This is a question for experienced lucid dreamers. Have you ever intentionally behaved badly in a dream, just to see what it would be like? I mean the hard stuff, not simple naughtiness. Things like as cat-kicking, nun-punching, gunning down a schoolyard full of children, etc. I don’t imagine that many folks will have a felt desire to do such things, but I also know that lucid dreamers will try strange things just for novelty’s sake. Since it’s not real life, and no one’s getting hurt, is it just like, say, watching someone get whacked in The Godfather, with no moral ramifications? Or would you worry that lucid violence would habituate (or at least desensitize) you to the real-life thing?
Yeah once in a prelucid dream I tortured some guy with a crossbow. First he was attacking me, but then I realized it couldn’t be true (I didn’t get lucid, because I didn’t understand the true meaning of all this, that it’s a dream). So I took his crossbow and started to work out my aggression on him. I actually felt great doing this.
Too bad I didn’t gain lucidity, because then I would have faced him and chatted with the guy. That would have helped me much more instead of just torturing him to death.
What i have experienced is that your Ego is change when you are in the dreamworld.
Because of this you act differently tho you are the same I.
Thats why you can behave really really strange and bizarre while nonlucid.
You can be a bankrobber and be really good at it, thinking that you have children and a wife but when you wakeup you know you are single and have no children.
You can sculpture your dreamego they way you want it…if you choose to.
If i where to put my entire Physical Ego inside the dreamenvironment i would not want todo the things i do in them
I have created girls from a pile of flesh and sculptured the way i wanted too and then have had sex with her just for the fun of it.
If i would have had the ego i have in waking life i would have gotten scared just by the morhping effect.
I dont think the moral thing that we have in this waking reality is the same at all in dreams.
In the dreams you dont feel bad for things you do because that environment is not poisoned by the social beliefs about how things are supposed to act and behave.
The dream is your own world, and just because you act like a serialmurder doesnt mean you are one. You just act like one.
Its like beeing a movecharacter, tho you create your own script.
Just because a famous actor can act really professional as a serialmurder doesnt mean he is one when he get home from “work”.
the great thing about lucid dreaming is you can be yourself (even though you should in waking life too), but what i mean is if you like cheating in a game of poker against an old lady, if you really are that twisted, you can and should do it in a lucid dream to be who you really are
I really like the points you are making. I read that the reason we can behave so freely in dreams is that the part of the brain responsible for self-control has very low metabolic rates during REM. (the part that controls not being violent when you get angry, repressing emotions, being polite etc)
But no one knows why there is so little activity in that part of the brain while sleeping…
I gotta try that! There was some annoying HS freshman and beat him down like a rag doll. he turned out to be a robot but I did beat him down to his bare circuits
Although it is possible to be a monster in lucid dreams I am surprised by the extent to which I consciously restrain myself. For example, if I create a date, she must be willing, I have never forced anyone. This is quite interesting as I know many people enjoy dream violence.
My guess is that at some point after becoming lucid and the scene is set I lose lucidity, but continue in mental charge, hence the moral dilemma. I have once dream-killed a friend by accident and it bothered me deeply for a long time (although I had no lucidity).
Another interesting restriction I have is the fact that I cannot make myself jump out of a window in a dream. As a child I used this method as a way to switch from a nightmare. However, once when I jumped, window bursting, and crashing into the ground, I felt how something suddenly fell through me, and suddenly I had the sensation that my physical body was freezing. Never have I experienced anything worse, and for a few seconds I was sure I had sleep-walked and really done it! As I write here now I know it was all in the dream, but not then. Consequently this escape way is now effectively not in use, however, I must say it is all good. Ny being forced to meet your nightmares they also become less frightening in the future.
Best Wishes
joccis
Sounds like we all agree that there’s nothing morally terrible about dream misbehavior, but I think that some of my impure motives, especially the sex oriented stuff, are actually holding me back from LD’ing. Being too excited, or unconscious guilt might be a problem…
I’m working on trying to be more motivated by wholesome stuff…
Any thoughts?
Peace,
Sruthan