{"id":2665,"date":"2010-07-26T10:52:00","date_gmt":"2010-07-26T17:52:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bhagwad.com\/blog\/?p=2665"},"modified":"2010-07-26T10:52:00","modified_gmt":"2010-07-26T17:52:00","slug":"how-do-you-wake-up-from-a-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bhagwad.com\/blog\/2010\/personal\/how-do-you-wake-up-from-a-dream.html\/","title":{"rendered":"How do you wake up from a dream?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ever been in such a horrible situation that you wondered (or wished) it was a dream? How can you tell if it is or isn’t? I watched “Inception” a few days ago, and that’s what got me to write about this.<\/p>\n

Sometimes in order to wake up, I try to open my eyes as wide as possible. When nothing happens, I pinch myself and feel pain, but I still<\/em> can’t get up. So I conclude it’s no dream, but reality.\ufeff<\/p>\n

But when I finally wake up, I realize it was<\/em> a dream! So what could I have done inside<\/em> it to make me realize its not real? Googling showed some ways to perform “Reality Testing” – techniques that will tell me if I’m in a dream or not. And I came up with three ways:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Look at your watch, look away and then back again. If the time has changed, you’re in a dream. Apparently digital watches work best here. But in real life, I don’t wear<\/em> a watch. What if there’s no watch in the dream?<\/li>\n
  2. Second option would be to flip a light switch. If the light levels don’t change, it means you’re dreaming. But what if there’s no light switch (say you’re in a desert?)<\/li>\n
  3. Third option would be to examine your hands very closely. If they look different, you’re not awake. But I don’t think this will work. I’ve tried this before by examining a spot on the wall very carefully in a dream, and I can see every little detail very closely. So this may not work.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    This is important because as we know, nightmares can be horrifying. So horrifying that you wish you were dreaming. You’d like to end it as soon as you can – or maybe continue while knowing it’s not real…either way we need to be sure first.<\/p>\n

    Does anyone else have this problem? How do you solve it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    How do you realize you’re in a dream? Can you break the illusion and wake up whenever you want?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2665","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-personal"],"yoast_head":"\nHow do you wake up from a dream?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"How do you realize you're in a dream? 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