How do you tell the difference between dream and reality?

• pinch your nose and try to breathe through it
• Count your fingers
• Check a clock
• Read text

If you are reading this you aren't dreaming. It's hard to read text in dreams because the part of your brain that handles text processing isn't turned on.

Carry a totem, like, say, a top.

One happens when you sleep. The other happens when you’re awake.

If you can think clearly then it's not a dream. In a dream large parts of your brain are just off. So thinking is very hard.

However it's very hard to remember that in a dream. So it's easy to tell when you're not in a dream, but hard to tell when you are.

Meh, don't worry about it... whatever environment you find yourself in, navigate it the best you can. Reality might be real to someone experiencing it, but it's irrelevant to someone who isn't.

Do many people have trouble with that?

My dreams are all repetitive nonsense that doesn't even have the quality of feeling like reality. During them I almost never think to wonder if it's a dream, but if I do then either I wouldn't be able to hold onto that as a coherent thought, or the dream would just end.

My dreams usually end with disaster, my life is a continuing disaster that doesn't seem to end

I'm getting laid.

There are reality checks you can do;

• Flip a light switch. If the lights come on you're probably awake but if something else happens you're dreaming.
• Try to push your hand thru a wall. In dreams you can do this.
• Read a piece of text, look away and re-read it. In dreams the text changes.
• Try jumping really high. If it's a dream you'll jump much higher than anticipated or even start flying.

Keep in mind though that these tests needs to be done regularly and in a serious manner even when you think you're awake or else the habit wont carry into the dream world. Tell yourself; if my hand hits the wall I'm awake and if it goes thru I'm sleeping. Then do the test and see what happens. Be aware though that your brain is really good at explaining why weird things happen in your dreams. For example I once performed the jumping test and I just took off and went like "holy fuck I'm dreaming" but then I looked back and saw a crane hook attached to my back and went like ahh ofcourse makes perfect sense, nothing weird about that.

I also want to include a slight warning here. If you do realize you're dreaming and aren't immediately waken up by this realization then one thing that's generally not recommended to do in dreams is look into mirror. The reflection wont be you or the very least it's not what you expected and this might be really uncomfortable experience. Also; realizing that you're dreaming may make you anxious and cause your dream to turn into nightmare. You can in theory turn this nightmare back into normal dream by for example hugging the monster but this is easier said than done.

Happy lucid dreaming!

Anecdotal, but I once dreamed an entire Wednesday. Got up went to work, a few hours in realised it was Wednesday all over again.

I suspect that one's mind can differentiate a dream from reality because dreams are not a simulation, they are not internally consistent or even generally comprehensible, while reality is.

Read something. You won’t be able to get more than a few words in a dream. Doesn’t matter what it is: billboard, menu, homework, whatever. It’s one of the easier ways to tell if you’re dreaming.

Stop wasting time on Lemmy and wake up

Have you read the zhuangzi? "How can I tell if I'm zhuangzi dreaming he's a butterfly or a butterfly dreaming he's zhuangzi?" is probably the most famous line from that text.

Personally, I think the story is encouraging the joy of not knowing, becoming comfortable in a world that lacks fundamental certainties even about yourself and reality.

If this question interests you, you might enjoy the full text - it's public domain and there are plenty of recordings on youtube.

Well, according to Waking Life, if you flip a light switch and nothing changes, you might be dreaming.

Assuming you are talking about lucid dreaming, what you want is a "Dream Check".

In dreams, large areas of your brain are operating in alternative states. This makes things like reading difficult or impossible. Unfortunately it also makes remembering to try reading just as hard.

What do carry over well are habits. You need to do something, while awake, that won't do anything when awake, but will in a dream. If you do this habit when awake however, you will also do it in a dream. It working acts as a trigger, you become aware of the dream state.

My personal check is to reach into my back pocket for a bazooka, or other heavy weapon. I obviously never have one, and the action looks innocuous in real life. It also has the added advantage of being excellent for nightmares. Nothing ends a nightmare faster than turning to face whatever is chasing you, while dual wielding AK47s.

At that point, the trick is staying in the dream state. Too excited, and you wake up. Too relaxed, and you fall back into passive dreaming. It's often best to roll with the dream, and only alter small things. This lets you direct it, but not shatter it.

Happy dreaming.

I’ve never wondered if I’m dreaming while awake. So I’ve conditioned myself that if I’m wondering whether I’m in a dream, I’m in a dream.

Makes it easy to lucid dream.

Wherever you are, that is real. Make the best of it.

I check a clock, works pretty much every time. Could be wall, alarm, wrist watch. Dunno what it is about dreams, they are bad with time, minutes and hours won't make sense if you look for it

If Kylie Minogue is in my bed it’s definitely a dream.

Reality is a dream. Try to enjoy it while you're here.

I can't always tell I'm dreaming when I'm dreaming, but I can always at least tell it's reality when I'm awake. Apart from that one time I was concussed when I fell off my bike as a kid. And the slew of drug-addled experiences as a young adult, but I'm not sure if they're considered reality or not.

Check your cell phone. If it works normally, that's reality. If it's fuzzy or does crazy things then you're in Dreamland baby!

I can always tell that i'm not dreaming, i'm never really sure when i am dreaming.

If you’re talking about lucid dreaming, try looking at your hands or to read some text.

EDIT: The fact that I don't dream in 1st-person is probably the most relevant bit here. For others I guess I'd say try looking into a mirror to make sure you're you, at least if you can remember who you are and that other people are not you (therefore if you're them it cannot be reality).

Though lacking experience, I don't know if mirrors in dreams have common effects though if they just didn't work in dreams sounds like something I may have heard before.

Probably unhelpful, but I do not dream with enough clarity for that to be an issue. The more vivid ones I've had seem to be shorter (I've had a dream once that was basically just a still picture with moving colors), everything else is usually just weird and at-best might be mistaken for a cheesy movie. I also cannot recall any from my own (or any) 1st-person perspective, even if the dreams might have details or themes from my own life.

Lack-of-detail/vividness may be related to me having aphantasia, but it also might be an issue with REM sleep due to health issues particularly if I don't remember having a dream even long before I've woken up.

Dougal had exactly this question in Father Ted. Maybe Ted’s diagram will help. https://youtu.be/n_Jbk6gqRfo?si=SDW2FP-IlQaeFC7C

I hardly dream so I guess I would say "it's a dream when I wake up afterwards"

if it looks ai generated, its probably a dream.

Eh I usully cant, being sleep deprived reality really feels like a dream but things still function, in dreams I usually cant tell which is terrible because I have a tendency to die/watch loved ones die in them... and even then I wont wake up from either event

I'm never anxious in my dreams.

Give myself a trapdoor math problem.