Fantasy dreams

Question: I am interested in learning about women and dreaming. Specifically, what differences exist between the way men dream and the way women dream.

Collections of fantasy dreams of men and women seem to show there is a difference. As to whether this is nature or nurture, hormones or the way we raise children of different sexes differently is still an open question.

Some studies indicate that gender differences begin to show up pretty early, between 3 and 5 years old (Van de Castle, 1994). When dreams are collected by having children stay at a sleep research lab, these differences seem to disappear in the children (Foulkes,1982).

Girls' dreams have more people they know in them and more concern with personal appearance. The interactions are more friendly have more references to food and have more female characters in them. Girls are more likely to report longer dreams and recount them with more feeling, using colors to express feelings.

The adult studies seem to follow a similar pattern, with emphasis on indoor settings, family and home. Women more often dream of enclosed bodies of water, such as pools, lakes, ponds.

Men tend to have more men in their dreams and be in conflict or competition with them. Outdoor and unfamiliar settings are prevalent. Weapons, tools, cars and roads are common. Men report more sexual dreams, usually with unknown and attractive partners.

Up to about 12 years old, aggression in dreams is about equal. Afterward, aggression decreases for females and continues on with males. One study (Hall, 1963) calculates about one out of four characters the dreaming male encounters involves aggression. This drops off a bit after men are in their thirties, but woman, by comparison have only one in twenty five encounters that have aggressiveness. Also, the aggressive encounters men have involve physical threats, and with women, they are more likely to be verbal assaults.

Calvin Hall and Bill Domhoff investigated if these differences were cross-cultural or just specific to the United States. They compared dreams from such diverse cultures as Nigeria and Scotland, from Australian aborigines and Native American Hopi, and many other groups. It seems that it is the same story around the world.

However, many factors can alter these statistics. For example, a woman who is raised in a family where there is a dominant older brother will have many more dreams of men than a woman without this influence.

Woman who work outside the home report more vocational dreams and less family oriented dreams, and interestingly enough, less threatening dreams. Van De Castle speculates that women in dual-roles have high degrees of self confidence.

Studies that look at sexual identification rather than real gender find that the gender differences begin to break down. Those who live and value traditional masculine qualities will have dreams that match male dream content whether they are male or female. For example, studies of transsexuals (Krippner, 1974) who have crossed from male to female sexual identification tend to have dream content similar to women.

As you might expect, there are gender related factors that influence dreams. Women's dreams during the menstrual cycle are more violent and filled with images of blood and wounds (Van De Castle 1968). Women during pregnancy have dream that reflect the anxieties surrounding child bearing, from concern about the baby, to issues of self image (Stukane, 1985).

Men and women dream differently, but age, vocation, family structure, sex role orientation and other factors seem as important as anatomy in many cases.

A simple explanation is to say that we simply dream about those things we have concerns about in waking life. To the degree that these concerns are gender specific, then so will our dreams be gender specific.

But this isn't quite so. We don't often dream about work, for example, compared to the number of hours we actually spend on these tasks. There seems to be room for a great deal more study before any conclusions can be made.

Her sleep was restless, the kind of sleep punctuated with small periods of consciousness and rare moments of true deep slumber. The spaces in between filled with random thoughts and small snippets of nonsensical fantasy dreams. She rolled over and fluffed her pillow as she heard the front door close, her husband and children finally gone for the day.

Her breath seemed to come more evenly as she luxuriated in the knowledge that she was alone, free to sleep or wake at her leisure. The bed seemed warmer, her pillow softer, the house a haven, and her bed a sanctuary, and for the moment her time was her own.

She slept soundly for a while as the dream began to weave its magic, slowly, gently gaining purpose. Moving in the shadows of consciousness it deftly came into full focus. As it spoke to her in soft whispers, she responded completely both body and mind. "Come with me" it beckoned, "Let me" it pleaded, demanded and then with a low pitched growl of satisfaction it took her as she willingly set her feet to follow the path laid out before her.

It was he who came to her in the dream, this man who had dominated her waking moments over the past few months. Awakening in her, desires she had thought were long dormant, lately she had found herself stumbling around high on these wondrous new feelings he stirred inside her. He now had found his way inside, invading her sleeping mind with his endless treasure trove of forbidden pleasures.
Comment on this Article

She moaned softly in her sleep as he began the seduction. Slowly, with maddening deliberateness he laid his lips on her face, following the path of her jaw line, kissing, his tongue teasing, his beard tickling and scraping as he made his way to her ear. His breath warm on her neck sent shivers of pleasure coursing though her body, his hands moving lightly with familiar knowledge over her sleep warm skin.

Straying over the more sensitive areas, before moving on, leaving a trail of aching desire, while still somehow giving extreme pleasure. He sucked gently on her earlobe, nuzzling his face into her neck. She shivered with pleasure, it seemed as if each hair on her body began to stand on end.

She rolled in her sleep; legs clenched tightly together, nipples tight and hard, rubbing against the soft cotton of her T-shirt. His kisses centred over one breast, his mouth wetting the material of her shirt so it clung to her erect nipple. He sucked firmly for a brief maddening moment, then pulled ever so gently on her nipple with his lips, stopping at times he let his breath brush over the damp fabric. His eyes watched her intently, measuring each of her reactions. His hands ran over her belly then along the inside of her thighs, touching everywhere, yet avoiding the warm moist nest of her pussy. Brushing at times over the dark hair that covered her she trembled and began to squirm in her sleep.

She slowly became aware of his voice, his questions, his declarations of just what he wanted to and planned to do, adding to her arousal. He knew all her secrets and played on them, her need coiling tightly in her stomach, her skin somehow more sensitive to each caress as she waited longingly for his next touch. His hands moved now to cup her mound gently; one finger curled slightly just a fraction of an inch above her opening.

She blushed, knowing he could feel how wet she was, yet still she pushed her pussy more firmly into his hand, grinding her hips to feel the pressure of his palm on her tight hard button. She heard him chuckle and ask, "You want something?" his voice sounding pleased with her reaction, confident that yes indeed she wanted something and wanted it quite badly. "Tell me" he demanded with a seemly cordial calmness that told her he would wait all day until he heard the words he wanted come forth from her mouth. Showing him with her body would only enflame her situation and garners his resolve. Still she tried, moaning again and moving restlessly against him.

"Like that, do you?" he commented as he slipped one finger quickly inside of her, allowing his thumb to find it's way between her lips and brush briefly against the hard nub that lay hidden between. He then moved his hands back down her legs, stopping to caress behind her knees before making his way back up the insides of the soft flesh of her inner thighs, this time his fingers teasing her making her warm and wet. Sliding two fingers inside her, he moved sending ripples of heat through her body. He slowly eased them in and out mimicking the movements of love as she trembled.

His mouth fastened on her breast and sucked in earnest making her body surge forward with pleasure, stopping only when he could feel her begin to tighten around his fingers, the beginning of an orgasm building. He looked again at her face, his eyes taking in her flushed completion, her breath that came in ragged quick gasps, her hair wild and damp around her face, falling over her shoulders in dark tangles. He lifted one of those random curls and rubbed the hair between his fingers.

Tell me, he said softly, what you want, no longer teasing but earnestly wanting her to choose. He rubbed his chin back and forth over the sensitive skin of one breast as he waited for her response, his beard brushing softly over her still hard nipple.

"I want you," she gasped arching her body against him in encouragement.

He began to trace one finger delicately inside the crease of her thigh, following what would have been her panty line. She wished she could answer him; tell him all the things he did to her that made her crazy with desire. He was so much more comfortable expressing just what he wanted and she longed to be able to arouse him with merely her own words. Her hands ran wildly over his body, tugging at him and pulling him closer. She felt his hardness against her leg and knew she wanted to feel him inside of her. She wiggled down to align their faces and pulled his bottom lip into her mouth. "I want you to take me." She said clearly, her hand reaching down to wrap around his manhood and guide it to the wet heat at her centre. "I want you inside now".

A smile tugged at the edges of her lips as she rubbed the head of his dick up and down along her slit, coating it with her juice until she could wait no longer. She pulled her knees up as she felt him glide inside of her, wrapping her legs tight around him she forced him to hold still, not allowing him to pull back or move as she revelled in the fullness she felt with him buried deep within.

He held his body still for what seemed like eternity before pulling one of her legs and then the other up and over his shoulders. He looked down over her body, knowing that there wasn't anything she would deny him. She was his for the taking, yet it was her obvious pleasure in him that was the ultimate turn on. The knowledge that he could make her cum over and over again in so many different ways made him ache at the thought of it.

She was, in this position open to him and somewhat vulnerable, yet he moved with care as he slowly pushed himself inside her then pulling back, watching for the tell tale signs that she wanted more, wanted it harder and faster, until finally he was thrusting mindlessly into her, his balls slapping against her as he planted himself so deeply into her. "Tell me" he demanded, "Tell me you love it," he said between thrusts, knowing by her movements that she gloried in his every move, but wanting to hear it all the same.

"Yes," she gasped as he slid between her legs, "Yes, I love it, love you" she moaned as her pussy began to tighten around him, clinging to his cock as she began to orgasm. A crescendo of tingling electric shocks centred inside of her, running down the inside of her legs, the souls of her feet and the tips of her breasts. She clung to him as he pumped harder and faster still, making her orgasm roll over and over her body, her teeth biting into her bottom lip as she came, her body lunging forward

"Yes!" roared in her ears as she opened her eyes. Her own voice or his heard for the moment only inside her head?

Her body still trembled as she rolled once again in her empty bed. The dream had seemed so real, her heart still beat erratically, her blood still running fast and hot and she gasped as the material of her sleep shirt brushed against skin that seemed at once fevered and chilled, gooseflesh raising the fine hair on her arms.

How had he done this she wondered, touching her body, a wanton smile crossing her lips that were somehow swollen but had not in reality been kissed. Even in sleep he had made his claim on her body. As her fingers sought relief in the white-hot heat of her flesh she acknowledged with a sigh that while he had claimed her body, it was she that had given him her heart.
Readers' Commen

I've just woken from a deep and troubled sleep. A nightmare really. The lottery didn't exist and all those billions, from which retailers make a margin, weren't there. And we all had to build traffic from the current national craze, the ABC Circulation Fantasy League.

It's a strange game because it involved 10 national teams, each with a manager (known as a circulation manager or CM) and they had to run a race each day to deliver words and pictures to 50,000 destinations or `goals'.

All the team players who did the racing about were qualified members of Accelerated National Moving Words. They were paid wages and a performance bonus with hundreds of millions of pounds changing hands each year.

What I couldn't work out was why all the members of ANMW were playing for all the teams at the same time. We were told it was a competition, but who was competing with whom?

Then the penny dropped. They were all playing to lose, of course. Each team was scoring less and less each season and the real end game was for each CM to survive the job on his share of less and less. They had also worked out that, having more and more destinations, kept up their work rate and kept up the wages they could claim from more and more goals.

The guys from ANMW had worked this out and had succeeded in playing for everybody making sure that they had secured a bigger share of less and less and avoid relegation.

But I was still in the mists of confusion when I spoke to some of the 50,000 goalkeepers chained up at the destinations.

They said the ANMW team players were coming round each week and demanding more and more payments. Something garbled about the losses they were making from the shrinking figures and something called a carriage needed feeding.

Last week alone, the ANMW players demanded extras averaging 1.2%. I asked about customers, but nobody seemed to know what they were.

Then I woke up in a muck sweat, shaking with fear. Thank goodness we don't have to deal with something like that every day.

There is nothing weak of foolish about fantasy. Fantasy dreams has a function and is a creative way of thinking. Fantasy uses symbols and imaginary scenarios to solve problems in ways that are different than logic. People who are able to fantasise are often more creative and inventive that a person who does everything by the book. Indeed everything we have today had first to be conceived in the imagination of someone before it could become a reality. On an emotional level fantasy can act as a safety valve that enables the person to release pent-up feelings which cannot normally be expressed in everyday life.

If we can take conscious control of our fantasies or at the least become more aware of them then I believe that we can live more fulfilled and creative lives. We use fantasy all of the time but in most instances are unaware that we are doing it. We carry in our minds many pictures of how the world is and how we wish the world could be.

CAN WE MAKE SENSE OF THE STRANGE AND SOMETIMES ABSURD WORLD OF DREAMS?

Fantasy Dreaming' by the medium Craig Hamilton-Parker reveals the meaning or our dream fantasies and sexual fantasies and shows how they influence our waking life. The book explains why we have fantasies and offers easy ways to emotional health. It exposes our hidden fantasies and shows how advertising uses fantasy to secretly motivate us. Discover also how fantasy influences relationships and how family and work colleagues perceive you. Fantasy Dreaming draws on proven techniques to empower you to make fantasy a positive part of your life.

FANTASY, SEX AND EROTIC DREAMS

There is nothing weak of foolish about fantasy. Fantasy has a function and is a creative way of thinking. Fantasy uses symbols and imaginary scenarios to solve problems in ways that are different than logic. People who are able to fantasise are often more creative and inventive that a person who does everything by the book. Indeed everything we have today had first to be conceived in the imagination of someone before it could become a reality. On an emotional level fantasy can act as a safety valve that enables the person to release pent-up feelings which cannot normally be expressed in everyday life.

If we can take conscious control of our fantasies or at the least become more aware of them then I believe that we can live more fulfilled and creative lives. We use fantasy all of the time but in most instances are unaware that we are doing it. We carry in our minds many pictures of how the world is and how we wish the world could be.