Spiritual Forums

Home


Donate!


Articles


CHAT!


Shop


 
Welcome to Spiritual Forums!.

We created this community for people from all backgrounds to discuss Spiritual, Paranormal, Metaphysical, Philosophical, Supernatural, and Esoteric subjects. From Astral Projection to Zen, all topics are welcome. We hope you enjoy your visits.

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest, which gives you limited access to most discussions and articles. By joining our free community you will be able to post messages, communicate privately with other members (PM), respond to polls, upload your own photos, and gain access to our Chat Rooms, Registration is fast, simple, and free, so please, join our community today! !

If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, check our FAQs before contacting support. Please read our forum rules, since they are enforced by our volunteer staff. This will help you avoid any infractions and issues.

Go Back   Spiritual Forums > Spirituality & Beliefs > Dreams > Lucid Dreaming

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #1  
Old 14-06-2017, 10:08 AM
Antonio94 Antonio94 is offline
Seeker
Join Date: Jun 2017
Location: Vietnam
Posts: 38
  Antonio94's Avatar
Is there a way to train Lucid Dreaming intentionally?

I remember 4 years ago I read an article which said that we can teach and train ourselves so that we can enter the state of Lucid Dreaming intentionally. There was even a website about it, though I don't whether it exists anymore. And so now reading the posts, I'm quite interested in this again. Is it really possible to enter lucid dreaming intentionally?

Back in the past I've entered the state of lucid dreaming several time (it's not intentional though) and during those time, it felt like I can think and control myself in the dream itself. It felt like I had conscious but once I woke up, I wasn't sure I was in control or it was just a scripted dream.
Reply With Quote
  #2  
Old 17-06-2017, 02:19 AM
Aaron Lowe Aaron Lowe is offline
Deactivated Account
Join Date: May 2017
Location: For me, here, for you, there.
Posts: 4,260
  Aaron Lowe's Avatar
I've only lucid dreamt twice. Both times were accidental. I realised I was dreaming and unusually this didn't end the dream but it continued into a lucid dream.

I could have sought to explore lucid dreaming but my heart wasn't into it, but here's a few ideas.

In dreams you don't really have new choices but mostly old ones. Choices you've made before. You purely react in dreams, not act. Dreams represent you're highest representation of unconscious thought.

There are a few ways around this I know. Some harder than others. Which one works for you depends on you.

1) Pre-choice.
The way to do this is to simply choose before the dream. You have to be very clear and precise for this to work. It has to come from the heart. What you do is say to yourself, "if I come across this situation, this is what I will do." Then actually make the choice to do it once that condition is met. When you reach that point in the dream, if you've made the choice sincerely, you'll do it in the dream.

For example, "the next time I realise I'm dreaming, I won't wake up. I'll have a lucid dream." Commit to this decision absolutely. A bit like deciding that the next time you see someone you'll say hello, then no matter how nervous you are, you do it.

2) Technological trickery
Another way is to buy a device that is timed to flash your eyes after you reach REM sleep. Either based on a timer or a delta wave monitor. When you see the flash in your dream you'll remember it means you're dreaming and can trigger a lucid dream. It might take several nights before it doesn't wake you and you become accustomed to it.

You can simulate this yourself by setting an alarm on your phone so go off 4 hours after you go to bed. When it wakes you up go immediately back to sleep but note you are dreaming. Done right you'll slip back into the dream you were having but realise you're dreaming and trigger a lucid dream. I've heard this can take months of practice until you get it right.

3) Enlightenment
This is the hardest to achieve. Dreaming is by nature unconscious. Lucidity is by nature very conscious. Doing both is a challenge to say the least. As you raise your waking consciousness this is retained during sleep meaning you're more likely to be able to sustain consciousness there.

Imagine that consciousness is like a castle and unconsciousness is like chaos. We all live in a castle in our waking life that is beset on all sides by chaos. When we sleep (or die) we leave this castle and merge with the chaos. The trick is to build a castle in the chaos so that when we leave our waking castle we still have a lucid place to reside in.
Reply With Quote
  #3  
Old 17-06-2017, 02:58 AM
BlackHoleSun BlackHoleSun is offline
Pathfinder
Join Date: May 2016
Posts: 62
  BlackHoleSun's Avatar
Long-time lucid dreamer here. It varies for everyone, but here's a list (in no particular order) of what worked for me:

- Start a dream journal. Make it detailed. If you have problems with dream recall, give yourself about 10-20 minutes when you first wake up to sit there and repeat in your mind over and over and over what you do remember, solidifying it in crisp detail in longterm memory, and then write it down. Be very detailed and descriptive, and pay close attention to how you felt in the dream.

- Study how dreams work physically. Seriously. It helps things make more sense. For example, the emotional centers of your brain are heightened during sleep, while the parts of your brain that regulate behavior show minimal activity, meaning that in your dreams you are completely unfiltered, you don't register crazy stuff as being abnormal, and you are more prone to irrational/odd behavior or extreme emotional states.

- Learn your "dream vocabulary". Don't go looking for what someone else thinks different things mean in dreams. Start asking yourself what YOU associate with these things. For example, if you dream of a turtle, what do YOU think of turtles, what memories do YOU have about turtles -- that is your dream vocabulary, and it's built off your experience, memory, association, and emotional or value judgments you personally carry about your life. This will help you understand and communicate with your own individual subconscious better, which can in turn help you have total control over it.

- Remember that when you try to lucid dream, you basically need to get commands to stick with your subconscious enough to be recalled and acted upon when your conscious brain is dead to the world. This means you will need a lot of repetition and what is essentially self-hypnosis so that things get really lodged in the deeper waters of your mind enough to become basically instinctive responses.

- Don't expect immediate results or get disappointed if nothing happens for a while. You're having to train your own instincts, and that can take time. It took me a few months to start getting results.

- Some suggestions for what kind of training you can use include "reality checks" repetitively during waking life (again, the repetition makes it a habit), where you look around and question whether everything around you is in fact what it appears to be or not

- "Absurdity checks"...paying attention to anything totally out of the norm, seemingly absurd, such as a talking cuckoo bird. Train yourself to respond to absurdity with the understanding that "Toto, we ain't in Kansas anymore..."

- Specific commands/intents. I don't recommend this necessarily until later, but to be fair, it worked well for me, so I can't NOT recommend it either? lol. Basically as you're falling asleep every night you give a specific command. Mine was, "I will fly when I dream". It worked, btw. Flying then gave way to other things, and more and more it became a habit to become lucid and take charge.

- "I will Remember"...technically falls under "specific commands" but is important enough to stand on its own. Enhances dream recall and cognizance during dreams.

Best of luck on your journeys. It's been about 10 years for me doing it on purpose, and a lot of accidental times throughout my life before that, and it's a pretty wild ride. I ended up incorporating a lot of techniques into my energy work, and now have this whole entire paradigm built out of the idea that all of life (waking and sleeping, doesn't matter) is basically "Dreams". "Dreamwalking", "Dreamweaving" and "Dream augmenting" are now some of my best and most favorite tools for magick. <3
__________________
Modern Shaman. Sorceress. Energy worker. Astral, out-of-body, dream traveler. Truth-seeker. Reality augmenter. Spirit worker. Ethereal warrior. Shapeshifter. Middle Path walker. That crazy woman with all the wild stories. Proud flyer of the Freak banner.

See you on the flipside, baby.
Reply With Quote
  #4  
Old 17-06-2017, 06:43 AM
Seth1995 Seth1995 is offline
Newbie ;)
Join Date: Jun 2017
Posts: 6
 
Personally there's two ways I can lucid dream. One is by simply just creating the intention, were you tell ur subconscious to create the dream from start to finish. Another way is when im in the middle of a normal dream & sth tells me I'm dreaming, & then start to exert control over the rest of the dream.
Reply With Quote
  #5  
Old 26-06-2017, 10:37 AM
Antonio94 Antonio94 is offline
Seeker
Join Date: Jun 2017
Location: Vietnam
Posts: 38
  Antonio94's Avatar
Hmm, quite interesting. But there is another issue I've heard from other friend of my mine. She said that dreams are supposed to be natural and not controlled. Sometimes God and other great spirits (like Buddha or Jesus) may commune with us via dreams. And so will lucid dreaming prevent us from receiving those divine message?
In my case, i think it's not because if we're conscious during dreaming, we can understand and aware of what's happening when we dream, whether it's divine message, or just a trick of our mind.
Reply With Quote
  #6  
Old 02-07-2017, 02:21 PM
Aaron Lowe Aaron Lowe is offline
Deactivated Account
Join Date: May 2017
Location: For me, here, for you, there.
Posts: 4,260
  Aaron Lowe's Avatar
Quote:
Originally Posted by Antonio94
Hmm, quite interesting. But there is another issue I've heard from other friend of my mine. She said that dreams are supposed to be natural and not controlled. Sometimes God and other great spirits (like Buddha or Jesus) may commune with us via dreams. And so will lucid dreaming prevent us from receiving those divine message?
In my case, i think it's not because if we're conscious during dreaming, we can understand and aware of what's happening when we dream, whether it's divine message, or just a trick of our mind.

Dreams also have a biological purpose. They help our brain flush out and perhaps metabolise poisons caused by mental stress. They help unblock our focus on intractable problems and reset our perspective. They help balance the chemicals that keep the brain alive.

The brain is a chemical reaction, like all biological systems, and without an equilibrium the reaction stops and the organism dies. So, mental health isn't just pleasant, it's essential for survival.

Humans have a habit of messing with what they don't know and causing damage in the process. It's better to let nature do its job and find alternative ways to achieve what you wanted from the objective.

Lucid dreaming is a quick and cheap way to experience total liberation. If total liberation is what you want, there are other ways.

As Socrates said, "Seek within." Within what? He didn't say. But, actually he does say. And seek what? He didn't say, but actually he does say.

Jesus said the same thing. Luke 17:20-21 "the kingdom of God is within you".

There are other translations of this verse. Someone asked where heaven is and Jesus replied, "the Kingdom of heaven lies within your heart."

Sounds very similar to Socrates, doesn't it. Buddhism says exactly the same thing. Buddhism models the human as being like a wheel with spokes leading to the center which they call Oblivion. In Buddhism the highest state of being is to have relinquished all desire (the spokes) until you are left with what is at the center (i.e. seek within).

You'd think that with every great philosopher, prophet and religious founders and teacher in the world and in all time saying the same exact thing that people would get the hint.

There's an Indian saying: "The thief never looks under his own pillow."

What does it mean? We are all thieves. What have we stolen? This moment. Every time we reach for this moment with our minds and try to keep it we are like a thief in the night stealing what isn't ours. Yes the moment is ours to enjoy, but own, no. What is God's is God's and what is ours is ours. Jesus explained this also in reference to what is Caesar's.

So, what is the pillow? It is where we lay down to rest. Where do we lay? Only we know when we are asleep. Where to we rest? In our own hearts. So, the moment we are seeking to own (steal by holding in the mind), is hidden under (within) our own heart. That is why we never find it because we want to look everywhere else. That's why the thief never looks under his own pillow.

You want the absolute liberation lucid dreaming can provide (or maybe you're just curious), but you don't want to mess with your head and give yourself a mental illness. So, seek within your heart. Take time each day to spend with yourself and just be in the moment, then you will find the absolute liberation that you seek without risking your mental wellbeing.

That's my 2 cents. Ok, gotta go now cause my kitchen has flooded lol. Time to find a plunger
Reply With Quote
Reply


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 06:57 AM.


Powered by vBulletin
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
(c) Spiritual Forums