Redfox,
thanks for the insightful response - after more reflection it looks indeed your approach makesmuch more sense then mine.
Usually the most important part of dreams are how they make you feel - asking where this feeling comes from (i.e. has it been put there for disinformation purposes is it from yourself) is what I do, followed asking why you feel it (the context of the dream helps).
When I wake up after these kind of dreams I feel confused. The dreams are so real, like I said, nothing weird happening in them (no time jumps, no sudden appearances or disappearenc es of characters, no sudden change of setting) that I need a few moments to realize where I am and if I am still dreaming or not after waking up. It is like waking up after a long travel and lying in bed looking around to remember where I landed last night and where I am now. So that would be for me the central feeling: confused about what is dream and what is real. (that is the reason I guess why I came up with the idea that it might be the loading of a program)
the question then should be about your self image related to 'failure' and the feelings around that.
that seems indeed to be the case. The dream makes me wake up as if I have already failed.
do you feel like a failure?
In many aspects of life I do feel like I am failing. Professionally I am quiet successfully in what I do and it provides the finances for the family. It is not the dreamjob though - although I would not know what the dreamjob really would be for me. Socially I am pretty isolated. I have a hard time connecting with people. Family wise I have quiet some issues to be around the family. The environment of the family stresses me. So in short: I feel like I am surviving and providing for the basic materialistic needs of my wife and children: they are clothed, fed and have a room over their heads. I do spend a lot of time with my children, and often enjoy it, others times though I feel I would like to be by myself and being with them becomes nothing more then supervising them, making sure nothing happens to them, while I watch the clock and wait for the time my wife takes over the guard. I am installed with some sense of responsibility (on the level of their basic needs) but I feel failure because it stops there.
who in your life has told you you will fail?
Except for my wife who tells me sometimes in plain words that Will fail: like last week when I announced her I was going full on the diet, I think it was told to me I would fail in a more subtle manner. I went to a rather elitarian school where all performances where measured to the smallest details and all those performances were ranked from the best to the worst of the class. I was most of the time close to the best, but not the best. Maybe you could call this the silver medal syndrome: My parents were satisfied with my results but mentioned always I could have jumped that extra few inches and have been the best. this was also what the teachers told me and them: he could even do better then he did. So whatever I did, it was never good enough: failure became unavoidable. This made me irritable and in the end I just started to make sure I was not the best I made deliberate mistakes. I guess this was confirming the expectations as this was the form of love I was getting.
this feeling over never good enough is continuing in the relationship with my wife. She is pretty demanding and a perfectionist who wants to have things done as she thinks they should, according to her standards. I do my fair share of the household duties and as expected, the way I do it is rarely good enough. there is a pretty constant barrage of critiques or recommendations (depending the current mood). So there this feeling of failure is fed.
Then I (or the predator) tells myself I will fail. I tend to induce that by deciding to do something and doing it into extremes and then fail to hold up to those extremes demands, confirming myself I will never be good enough for myself. This is a strong program.
I feel fear when connecting to people as I will not be what they expect me to be: perfect. Or so I think. This forum is maybe the unique place where I feel that I am not expected to be perfect. I can fail and pick up myself without being attacked for it. Not being perfect was failure for the bigger part of my life. And I was punished for it. Failing is linked with punishment in my case, if not by others, then by myself.
My first reaction to this question: I fail all the time. From what I wrote above that is the direct consequence. As I was programmed to be perfect, nothing I achieved is ever good enough, so no matter how good it might be, it is never enough. I could always do better, jump that few inches more. I realize this is ridiculous but is is hard to set a goal, reach it and see it as a success. More, it prevents me to reach any goal, as no goal is good anyway - so I remain stuck in status quo, confirming the status quo. And I use it as an excuse. And as argument in discussion: genuine critique is not accepted with the argument that nothing is good enough anyway. I became very sensitive to critique and have a hard time distinguishing between what might be good advice to listen to and feeding manipulation. Critique irritates me.
One thought may be that perhaps this is a signal from your body you are not getting enough food/energy - that is genuine anxiety due to bodily stress. So perhaps try eating more fat?
I eat quiet some fat but admit I have no idea for the moment how many grams I would need to intake to have enough energy. I am still in the conversion phase from burning sugar to fat, so will see in the coming days and weeks if the light symptoms I notice are due to the conversion and dissapear or persist and require me to do have more fat intake.
Or it simply may be that you have not studied the subject well enough - have you read the diet threads fully and books? It is generally not a good idea to follow this diet without knowing what you are doing.
I have several books on diet and detox and started to catch up on the life without bread thread. I would say my knowledge is basic. As said I am catching up, but in the meantime I continue the diet. Waiting until I have read all the books and threads is not the best strategy in my case.
