It sort of just happened to me a few years ago. It’s neat—flying is fun. (As is the opposite, when it just doesn’t work and I wake up sort of laughing at myself for having spent, presumably, hours jumping around in my dream.)
But at least for me, the price was dreams, the moment I go lucid, ceasing to be self directed. I get that I’m in a movie, and I have to always create the next step. Nothing surprises or horrifies anymore. (If I’m lucid.) I have to kind of create my own magic, which isn’t particularly restful.
> I get that I’m in a movie, and I have to always create the next step. Nothing surprises or horrifies anymore.
I haven't lucid dreamt since a child, but I recall everything about the dream continuing to be autonomous as before becoming lucid, but if I wanted to do something, I could add that element. I definitely could still be surprised, as the dream fulfilled wishes like a genie would, meeting it technically but perhaps not as I meant when I willed the change. The few times I reigned my subconscious so I had full power and there were no longer any surprises, I would wake up.
> everything about the dream continuing to be autonomous as before becoming lucid, but if I wanted to do something, I could add that element. I definitely could still be surprised
I may have overstated what I said. The environment continues to be dynamic, and characters enter and exit and cause their usual mayhem (alongside me). But if something unexpected happens, there is–in my mind–a theatrical explanation for it and thus a plot-driven solution. The stuffed animals are upset I'm going to wake up and kill them, so I put them in a zoo where they believe they continue to exist after I stop dreaming, et cetera. (And sure enough, they're there next time I'm in that "place".) If you're trapped somewhere, you know an exit will materialise because you're the main character, and sure enough, it eventually does. If I break something I love, I know something will happen that makes it whole again. When anything that happens can be undone, action is robs of its meaning.
My wife and I were just talking about this the other day. She lucid dreams very regularly, and she says she spends a lot of that time flying.
I, on the other hand, never lucid dreamed, so a few years ago, I spent a lot of time journaling and doing wakefulness tests to see if I could learn to do it. One night, I did -- I was dreaming and then had an 'awakening' in which I realized I was asleep. Finally, a lucid dream! Naturally, the first thing I did was start to fly. About five seconds in, I told myself, "Wait a sec... People can't fly." That took the wind out of my sails, so to speak, and I couldn't fly again in the dream. I believe I woke shortly after, too.
I keep wanting to get back to it and try it out, but I'd love a more efficient way to get there instead of constant wakefulness checks and first-thing-in-the-morning journaling.
> Wait a sec... People can't fly." That took the wind out of my sails, so to speak, and I couldn't fly again in the dream
There is a Peter Pan tendency, at least to my dreams. You know you can’t fly. But then you remember you have, and believing it’s true makes it happens.
That’s what I was getting at with the film-script effect. I’ll be in a bind and then realize that there “must” be a solution in a particular form, otherwise the dream wouldn’t make sense, and that sort of conjures that thing into existence.
Maybe fortunately, maybe sadly, the one thing I’ve not been able to do is conjure up lost loved ones. I’ll get a bunch of puppies who know my dog, but he just couldn’t show up, or I’ll get strangers or living loved ones who know my grandmother or best friend; they’re just constantly indisposed.
Training yourself to remember dreams by writing them down before they fade away is paramount, it's not enough to just think about them - they still somehow fade away along with your thoughts about them. Then read what you wrote before going to sleep again.
If you want to achieve lucid dreaming consistently you also have to develop a habit of doing reality checks. The most effective one is to pinch your nose and try to breath through it, in your dreams it will almost always work and the surprise is major.
Checking clocks for consistency. Text as well. They are less reliable. Some people swear by rotating a text containing object upside down and see if the text auto-rotates, apparently it does in their dreams. Some people can't read anything in their dreams.
Keep a dream journal. There any many methods for achieving it but if you keep a dream journal long enough you'll start getting consistent lucid dreams.
I was fortunate to be taught by my father when I was younger. It may be an age/luck-of-the-draw thing, but check out "MILD"; it's the name for the simple technique that worked for me.
Most consistent way of achieving it I've managed is use a watch with an alarm that vibrates and is trivial to turn off or turns off by itself, then set it to go off after sleeping 5-6 hours. When waking up, don't move and focus on the black behind the eyes, then after a few seconds it may turn into a dream and you go straight from waking into a lucid dream.
Is there any research that would support that such a device actually works? This just looks like vaporware, and what I was able to find on the /r/luciddreaming subreddit also seems to echo that sentiment.
I'm not sure about that device but there's research about lucid dream induction through flashing lights during sleep in a consistent pattern and there are a few head devices that do that.
My tell is to recognize any room with a piano in it. I naturally want to sit down and play this piano, but the keys are totally wrong. No problem, I'll look around and, lo and behold, dozens more pianos all... with the keys in the wrong places. I can't play anything. "Oh, this again. I must be dreaming. How frustrating."
A very regularly occuring dream is that I'm in a train and realize that I don't have a ticket (never happened IRL), so I want to buy an e-ticket, but the ticketing app does not work. The text changes all the time, the buttons move around, weird errors, and then I realize 'yep I'm in a dream again'.
The nicer lucid dreams are those were you can fly or make spectacular light and colors, but I find that it's usually a difficult balance to avoid waking up.
I was really into it in my early 20's. One way to tell if you are mentally in the state to lucid dream is if you no longer feel tired. One night, after a grueling hike, I was completely exhausted when I went to bed. I closed my eyes, and moments later all my exhaustion just vanished, and I began to explore the space.
It sort of just happened to me a few years ago. It’s neat—flying is fun. (As is the opposite, when it just doesn’t work and I wake up sort of laughing at myself for having spent, presumably, hours jumping around in my dream.)
But at least for me, the price was dreams, the moment I go lucid, ceasing to be self directed. I get that I’m in a movie, and I have to always create the next step. Nothing surprises or horrifies anymore. (If I’m lucid.) I have to kind of create my own magic, which isn’t particularly restful.
> I get that I’m in a movie, and I have to always create the next step. Nothing surprises or horrifies anymore.
I haven't lucid dreamt since a child, but I recall everything about the dream continuing to be autonomous as before becoming lucid, but if I wanted to do something, I could add that element. I definitely could still be surprised, as the dream fulfilled wishes like a genie would, meeting it technically but perhaps not as I meant when I willed the change. The few times I reigned my subconscious so I had full power and there were no longer any surprises, I would wake up.
> everything about the dream continuing to be autonomous as before becoming lucid, but if I wanted to do something, I could add that element. I definitely could still be surprised
I may have overstated what I said. The environment continues to be dynamic, and characters enter and exit and cause their usual mayhem (alongside me). But if something unexpected happens, there is–in my mind–a theatrical explanation for it and thus a plot-driven solution. The stuffed animals are upset I'm going to wake up and kill them, so I put them in a zoo where they believe they continue to exist after I stop dreaming, et cetera. (And sure enough, they're there next time I'm in that "place".) If you're trapped somewhere, you know an exit will materialise because you're the main character, and sure enough, it eventually does. If I break something I love, I know something will happen that makes it whole again. When anything that happens can be undone, action is robs of its meaning.
Yep, same. The dream gets incredibly boring after you get control of it.
> dream gets incredibly boring after you get control of it
Wouldn’t go that far. But you have to consciously make it interesting by creating the weirdness.
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Not if you are an aphantast.
but but, you can do whatever you want?
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My wife and I were just talking about this the other day. She lucid dreams very regularly, and she says she spends a lot of that time flying.
I, on the other hand, never lucid dreamed, so a few years ago, I spent a lot of time journaling and doing wakefulness tests to see if I could learn to do it. One night, I did -- I was dreaming and then had an 'awakening' in which I realized I was asleep. Finally, a lucid dream! Naturally, the first thing I did was start to fly. About five seconds in, I told myself, "Wait a sec... People can't fly." That took the wind out of my sails, so to speak, and I couldn't fly again in the dream. I believe I woke shortly after, too.
I keep wanting to get back to it and try it out, but I'd love a more efficient way to get there instead of constant wakefulness checks and first-thing-in-the-morning journaling.
> Wait a sec... People can't fly." That took the wind out of my sails, so to speak, and I couldn't fly again in the dream
There is a Peter Pan tendency, at least to my dreams. You know you can’t fly. But then you remember you have, and believing it’s true makes it happens.
That’s what I was getting at with the film-script effect. I’ll be in a bind and then realize that there “must” be a solution in a particular form, otherwise the dream wouldn’t make sense, and that sort of conjures that thing into existence.
Maybe fortunately, maybe sadly, the one thing I’ve not been able to do is conjure up lost loved ones. I’ll get a bunch of puppies who know my dog, but he just couldn’t show up, or I’ll get strangers or living loved ones who know my grandmother or best friend; they’re just constantly indisposed.
Training yourself to remember dreams by writing them down before they fade away is paramount, it's not enough to just think about them - they still somehow fade away along with your thoughts about them. Then read what you wrote before going to sleep again.
If you want to achieve lucid dreaming consistently you also have to develop a habit of doing reality checks. The most effective one is to pinch your nose and try to breath through it, in your dreams it will almost always work and the surprise is major.
Lucid dreaming even works for people with aphantasia: <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphantasia>.
Are there any more subtle reality checks so people in the real world don’t think I’m insane trying to breathe through my closed nose all day?
Checking clocks for consistency. Text as well. They are less reliable. Some people swear by rotating a text containing object upside down and see if the text auto-rotates, apparently it does in their dreams. Some people can't read anything in their dreams.
Look into all day awareness. It's the phenomenon of noticing the incredible level of detail of the real world and trying to do that all day.
Read something, and then read it a second time. If you are awake it will be the same text, but if you are dreaming it will have changed.
Keep a dream journal. There any many methods for achieving it but if you keep a dream journal long enough you'll start getting consistent lucid dreams.
Yeah, I do that. I've read many books about it. My particular physiology is just stubborn thus far.
I was fortunate to be taught by my father when I was younger. It may be an age/luck-of-the-draw thing, but check out "MILD"; it's the name for the simple technique that worked for me.
Most consistent way of achieving it I've managed is use a watch with an alarm that vibrates and is trivial to turn off or turns off by itself, then set it to go off after sleeping 5-6 hours. When waking up, don't move and focus on the black behind the eyes, then after a few seconds it may turn into a dream and you go straight from waking into a lucid dream.
there's a wearable dropping this year that's supposed to make it easier to lucid dream: https://www.prophetic.com/
Is there any research that would support that such a device actually works? This just looks like vaporware, and what I was able to find on the /r/luciddreaming subreddit also seems to echo that sentiment.
I'm not sure about that device but there's research about lucid dream induction through flashing lights during sleep in a consistent pattern and there are a few head devices that do that.
My tell is to recognize any room with a piano in it. I naturally want to sit down and play this piano, but the keys are totally wrong. No problem, I'll look around and, lo and behold, dozens more pianos all... with the keys in the wrong places. I can't play anything. "Oh, this again. I must be dreaming. How frustrating."
A very regularly occuring dream is that I'm in a train and realize that I don't have a ticket (never happened IRL), so I want to buy an e-ticket, but the ticketing app does not work. The text changes all the time, the buttons move around, weird errors, and then I realize 'yep I'm in a dream again'.
The nicer lucid dreams are those were you can fly or make spectacular light and colors, but I find that it's usually a difficult balance to avoid waking up.
> [..] app does not work [..] text changes all the time, the buttons move around, weird errors, and then I realize 'yep I'm in a dream again'.
Unfortunately, this is becoming less and less of a "tell"! You're going to have to find a new one.
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I was really into it in my early 20's. One way to tell if you are mentally in the state to lucid dream is if you no longer feel tired. One night, after a grueling hike, I was completely exhausted when I went to bed. I closed my eyes, and moments later all my exhaustion just vanished, and I began to explore the space.
Another way is to try to see what the clock faces say in your dream. Also, see if the light switches behave as you would expect.
maybe you just got to get scared enough! https://medium.com/luminasticity/beating-up-sadako-82c5fb3f0...