Lucid Dreaming

[Raistlin1040]

So a friend of mine mentioned that she was going to "try lucid dreaming". I always assumed Lucid Dreaming was some kind of meta-dreaming state that just sort of happened, but she said she read about a way to train yourself into doing it. I'm a little curious to try if it's possible, but I can't seem to find anything definative one way or the other.

Has anyone in the Playground had first hand experience with Lucid Dreaming? Is there a technique to it that one can learn?

[MageOfCakes]

I know there are books on the subject. It's not something I have really looked into myself or tried to pursue. There were a couple times in my life where I realized I was dreaming and was able to shape the dream to a limited extent. I found that even when you know you are dreaming, dreams themselves can easily get away from you. You can quickly lose control of your dream and the surroundings it creates. There maybe techniques that help you direct your dreams with more control, but I don't know them myself.

[Weezer]

I've never tried lucid dreaming intentionally, but that's probably because I do it anyways really often. About 60-70% of my dreams are lucid, I was actually surprised the first time I realized that most people are rarely aware that they're dreaming.
But I have been told the trick (or at least one way) to making yourself lucid dream more. Basically all you do is get yourself in the habit of consciously asking yourself ''am I dreaming'' regularly even when you're awake. Once this mental 'check' becomes completely habitual you'll start doing it while dreaming, making yourself aware that you're dreaming. Or so I've been told, as I said I've had no first hand experience with actually doing it.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

Some hints taken from the great movie: Waking Life.

Check the lights. Most people, in dreams, are unable of changing light levels. So, check to see if you can make light-switches go. The trick, is to get into a habit of turning on and off lights IRL as well, so you automatically do it in a dream.

Also, when you look at something with words and letters, take a habit of looking twice: once, you look for meaning, like you normally do. Then, take a second look. Yes, you looked at the clock, and decided that 9:00, and thus time to get up, but look at what the clock actually says: look at each digit. In dreams, you get the meaning from written words and digits, without the digits or words actually existing. So, double-check to see if all the individual letters are there. Again, you need to make this a habit.

Ask yourself: how did I get here? What was I doing right before this? This is trickiest if your dream starts with you waking up, but getting into a habit of asking yourself where you were just before this. Dream-causality is messed. This is the least effective, imo, method.

I use all of the methods above, and yeah, they work. Lucid dreaming is fuuuuuun, but generally, I like the sensation of having no control. So, I only take over lucid-dreaming control if a dream is heading into nightmare territory. Generally, I know if it's gonna turn into a nightmare, because there's music right before it does, like a soundtrack.

[sparkyinbozo]

I have heard stories of people teaching themselves to enter lucid dreaming states, but don't know if it's legitimate.

From personal experience, it did happen by chance to me once, and I remember it being a really cool experience, but am pretty short on the details. It was a while back.

[Ravens_cry]

Lucid dreaming is fun!
It can be a wacky and weird and wonderful exploration of the inside of your head.
Just don't do it too much as it is not as restful as normal sleep as basically you're awake but dreaming.
Confusing?
Hells yes, and so are the things that can happen in lucid dreaming, but it can be a worth while exploration of ones subconscious mind.

[Ceric]

I'm not sure if what I do is lucid dreaming or not. As far as I can remember, I've never not known that I was dreaming. There are some nightmares where I get truly scared, but I can pull myself awake in the middle of a dream and I always know that I can. But I've never tried looking at numbers or adjusting lights in my dreams, nor used any special techniques to achieve lucid dreaming.

For me, the main difference between dreams and reality is that I absolutely cannot run in dreams... I get slowed down trying to figure out exactly how my legs and body move to run and then whatever's chasing me catches me :smallsigh: So I gave my dream-self the ability to fly instead. So much easier :smallbiggrin: If I'm at point A and I need to get to point B, I just tell myself to fly over there and I do. (It's evolved to be more like teleportation (quicker and doesn't require imagining the journey). And sometimes I can shoot fire and magic missles. My dreams try to kill me :smallsigh:)

The only time I ever fail to realize that I'm dreaming is when I think I've woken up already. I see my bedroom, get out of bed, and go to do my morning routine... until the alarm clock wakes me up for real. (Alternately, until I try to use the toilet. I think I'm just consious enough to avoid wetting the bed :smalltongue:)

[Nameless]

I lucid dream very often, although I really dislike it. They usually end up being nightmare-ish and it takes a lot of effort for me to wake up from them.

[TSGames]

Has anyone in the Playground had first hand experience with Lucid Dreaming? Is there a technique to it that one can learn?

It is most definitely possible. I never had a lucid dream before I trained myself to have one.

Below is an excellent article on the subject. Be forewarned, though, the article does contain a lot of....to put it politely...."unsupported theories" on various states of consciousness. Despite this, its instructions for attaining a lucid dreaming state are rather effective.
http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=64&id=16#article (http://www.phrack.org/issues.html?issue=64&id=16#article)

Here is an excerpt, spoilerred for length.



Becoming lucid for the first time can be however some kind of a
challenge. Fortunately, many types of training have been developped. Here
are a few ones. I encourage you to google these for more information
and technics:

- Make your watch beep every x minutes. It can be quite annoying for other
people though. However, this beep will progressively be integrated by your
subconscious mind and will start to appear in your dreams after a week or
two. What you must do (in physical reality) is check out your surrounding
everytime your watch beeps. Do this seriously, it is really important to
get totally involved into this verification of reality. Try to remember
your whole day, and the past days, for chronological problems etc. Do
not think that you are in the physical reality but really imagine that
you might be dreaming. If you realize that there is a problem, well,
congratulations, you are doing a lucid dream now.

- Do some reality checks the same way when you see something strange, or
on the opposite (which might work better for some) when you do something
really basic, like washing your hands, or opening a door. Do it each time
for a few days or weeks, and very seriously (at least for one minute). You
will become lucid if you try this while dreaming after it becomes a habit
(as it will be integrated by the subconscious mind).

- Before you go to sleep, while laying down in your bed, feel the world
around you, feel that you are lucid, fully aware of yourself. Repeat a few
times .I WILL be lucid tonight, I WILL be lucide tonight .. while holding
the feeling of lucidity. Do this until you start sleeping if you want.

Once you become lucid in a dream, stay calm and enjoy. Repeat loudly
every five seconds (to prevent you from risking to lose your lucidity and
being caught back into a normal dream) that you are lucid, it will help
you stay in this state. You can try to fly to move more easily into your
created universe (lift your legs and even move your arms as if you were
swimming might help at first), but do not try harder stuff like going
through walls, teleporting or creating big objects from nothing before
you have enough experience to stabilize entirely your dream. Indeed the
mind does not like lucid dreaming at first and it will try to wake you up
(in this case, if you feel that the dream is losing consistency and the
image is disapearing, concentrate very hard on your five senses, touch
the ground, look closely to some details etc. This will help to get you
back into the dream but you might lose a lot of mental energy doing so so
repeat actively that you are lucid after that otherwise you might lose
your lucidity entirely), or to make you lose your lucidity (typically,
by catching you back into a scenario . a naked member of the opposite
sex (or same, depending of the sexual preferences) might appear, someone
will tell you that something has happened to your house, a giant dinosaur
might start chasing you etc., anything that would get you involved into
the dream will be used, so do not get caught and stay focused!

[arguskos]

I lucid dream almost at will. I've been doing it for as long as I can remember, probably because of some RL habits I have (such as reality checks every five minutes or so and compulsively checking my watch for the time). I've found that I can do basically whatever I want in the dream, be that teleportation, creation of objects, manifestations of subsections of my psyche to talk to about issues that are troubling me, flight, everything you can think of. It's actually pretty neat, though somewhat troubling, since I have to actively not interfere in dreams if I want to hear what my subconscious has to tell me. Given that this is a realm where though literally equals action, it means I have to suppress my natural urge to question everything. It's aggravating at times.

Can't help you do it yourself, but it seems like others have that handled anyhow. I recommend learning to lucid dream, and more importantly, learning to control your actions in the dream so that when your mind is trying to tell you something, you can stop and listen without interfering.

[Xyk]

Some hints taken from the great movie: Waking Life.


This is one of my most favoritest movies of all time. I was gonna mention it but you got here first. Everyone interested in dreams should watch it.

[Ravens_cry]

If I am underwater, I am either buck naked or fully clothed, never any appropriate swimwear. One of the things I loved doing in dreams was running like Dash or the Flash across the surface of lakes.
It is so exhilarating.
When Lucid Dreaming however, I tend to be clumsy. The wonky gravity, often off axis or simply wrong measure, or both, does not help. I remember falling to the pavement and been surprised it felt as real as real, the warmth, the texture,a sensory memory replayed.

[arguskos]

This is one of my most favoritest movies of all time. I was gonna mention it but you got here first. Everyone interested in dreams should watch it.
Yeah, totally forgot to mention that Waking Life is pretty chill stuff. The message is frankly kinda pretentious but the rotoscoping and the smaller sections are pretty excellent. It's a good film, and well worth a watch.

[Nameless]

If I am underwater, I am either buck naked or fully clothed, never any appropriate swimwear. One of the things I loved doing in dreams was running like Dash or the Flash across the surface of lakes.
It is so exhilarating.
When Lucid Dreaming however, I tend to be clumsy. The wonky gravity, often off axis or simply wrong measure, or both, does not help. I remember falling to the pavement and been surprised it felt as real as real, the warmth, the texture,a sensory memory replayed.

Ah, I get that too sometimes when I lucid dream. I tend to feel very vulnerable knowing that I'm asleep, but as I said, it's very hard for me to wake up, which makes me feel very uncomforttable and even more vulnerable.

Some of my lucid dreams involve me lying on my bed in almost exactly the same position I'm actually sleeping in. My room looks exactly the same too, but there tends to be people or creatures wandering about it. Sometimes I'm paralised and can't move or back away from them. It's very fustrating. :smallannoyed: I know that I'm dreaming but they always feel so real.

[Ravens_cry]

A lot of myths and legends probably started from similar dreams.
I personally have only once to my recollection "woke up" in my room. I remember crawling to the floor, when I noticed the door knob on my apartment door was missing.
This rather freaked me out and made me angry.
Then I realized it opened the wrong way.
Then I realized I was dreaming.

[Traab]

My favorite past time while lucid dreaming is super jumps. I do something that almost makes sense. Basically, I jump, and when I land I translate the force and momentum of the impact into making a stronger leap, lather rinse repeat, until im superman jumping all over basketball courts and trees.

[Lord Loss]

One of my teachers taught herself how ot Lucid Dream after having the same dream continue itself every time she slept for almost a year. It was kinda like a Sitcom, apparently (the Dream she had, not lucid dreaming).

I hear that looking down and seeing if the distance between you and your feet is normal is another good way of checking if you're Lucid dreaming, as is looking at any number or words, looking away and looking back.

It's happened to me too, but not very frequently. I can only remember a few lucid dreams that I've had.

[shawnhcorey]

Some of my lucid dreams involve me lying on my bed in almost exactly the same position I'm actually sleeping in. My room looks exactly the same too, but there tends to be people or creatures wandering about it. Sometimes I'm paralised and can't move or back away from them. It's very fustrating. :smallannoyed: I know that I'm dreaming but they always feel so real.

Your brain prevents itself from sending signals to your muscles when you're dreaming to prevent injury. However, when you're lucid dreaming you realize your body is not responding but you can feel its position. This can be frustrating or if you're having a nightmare, very scary.

Sometimes when I'm dreaming, I dream I wake up. Then I realize it's still a dream, so I dream I wake up again. And again. Gets boring after a while.

[Howler Dagger]

I remember a time where I lcuid dreamed, I was at boy scouts in a tent, at first dreaming about an orchetra trip. Then somehow, I said to myself, "Wait, im dreaming". It instantly changed to me hearing the wake-up music of a boys-scout summer camp i recently went too, and waking up. I dont remember what happened after that. So what I can say is that in my experience, your mind will put you in a similar situation that you were in while awake.

I do sometimes, while im dreaming I will (in the dream) kick or move forward, only to feel like im falling, then sudddenly wake up and realise I actually had moved my foot, causing me to wake up.

[Green-Shirt Q]

I can do it pretty often, because I've read a lot of tips online. I'm not very good at it though. Whenever I try to change the dream I'm usually unsuccessful.

Example of one typical exchange in my lucid dreams:

Me: (to a cute girl in my highschool I have a crush on) "Hey, wanna have casual sex?"
Her: "In your dreams"
Me: "I AM DREAMING! Am I that lame?!"

This may sound like an exaggeration or a joke. It's not. :smallfrown:

[neco]

I average about 1 Lucid Dream a month, most of the time it comes from my natural habit to check my watch every 5 minutes. Most of the time within "minutes" of realize I am dreaming everything starts to break down and I get a sense of everything becoming heavy, which now I realize is happening and combat by taking deep breaths, didn't work too well at the beginning, but after a few times it is starting to help. The weirdest Lucid Dream I have had has been one where I woke up from a Lucid Dream, to immediately figure out that I was still dreaming, hilarity ensued.

[Coidzor]

Doesn't really work for me. I become aware that I'm in a dream, but the part that becomes aware is not the part that's directing the events I'm witnessing.

Then again, I've never really tried to do so, it just naturally happens about half the time I remember my dreams, I've become aware of them while dreaming them, so maybe I just need the training.

[StarRider]

For some to lucid dream comes easily, others have to work at the basic all the time, especial in the beginning. Apparently anyone can do it. It depends on how well you can recall you dreams, how well rested you are and even what you have eaten can make a difference. a Good starting point is practicing checking if you are in dream all the the time. Sleeping or not. Its all about maintaining your consciousness going from an aware state to a sleeping state, one needs to practice it while aware and conscious. It's just practice......

[thubby]

Some of my lucid dreams involve me lying on my bed in almost exactly the same position I'm actually sleeping in. My room looks exactly the same too, but there tends to be people or creatures wandering about it. Sometimes I'm paralised and can't move or back away from them. It's very fustrating. :smallannoyed: I know that I'm dreaming but they always feel so real.

this is called sleep paralysis and is something else entirely. you're not dreaming of your room, it is your room. the images and inability to move are whats left as your brain tries to wake up.
stress is a common trigger.

I've had lucid dreams, and frankly i was bored in them. they're really not much different from a videogame.

[Fri]

Yes, it's possible. Lucid Dreaming is one of my favourite subject, and I've been training myself to be able to do it for years. This page is a good place to start.
http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Lucid_Dreaming

for years I trained myself to do Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dream but never got any success with it. Years later I realized that there's actually other ways to have lucid dream, though those ways might be less certain.

Now I'm using Wake-back-to-bed and autosuggestion. I still can't have lucid dream at will yet, but I think I managed lucid dream somewhat regularly now, about a couple of times per month.

The most important and basic way to have lucid dream is this two. First, improve your dream recall. You can do it by having dream diary, write as much as you can about your dream right after you wake up.

The second one is reality check. Every once in a while, everytime you remember, do a reality check. Ask yourself, am I dreaming? Then do the check. There's a couple of way on how to do that. My favourite/easiest/most effective way is to pinch your nose. If you're dreaming, you'll still be able to breath. From my experience, this technique have 100% certainity. It's amazing, the feeling when you pinch your nose, and you find yourself being able to breath, and realizes that, holy crap! yes, I'm dreaming!

Then usually you'll get too excited and wake up soon. A way to let yourself be in your dream for a bit longer is to rub your skin and spin around in your dream. It will give give your body sensory information and let you dream longer.

[Coplantor]

I have a strange relationship with my dreams, I love them the way they are, they are strange, cinematic, absurd in beautiful ways. But at the same time I'd kill for the ability to lucid dream. Even following the tips and training, like looking at the watch, signs, my hands, playing with the light switch, etc... I always wake up as soon as I realize that I'm dreaming, once I managed to stay dreaming, as soon as I realized that the dream was "stable" I decided to try controlling it, so I raised my hands to the sky and shouted FIRE! but I woke immediately, feeling like a god that just lost his powers.

[Ravens_cry]

this is called sleep paralysis and is something else entirely. you're not dreaming of your room, it is your room. the images and inability to move are whats left as your brain tries to wake up.
stress is a common trigger.

I've had lucid dreams, and frankly i was bored in them. they're really not much different from a videogame.Not always, I personally have dreamed I was in my room that turned out to not be my room. See above post. Sleep paralysis is interesting as it happens every time you dream to prevent yourself from acting out what is happening in your dream. Interestingly, the reverse, dreaming without paralysis, is apparently not the usual cause of sleepwalking.

[Artemis97]

In addition to the reality checks, I've read that keeping a journal of your dreams helps with Lucid Dreaming. It trains you to recognize patterns in the dreams so that you can better know when you're dreaming.

I tried for a summer to train myself into lucid dreaming with limited success. When I do have lucid dreams it's usually in the early morning, often right after I've woken up and rolled over to get a little more sleep. Something about the sleep cycle contributes to that. I've notived my dreams are more vivid at that point too. Might just be because they're the last thing that occured before I woke up so I remember them better.

There's also a few devides out there to help you lucid dream. I remember one was a mask that would cause a pulse of light, which was supposed to manifest as a flash of lightning or something in your dream, and you'd see it and say "oh hey I'm dreaming". Another made a sound or tone that was loud enough to be heard but not loud enough to wake you up. Those are for if you're really serious about it, though.

I think it's a fun thing to try to learn to do. It would definately be useful against a nightmare. The ones I've experienced were neat, but difficult to control. More often than not I would wake right after realizing I'm dreaming. Rather frustrating.

Just my 2cp. Goodluck with it all.

[Raistlin1040]

I will be attempting to keep a dream journal. I have been trying to make a habit of flicking the light switch ever so often and I check my watch fairly often. So far I have had no success though.

[Kindablue]

Yeah, totally forgot to mention that Waking Life is pretty chill stuff. The message is frankly kinda pretentious but the rotoscoping and the smaller sections are pretty excellent. It's a good film, and well worth a watch.
I completely agree.


Your brain prevents itself from sending signals to your muscles when you're dreaming to prevent injury. However, when you're lucid dreaming you realize your body is not responding but you can feel its position. This can be frustrating or if you're having a nightmare, very scary.

Sometimes when I'm dreaming, I dream I wake up. Then I realize it's still a dream, so I dream I wake up again. And again. Gets boring after a while.

I've heard that that's probably the source of most alien abduction stories, or at least the ones that start with the victim being paralyzed in bed by a beam of light streaming through their window.

[Nameless]

I've heard that that's probably the source of most alien abduction stories, or at least the ones that start with the victim being paralyzed in bed by a beam of light streaming through their window.

Actually, I remember hearing about this too now that I think about it. What happens to your body makes sense though.

[akma]

Lately whenever I realise I`m dreaming I immediatly wake up, so I can`t lucid dream. How do I stop it?

[shawnhcorey]

I've heard that that's probably the source of most alien abduction stories, or at least the ones that start with the victim being paralyzed in bed by a beam of light streaming through their window.

It's also the source of being-visited-by-angels stories but they don't get the press alien abduction does. :smallsmile:

[ORione]

I had a lucid dream once. At first it was a regular dream. I was reading a story (in the drea,) about this fish-kid. I don't remember the details about the story. Somehow I knew I was going to have a dream about the story. Then I woke up. At the time I was sleeping in a loft bed (like these) (http://www.amazon.com/Loft-Bed-Frames-Headboards-Furniture/b?ie=UTF8&node=3733181), so I was climbing down a ladder to get out of bed. Somehow I knew that the events in the fish-kid story were coming true, which was odd, because I was sure I was going to have a dream about them. Then I thought, "Wait a minute... maybe I'm dreaming now." I had heard about lucid dreaming, and I was excited to see what it was like. While I was getting excited, there was a kind of wave going through the world... it's hard to explain. When it finished the weather outside my window turned from streaming sunshine to pouring rain. But then, before I could make any conscious changes, I woke up for real. :smallannoyed:



Sometimes when I'm dreaming, I dream I wake up. Then I realize it's still a dream, so I dream I wake up again. And again. Gets boring after a while.

Not lucid dreaming, but that reminds me of a dream I had when I was young. I was climbing up a volcano that was spewing lava. Then I woke up. For some reason, I felt a need to go to my parents' room. I opened their door. Inside there was a volcano. I woke up again. I went to my parents' room... Long story short, I could tell when I was really awake by the absence of a volcano in my parents' room.

[shawnhcorey]

Long story short, I could tell when I was really awake by the absence of a volcano in my parents' room.

Lol. Yeah, some clues are hard to miss. :smallwink:

[Traab]

Its not fully lucid dreaming, but often when im having a nightmare im able to control events as they happen to the point where im not in imminent danger of death. For example, being chased by Jason. Im able to constantly find a way out of wherever I am, am always able to get far enough ahead to talk to other people in my dream, or make new plans, then go back to running. I will often be running in loops, back and forth through the same areas. Not sure why jason is ignoring everyone else just to try and catch me, but as he cant catch me, I dont mind that much. :p Only downside is I usually wake up extremely tired from that sort of dream, as if I really have been logging for hours.

Also, sleep paralysis doesnt always work on me. I nearly busted every bone in my hand by throwing a punch at another bad guy chasing me, only to slam my fist into the slanted ceiling above me. Freaking OW that hurt! Ive also had times where I wake up, but the dream doesnt go away entirely. I used to have this really aggressive pet bird, you couldnt come near it without it trying to bite, (poor thing had been abused before we got it) anyways, I dreamt it got out of its cage and started attacking me. I woke up, turned my head, and there was the bird, lying on my pillow about 6 inches from my face. I jumped out of bed and got my parents, only for the bird to still be in its cage when we checked.

[Kindablue]

Also, sleep paralysis doesnt always work on me. I nearly busted every bone in my hand by throwing a punch at another bad guy chasing me, only to slam my fist into the slanted ceiling above me. Freaking OW that hurt!

I got that, too. When I was younger I had a recurring dream that I was running down a sidewalk, and--wait, it gets better--and this giant hole appeared in front of me before I could slow down, so I would try to jump over it, kicking my actual right leg violently up and rolling out of bed. I remember it happening at least a dozen time, always exactly the same way.

[Chainsaw Hobbit]

I've experienced lucid dreaming many times, but I've never been coherent enough to do anything cool with it. My lucid dreams always start with me summoning random objects, and gaining more and more awareness as I do so. As soon as I become mostly, or fully aware, I decide to do something interesting, and then wake up.

[Saposhiente]

My problem is that I don't dream much at all (Or if I do I forget completely before waking up). When I sleep, I'm out, and next thing I know my alarm is ringing.

[Comrade]

I've never lucid dreamed before and I don't think I could either.

Which sucks because I have literally not once in my life ever had an actually good dream, as much as I would like to have one just once. I've had either nightmares or really weird, trippy ass dreams. Never had a dream where I won the lottery, or hooked up with some chick I was into at the time.

I have, however, dreamt in Chinese with English subtitles.

That particular dream was kinda ****ed up, though.

:v

[Fri]

My problem is that I don't dream much at all (Or if I do I forget completely before waking up). When I sleep, I'm out, and next thing I know my alarm is ringing.

This is what dream journal is for. Put it beside your pillow, and as soon as you open your eyes, write whatever you remember about your dream. It'll feel like grasping water with your hand at first, but hopefully, you'll improve in time.


Lately whenever I realise I`m dreaming I immediatly wake up, so I can`t lucid dream. How do I stop it?

Yes, this can be quite frustrating. The tips I know are, try to rub your skin or spin around in your dream, to... I think so it gives sensory information to your brain and make your brain think you're already awake or something...

[Moff Chumley]

To the best of my knowledge, I've only ever had one lucid dream. A couple years back, I had a ~103 degree fever and a stomach flu, and I believe I slept for something like eighteen hours. It was a pretty run-of-the-mill flying dream, but it was so vivid, so exhilarating, and it lasted for so long (felt like weeks) that eventually I realized it was a dream. Or, paranoid bastard that I am, that someone had picked up the wrong medicine. >.>

I almost never remember my dreams, and I'm fairly sure I don't dream most nights. However, whenever I had a large quantity of dairy right before I sleep, things get WEIRD. :smallannoyed: Might wanna try that, once you have the hang of lucid dreams.

[ORione]

I almost never remember my dreams, and I'm fairly sure I don't dream most nights.

You probably are dreaming. When people don't dream, it messes them up. Often times people don't remember their dreams, though. I usually don't.

[Fri]

I almost never remember my dreams, and I'm fairly sure I don't dream most nights. However, whenever I had a large quantity of dairy right before I sleep, things get WEIRD. :smallannoyed: Might wanna try that, once you have the hang of lucid dreams.

I do heard that some foods might help you achieve vivid/lucid dreaming. What I know are vitamin b, milk, and banana. Vitamin B because of its effect on neural system, and milk and banana for some particular amino acid they have, apparently.

[neco]

Just had another Lucid Dream last night, I think all this talk has helped keep in in the back of my mind. :smallbiggrin: It was interesting no feeling of heaviness this time, and it felt like I had more control, well at least until the people I was with in the dream attacked me Inception style. :smallannoyed:

[Moff Chumley]

You probably are dreaming. When people don't dream, it messes them up. Often times people don't remember their dreams, though. I usually don't.

Explains why I'm messed up, then.

[Nameless]

Explains why I'm messed up, then.

Everyone dreams an avarage of 8 dreams a night, (I think) but most dreams you just can't remember.

[Traab]

Im interesting, I dream the second I fall asleep. Literally. Ive had tests done where I can drift off for 5 minutes, they wake me up, and I remember my dream. I like remembering my dreams. What I DONT like is having a nightmare. Not because its oh so very scary, but because when I start having those, I end up tired the next day dealing with the nightmare in whatever fashion I choose. I make myself sleep through the night, but I still wake up tired. But if I wake up then fall back asleep, I start dreaming the nightmare again anyways, so im screwed either way.

[hydroplatypus]

I occasionally remember my dreams (for a while, I forget in a few hours) and have had 3-4 lucid dreams. That being said the dreams I remember are either screwed up, or falling dreams. The falling ones suck. Eventually I got used to them, and stopped caring, but I guess my subconscious didn't like that. After I got used to it I was thinking "ok, in about 5 seconds, I'm going to wake up just before I hit, 5 4 3 2 1..." and then I hit the ground. It hurt... a lot. They tell you that if you hit the ground you die... that is false, you mearly get mind numbing amounts of pain for a few seconds... then you wake up. Eventually I stopped having those dreams, but still, it sucked.

[PhaedrusXY]

I'm not sure if this is lucid dreaming or not... I guess not since I don't think I usually consciously know I'm dreaming, but... I have an amazing recurring dream. There are variations on it, but I always have telekinetic powers which I can use to move objects and also to fly. In some versions of the dream, I am also some kind of possessing entity that has to use the bodies of others to survive. This is all in a modern setting, also.

In earlier versions of the dream, my control over my powers was kind of weak, so that flying was a challenge and was mentally draining. I remember it being exhilarating, but also nerve-wracking as I was constantly worried I'd lose my "focus" and fall, which sometimes would happen (causing me to wake up in a panic).

In the last dream I had, during which I woke up and then fell back asleep and "re-entered" several times, I had much greater control. I realized that the key was not to try too hard (very Jedi-ish, I know...). So I was effortlessly flinging cars and other enormous objects around while flying with no strain on myself at all. In the dream, I wound up fighting some invaders in a gigantic "steam-punk" flying ship which was the size of a decent sized city. Despite the ship's size, I don't remember being afraid in the slightest.

The dream was so realistic that I remembered it quite vividly after I woke up, and even found myself wondering if I could actually telekinetically levitate the dresser next to my bed... :biggrin:

[THAC0]

I almost always lucid dream. I also have regular episodes of sleep paralysis.

[Mewtarthio]

Its not fully lucid dreaming, but often when im having a nightmare im able to control events as they happen to the point where im not in imminent danger of death. For example, being chased by Jason. Im able to constantly find a way out of wherever I am, am always able to get far enough ahead to talk to other people in my dream, or make new plans, then go back to running. I will often be running in loops, back and forth through the same areas. Not sure why jason is ignoring everyone else just to try and catch me, but as he cant catch me, I dont mind that much. :p

Weirdly enough, it's kind of the exact opposite for me. Whenever I have a nightmare, I'll suddenly get this feeling that I'm the one in control of the story. Then things get worse. Since I'm in control, I know what's coming, but I still can't do anything to stop it. At best, I'll be able to force myself awake. The few times I do manage to change the story, I always get this sense of shame and regret, like I had this great story going on, but then I went and ruined it by being all selfish. And then I wake up.

[PhaedrusXY]

Speaking of Lucid Dreaming... if you haven't seen Inception, go watch it...

[Venom3053000]

for me dreaming is weird like i can fly but only like three feet and barely four feet off the ground which is probably my fear of highs, any way i also sleep walk and talk, of course i only learned about that when parents told me that i did because i always wake in my bed

[Maxios]

I had a Lucid Dream last night. In the dream, I was watching Castle but it seemed...different. F-Bombs were getting dropped and it a lot darker. I quickly realized this was a dream, and changed it to something else.

[Threeshades]

I've actually had a lot of lucid dreams by now. Though never have I actually managed to do it on purpose. It was always just me realizing that i was dreaming because of something that happens.

When I start lucid dreaming I usually go on super-powered rampages just because I can (and I know i'm not hurting real people). Though after a while I often lose control over my dream. Sometimes I just suddenly can't bend what is happening to my will anymore, sometimes i completely forget that I'm dreaming and thus lose power over it. It's weird.

That sometimes gives me the impression that the lucidity of the dream was really just more of an illusion, basically me still running along with what the subconscious was putting together, thinking I was controlling it. That's how it feels at least.