Lucid Dreamers: Are we cheating ourselves / Can we do better?

[Piggy]

A fascinating look at dreams from Nova reveals some new thinking about dreaming.

Specifically, the discovery that there are REM dreams and non-REM dreams.

The report contends that we may actually have 2 very different types of dreams -- non-REM dreams, in which we rehearse and perhaps even "practice" activities we engage in during our daily lives; and REM dreams (which are more prone to be negative) in which we challenge ourselves to put these lessons to use in adversarial situations in order to hone our skills.

So it would be non-REM dreams which allow us to literally wake up with solutions to vexing problems. I, for one, can vouch that this actually does happen. It's not at all unusual for me to wake up with the answer to a problem I'm wrestling with at work, or to have the answer pop into my brain while showering.

A very interesting finding was that children tend to have primordial nightmares -- being chased by wild animals, for example -- but as we grow up our nightmares become less generic and primitive, and more specific to modern adult life. This could indicate that nightmares are hardwired into us, and only become personalized as we accumulate experience.

The hypothesis in the NOVA special is that we use nightmares as practice time, trying out various responses and hardening ourselves for real-word crises.

I trained myself to lucid dream when I was a kid, and I've been doing it ever since. It's extremely rare that I don't know I'm dreaming when I'm dreaming.

As a result, I pretty much don't have nightmares. Since I know nothing can really hurt me in a dream, I've essentially negated the fear factor.

So if the NOVA hypothesis is true, I've just shot myself in the foot. I've done myself no favors, and am actually cheating myself of valuable training time.

So I've decided to change my attitude toward my dreams, and seed my mind with the notion of dreams as training space.

I'm wondering what other lucid dreamers think of this.

I'll post anything interesting that I observe. That is, if there's anything interesting that comes of it.

 

[BardKesnit]

I almost never remember my dreams, so have only a limited pool to base my answer on. That said...

I find I can only lucid dream during nightmares. If I'm just having a "normal," dream (no matter how strange the dream is), I can't take control of it. But if I'm having a nightmare, I can stop whatever is scaring me.

 

[Piggy]

But if I'm having a nightmare, I can stop whatever is scaring me.

Well, that's really the important part. Are we doing ourselves a disservice by doing that? I think we might be.

Unfortunately, I don't know if I'm able to actually have a nightmare anymore.

Since I know I'm dreaming, I doubt that I'd be able to actually be frightened.

By learning to dream lucidly, I may have just short-changed myself out of a valuable learning tool.

 

[Silly Green Monkey]

I've not had nightmares (dreams in which I feel fear) for a long time. Course, the dreams with fear weren't really logical, no real threat that I would recognize on waking. I'm not sure if I dream lucidly or not, I fly sometimes, go through walls sometimes, but not all the time and it never works if I remember in the dream that sometimes I can but in this dream I can't. I've dreamed of dying before.

 

[Illustronic]

I think lucid dreaming goes beyond simply knowing you are in an impossible situation, nightmare have you, and having the ability to end it. One such dream comes to mind that realizing I was in a dream, I decided to do impossible physical feats, have things appear where I wished, and went through walls with no doors.

Reoccurring locations in dreams I don't believe indicate lucid dreaming either, even if the place is where you have never been. I would like to hear a firm definition of a true lucid dream, and what one wishes to do in one, and of course, how one 'trains' to initiate one. I believe the term is loosely used.

 

[Modified]

I think lucid dreaming goes beyond simply knowing you are in an impossible situation, nightmare have you, and having the ability to end it. One such dream comes to mind that realizing I was in a dream, I decided to do impossible physical feats, have things appear where I wished, and went through walls with no doors.

I've done that a few times, but then I always feel like I'm waking up, apparently forget that it was a dream, and slide into another one.

 

[Lanzy]

I did lucid dreaming for a time. Did a lot of flying, even into outer space. But, knowing it wasn't real actually eventually took all the fun out of my dreams. I still dream and remember at least some of them every night, but now I just let them happen and am frequently surprised when I wake that I was dreaming.

 

[malaka]

But, knowing it wasn't real actually eventually took all the fun out of my dreams.

That's my problem, exactly. I've had several lucid dreams (that I can remember). But each time, once I realized that I was dreaming, I thought, "Cool...I can do anything (or...ahem...anyone) I want!", but then thought, "But...since it's just a dream, it's not real...and doesn't really matter...". Then I'd wake up.

 

[Dogdoctor]

I think I am still a lucid dreamer although mostly I don't remember dreams anymore. As a child I learned to lucid dream although never heard that phrase till I was much older. I looked at bad dreams as a problem solving time. Even though I knew I was dreaming I would let the dream go on and attempt to find a solution. If I did not like the way things went then I restarted the dream at a point where I could pick another way to deal with the situation. In every bad dream except for one I found solutions that satisfied me. I am not sure why I could not find one in that one dream. Eventually I quit getting the being chased by a monster or bad guys type of dream and potential real life bad situations became my bad dreams. So those dreams had a potential for preventing real life complications.

 

[Correa Neto]

Well, I can lucid-dream. I developed it, I guess, as a defense mechanism aganst the constant nightmares I had untill the mid or early 20's. Nowadays I usually just relax and enjoy the dream show, using it as a window to peek in to my subconscient (whatever this word actually means) without interference.

It sometimes sounds kinda woo, but I think or believe I can draw some broad conclusions. Ex. Constant dreams of a tsunami (yep, I have them since a long time ago) usually indicates some event which worries me and I know is coming and I can do nothing to stop it; only brace for impact.

Believe it or not, I'm glad I can make this crappy self analysis, since I believe it brings informations about myself and thus I can understand better what goes inside my head.

I understand there's just a slim chance at best that I'm correct; however, if I'm right, then probably I am not missing something by lucid dreaming. On the contrary- I'm wining. Given the diversity and complexity of humans, this doesn't mean other people are fairing worse than me by not being able to lucid dream. Maybe there are other types of benefits (can't imagine which ones or which would be more useful), maybe there are none.

Hope I made some sense...

 

[Asm]

I'm happy that my fever induced dreams has trained me how to react should I ever be faced with abstract surfaces getting smoother and smoother, or spheres growing in size exponentially; With PANIC.

 

[Piggy]

I think lucid dreaming goes beyond simply knowing you are in an impossible situation, nightmare have you, and having the ability to end it. One such dream comes to mind that realizing I was in a dream, I decided to do impossible physical feats, have things appear where I wished, and went through walls with no doors.

Reoccurring locations in dreams I don't believe indicate lucid dreaming either, even if the place is where you have never been. I would like to hear a firm definition of a true lucid dream, and what one wishes to do in one, and of course, how one 'trains' to initiate one. I believe the term is loosely used.

Ending nightmares was one of the first things I did -- perhaps unfortunately -- once I learned the trick.

Lucid dreaming is simply being able to differentiate between dreaming and waking states, regardless of what you choose to do with that.

My case is, of course, purely anecdotal, but I'll tell you why and how I trained myself to do it.

As a kid, I developed recurrent insomnia, and one of the reasons was that I was afraid to fall asleep because I had nightmares.

In dreams, I had no control. Anything could happen, and that frightened me. Of course, when you're awake you know that no harm can come from dreams, but you don't know that when you're (non-lucidly) dreaming, so I became terrified of falling asleep.

Then one morning, while having breakfast, I read on the back of a cereal box -- I think it was Life cereal that had these little stories on their boxes back then -- about a tribe in Africa that "read" their dreams. And very shortly after that, I had a dream in which I was in my school library with two friends (Scott and Staci) and one of them said that "this is just a dream".

That was my first lucid dream.

The possibility of knowing the difference was enormously attractive to me, so at night when I was in bed I would think about what it felt like to dream, and tell myself that I would recognize that feeling.

And I started to actually do that from time to time. I think flying was the first clue that started to consistently alert me to it.

Over time, I simply came to recognize the difference between the two states.

Once I was able to do that, I initially played around a lot, doing various tricks to control things. But eventually, I got tired of that and just let dreams play out unless they turned into nightmares, in which case I would end them (which can take a lot of effort) or change things around so they weren't scary.

I didn't know it at the time, but since then research has shown that the best way to dream about something is to think about it before you go to bed, then to think about something else.

What I was doing was planting an idea in my mind that I would try to sense the difference between what it feels like to dream versus being awake.

What I've decided to do now is to put the idea in my head that I will invite challenging dreams rather than attempt to avoid them.

Should be an interesting ride.

 

[Piggy]

I think I am still a lucid dreamer although mostly I don't remember dreams anymore. As a child I learned to lucid dream although never heard that phrase till I was much older. I looked at bad dreams as a problem solving time. Even though I knew I was dreaming I would let the dream go on and attempt to find a solution. If I did not like the way things went then I restarted the dream at a point where I could pick another way to deal with the situation. In every bad dream except for one I found solutions that satisfied me. I am not sure why I could not find one in that one dream. Eventually I quit getting the being chased by a monster or bad guys type of dream and potential real life bad situations became my bad dreams. So those dreams had a potential for preventing real life complications.

You took the path that I now think I should have taken. Hopefully, I can still choose that path going forward.

 

[Piggy]

Well, I can lucid-dream. I developed it, I guess, as a defense mechanism aganst the constant nightmares I had untill the mid or early 20's. Nowadays I usually just relax and enjoy the dream show, using it as a window to peek in to my subconscient (whatever this word actually means) without interference.

It sometimes sounds kinda woo, but I think or believe I can draw some broad conclusions. Ex. Constant dreams of a tsunami (yep, I have them since a long time ago) usually indicates some event which worries me and I know is coming and I can do nothing to stop it; only brace for impact.

Believe it or not, I'm glad I can make this crappy self analysis, since I believe it brings informations about myself and thus I can understand better what goes inside my head.

I understand there's just a slim chance at best that I'm correct; however, if I'm right, then probably I am not missing something by lucid dreaming. On the contrary- I'm wining. Given the diversity and complexity of humans, this doesn't mean other people are fairing worse than me by not being able to lucid dream. Maybe there are other types of benefits (can't imagine which ones or which would be more useful), maybe there are none.

Hope I made some sense...

The Nova special actually provides support for this view of lucid dreaming.

 

[shandyjan]

Very interesting Piggy. I must read up, because I thought, from what I'd read, it was a good thing to lucid dream, and a good thing to try help kids to do it to combat nightmares. I be;lieve you also have dreams that you cant remember anyway, so they may be the ones that your subconcience takes messages from if that is the case!
I dont do it so often any more. I have managed to tell myself a nightmare was just a dream and evaporated the fear a few times, which is a good thing, night terrors arnt good!

 

[Jeff Corey]

It's been known for a while that not all dreams occur during REM, but non REM dreams are more chaotic and disorganized. My only experience with something like lucid dreams was as a young paperboy when I discovered that aggressive dogs would run away when I picked up an imaginary rock (in the real world) or fired an imaginary gun in the dream world. About that time I had read a story where the kid was plagued by nightmare monsters and his uncle took him out to the shooting range and taught him to shoot with a Colt 45, just like my father had in his collection.
What happened was that when I had these dreams, I would say to my self, "It's dream, wake up."
That was also helpful when I dreamed I needed to take a piss.

 

[Illustronic]

I have a suspicion there is a connection between lucid dreaming, (perceived or imagined) astral projection, and sleep paralysis, along with persistent ringing in the ears.

 

[SezMe]

Lucid dreaming is simply being able to differentiate between dreaming and waking states, regardless of what you choose to do with that.

......

And very shortly after that, I had a dream in which I was in my school library with two friends (Scott and Staci) and one of them said that "this is just a dream".

That was my first lucid dream.

I'm not able to follow you, Piggy. How does a character in one of your dreams saying "this is just a dream" imply that "you" were able to make the differentiation which is the basis of your definition. I put "you" in quotes because I am not sure who the referent is. The Piggy I'm talking to here or the Piggy that was in the dream?

 

[Piggy]

I'm not able to follow you, Piggy. How does a character in one of your dreams saying "this is just a dream" imply that "you" were able to make the differentiation which is the basis of your definition. I put "you" in quotes because I am not sure who the referent is. The Piggy I'm talking to here or the Piggy that was in the dream?

Well, of course, everything in the dream is "me".

When a character in the dream said "this is just a dream", I realized that I was, in fact, dreaming. At that point, I knew that I was not sitting in a library with Scott and Staci, but that I was actually asleep in my bed and everything around me was the product of my own mind.

That was the first time I was able to recognize, while dreaming, that I was in a dream state.

So that was my first individual lucid dream.

It took some time and much effort before I was able to consistently differentiate between dreaming and waking states.

Even now, I occasionally have dreams which I'm not aware are dreams, but it's rare.

 

[Dogdoctor]

Perhaps of interest to you I slipped into lucid dreaming from being forced to go to bed (as a child) well before I was tired. I used to lay in bed and read books with the flashlight and then sort of day dream or think of things I wished I was dreaming about. I then found that I would have those very dreams often after wishing to have them. Gradually I started creating my wish list of dreams before I was asleep and then proceeded to have them somewhere in this process I learned to recognize that dreams however pleasurable they were presented a small amount of data for my brain to deal with so while dreaming I could notice gaps in the data stream coming into my brain. No mater how great a dream was it never presented the same volume of data for my brain to deal with and that became easily noticeable. In real life your brain has to shut out most of the data your receptors are receiving and in a dream if you pay attention to these portions of normal input you will find your brain does shortcuts leaving gaps that could never happen in reality. So I might be walking from one place to another and I would skip a part of the walking and go immediately from here to there like in a movie. You might see something but on close inspection details are missing like a book but the writing is all gibberish or a piece of clothing but it has no weave or threads visible just little things that if you just went along with it like you do a movie you wouldn't notice. Then once realizing I was dreaming I then could alter things to be sure if there was any doubt. So I never tried to do this it just happened.