The Art of Transforming Nightmares: Harness the Creative and Healing Power of Bad Dreams, Sleep Paralysis, and Recurring Nightmares

by Clare R. Johnson

Transform Nightmares into Healing, Creative, Spiritual Gifts The Art of Transforming Nightmares is a friendly, hands-on guide to help you tap into the immensely rich gifts that bad dreams offer up when we work with them in healing ways. Dr. Clare Johnson, world-leading expert on lucid dreaming, shares her best practical tips for overcoming nightmares and a unique quiz that identifies your personal sleeper-dreamer type so you can fast-track to the transformative techniques that work best for you. With forty-five practices and fifteen tailor-made nightmare solution programs, this guidebook helps you set up your own unique program for transforming your dream life. It shares practical tools to reduce nightmare frequency, manage sleep paralysis, resolve distressing dreams, and release fear. You'll tap into the deep wisdom of your unconscious mind and discover how to transform your night of sleep into a beautiful, healing refuge so that you wake up energized and ready to lead a life of happiness and wonder.

Genres: Nonfiction, Audiobook

328 pages, Paperback

Published February 8, 2021

About the author

Clare R. Johnson, PhD, is a leading expert on lucid dreaming. She has a PhD from the University of Leeds on using lucid dreams as a creative tool (the first doctoral work in the world to explore this topic), is a lifelong lucid dreamer herself, and is President of the International Association for the Study of Dreams. Her books include Mindful Dreaming (European title: Dream Therapy) and Llewellyn’s Complete Book of Lucid Dreaming.

Reviews

[Laura Hundley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clare Johnson has written a very insightful book about the one thing that has caused millions of people to look for answers about the dreams they experience while sleeping. I have never really questioned mine until I got older and started to experience the same dream over and over again. Although the dream was in different time frames or places, it is always with the same people. After reading this book I honestly believe I gained valuable information that allowed me to interpret my dreams realistically different from before as google is not that great when it comes to finding the meaning of certain dreams. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and found the information inside to be very helpful. The author is very descriptive and poignant. I loved her writing ability as well as the verbiage she uses to convey the information. If you would like to better understand your dreams, look no further as this book will explain the what, why, and how’s to you.

Thank you to netgalley as well as the author/publisher for allowing me to read this book in exchange for my honest review.

[Baroness · Rating 1 out of 5]

This audiobook was a dull wordy nightmare LOL
I would have enjoyed it more if the author had focused on the how tos of nightmares instead of telling stories about her clients.

[Emily Armstrong · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a lifelong vivid lucid dreamer with frequent sleep paralysis and hypnopompic hallucinations, I’m really excited to use these ideas to see where my dreams can take me now! This book is full of really interesting ideas - naturally I’ve no idea if they will work for me (or anyone) but this is my first delve into dream books, and I really like her positive approach to facing dream monsters and fear. A really interesting read!

[Elaine Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

To get the most out of this book you need a hard copy. Many references made to other chapters, and you will need to make evaluations of your dreams in accordance with certain properties provided. Lots of nightmares discussed. The book was very enlightening and somewhat helpful although I was not so haunted with nightmares but with wanting to know more about my dreams and their generation.

[Ani · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting and pulls from various resources from many psychological references. The practice exercises are good. I was able to use a few for experience before I mention techniques to clients. This is a book I will be able to reference when I need to since it has a table of contents and an index. I will probably go back and re-read some sections as well as try more of the techniques whenever I experience dreams that are disturbing.

There were examples of dreams from the author's client base which help in understanding how dreams are very subjective to the dreamer and their own belief's. Because of this, I was very glad that there was not that blanket glossary of what a subject means in a dream i.e. if you dream X then it means Y. The information and exercise in the book could help in client centered therapy to help someone uncover what the dream means to them in a personal way.

It is well written and clear. It is academic but also with a conversational feel to it which some readers may not get on with and I think this is the only reason I did not give it 5 stars.

As it is dealing with a subject matter that is still so unknown, it is difficult to label it as scientific. However, the same can be said with anything to do with psychology.

[ThymeOperator · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was a little too basic for me. 95% of it was stuff I already knew. The suggested techniques promised so much but then weren't very deep. I'm sure this is a decent introductory book for a different audience, but I found it a bit shallow and flowery. I also don't understand this thing of setting an intention to do x y z in your dreams, as if that will just instantly make it happen. And I can't tolerate grown-up books written with endless exclamation marks and phrases like 'super worried'. It sounds so patronising.

[Annarella · Rating 5 out of 5]

An interesting and informative book about nightmares that I found useful.
it's well written, well researched and interesting.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

[Matthew · Rating 1 out of 5]

Went in with an open mind, but the book is more for metaphysical woo than any set of primitives for actually resolving the nightmare issues.

The chapter on trauma related nightmares is downright patronizing.

[Pouneh · Rating 1 out of 5]

Anecdotal instead of scientific.

[Catherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

I listened to the audiobook and I ended up buying the paperback because you really need a paper version to benefit from going back and forth with the strategies provided.

Review 2- As a person who experiences nightmares on a regular basis, the strategies and techniques in this book are invaluable.