[Enayla]

How is it that at the age of 23, I'm still afraid of the dark?

Did watching Poltergeist when I was just a kid really damage me that much? Or was it Edgar Allan Poe and H.P Lovecraft at a very early age?

Or a vivid imagination.

But seriously - how can someone grownup have those /really/ vivid nightmares that leaves you unable to go to sleep for /hours/. It's not like I don't know it's just a dream.

So ridiculous.

Ah well. Um... What I meant to say was really this: could horror movies and stories at an early age really damage you, in a way, for a good long while?

Or is that just bullshit, and I happen to be whacked out?

*goes to bed again*

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��You can't leave footprints in the sands of time if you're sitting on your butt��
(And who wants to leave buttprints in the sands of time?)

[FaithInChaos]

i watched all kinds of horror movies as a kid, i played with a oujia board, and read stephen king and stuff the like the necronomicon constantly. ive never had a problem with being afraid of the dark or trying to go to sleep after telling ghost stories...

but i was born a die hard agnostic.
and im the kind of type who has to see it to believe it.

[sacrelicious]

I've always been afraid of the dark, and I'm a big wuss at horror movies. But I go and see them whenever I get the chance, and walk around in dark, lonely places for the excitement alone. I guess I believe in all kinds of spooky stuff lurking in the shadows, but I've never seen any ghosts, monsters, or ghouls in the flesh. That quality of darkness- the unknown- is the foundation of fear.

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Weaseling out of things is what separates us from the animals... except the weasel.

[Spitfire]

The only thing that haunts me in my nightmares is myself, so the dark doesnt hold much scares for me.

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I am but a statue, impervious to love.

[Cooter]

Wait til' you have a really vivid dream about your own death. So vivid that you know the location, time and place- just not the year. Picture living with that floating around in your head as you walk out to the car in the dark parking lot every morning.

[Spitfire]

Wait till you dream vividly about you killing, mutilating and raping the people you love, and then seeing them every morning.

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I am but a statue, impervious to love.

[Chapel]

Some nightmares are healthy in a sense. I think it means your imagination is working overtime. Which is always good to me.. cause well it means I have an imagination. Now if only I could control it.

By the way, on occasion the darkness does scare me. But I can usually come to terms that it is just me imagining things. I use humor as a defense mechanism, so I usually make jokes when confronted with something scary. I'm pretty hilarious walking through a haunted house... creepy night at the Improv!

[This message has been edited by Chapel (edited February 06, 2001).]

[SlightlyTwisted]

People often remark that I must have terrible nightmares, taking into account the things I draw. If anything, I think the things I draw keep the nightmares at bay.

It's my personal theory that people with quite active imaginations, which very much includes artistic types, often have very vivid dreams, and when they have nightmares, their nightmares are supercharged by their powerful, and often twisted, imagination. I used to have terrible nightmares. I used to be scared shitless of the dark. I used to absolutely hate going to bed, because I was so very afraid of the simple act of falling asleep.

But that was before I started drawing the darker stuff, the slightly horrific, with a mild twist of subtle humour, thinking here of the dead unicorns, and the very rotten girl, that I know you at least have seen, Enayla. Once I started putting those things on paper, or on screen, the nightmares started to back of. It was as if, by getting them out in the open, the darker aspects of my imagination were worn out, too weak to assault me when I'm at my most vulnerable, half asleep, lying all alone, in the dark.

I have less nightmares now, and the ones I do have are more psychological than anything else. But I get a lot more sleep. It's just a theory, but it worked for me, and I didn't even know I was doing it, at the time. So maybe it can work for others too.


However, the book I'm currently reading, The House of Leaves, just might single handedly be able to knock down all my night time defences. If you're not afraid of the dark when you pick the book up, you will be when you put it down. Which perhaps makes it unwise of me to read it, alone, in the dark.

[This message has been edited by SlightlyTwisted (edited February 06, 2001).]

[Ragnarok]

When I'm having a nightmare I enforce myself to wake up. When I'm awake, I think of another thing and then I sleep again.
Usually is that easy. And when the nightmare is quite strong I try to deformate it so it's funny instead of scary.

[Lunatique]

I grew up watching very scary films, and I am very nervous about the dark, ghosts, and other supernatural scares. As I get older, I become less afraid, but the spooky stuff still gets to me. I would NOT go lounging around in an old, abandoned house where murders were committed, if you know what I mean. . ..

[FaithInChaos]

my nightmares allways seem to morph into wet dreams.

[::ronin]

I don't have a problem with scary movies.. but i'm still afraid of the dark sometimes.

I've died many times in my nighmares.. once I shot myself and then fell down and just lied there for a while, thinking so this is how it's like being dead .. oh and I shot myself because I didn't want to be captured by the aliens (from the movie Alien etc. - those grey guys are also a bit creepy)

[nightmare]

im a nightmare

sometimes im afraid of the dark, and sometimes i like it very much. sometimes i wish there were less streetlights so i could walk around with a lantern.

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it's all a conspiracy!

[Impaler]

*shrug*

Depends on if you live in a steamy abandoned warehouse with lots of catwalks and machinery.

Or maybe an old spaceship floating around in the void.

Or maybe a pristine bedroom with lots of clown dolls.

If you live in a place or go near a place/scenario that resembles a scary movie (that you of course saw as a child) scene, then it will scare you senseless.

It's why people are far more afraid of cemeteries than compost piles, even though the two are essentially the same.

Honestly. How many scary movies have you seen where the monster leaps out of a compost pile or terrorizes the denizens in broad daylight?

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My signature is slightly better than yours.

[Trance-R]

As a kid, you may not fear dark, for you do not know what lurks in the darkness.
I think as one grows older, he begins to comprehend fear at a deeper level. Another factor could be the stress everyone recieves constantly. I could safely assume almost everyone above 17 on this board is stressed from some source. This stress does many things. It stiffens you up, makes you more nervous. See... if I recall correctly, dreams are 'left-over' brain activities from the day. Having to process so much information each day may cause realistic dreams! <-)


Yeah... right. Whatever.

[Affected]

Hey, today, when I was doing my math preliminaries, I had a flashback of an old nightmare that didn't endwhen I woke up... Try doing geometry when you have a shitload of people silently screaming in your head.

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Affected

Democracy is a lie

http://affected.xs.mw

[Count Zero]

Nah, don't fear the dark. As a kid, yeah. But not anymore, I actually find darkness and night quite comforting. When its dark, I'm usually at my best. Oh well...
I am not a vampire though.

[Ian]

I don' fear Ghosts/Ghouls/Dah-Boogey Man/ or crap like that.... but..

Darkness is unknown. And if there is one thing that the Human has feared for thousands of years it is the Unknown. Yes, I sometimes fear darkness because what does it hide? who knows. But, Dark Alley on a shity side of town? YES! That wierd shadow made by my coat on the wall from the street lamp? Uhmm... no.

Ian

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Sit on my face, and tell me that you LOVE me!

[Sap]

I have been watching horror movies all my life, they all pretty much stopped freakin me out... Except for those 2 little girls from the shining.... I don't know what it is but I get the crawls when I think of those evil twins... I am getting freaked out just thining about them.... errrrrr

-Sap-


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Booya grandma!! Suck it!

Www.Sidiouz.com

[Giant Hamster]

i dont like the dark. i always need some kind of light on.

you know what i hate about some people?

the ones that walk into a bathroom and close the door before they turn on the light! its dark! and what if the light is burnt out and they cant find the door handLe? now theve just died impailed on a toothbrush infesting my bathroom with sick hauntings and whatnot. damn them all

im not as afraid as i was. back a few years ago i put up christmas lights in my room, left the tv on, my computer screen on, and a lava lamp. my room was EXTREMELY lit up!

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-JameZ the Giant Hamster-

The Hamster Alliance
AIM: Gianthmstr
Multimedia Producer/designer/all of the above.,overall guru :)...and music music music! weee!!