Lucid Dreaming

[Andro]

In Lucid Dreaming, the experience can be so convincingly real to the point of becoming so immersed in it that we lose lucidity.

In Waking Life, this very same immersion causes us to forget we're actually dreaming.

When I was 23 or 24, I wrote: "There's an infinity of realities and nothing is real."

After years of exploring OOB and Lucid Dreamscapes, the quality of my experiences has somewhat "mutated". The "dividing lines" have become very blurred.

An example: I can at some point wake up from sleep during the night, then consciously go OOB, then enter a Lucid Dreamscape, and then physically wake up (and go to the kitchen/bathroom/etc.), all while the Lucid Dream narratives and interactions continue as if nothing changed, except I am now awake and aware in more than one reality at the same time.

It sounds quite weird, but one gets used to it. It also doesn't happen very often. Maybe once or twice a month. And it's not "lucid sleepwalking"... or maybe that's exactly what it is

Anyway, I don't really have defined standards/criteria for "what is what" anymore... OOB, Lucid Dreams, Waking Life... It's all ONE infinite ocean of intersecting waves of multidimensional mind-fuck... Until you finally get access beyond the dream

[Illen A. Cluf]

In Lucid Dreaming, the experience can be so convincingly real to the point of becoming so immersed in it that we lose lucidity.

In Waking Life, this very same immersion causes us to forget we're actually dreaming.

When I was 23 or 24, I wrote: "There's an infinity of realities and nothing is real."

After years of exploring OOB and Lucid Dreamscapes, the quality of my experiences has somewhat "mutated". The "dividing lines" have become very blurred.

An example: I can at some point wake up from sleep during the night, then consciously go OOB, then enter a Lucid Dreamscape, and then physically wake up (and go to the kitchen/bathroom/etc.), all while the Lucid Dream narratives and interactions continue as if nothing changed, except I am now awake and aware in more than one reality at the same time.

It sounds quite weird, but one gets used to it. It also doesn't happen very often. Maybe once or twice a month. And it's not "lucid sleepwalking"... or maybe that's exactly what it is

Anyway, I don't really have defined standards/criteria for "what is what" anymore... OOB, Lucid Dreams, Waking Life... It's all ONE infinite ocean of intersecting waves of multidimensional mind-fuck... Until you finally get access beyond the dream

Thanks, Andro. The lucid dream does seem like it has a lot of commonalities with the OBE experience, except that in the OBE experience, I didn't seem to be in control of the environment. However, it was of such a short duration that perhaps I may have had control of the environment if it had lasted longer. As for certain types of "vivid" dreams, they do seem a lot like the lucid dreams. In some of these "vivid" dreams, I seemed to be fully awake and actually experiencing the dreams. I also obtained information from one of the dreams that is not available through other sources.

There's also another experience which doesn't involve dreaming. I'm not sure what to call it, but seems similar to the religious experiences that some ascetics had in the past. It happened once when I was focusing on a painting that had an unusual chess setup painted on a court with knights, bishops, a queen, a king, horses, etc. I was meditating on what it might mean. As I did so, my body started tingling, almost like goosebumps, it started feeling very warm and 'glowing', and I suddenly felt euphoric, intensely happy and intensely aware. I had a shelf of about a dozen books about chess setups. I 'randomly' picked one up one of the books, randomly opened the book to a certain page, and there it was!!! The EXACT setup setup that was shown in the picture. It involved a very old and rare setup when a Grandmaster lost the match due to a most obvious error. It was an example of "Chess Blindness". It was the ONLY discussion of that particular set-up in any of the dozen books I had. The chances of finding this randomly like that are astronomical, as you can imagine. This helped increase the state of meditation even more, and I went soaring into the secrets of the Universe. Everything was opened up to me, and I understood everything. The glowing and heat of the body increased immensely. This state lasted for a few hours, but the very peak, when I understood all of the secrets of the Universe, only lasted for moments. By the next day, everything about the secrets I had discovered about the Universe had been forgotten ( I assume purposefully).

I've had several other such 'experiences', but each was completely unique. Most involved precognition (twice saving someone's life), and one involved setting mineral crushing machinery on fire with the intensity of my thoughts (a long story).

[Awani]

My problem when trying to make the body fall asleep, yet keep the mind awake is this:

When I am tired I fall asleep. When I am not tired I cannot make any part of me fall asleep. Does this mean I need to practice meditation, or is there a hack?

[Andro]

My problem when trying to make the body fall asleep, yet keep the mind awake is this:

When I am tired I fall asleep. When I am not tired I cannot make any part of me fall asleep. Does this mean I need to practice meditation, or is there a hack?

One hack is to do it when you briefly wake up during the night between sleep cycles. It's usually a time when your body is still in "sleep mode", but mentally, you are briefly awake. The body is very relaxed and you are aware enough to consciously focus on keeping the mind awake while the body naturally falls asleep again.

Another hack is to do mental (but not physical) tasks before bedtime. Ideally, tasks that do not involve a phone or any kind of screen. Reading a book (before bed, but not IN bed) can be very good for this.

Another hack is to get yourself sexually aroused while falling asleep. Just concentrate on the sexual area and keep your mind focused on that while the body falls asleep. I can't really explain the mechanism, but it can have a good success rate.

Another hack is to do it in the afternoon. Even if you're not really tired, lie down in bed and let some sun on your face through the window. It's a state in which your body may naturally want to nap but mentally you are not tired enough to do so. It's all about mind awake/body asleep.

None of those will work well for beginners if a lot of artificial EMF is present (such as computer and phone screens, even artificial light). All those need to be removed if you want any chance to succeed in the first stages.

Some people have a natural gift of phasing in and out of body. I had it for a few months at a relatively young age, and then lost it, mainly because the sleep paralysis scared me shitless. When this happened I had no Internet, I had never heard of Robert Monroe and I had zero information about this phenomenon. I even went to doctors and to a psychiatrist about it.

Then I "lost the gift", but a few years later I found someone in a new age bookstore who gave me some books that touched on this topic. Not a lot, but enough to know that something special had been happening and that the doctors were clueless about it. So I started to practice obsessively, for many months, until I managed to make my first fully conscious "round trip" - maintaining full awareness from exit to re-entry. I used binaural beats (Deep Theta) , and those seemed to help at the time. I didn't even have headphones, just a some cassette tapes played through speakers at low level... The fear barrier also took a great deal of sheer willpower to overcome. But it only got easier from then on.

[Kiorionis]

Another hack is to do it in the afternoon. Even if you're not really tired, lie down in bed and let some sun on your face through the window.

I’ve tried this method before, at the recommendation of some internet site. I usually ended up falling asleep, and the dreams were so bright, my dreams were flushed with light.

However there was only one time I was able to get a lucid dream, and it was very ‘Sun’ related with lion-headed dream figures.

After awhile I switched methods.

[Anterior Taproot]

Has anyone had here been able to consistently lucid dream for an extended period of time? Or has it always been once and a while, here and there? I ask because I have not. Every time I look around in my dreams or start to try to imagine something or create my dreamscape, the act of focusing seems to wake me up.

Also does anyone have any dietary or habit tips that have been very helpful?

The asking yourself throughout the day if your dreaming tip seems interesting, I will start doing that today ,but anything else would be greatly appreciate. I am skeptical with all these videos, books and programs pushing lucid dreaming due to the profit motive. You never know if some shyster is trying to fleece you with the emperors new clothes trip ie. everyone else can do it, why can't you.

[John Two]

I had my first experience of lucidity (that I can remember at least) a month or two ago, but when I became lucid I decided to sneak up on an entity, and woke up. Very immature, and very dumb. I've had some horrifying experiences with sleep paralysis. I have a long way to go spiritually according to my dreams.

I've had great success with dream recall in the past and started to keep a dream diary again when I started working with spagyrics.

[tAlc]

One hack is to do it when you briefly wake up during the night between sleep cycles. It's usually a time when your body is still in "sleep mode", but mentally, you are briefly awake. The body is very relaxed and you are aware enough to consciously focus on keeping the mind awake while the body naturally falls asleep again.

Seems you've had your experiences in the past Andro. This resonates with me. When this scenario occurs, I more often than not, find myself levitating up and out of my body on its own, and I'm holding onto invisible handle bars (willfully resisting the take off).

Do you think Lucid Dream and Astral Projection is the same thing, or at least, in the same realm or ''sphere''?

[Andro]

Seems you've had your experiences in the past Andro.

Why "in the past"? I'm still exploring on a regular basis, just not in the same "realms" I used to go to years ago.

I'm holding onto invisible handle bars (willfully resisting the take off).

Why are you resisting?

Do you think Lucid Dream and Astral Projection is the same thing, or at least, in the same realm or ''sphere''?

Sometimes they can coincide, sometimes they don't. I don't have a clear-cut reply for this. The "boundaries of the territory" are generally set by how much of your sense of self/identity you carry with you, because it acts as ballast.

[Uambra]

I have lots of experience in lucid dreaming but never had an OBE except very few times in dreams. In my opinion OBE has nothing to do with lucid dreaming, you don't need it for the lucid dream. Actually you don't need it to visit other realms while being awake either.

I've never understood why someone would like to leave the body and why he thinks it to be helpfull for anything.

@Andro, maybe you have an answer to this? And why do you think a sense of identity acts as ballast? Ballast for which activity? Leaving the body or lucid dreaming?