Antagony

Just thought I'd start a thread about lucid dreaming since I haven't seen one (and can't search for one).

For the ignorant, lucid dreaming is the concept of being in a dream, becoming aware that you are in a dream, and then taking control of the dream.

Many people believe that this phenomenon can even be practiced and mastered to the point such that a person can have lucid dreams practically at will.

While many people think that lucid dreaming doesn't exist, I read that a scientist long ago actually had convincing evidence that it is indeed real. I believe the experiment went something as follows:

We all know you can hook up machines to a person's head and monitor the different stages of sleep/dreaming they are in by watching their brainwave patterns. We have very distinct patterns (mostly alpha-waves, I do believe) when we are in R.E.M. sleep, which is our dreaming cycle. So, the scientist found an individual who claimed to be skilled at creating lucid dream situations for himself. The scientist instructed this guy to move his eyes back and forth a certain number of times while dreaming so that he could prove consciousness.

Sure enough, it happened. And it was during his R.E.M. sleep cycle. The results were reproducable as well.

(I don't remember the source of that information, so I can't check the correctness of it, but that was the gist of what happened, anyway.)
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Please add your knowledge, input, comments, whatever about lucid dreaming. I think it's fascinating.

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SVT01Cobra

I've had one, and it was amazing.

Nefir

I *think* I get short periods of lucid dreaming some times, but I never intentionally cause them, and it never for any useful duration. All of a sudden I just realize that I am dreaming, and wonder what might be a cool thing to do next. It usually ends up involving sex with some random chick who just happens to be passing nearby in the dream, and/or waking up very quickly.

Now that I think about it, perhaps the actions taken in these dreams were not out of conscious will, but induced by the dream itself, just like the belief that I was dreaming may have been part of the dream. That makes things... not very lucid at all.

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gremlinx8

The only lucid dreams I've had are ones that I'm having for a second or third time. Part way through the dream I'll realize, this has happened before, and at that point, I realize I'm dreaming.

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blizzak

i've had some lucid dreams before.....nothing really that interesting
and they only existed for very short periods of time....just me walking around somewhere or something similar
also, if it makes any sense, they seem to happen more at the end of my sleep cycles....thus I usually wake up in the middle or right when it starts to get interesting :P

man i'll have to see if I can start taking control of these dreams...could turn out to be rather interesting
heh and on that note...g'night

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SVT01Cobra

It was like, regaining control of yourself I guess. Kinda waking up in your dream world.

GoldenOuroboros

Been there... done this too many times to count. hehe.. Lots of fun tho There were a couple of Lucid Dreaming threads in here but they seem to have gone now O_o

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Eviltree

I have been practicing the (art?) of Lucid Dreaming for a little less than a year now. I have had multiple lucid's of varying degrees of control.
LD'ing is very fun, and you are able to do anything after some practise. I don't understand how you could not believe that they are not possible, but that could just be me. There are too many different ways to induce LD's to list here, Here are some good sites

www.ld4all.com --> Some info with a Forum

www.lucidity.org --> The lucidity institute's site

:::OshnSoul:::

I have had a few lucid dreams- more when I was younger- I can't remember them really.

ApexgriN

I've had them, practice, and I'm pretty good now. It's been awhile, weed makes me less likely to remember/less likely to realize a dream state...

All I can say is, if you realize you're dreaming, don't try to fly first. That seems to be the first thing anyone tries, including myself. It does make sense. I just think this is too much for your brain to handle at once and remain sleeping. You will usually wake up very soon after trying to fly (and failing) if you didn't wake up right after going lucid.

Try something more basic, like turning around and _expecting_ to see something of your choice. This is the key, expecting it rather than trying to conjure it. I find that when I put effort into changing a dream, I always fail and usually wake up. If you just know that something is happening, it usually does/is.

I've pretty much mastered flying. One dream I was practicing jumping large distances across my city (miles long jumps) and, while floating above our valley, wondered why I shouldn't be able to instantly travel from one point in the valley to another. I couldn't quite get it, I ended up waking up after several _fast_ (but not instant) trips across the valley. I now believe I was concentrating to hard on traveling that distance, rather than knowing I was at my destination.

It's also easier to turn around or look in another direction for what you expect to see. I think that assembling a new scene is too much for the brain to process while staying asleep. Turning around gives you a clean slate to work with. Once I was being chased by an angry mob outside a busy movie theater, and when I went lucid, turned around and everyone was gone (because I knew they would be), unforturnately I immediately tried to fly, and that time it didn't work out.

I could go on, but I'll spare you guys if this didn't make any sense. Your mileage may vary. I'd be happy to share more, as it's one of my favorite subjects.

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apexGrin

lordjeebus

I lucid dream a few times per year.

When I'm awake, I'm in the habit of reading signs or other things, looking away, then looking back and reading them again to see if they've changed. Of course they don't. But because of this habit, sometimes I do it when I'm dreaming. And they say different things when I look back.

I've never had any trouble controlling things once I go lucid.

gilada

I have one re-occurning lucid dream... where I can breath underwater. I'll be in a swiming pool, then realize I can breath underwater, realize it's a dream, and really enjoy it. I'm quite dissapointed when I wake up.

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VitaminH

I've had a few, usually involve me in some bad or threatening situation, then realizing it is a dream and taking over, and kicking some ass.

Good stuff

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BentNotTwisted

Funny, I was just going to download a 'Learing to Lucid Dream' recording into my portable MP3 player when I ran across this. I've had a few of them and they are hard for me to control. That's why I want to start listening to the recording, to gain better control. I generally become lucid when I notice something in a dream that doesn't match my non-dream reality. For example, I'll realize I'm in a house that's not mine, but in the dream it feels like I own the place. When that happens I try to control the situation and quickly fall out of the dream.

I have had many of the flying dreams ApexgriN mentions. They are really cool. I wouldn't classify them as lucid for me because I don't think about the fact I'm dreaming or not. I just realize I'm floating, enjoy the feeling, and exercise only moderate control over what's happening.

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~springrain

in my my lucid dreams... i am never able to talk control...

i usually just end up waking up screaming and fighting... it's all about anxiety i know... but haven't been able to master to ability to take control...

i'm envious fo you who can...

ApexgriN

Being able to control most aspects of the dream is where it's at. Flying dreams are cool, but when you KNOW you're dreaming, flying/exploring is so much more fun.

In a rather long lucid dream I had awhile back, I was floating myself about 5 feet off a sidewalk in front of some buildings. There were many "people" around, and I was doing tricks for them. I thought it was amusing to float there and change $1 bills to $100 bills to entertain. It was strange though, while I was definately lucid and in control of myself, I was letting the scene take it's own shape. This was only a small portion of the dream. I'd say the whole thing lasted around 20 mins (and yes, 20 mins dream time is 20 mins realtime... you can get much more done in 20mins when things can be "skipped")

The "scene" seems to be the hardest to change. Only on rare occasions I'm able to completely change the general scene, and even then it never seems to last.

I want to hear about other peoples lucid dreams. I'm interested to hear about the events of the dreams and where they took place, the level of control, etc etc.

-springrain, try not to "take" control, try instead to believe something is happening. It's a strange feeling to have your thoughts control your dream in realtime. It takes practice, but you'll get it. Try writing down every dream you can remember in the best detail possible after you wake up. This will help you keep your memory intact when dreaming, and that allows you to become lucid easier. After that, it's just a case of practice makes perfect.

BTW - Anyone ever seen Waking Life? If not, I'd highly recommend it for any lucid dreamers out there.

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apexGrin

Raptor20561

i usually go lucid in nightmares, twice i wasent in one. usually in the nightmare i have some muderer, or someone trying to kill me following me. before i knew about lucid dreams i would be running away from the person, then realize im just dreaming, so i would stop and let him kill me or watever, or concentrate REALLY hard on waking up and i would, usually sweating my ass off lol. when i friend told me about lucid dreams, i started trying to get away from the thing/person chasing me or watever. ive done it twice before, but havent been able to do anything for 2 long since this usually happens towards the morning, and my alarm goes off really pissing me off! im going to read on some references on this and try it again.

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cait987

Ive had a few Lucid Dreams before, they are very odd and I can never really get enough control to do alot without waking up.

Honestly, I rarely dream however the way I sleep on my bed I'll normally wake up in the middle of the night with my arm asleep cause I slept on it, However, If Im dreaming when my arm falls asleep, I can somehow tell I'm dreaming and control it somewhat but can never do much and normally wake up like 2 minutes after I realize I'm dreaming because my arm hurts to much odd aye?

ApexgriN

Try setting your alarm for 2 hours before you wake up. When it goes off, get up for a half hour. When you go back to bed, just keep thinking about how you're going to lucid dream. Since your memory takes a bit of time to disconnect, and REM sleep will come on much quicker, it is easier to become lucid.

Hope this helps.

http://www.lucidity.com/LucidDreamingFAQ2.html

EDIT: Another good one: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/dreams-faq/lucid-dreaming-faq/

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apexGrin

mr_mcrafe

same with me, I used to get them very often (probably most sleeps) when I'm at the end of my sleep, and sort of slightly awake. they tend to screw up and do something different to what I want and I'd sort of fight my dream and it would stuff up and end .

nash

I've never had a lucid dream, and it's kind of difficult to imagine what y'all are talking about because I've never experienced it. It sounds interesting, though, and I would like to "try" it. It's also weird that I've never had a nightmare before.

mbchills

Vanilla Sky was a great movie

had to do with lucid dreaming

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rawr.

xim

I love lucid dreaming but have only been able to do it 5 or 6 times.
some pointers:
Dont smoke any weed for two atleast two days...(i know it sucks)

take about 6 grams of melatonin before you goto sleep (buy it at eckerds or any pharmacy)

try to sleep 12 hours -- the longer you sleep the more intense your dreams get

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xim

This is kinda lewd so hang on to your hats.

Well somehow or other I realized I was dreaming, and I was in mexico. There was this girl (in real life) who I had had classes with in highschool but never talked to and hadn't seen in years. Well I saw her and decided I wanted to bang the sheet out of her. I remember the door to the bathroom said "Freaks welcome" on it and being amused by that. So we were in this bathroom stall and I was fewkin her like crazy, but I couldnt feel it. I guess I couldnt feel it for the same reason it doesnt hurt when you pinch yourself in a dream (my only guess for why that is is because you arent actually physicly being pinched/fewking a hot girl and therefore there is no real sensation). I was getting really pissed actually because I was stuffing her really hard, and she was going crazy moaning, screaming, gyrating and squeezing and touching all of her best places in the best of ways but I could barely feel anything like I had been numbed by an anesthetic or something. So I just kept pumping her harder and harder until I actually woke up thrusting into my blanket laying on me. Good thing I have my own room...

I returned to that dream when I went back to sleep (multiple times) but never with enough control and never long enough to get her back to that bathroom (I guess I should have just started going at it with her in the lecture hall at my college during the lecture (which is where we were in the latter dreams) that would have been cool I bet I could have gotten people to cheer me on while I was giving her my numby).

Thats the only time I've ever had a sexual dream. Ive also had lucid dreams where I was flying and such but those wouldnt make such interesting reads now would they?

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ApexgriN

I've had sex a few times in Lucid Dreams. It's definately something that you'll try once you become aware that you're dreaming and have some feeling. Although I could feel it, I've never "finished", do to the fact that I love having sex and I can go forever in a dream, or at least until I wake up.

I'm going to start a thread on Ketamine. This is the easiest and most reliable way to induce a lucid dream state. --->

EDIT: http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...threadid=43206

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apexGrin

=simbolik=

gawddammnit apex never finishes, I can barley start befor I turn into a drooling pile of...well you know

I have however had a colpe of experiances with really hot strip teases, performed by girls that I "designed" myself.


with lucid dreaming as with life it seems,

realization = manifestation

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CinnamonGirl

I've never had a lucid dream, and wasn't aware you could "practice." Thanks for the link, Eviltree, I'll definitely be trying some of the tips .

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mokle

I used to lucid dream all the time, when I was much younger.

In fact, my dreams were so lucid that they got to the point of being "psychic" dreams.

For example, when I was in grade school, I'd have dreams where I'm waking up, getting ready for school, and going about my day. The dream would be like real life, I didn't even know I was dreaming, but it was lucid, as I could still think and have conversations, and do tests is class. School would end, and I'd suddenly wake up. Being so young, I never really grasped the fact that I just had a dream. I'd get ready for school, get to class, and start talking to friends. Immediatly I'd be saing things like "You jut told us this yesterday". I'd get to class and say "Man, that math test sucked yesterday eh" and my buddies would be like "what test?", only to have the teacher walk in and say "test time", and I'd be handed the same test I remembered doing the day before. Everything that happened that day would be almost the same as what I'd dreamed.

I had dreams like that all the time.

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Mokle
"Your hands can't hit what your eyes can't see" -Ali

SVT01Cobra

My latest, it was quite fun.
The dream first started, it was real dark, and I was lying in bed when I overhear a conversation between two people. Turns out this girl was upset with the guy because he couldn't get her pregnant or something. Then she says something about going into the room I'm in and being with someone that CAN procreate.(me )

About this time I realize I'm in my dream, and I stand up and I see that it is a very skewed version of my parents bedroom that I'm in. Needless to say, I was quite excited that in this dream this chick was coming into my room for sex.
Yeah, I found that maintaining people in dreams is really damn hard. Anyways, she comes in the room, and I can remember standing behind her, kissing down her neck. Then I realized that the friggin door was open, so I leave to shut it. I start back towards the room when I realize that I can't shut the damn door. When I tried to force the door shut, the door kind of stretched out I guess. There was a gap between the door and the wall now. Well, I was really pissed that I couldnt shut the door, so I think to myself, "Hell, if I can't shut the damn door, I'll just turn it into the wall.
So I concentrate, and I'm holding my hands up as the wall starts to take over the door, and all that's left is a small outline of where the door used to be.

Not too shabby if I say so myself. The only downside to concentrating this much was that now my girl was gone, and was replaced by a mannequin, DAMMIT!

I'm really enjoying these lucid dreams.

Fullzero

For those who are interested in Astral Projection or Out of body experiences or OOBEs :
Anyway, Xim said that u shouldn't smoke weed for at least a couple of days...first of all, let's b serious, no serious pothead could do that and besides that, weed can really get you out of your body. Here's what happened to me.

It was monday morning (really early in the morning, like 5 or something) and i was on the bus. I was going snowboarding with a friend of mine. Before we left, we had a really nice and phat joint, skunk of course...anyway, the thing is that we were both really stoned, dozed and tired cause we hadn't had much sleep and on top of it, we had that amazing joint. The bus left, my friend fell asleep but i couldn't actually sleep, i was really relaxed, but couldn't sleep. so i was just sitting there, with my eyes closed, and my mind was flying,thinking all sorts of stuff before i knew it, i started getting this weird feeling, like vibrating, starting off of my legs, going up to my arms and torso. It wasn't like i was having a tantrum, it was more like an electric shock, painless of course. After a while it stopped and i thought i should get up for a bit cause it felt weird.when i did, i felt weightless and really, really feather-like. i turned around and saw my friend sleeping, and turned my head the other way and saw my body sleeping too. I freaked out and snapped back. After 5 minutes, i did the same thing and i "flew" (or something similar) 5 rows ahead, and overheard a conversation 2 guys were having. They were speaking really softly, so it'd be impossible for me to listen to them from were i was actually sitting. They were talking about that girl that had dumped one of them and he was upset. after i flew around a bit, i decided i wanted to get back into my body and wake up. And so i did...when we got there, i walked up to where the two guys were sitting, and i asked them if they were talking about the girl. They said yes...i freaked out man.
And the other day, me and my girlfriend were chilling at a friend's house, smoking up...we've had like a couple of joints and we were watching tv. I was bored to watch tv, so i tried to have an OOBE. I relaxed, with my eyes open, i was watching tv, but not actually watching...i was more like looking at the screen, i was thinking millions of other stuff, but my body was dead relaxed. I couldn't feel any limbs, parts or anything. After a while, my hearing went out, i closed my eyes and within a *click*,there i was sitting on my body, watching everything, and kinda floating, i got up and stood in front of my girlfriend, my friend and my self. I was watching all 3 of us...it was amazing, after that she woke me up, cause she said i was being lame sleeping (...sighs....). Anyway, the thing is, that the key to OOBE is to put your body to sleep, but keep your mind awake. Try to keep thinking of stuff, all sorts of stuff, anything, but be relaxed. And don't let the vibrations freak you out.
You CAN smoke up and have both lucid dreams, and OOBEs. Just don't let your self go to sleep.

kurtisj

Every onece in a great while i control what i do in my dream, but i don't know how i do it, hell half the time i dont even remember having a dream in the first place.

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phathom

.
I actually have lucid dreams quite often, not to the point I can say that I will have one such and such night ect. But normally after the first part of the dream I am just dreaming like being reaquainted to the dream world, then I start to control it, this happens to me for just about every dream I have. It's not just a random thing but all of my dreams or just about all (90% of them) are lucid dreams. Most of them aren't about sex though as you would think or would think I would make them be about, (think its subconscious of me that I don't want to cum in my boxers while sleeping.) But rather of situations that could happen in the future, most of them are diaster type flood/fire/famine type of dreams, or dreams that are kinda set like a war/terrorist elite guy goes into war kinda thing. When I do get a lucid dream, basically I have a lot of control over it, basically picture NEO not in the first one but in the second one, I can fly, pause in mid air, change things, change the scene, I find I am more able to change the scene by running or driving or something in a direction and making the terain go by really fast rather than just turing around and instantly happeneing. One of the things I realize is that I can actually get hurt in my dreams, as in I'll be hit several times in a fight against people, I'll win eventually because as I said in my dreams I am basically NEO, but I'll wake up and every part down to the inch of me hurts and aches, its sore, sometimes bruises even show up, this happens to places I couldn't actually hit myself as well, such as spots on my back i can't reach, my friends have saw me and say that I kinda lay there tense and toss around a little, but not actually moving much, and I'll wake up the same way. I recently had one last night where I was at my parents automotive shop and we were having a big storm, they were talking about going over to my friends house and business and helping them out, but then a tornado formed, but it had a mind of its own and literally turned itself into a hand and reached down and grabbed one of their employees, I kinda jumped (about 15 feet up) on to it and started beating the crap out of this tornado hand, it wouldnt let go, but I wasn't on it anymore, I was flying and floating up as it was taking him up into the stormy sky above, Eventually I realized that I could care less and it was probably taking him for a reason and that I was actually the one that had summoned it from the actual tornado that was there and decided to let it take him because after all that's what I wanted to begin with. But anyways I do have lots of lucid dreams and control them well as far as OOBE I only have had a couple, they tend to freak me out more though so when they start I go back in. But as far as lucid dreams being psychic predicting dreams, I have had a couple of those as well and relived the entire day/scene down to the T also get a lot of deja vus this way.

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Rodney

Had the same thing happen. When I was quite young -- very early grade school -- I had to have my tonsils out. A few days before the operation, I lucid-dreamed going to the hospital, checking in, and going into the operation. I woked up. When i finally went in, it was all the same -- and I had never been to that hospital before.

I also remember, when young, having dreams about everyday life that I realized were dreams at the time. I steered the dreams and did what I wanted to do -- it was all very natural, and I had full conversations with the people in my dreams.

Now that I'm older, that doesn't happen anymore, except.... sometimes I'll be dreaming in a half-awake state and in that dream I'll be reading a book or newspaper (I do that a lot in dreams, for some reason). I'll try to actually read the print on the page to myself, word by word and it's usually pretty darned garbled -- but not completely meaningless.