you are afraid. I think that having experienced trauma, it makes it that much harder to convince ourselves we are safe, loved, protected, when there are fractured pieces of ourselves that it seems to have been proven the opposite is true. Really the only way out is through. You have to find a way to consiously..build your armor so to speak, in your waking life. I have found meditation to be a great tool. Find a physical place where you feel comfortable and safe and won't be disturbed for 30 min or more. If you have anxiety or start to feel triggered, I've found weighted blankets helpful, or cacooning gently in a blanket if it feels good and is calming. If you are religious say a prayer, ask to be surrounded with your higher power's light and love. Take a few moments of just paying attention to your breathing, the way it fills your lungs.Spend some time visualizing being wrapped in a soft warm blanket of the light, love , and protection of your higher power(or whatever is most comforting of a thought to you). The key is to really feel and understand that you are safe, loved and protected and then from that space - begin to explore the house- awake, protected and in consious control of the experience. Look in its rooms, find the small scared part of yourself- and give that part of yourself the love and protection it needed but didn't get- whatever that may be. Allow yourself to be fierce in that moment if you need to and embrace any emotions that come up. Express them, give them space and know it will pass once it's felt and soon be replaced with another if you allow it to be without judgement. You might have to scream, or rage or sob like a child, do it without abandon and know it's safe to do that in that moment. When you are ready to leave, let that part of yourself know you will be there for her/ him whenever it is needed, thank your higher power...the point is to sort of practice retroactively giving yourself the grace you may not have been given, to imagine your past as having a different outcome so as to change your perspective in the present. If it gets too intense to do alone, try to find a professional that can maybe walk you through it, or a group meditation can help sometimes too. Once you've built up that armor and have full faith you are indeed currently safe, worthy and protected, no other force on the face of this world, or any other has the ability to have or harm you. If anything it's our own fears, when given free reign, that can do the biggest damage to our overall well being. There may come a point in the dream state where you encounter this "shadow figure" again, and if you've practiced integrating, building your armor in the waking state- you will have the tools to turn around and confront it, once the fear is dissolved you just might find an entirely new healing experience behind it.
At any rate, that's is just my personal perspective on it and I hope any part of it can be useful. Take what you can use, leave the rest :)
Highest Love
Mander

[Mander7]

Hi Victoria,
I'm new to posting in this site, so let me start by saying I am in no way am I an expert in anything. I can only share my experience, viewpoint and intuitions.
At some point in my own journey, I would say I was in my late teens early 20s I too started having a reoccurring dream about a shadowy figure chasing me. Like you, I was in a house and this shadow was formless, always morphing, flying along the walls and across ceilings , chasing me from room to room. There was a bit more to it, but the premise was about the same. In my day to day waking life I was going through a really rough experience and started making an honest effort to try and put right what seemed to be going wrong in my life and draw closer to a higher power, healing, etc. Yet at night, I fell asleep and kept waking up terrified like, " what the heck man". My entire life as I had known it up to that point was changing and morphing and what happened in the progession of this dream was empowering beyond belief in retrospect and at this point in my life, almost 20 years later, I recognize confronting this and getting past it was THE turning point in my journey. I will share with you the thought process of how it went for me:
I believe that we are all born "Tabula Rasa" - a blank slate (consciously anyhow) innocent and pure until we start to interact with the outside world. First our parents and family, then our peers and the world at large all make their mark. We filter our developing personalities through the lens of what we are told we are, what is expected of us, what actions bring reward and keep us safe, which ones bring us punishment ,shame,pain and make us feel unsafe. I feel that every time that we experience a mixing of wires, when as children those that should embrace and protect us ,fail us and we are left vulnerable, afraid and feeling powerless, when we experience trauma - our soul, our personality becomes fractured and those fractured pieces get tucked away somewhere in the deeper recesses of our mind and overall life experience. It is a protective, survival measure. We run from those pains, develop calluses over them, busy ourselves, practice and perfect all the mechanisms, healthy or not,that help us keep on keepin on. It is in the dream state, where the threat of actual physical danger doesn't exist, where all of these fractured parts have the freedom to come forward and work themselves into awareness - if we consciously allow ourselves to hear what they have to say. I think that the dream reality and other aspects of non physical reality - they don't tend to speak to us in literal ways though- all of it is HIGHLY symbolic and emotionally charged. I think every person has their own personal collection of symbols, ones that carry meaning for them and them alone, the meaning of which is usually tied to what emotions those symbols bring up- BUT I do feel SOME dream symbols are largely part of our..collective consciousness. As I said, I am no expert, I have had almost nightly dream recall for the past 20 years or so and not to sound like a walking dream dictionary but -Victoria - Dreams of being in a "house" - houses almost always represent the totality of …well," yourself" in dreams. What is the condition of the house? Is it dark, scary, falling apart? You might feel like things are out of control and "falling apart" in your waking life and you are "in the dark" about what to do about it. How many rooms does it have? Does it have 100 rooms, feeling like an overwhelming maze, every hallway cracked with chipping paint? In your waking life you may struggle with knowing yourself or being authentic, worry that people are going to "see through the cracks" so you run around in circles trying to please everyone else. These are just examples. Again, only you can really know the specifics, what emotions they call up and what it personally means for you.
As far as the shadowy thing chasing you, I agree with a previous poster- that is your "shadow self". I believe it would be a representation of what Freud called the "id" . It is the unknown part of yourself, a part that you run from because you are afraid. I think that having experienced trauma, it makes it that much harder to convince ourselves we are safe, loved, protected, when there are fractured pieces of ourselves that it seems to have been proven the opposite is true. Really the only way out is through. You have to find a way to consiously..build your armor so to speak, in your waking life. I have found meditation to be a great tool. Find a physical place where you feel comfortable and safe and won't be disturbed for 30 min or more. If you have anxiety or start to feel triggered, I've found weighted blankets helpful, or cacooning gently in a blanket if it feels good and is calming. If you are religious say a prayer, ask to be surrounded with your higher power's light and love. Take a few moments of just paying attention to your breathing, the way it fills your lungs.Spend some time visualizing being wrapped in a soft warm blanket of the light, love , and protection of your higher power(or whatever is most comforting of a thought to you). The key is to really feel and understand that you are safe, loved and protected and then from that space - begin to explore the house- awake, protected and in consious control of the experience. Look in its rooms, find the small scared part of yourself- and give that part of yourself the love and protection it needed but didn't get- whatever that may be. Allow yourself to be fierce in that moment if you need to and embrace any emotions that come up. Express them, give them space and know it will pass once it's felt and soon be replaced with another if you allow it to be without judgement. You might have to scream, or rage or sob like a child, do it without abandon and know it's safe to do that in that moment. When you are ready to leave, let that part of yourself know you will be there for her/ him whenever it is needed, thank your higher power...the point is to sort of practice retroactively giving yourself the grace you may not have been given, to imagine your past as having a different outcome so as to change your perspective in the present. If it gets too intense to do alone, try to find a professional that can maybe walk you through it, or a group meditation can help sometimes too. Once you've built up that armor and have full faith you are indeed currently safe, worthy and protected, no other force on the face of this world, or any other has the ability to have or harm you. If anything it's our own fears, when given free reign, that can do the biggest damage to our overall well being. There may come a point in the dream state where you encounter this "shadow figure" again, and if you've practiced integrating, building your armor in the waking state- you will have the tools to turn around and confront it, once the fear is dissolved you just might find an entirely new healing experience behind it.
At any rate, that's just how I worked through a similar experience dream wise. Hope any part helps. Take what you can use, leave the rest.
Highest Love
Mander

[Mander7]

So sorry, don't know how I posted 3 times and haven't figured out how to delete yet