Lucid Dreaming

Welcome to the world of lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming is realizing you're dreaming during a dream. The best part about it is that once you've realized you're dreaming and that it's all in your head, you can change anything!

There are many things you can do in a lucid dream since you have total control and know you can't be hurt. You can play games, have an adventure, or fulfill your greatest wish. You can face nightmares and learn what they mean.

You can solve problems or come up with creative ideas since you have every tool imaginable at your disposal. You can even explore and get to know your inner self.

One of the more interesting things you can do is practice motor skills. You can master skiing, for example, and have actually been on skis only a few times. In fact, if you exert a lot during a dream, your muscles might even strengthen! The only limitation is that if you haven't tried it yet and don't know the techniques, it will be hard to invent them. You can also practice upcoming events like a tournament or recital. If you want, you can just rehearse tomorrow.

You can also practice more human things like meetings or dealing with a person you don't like or know very well. The big limitation here is that the characters you create are only your subconscious impressions of them.

Believe it or not, there are a few scientists who spend their whole lives researching lucid dreaming. One of the most prominent is Stephen LaBerge. LaBerge started his research at Stanford but later founded the Lucidity Institute (which is devoted to lucid dreaming) on the Stanford campus. One of the really cool things he figured out is that because your eye movements in a dream correspond to your physical eye movements, lucid dreamers can signal to the outside world.

I have already had a few lucid dreams myself. My favorite and most successful dream was back in third grade. Earlier, I had realized that I was dreaming but then forgot (which is easy to do during a dream). Then, I was by my classroom and there was going to be a SuperSoaker fight. I had forgotten mine but just then I realized I was dreaming again. I made a SuperSoaker appear in my arms! Unfortunately, I wasn't familiar with techniques for staying asleep so I woke up.

How do you actually have lucid dreams? Well, there are several ways. You may have a lucid dream just because you heard about my report or read the first few paragraphs. For more effective ways, read on.

One very useful thing to do is to keep a dream journal. It can be as simple as a basic memo pad. The two reasons for keeping a dream journal are improved dream recall, so you can be more familiar with the dreams that you have; and, once you have more than 10 dreams recorded in your journal, you can build a personal list of "dream-signs." Dream-signs are little incongruities in a dream that couldn't happen in real life and tell you that you are dreaming. Every morning, right after you wake up, don't stretch or move. Try to remember the dream you just had. Once you have a pretty good story, immediately record it in your dream journal. You don't have to be perfect about it, because you aren't going to be graded on it.

Reality checks are also very useful for encouraging lucid dreams. I personally think that if you're serious about lucid dreaming, you need to do these. All you have to do, every half hour or so, is ask yourself if you're dreaming or not. There are several ways to answer a reality check. One of the best ways is to look at a piece of text (or your digital watch), look away, and look back again. If it's a dream, it's likely that the text will be different. Another way to do a reality check is to try to change something with the power of your mind. For me, and probably some others, this doesn't work very well. I try and try, and it doesn't change. Maybe I'm just not experienced enough yet. The last way is to look for dream-signs or small incongruities in the scene. A good idea is to make a list of things that when you hear or see them, you do a reality check. Some examples might be "whenever I see a blue car," or "whenever I hear a door open." This way, you associate something that might happen in a dream to a reality check. The idea behind reality checks is that you might do one during a dream.

There are two ways to go directly from awake to lucid dreaming. The first, called Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreaming (MILD for short), you perform after you wake up, right after a dream. You do have to be pretty good at dream recall.

  • Step 1.) Recall the dream you just had as completely as you can.
  • Step 2.) Tell yourself that you're going to realize you're dreaming during a dream and concentrate on just that fact. If your mind wanders, gently return to your task.
  • Step 3.) Replay the dream you just had but add a twist. Imagine that at some point you realize that it's a dream for some reason (maybe seeing a dream-sign).
  • Step 4.) Repeat steps 2 and 3 until you think that you're actually dreaming.

The other way to go straight into a lucid dream is Wake Induced Lucid Dreaming (WILD for short). There are several specific ways to do this, but the goal is similar. Stay focused and conscious enough to realize you're dreaming as soon as you start your dream. Counting yourself to sleep can actually work if you stay focused on your task of counting for long enough. Start counting by thinking to yourself "I am dreaming 1... I am dreaming 2..." and so on. If all goes well, you will (at some point), realize that you actually are dreaming. One more WILD technique is the twin bodies technique.

  • Step 1.) Focus on your body and what you feel.
  • Step 2.) Continue Step 1. At some point you should feel weird distortions or vibrations of your body, which happen on the brink of dream sleep.
  • Step 3.) Finally, after a while, you (now in your dream body) can leave your now-asleep physical body and explore or change your dream world.

One thing that you should do before all of these techniques is to get completely relaxed. One way to do this is Progressive Relaxation, which is pretty simple. Tense every specific muscle group that you can in sequence, either going from the top of your head down, or from your feet up. When you do this, make sure that all of your other muscles stay relaxed. Feel that when you release each muscle, it's more relaxed than before you tensed it.

Two problems for beginner lucid dreamers (including me) are, maintaining lucidity and not waking up. To maintain lucidity, keep telling yourself that you're dreaming. On the other hand, if you've already set up the scene you want to be in, maybe it's not so important that you stay lucid. If you feel the dream losing vividness or fading, either concentrate on some sense other than sight or, whirl around until the dream comes back into focus.

If you're really anticipating waking up, you may have a false awakening, so you might want to do a reality check after you wake up. Be careful not to get too excited or hyper because you will probably wake up, especially if you're a beginner.

So there's lucid dreaming for you. I can't guarantee that my versions of the techniques here will work, but I think they will. It can take only a matter of weeks or even a couple of years to get really good at lucid dreaming, so don't lose hope if you don't succeed immediately. Personally, I think that reality checks are most important since you don't have to do anything special while you're going to sleep, but it's not that easy to get into the habit.

Bibliography

Books:

LaBerge, Stephen Ph.D. & Rheingold, Howard. Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. New York. Ballantine Publishing Group. 1990

Harray, Keith Ph.D. & Weintraub, Pamela. Lucid Dreams in 30 Days. New York. St. Martin's Griffin. 1999

Web Pages:

The Lucidity Institute. "Lucid Dreaming Frequently Asked Questions Answered by The Lucidity Institute." 2001. <http://www.lucidity.com/LucidDreamingFAQ2.html> (25 Feb. 2002).