I’ve always known the concept but never looked much into it - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucid_dream. Is anybody here doing this? Sounds really fun and good use of 8 hours that would be otherwise wasted every day. I wonder if it has negative effects if I’m consciously using my brain every night instead of resting though.
I experimented a lot with Lucid Dreaming and Astral body wandering and such when I was younger.
There’s a pretty good way to start; Keep a dream diary. Basically when you wake up you try hard to remember even the slightest details of your dreams and jot them down. In the start it’ll be hard, but as the days go by your mind will pick up more and more details.
Once you are able to remember your dreams to a fair degree there’s a practice that worked for me as well as a lot of my friends at the time. I don’t know the phrase in English since I’m a Swede, but if you translate it directly I guess it becomes ‘association of text’. It’s somewhat hard to explain but basically every time you see a different font, typeface or such. (magazines, books, posters, ads, tv, net) you focus on it and try to imagine how it would look if it said ‘I am dreaming’ in the same font. Try to like morph it in your mind.
I did that for a bit more than one and a half week when it kicked in. Basically you become so trained in morphing the text in your mind so as soon as you come across text in your dreams it will form into ‘I am dreaming’ and that’s when you realize that you’re sleeping. And become ‘aware’
After that there’s a plethora of practices to do to train yourself to basically ‘command’ your dreams. It’s pretty cool and fairly freaky too.
Dream diary however, start there 
:lol: at the tags
Something tells me Russianbeer or Uber was huge into this mojo.
You’d be better off reading about narcolepsy, cataplexy, hypnogogia, REM sleep, sleep paralysis etc.
Most of these build up because of sleep deprivation in individuals who are not involved with the abuse of substances. People who do abuse substances however, usually have higher chances of developing one or more of such syndromes.
Oh btw, the term “Lucid dreams” and the article related to it on Wiki presents it in a manner that makes it seem cool or “dreamy” even when it’s actually not.
It’s when the body sleeps but the mind stays awake and keeps tiring and misses out on REM sleep during the sleep cycle that one experiences vivid hallucinogenic dreams. And 9 times out of 10 they are freaking nightmares. And they really freak one out because at that moment, the individual is aware of his being and state and sleep paralysis added to this is even scarier. It’s not a good feeling by any measure even when you have a slightly pleasant hallucination.
I know because I’ve had these “vivid” visions several times. In fact, this morning I woke up from one. I was running from something and trying to fight something but I couldn’t lift my arms or shout in rage and fear and that my friend, is a freaking shifty experience really.
The following day is usually ruined wholly. Because your brain is still hell tired from all the “hyperdriven” experience.
The REM sleep is when the brain accumulates the data from the experiences of the past day and refreshes itself. If you miss out on that stage, you’re in for a ride and the next day you can experience anything from just drowsiness to blackouts and muscular weakness.
Yeah, agreed with Phenex. You’re essentially asking for a psychological disorder. I’ve had some pretty horrifying sleep paralysis before, so I would know.
I would look into genuine power naps if I were you. There’s technique to have your body run at a full state with < 1 hour of sleep. Then you could really make those 8 hours productive…
I wish I dreamed… I use to when I was little but a few years back I just stopped. I sort of like the peace and quite. If I wanted to do stuff I would just stay awake.
Try being an alcoholic. Every day, is A dream.
:lol: We’re talking serious shifts in behavioral patterns and psychological disorders as Harish pointed out. Not only that, serious physical effects as well.
[QUOTE=fester8542;2346897]Try being an alcoholic. Every day, is A dream.[/QUOTE]
Best response possible.
[QUOTE=hl;2346876]Yeah, agreed with Phenex. You’re essentially asking for a psychological disorder. [/QUOTE]
I know from personal experience that what you’re talking about is something completely different. Having your unconscious being ‘aware’ is definitely not a psychological disorder. There are a myriad of books and resources about lucid dreaming and it’s a phenomenon that is quite real.
I looked into it a while back, saw a technique where every time you look at your watch to check the time (has to be a digital watch) look 2 or 3 times to check. Apparently machinery often doesn’t work in dreams (as expected), and so a digital watch shows a different time if you look at it two or three times. If you get used to doing that whilst your awake you may remember to do it whilst you sleep.
I did it for a few weeks, then one day it almost worked, but I just ended up waking up 
There were other ideas there as well, which apparently have been quite successful. The page said its quite common for people to wake up, but apparently if you start spinning in the dream then your less likely to 
seemed like a lot of effort to me. I can’t remember where I found this but it was through a google search so it can’t be hard to find.
Also, I’m far from an expert, but psychological disorders? Seems quite far fetched. Its not like something you can do on a daily bases, to the point where problems may arise. From what I’ve read it takes people sometimes months, if not years to achieve a single full lucid dream, and they have said it was one of the most amazing experiences of their lives.
But I don’t know much, so your probably better off listening to the other guys 
Who keeps tagging these as bs still isnt funny?
For anyone who likes deep, meaningful, but ultimately useless rambling on philosophy, dreams, ethics, metaphysics, or whatever, go watch Waking Life. It has a similar premise with lucid dreaming.
[quote=sekasi;2346833]I experimented a lot with Lucid Dreaming and Astral body wandering and such when I was younger.
There’s a pretty good way to start; Keep a dream diary. Basically when you wake up you try hard to remember even the slightest details of your dreams and jot them down. In the start it’ll be hard, but as the days go by your mind will pick up more and more details.
Once you are able to remember your dreams to a fair degree there’s a practice that worked for me as well as a lot of my friends at the time. I don’t know the phrase in English since I’m a Swede, but if you translate it directly I guess it becomes ‘association of text’. It’s somewhat hard to explain but basically every time you see a different font, typeface or such. (magazines, books, posters, ads, tv, net) you focus on it and try to imagine how it would look if it said ‘I am dreaming’ in the same font. Try to like morph it in your mind.
I did that for a bit more than one and a half week when it kicked in. Basically you become so trained in morphing the text in your mind so as soon as you come across text in your dreams it will form into ‘I am dreaming’ and that’s when you realize that you’re sleeping. And become ‘aware’
After that there’s a plethora of practices to do to train yourself to basically ‘command’ your dreams. It’s pretty cool and fairly freaky too.
Dream diary however, start there ;)[/quote]
Very interesting. Thanks for posting this. I’ve been keeping a dream diary on and off, but I never knew about the font thing. Do you have any links/books or any other info on this?
There’s a huge difference between whatever mental instability it is that you suffer from and controlled lucid dreaming. :lol:
[QUOTE=h2o;2346972]Very interesting. Thanks for posting this. I’ve been keeping a dream diary on and off, but I never knew about the font thing. Do you have any links/books or any other info on this?[/QUOTE]
Unfortunately every resource I was adhering to at the time was in Swedish. This was quite a while ago too, almost 10 years. I’d be happy to elaborate in a PM or something if you want though
There’s a couple of other techniques but they all pretty much stem from the same thing, which is furiously repeating something to the extent of making your subconscious react to it as well. It’s pretty tedious and takes a long time but I’ve had quite a couple of clearly lucid dreams in my days and it’s pretty extraordinary. There are different “levels” of lucid dreams as well. Can’t quite remember all the steps but I remember one of the hardest ones is to flip a light switch in your dream and thus make the lights come on. No idea why that would be harder than anything else but… 
when i was like 11, i thought i was dreaming so to check i punched someone right in the face, thank god i was asleep lol.
this also reminds of when i took hour long naps in math class, i was woken up constantlyby a fist flying into my face, id flinch crazely and wake up.
[QUOTE=nick P;2347004]this also reminds of when i took hour long naps in math class, i was woken up constantlyby a fist flying into my face, id flinch crazely and wake up.[/QUOTE]
I got that too; whenever I was asleep in class I would wake up very suddenly like I was about to be killed.
[QUOTE=TheCanadian;2347007]I got that too; whenever I was asleep in class I would wake up very suddenly like I was about to be killed.[/QUOTE]
Woah me too! I always wake up in class as I’m falling or something of the like in my dream. Generally a trip…
Leaves for a really nice jump and an awkward moment in class
