Lucid Dreaming!

[Sci-2]

That is cool! And difficult. Thanks for showing me, guess that will teach me to skim posts :)

No worries, wasn't chastising you - just wanted to make sure you saw it!

How to Lucid Dream - YouTube

[Sci-2]

Lucid Dreaming and Self-Realization | Psychology Today

Lucid dream researcher Beverly D'Urso knows everything about lucid dreaming: She has been a lucid dreamer since she was seven years old. She has worked with psychophysiologist Stephen Laberge, the founder of the Lucidity Institute. She was the first person to have a recorded orgasm during a dream. During her lucid dreams, she has tasted fire, visited the sun and overcome a writer's block. She has done it all. We recently conducted an interview with the lucid dream expert.

What does "lucid dreaming" mean?

Even though the term "lucid" means clear, lucid dreaming is more than just having a clear dream. To have a lucid dream you must know that it’s a dream while you’re dreaming. That's it. It doesn't require that you can control anything in your dream, though control is what beginning lucid dreamers often aim at. People get attracted to lucid dreaming because they want to be able to do things they could never do in waking reality, for example, taste fire or fly to the sun. More and more experienced lucid dreamers are realizing the benefits of lucid dreaming. You can use it to explore the boundaries of your own agency and the limits of the universe.

[Anatúrinbor]

Scientists find switch for people to control their dreams

This week, researchers showed for the first time that they could use electrical stimulation to switch lucid dreaming on . . . The study suggests that someday ordinary people might be able to produce lucid dreams using an electrical device. It provides a new way to study consciousness. And it also indicates possible therapies for mental health problems, including the recurring nightmares common in post-traumatic stress disorder.

. . .

The subjects went to sleep and eventually dreamed. Then, researchers turned on a 30-second-long electrical signal and then woke them up and asked them about their experiences. It turned out that a 40 Hz stimulation induced lucid dreams 77 percent of the time.

[Gillio]

Interesting.

I have realised in a dream that I was dreaming, but I dont think I thought to try to change things. I dont remember many dreams nowadays, but I had a recurring dream as a child, when a woman would sit on my bed then start to expand and expand till she suffocated me.

The dreams stopped when I left home (yes, mum!)

My husbands recurring dream was his dad being rolled in a carpet, it used to terrify him. The dream stopped when he was about 11; his dad died.

(the weird thing about this is, his dad was killed in a fire. - what we were told as kids was to roll someone who was burning in a carpet to smother the flames)

My younger son used to have terrible nightmares when he was 5 or 6, he'd wake up terrified, sweaty, almost hysterical! This happened nearly every night for weeks.

Now I dont know where i got this from, but I told him if he didn't like what was happening in his dreams, he should just stop the whole dream (umpire whistle or yell "cut" like in a movie ) say this is my dream, I dont like what you are doing, and then evict the "monster" from his dream!!!

He never had another nightmare, not one! Three years later, he taught his technique to my nephew, same effect.

My brother was amazed, nephews nightmares were so bad, my brother was scared!! He couldn't beleive the literally overnight change!

I suppose this fits here, dunno.

[Sci-2]

I suppose this fits here, dunno.

It does. :-)

I've read that younger kids are better at lucid dreaming due to First Person Shooters, but AFAIK no one has done any studies on this.

=-=-=

Scientists find switch for people to control their dreams

Cool. Following up on the PTSD angle:

Could Lucid Dreaming Be the Next Treatment for PTSD?

This dream control might be able to help people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) overcome nightmares. These can be frightening and overwhelming for anyone, but for people with PTSD, nightmares can be a way of reliving the events that first traumatized them. Every dream seems dangerous, and sleep becomes an ordeal rather than a refuge.

“Nightmares are terrifying experiences because during regular nightmares (like regular dreams) we are unable to produce a rational judgment about its bizarreness, thus we strongly believe that what is happening during the nightmare is real,” said Dr. Sérgio Mota-Rolim, Ph.D., of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte in Brazil, told Healthline.

Mota-Rolim hopes that lucid dreaming might be able to help. He explained, “Psychotherapies based on inducing LD could be an effective way of treating recurrent nightmares of PTSD patients, because they—being lucid during the nightmare—would be able to: one, naturally lose their fear by realizing the absence of real threats, i.e. the lack of reality of the perceptual experience; two, simply try to wake up during the nightmare; and, three, change dream context, in a way of transforming the nightmare into a neutral or even a pleasant dream.”

There’s evidence to support this idea. One set of case studies showed that people with recurring nightmares saw their bad dreams go away after they learned lucid dreaming.

[Sci-2]

Lucid Dreaming: Where Science and Spirituality Meet

Since those initial experiments in the days of disco, scientific research into lucid dreaming has thrown up scores of weird and wonderful new discoveries, with one conclusion and its implications standing out from the rest.

Using EEG machines, eye-movement and muscle-tone monitors, with experiments that involved activities like singing [1] and mental arithmetic within the actual lucid dream state, it was discovered that lucid dream actions elicited the exact same neurological responses as actions performed while awake.

Further research found that the same correlations existed for a whole range of lucid dream activities, such as holding the breath, estimating time (lucid dream time and waking time feeling roughly the same) and even sexual function. The implications are huge – our neurological system doesn’t differentiate between waking and lucid dream experiences. In other words, for our brain, there is no discernible difference between lucid dreams and waking life. Dreaming lucidly about doing something is not like imagining it – it’s like actually doing it.

The potential benefits of this finding are profound. In the waking state, if we imagine happy scenarios, we usually only induce a slight increase in neurologically measurable happiness.

In the lucid dream state, however, if we engage in an activity that bring us joy and happiness (whether it’s flying, swimming with dolphins or playing bass for the Beatles), the synapses in the parts of the brain associated with happiness light up and release feel-good chemicals in exactly the same way as if we were experiencing these activities while awake.

[dornishscorpion]

When i had 10 years up to about 17.i used to have a recurring nightmare accompanied by sleep paralysis upon waking up. It was all about a black figure chasing me and appearing out of nowhere in the middle of a dream. In time i intuitively began to know that i was dreaming and manage to wake myself up, (jumping from balconies and buildings) but sometimes me knowing that i was dreaming jumping from high places stopped working and i began being able of waking myself by sheer will. I did some research and found out in detail about lucid dreaming and sleep paralysis . In time i began attempting flying wich would sometime work sometimes not depending on my level of lucidity. The most time i was lucid i was lost in a dream and managed to transform my surrounding into the place i wanted to be i also flew to the sky and tried to make a fireball with my hands (it did not work ) . Now i stopped having lucid dream as the nightmares stopped or where replaced with other more diverse nightmares. Also sleep paralysis stopped i only have them once every several months. Lucid dream i have not had in like a year or so

[Madrugada]

Hi,

I just joined here. I was looking for stories of people who'd had dreams about Game of Thrones.

It's interesting how common the experience of lucid dreaming is.

I've recently started a project of sorts on my site, in which the goal is to lucid dream your way inside the series Game of Thrones:

http://www.sealifedreams.com/en/projects/dreams-game-thrones

Please feel free to join us.

Nick

[Creighton]

Oh God, I have terrible nightmares almost every night and I know that they are dreams and I still can't control them. The worst part is, that since I guess I realize it isn't real I wind up actually dying in my dreams and then starting a brand new nightmare.

I know a few tricks that got me to start being able to tell I was dreaming which was mostly just keeping track of my dreams through a dream journal, and also paying attention whenever you turned on or off a light switch to see if it would do what it is supposed to.

However, I'm not sure learning the difference between sleeping and dreaming has helped me or just made my nightmares 10,0000x worse.

[straits]

When i had 10 years up to about 17.i used to have a recurring nightmare accompanied by sleep paralysis upon waking up. It was all about a black figure chasing me and appearing out of nowhere in the middle of a dream. In time i intuitively began to know that i was dreaming and manage to wake myself up, (jumping from balconies and buildings) but sometimes me knowing that i was dreaming jumping from high places stopped working and i began being able of waking myself by sheer will. I did some research and found out in detail about lucid dreaming and sleep paralysis . In time i began attempting flying wich would sometime work sometimes not depending on my level of lucidity. The most time i was lucid i was lost in a dream and managed to transform my surrounding into the place i wanted to be i also flew to the sky and tried to make a fireball with my hands (it did not work ) . Now i stopped having lucid dream as the nightmares stopped or where replaced with other more diverse nightmares. Also sleep paralysis stopped i only have them once every several months. Lucid dream i have not had in like a year or so

Was your sleep paralysis accompanied by sharp wind noises? And have you ever tried forcing yourself to get up during sleep paralysis?

[dornishscorpion]

Was your sleep paralysis accompanied by sharp wind noises? And have you ever tried forcing yourself to get up during sleep paralysis?

my sleep paralysis was every time an incredibly disturbing experience it was accompanied by this feeling of a hand pressing against my body usually my back ,thigh or waist and my body attempting to return to sleep. In my early days it was also accompanied by visual illusions but i don't remember hearing anything , maybe i did but i don't remember. During this experience i would try as much as i can to not go back to sleep and get up yes. Usually by trying to move my head i think if a person was observing me during it he would see me frantically moving my head in the same direction i was never able to speak or scream during it

[Creighton]

my sleep paralysis was every time an incredibly disturbing experience it was accompanied by this feeling of a hand pressing against my body usually my back ,thigh or waist and my body attempting to return to sleep. In my early days it was also accompanied by visual illusions but i don't remember hearing anything , maybe i did but i don't remember. During this experience i would try as much as i can to not go back to sleep and get up yes. Usually by trying to move my head i think if a person was observing me during it he would see me frantically moving my head in the same direction i was never able to speak or scream during it

Ahhh OMG! I have the same thing now and since I was a teenager. It is really scary and my feeling is like a hand slowly creeping up my body until it sits on my chest and being watched, how did you deal with it, because the lucid dreaming doesn't seem to be working for me.

[dornishscorpion]

Ahhh OMG! I have the same thing now and since I was a teenager. It is really scary and my feeling is like a hand slowly creeping up my body until it sits on my chest and being watched, how did you deal with it, because the lucid dreaming doesn't seem to be working for me.

i did not deal with it it just happening less often now. However the knowledge of what exactly is happening to me biologically helps with the fear a little bit. But i still try to shake myself out of it everytime it happens

[dornishscorpion]

Update : i was just having a nap at the end of with i experienced a lucid dream followed by sleep paralysis. The weird thing is part of me was awake and part of me was in a dreamlike state for i tried to move my hands and my brain told me they moved but when i placed them in front of my opened eye is saw nothing the shock of this sent a terrible shill down my spine and body and woke me up

[Et Cetera the Mouse]

I've "woken up" while still asleep before. I just had a completely weird dream, then I'm in a slightly different version of my room. I try to get up, but moving is difficult, and often my vision is shaky or black, which scares me since I used to get dizzy spells/migraines, so my vision being weird scares me. Eventually, I realize I'm still dreaming and try to wake up for real, but can't open my eyes or move right away. This might be sleep paralysis, or something like it, but it's scary.

[Sci-2]

Lucid Dreaming & Virtual Reality

Crazy convo of two dudes involving the above subjects.

[Nymeria10k]

I've "woken up" while still asleep before. I just had a completely weird dream, then I'm in a slightly different version of my room. I try to get up, but moving is difficult, and often my vision is shaky or black, which scares me since I used to get dizzy spells/migraines, so my vision being weird scares me. Eventually, I realize I'm still dreaming and try to wake up for real, but can't open my eyes or move right away. This might be sleep paralysis, or something like it, but it's scary.

I think that's what you call a false awakening - the EXACT same thing happens to me sometimes, it really is frightening. Normally it happens when I need to wake early for whatever reason or I'm expecting something, they always are scary/negative though, I will usually go through a few of these, briefly wake up for real, but due to excessive sleepiness I'll fall right into the same thing again. Sometimes I feel literally paralysed and can barely move, and I can feel something touching me. I might have seen a flash of red once. And there was the one time I faintly saw my door opening at 2 am and my entire family said they didn't come into my room at night.

Lucid dreaming.. idk if that's what I do, sometimes I can control what I do, it's like a thought, I want certain things to happen and my dreams shape themselves accordingly. Sometimes I have dreams where not only do I know it is a dream but I can remember, in the dream, that I have been to this certain place before/done this certain thing in another dream. Weird. Like, when you go somewhere, and you remember that you came here before and did something else. It's not a recurring dream, it is an entirely different dream but involves certain aspects of previous dreams. And sometimes within my dreams, not sure if I actively realise it's a dream but I remember things from my real life within the dream.

Like the other night when I was dreaming, two friends were asking me to apply for a part-time job where they had just gotten jobs, I refused because I didn't want to spend £12.55 on a return train ticket to the city the job was in. That particular train ticket, irl, also costs £12.55. And at the time I was literally drawing that information out of my real life. So even if I don't realise it's a dream, I somehow know that this is a sort of different state to my 'real' one.

[lovelikeangels]

i got into lucid dreaming this time last year and managed to do it a couple times before i kinda stopped trying to do it.

the one really memorable lucid dream i had, i figured out i was dreaming by looking at my hands, then i realized i could do anything i wanted, so i decided to jump and push myself off the ground so that i was floating among the tree tops on a neighboring street for a really long time before landing.

i ordered Calea zacatechichi to help me lucid dream/have more vivid dreams and i used to follow the guidelines for how to take it to make it most effective (wake up 4 hours into sleep to take it, go back to sleep) but now when i take it i just take 1 pill before bed and i always end up having really intricate, memorable dreams.

[Sci-2]

i got into lucid dreaming this time last year and managed to do it a couple times before i kinda stopped trying to do it.

the one really memorable lucid dream i had, i figured out i was dreaming by looking at my hands, then i realized i could do anything i wanted, so i decided to jump and push myself off the ground so that i was floating among the tree tops on a neighboring street for a really long time before landing.

i ordered Calea zacatechichi to help me lucid dream/have more vivid dreams and i used to follow the guidelines for how to take it to make it most effective (wake up 4 hours into sleep to take it, go back to sleep) but now when i take it i just take 1 pill before bed and i always end up having really intricate, memorable dreams.

I was just taking to someone about Calea Z recently! Haven't taken it myself though. Sadly I've still been unable to lucid dream though part of that is been too busy to really think about keeping a dream journal. Though that might also be sorta an excuse. I think part of me is really curious about dreams and part of me is really weirded out by the idea of a virtual world that isn't real.

The Current State of Lucid Dreaming: A Talk with Robert Waggoner

When the scientific evidence for lucid dreaming emerged in 1980, everything changed. It clearly showed an amazing paradox; namely, you could be simultaneously asleep, dreaming and consciously aware. Moreover, it gave this ancient spiritual practice of lucid dreaming a sense of scientific acceptance and respect. Lucid dreaming could no longer be denied as impossible.

Since I taught myself in 1975 a simple practice to become lucid, I felt thrilled to read about Stephen LaBerge’s scientific evidence in the January 1981 issue of Psychology Today. Finally, I could come out and talk about this incredible state of awareness and its profound implications.

[Fat Mans Plan]

I have had a few lucid dreams, I keep thinking about trying to do it again but then forget about it. Sleeping in a strange place seems to make it more likely.
I do dream a fair amount though (or technically, I remember my dreams a fair amount)
A common occurance is my inability to read in dreams, which causes me to try and open my eyes more, generally followed by waking up... sometimes into another dream.
I love the fact that the dream world, despite being so random, goes to the level of detail of simulating waking up from itself.

hmm...

Has anyone ever awoke from a dream and just been entirely immobile, like just totally aware of your surroundings but unable to move? Sleep paralysis is really wierd, I got told that one time I was lying eyes open just making 'gruuuughh ugh' grunting sounds over and over.

I rarely have it but when I do it scares the hell outta me

This has only happened a few times for me, but was not when waking up from a dream, it is when I am drifting off then realise that and try and move. The paralysis is just stopping you from acting out dreams, though not always successful as one time I awoke from a dream where I punched someone to find I punched a wall.
I did once wake up with an extreme sense of terror and dread that took about 30min to fade, did not remember any dream though.