Lucid Dreaming

[Dragohunter]

I find it very interesting as I had never had any myself. Tell me for those who had one, can you immediately come out of the dream if you wish? Can you simply control your dreaming and do anything you want in the dream like it's own reality or does it seem more likely you're in a 3D movie observing everything going on while being aware it's not real?

[WARRIOR FOR THE LIGHT]

You control the dream as a participant in it. You control what happens etc and you are in a aware/semi concious state knowing what you are dreaming about, yet dreaming....sounds strange....it is and its Hard to explain... Lets say in the dream you have to go to the store... well what car do you want ? Mercedes, vette????? you pick. you see someone along the way side of the road... you choose, do I want to stop and pick them up or drive by.... its just you control, you decide....

Then there are regular dreams... and then visits from spirits too....OBE's where you can laeve body and go places....

The mind is a curious place.... its just figuring out what type of unconcious state your in and type of dream/visit/experience your having.....

I usually remember all my dreams, Im a light sleeper...I dont know if that makes a difference....

Doest it for anyone else who has these??? Im curious too on that aspect.......

[Dragohunter]

You control the dream as a participant in it. You control what happens etc and you are in a aware/semi concious state knowing what you are dreaming about, yet dreaming....sounds strange....it is and its Hard to explain... Lets say in the dream you have to go to the store... well what car do you want ? Mercedes, vette????? you pick. you see someone along the way side of the road... you choose, do I want to stop and pick them up or drive by.... its just you control, you decide....

Then there are regular dreams... and then visits from spirits too....OBE's where you can laeve body and go places....

The mind is a curious place.... its just figuring out what type of unconcious state your in and type of dream/visit/experience your having.....

I usually remember all my dreams, Im a light sleeper...I dont know if that makes a difference....

Doest it for anyone else who has these??? Im curious too on that aspect.......

I usually remember all my dreams too, but they soon fade away as like I don't care about the after hours pass for some reason. Thanks for the information.

[kreestar]

I've had a few lucid dreams. They usually start as a regular dream, then I suddenly realize what is going on. Once your in that lucid state, you can do basically whatever you want.

But I usually snap out of it...

[Ourmoonlitsun]

I was a lucid dreamer for years, ever since I was little.

For the most part, yes, you know you are dreaming and can control what is going on; but for me there also was a gray area to it where I knew something wasn't right sometimes, but I didn't exactly know I was dreaming.

In fact, it got highly stressful after awhile as sometimes the dreams were not really the most consistent experiences. Example: I one time was looking at a face, everything was normal, but when I turned away the features of the face kind of "smeared" in my vision. When I turned back, it was a different person.

Also, the dreams shifted a lot, entire settings, usually when my perspective changed.

It doesn't happen so much anymore, for which I am thankful. Sometimes I was just mentally drained having woken up from a lucid dream and not feeling as if I had any sort of break in mental awareness. I learned over the years that if I didn't focus on having lucid dreams shortly before sleep, they stopped happening.

I'm sure for some people they are fun and enlightening. For me, the awareness of small distortions in the dreams, and the inability to receive any rest in my awareness, was stressful. But then, I never sought out having them. They always just happened as a kid and as I grew up.

And yes, I could at times pull myself out of sleep, usually after much effort and followed by a bout of sleep paralysis. That can be scary.

[TheLivingDead]

I remember about 2-3 dreams a night, yet I've only been able to lucid dream about 3 times in my entire life, and even then, its only so I can wake up. I was actually about to post something asking if it possible for someone to not be able to lucid dream. I know a lot about dreaming and its always something I know of, so my question is I guess, even if someone knows fully about lucid dreams, can it be impossible for them to actually do it?

[Dragohunter]

I was a lucid dreamer for years, ever since I was little.

For the most part, yes, you know you are dreaming and can control what is going on; but for me there also was a gray area to it where I knew something wasn't right sometimes, but I didn't exactly know I was dreaming.

In fact, it got highly stressful after awhile as sometimes the dreams were not really the most consistent experiences. Example: I one time was looking at a face, everything was normal, but when I turned away the features of the face kind of "smeared" in my vision. When I turned back, it was a different person.

Also, the dreams shifted a lot, entire settings, usually when my perspective changed.

It doesn't happen so much anymore, for which I am thankful. Sometimes I was just mentally drained having woken up from a lucid dream and not feeling as if I had any sort of break in mental awareness. I learned over the years that if I didn't focus on having lucid dreams shortly before sleep, they stopped happening.

I'm sure for some people they are fun and enlightening. For me, the awareness of small distortions in the dreams, and the inability to receive any rest in my awareness, was stressful. But then, I never sought out having them. They always just happened as a kid and as I grew up.

And yes, I could at times pull myself out of sleep, usually after much effort and followed by a bout of sleep paralysis. That can be scary.

Seems interesting, I heard not all lucid dreaming is strange like that though, some are enjoyable. I should use a technique Richard Feynman used to lucid dream.

[eight bits]

I should use a technique Richard Feynman used to lucid dream.

Feynman's reports appear in Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman, as a large chunk of the chapter "Always trying to escape," particularly the second half or so.

It may be a little misleading to characterize what he did as a technique, and to suggest that it was his purpose to dream lucidly.

What happened was that in order to write a college paper, he followed up on a suggestion by his father that it would be interesting to make a description of what it was like to sleep. For a few weeks, Feynman observed himself falling asleep, attending to what his thoughts were like, what the "line" was like that divides progressively hazy consciousness from unconsciousness. etc..

Apparently unexpectedly, he found himself "observing himself" in similar fashion while dreaming. So, yes, he was lucid, that is, he was aware that he was dreaming while he was dreaming.

Since control has come up in this thread, he found he had some control (others have none, still others run a little film studio in their heads ... and other people have control without lucidity; the two issues are different). Mostly, though, Feyman wanted to learn what sleeping was like, and pursued his inquiries into dreaming when the opportunity to do so came his way.

Although the party line is to characterize Feynman's approach as an independent discovery of "waking induced lucid dreaming," also known as WILD, and searchable, which is a purposeful technique, I disagree. I believe that it is material to Feynman's experience that he was not trying to change his lucidity status, but rather was following up on a natural development in his investigation of sleep.

Also, what Feymnan actually did might be better described as "thought naming," also called "emotion naming," which is a well-known meditative technique.

It is interesting that Feynman stopped lucid dreaming, except for a few spontaneous incidents later on. He had a bizarre dream about his lucidity which made him aware that he had become tired of observing his dreams. So he didn't do it anymore.

Edited June 28, 2008 by eight bits

[Chasexc]

ive never had a lucid dream before but there were a couple of incidents where i was having a nightmare and right at the very end when i knew something horrible was about to happen i thought to myself that this is all a dream, and in my dream i shut my eyes and told myself to wake up...and i did. although i wish i had courage to stay in my dream and change it instead of telling myself to wake up, oh well i cant help it i guess

[CarreraGT]

I have had lucid dreams on several occassions, but as I think about it, it hasn't happened recently. For whatever reason the only dreams that I have control over what happens are of a sexually nature. Normal dreams I don't seem to be able to control. Not sure if it's because they are not as interesting or what.

[Countess Cutlass]

I love lucid dreaming! Unfortunately it doesn't occur that often for me, about five times a year maybe :/ My mind is really annoying, because most of the time if I'm dreaming and think, 'This isn't right...' my mind invents loads of false memories and stuff to justify itself! Also, I don't dream about myself often, I just seem to watchother people's stories unfold.

Anyway, I would love to know how to get round all this, because I enjoy having my own little world for a while