Quote from: Julia-Madrid on July 30, 2014, 05:40:29 AM
Fascinating how you can program your dreams to some extent Danniella... What's your technique for doing this?
xxx
J
Lucid dreaming is a fascinating and very complex area of study, and everybody is different in what works for them and helps them reach it.
Personally I use two common methods to induce and control lucid dreams...
If I want to directly induce a lucid dream, I use the "WILD" (Wake Initiated Lucid Dream) method.
Rather than type it all out here, this page has a fairly good breakdown of it.
http://lucid.wikia.com/wiki/Wake_Initiated_Lucid_DreamIt's quite tricky to get the hang of at first, as you tend to instinctually freak out a bit when you first feel your body go to sleep and your conscious mind being pulled into your dreams, but once you do manage to master it, you can pretty much choose when to dream, which is fun
The other thing I do (and often recommend to anybody wanting to "try out" or "Dip your toes in" lucid dreaming without lots of meditation and weirdness) is much a much simpler thing.
This is sort of a "passive dream awareness conditioning".
The single most important and key factor in achieving control of any dream, is the simple but vital moment of realising you are dreaming. Sometimes this happens randomly even without any training, but what we want to do, is make it happen as often as possible
So what you need to do, is get your brain to a mindset where it is frequently questioning whether it is dreaming or not during the waking hours, to the extent where it will carry this questioning behaviour instinctually into the dream world. So if it does this when you are having a regular dream, the brain will ask that question, and you will become aware that you are dreaming, at which point you gain control
Some people do this via very overt methods, like drawing something on their hands that reminds them to question things, setting alarms, playing with an object they take with them at all times and questioning if it is acting right (Yes, Inception was VERY well researched and use of "Totems" does work
) and countless other personal methods that work for them.
As long as it prompts you to question if you are dreaming during the day, it's a good thing.
But I find the simplest method, which I done for years now, is simply ensure that at least 3-4 times a day I ask myself mentally "Am I dreaming right now?" and spend a moment to check my surroundings for anything strange or out of place...before continuing my day.
It sounds so simple, but if you keep doing this, that question eventually becomes an ingrained mental habit that you take with you into your dreams. As a result when you are dreaming (whether induced or naturally) you will 9 times out of 10 still ask yourself that question, at which point you become aware that you are in fact dreaming
The best thing about this method, is that while it is not perfect and does not induce or guarantee a lucid dream every night, you don't actually need to meditate or jump through a bunch of mental hoops to control your dreams. You just get into the habit of automatically questioning them it and it becomes an almost "saftey net" as such for whenever you do naturally have dreams.
There is a great deal more to talk about and go into, like extending and expanding your dreams, techniques to stop yourself from waking up, how to distinguish between a fantasy you have conjured and an important subconscious manifestation, and how to interact with your subconscious in general etc...but that's all for another topic...as I feel that I have derailed this thread enough ^^;
It really is a fascinating area of study though, and I can't recommend it highly enough.
Fair warning though, once you have had your first Lucid dream I guarantee you will get hooked
