SHARED DREAMS
by Jean Campbell

Is it possible for us to share dreams while we are asleep, be aware that we are dreaming as the dream goes on, and remember these dreams when we wake? Yes.

Research findings in the past thirty years indicate that many of us spontaneously share images or appear simultaneously in each others' dreams. This type of mutual dreaming can be broken into two categories: Meeting dreams--those in which we meet each other in dream state and recall the meeting on waking; and meshing dreams--those in which symbols or events from one person's dream match the events or symbols of another person's dream during the same time period.

During the period between 1997 and the present, multiple experiments have been conducted in different venues including the Internet, indicating that dreamers can not only dream together when they choose to do so, but can also choose to meet in particular locations or accomplish specific pre-determined goals.

The field of consciousness studies and the role of dreams in society, though well known in many indigenous cultures, are fairly new to present day dream research. In part this is due to the conundrums and questions about the nature of time and space that such dreams pose.

Author Fred Allen Wolf, a physicist who is also a science writer by trade, gained popularity in two recent surprise-hit movies: What the Bleep? and Down the Rabbit Hole where he plays--well, himself.

In his 1994 book Dreaming the Universe, Wolf says:

Recently I have interviewed people who not only have lucid dreams but are also apparently capable of waking up night after night in a parallel world where they have a continuous life in a different body. (I myself have had this experience as well as the experience of other ordinary lucid dreams....)

Although there have been many books, articles, and papers written about the subject of shared dreams, some basic books covering the topic of shared dreaming are listed below. Each of these contains further information and more complete bibliography. The IASD Paranormal Forum at www.asdreams.org/telepath contains descriptions of several of the organizations dream telepathy contests, held for fun at the annual membership conference. These contests often produce the phenomenon of shared dreams as well as other psi phenomena.


Shared Dreams Bibliography

Bynum, Edward Bruce. Families and the Interpretation of Dreams. New York: Harrington Park, 1993.

Campbell, Jean. Dreams Beyond Dreaming. Norfolk: Donning. 1989.

_____________. Group Dreaming: Dreams to the Tenth Power. Norfolk: Wordminder, 1996.

Donahoe, James. Dream Reality. Oakland: Bench Press, 1979.

Guiley, Rosemary Ellen. The Dreamers Way: Using Proactive Dreaming to Heal and Transform Your Life. New York: Berkley, 2004.

Magallon, Linda L. Mutual Dreaming. New York: Pocket Book, 1997.

Moss, Robert. Conscious Dreaming. New York: Crown, 1996.

___________. Dreamways of the Iroquois: Honoring the Secret Wishes of the Soul. Rochester: Destiny, 2005.

Ullman, Montague. "A Group Approach to the Anomalous Dream." Dream Telepathy 2nd Edition. New York: Ballantine, 1994.

Van de Castle, Robert. Our Dreaming Mind. New York: Ballentine, 1994.

Watkins, Susan. Dreaming Myself, Dreaming a Town. New York: Kendall, 1989.

Wolf, Fred A. The Dreaming Universe. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994.