Now that I had several dreams which could be called lucid I have an idea, which probably has already fallen onto somebody’s head, but I have never read something about this. Is being conscious of being dreaming enough to call the dream really lucid?
When I studied at the university and had no access to the Internet yet, I often had dreams about getting connected. I would suddenly understand my computer was online, I would even begin to do something I had been going to do first when I were in an internet club, for example, to surf to Internet Movie Database, but I never get any information from there, because I was not online really.
But isn’t it possible that a thought like “Wow, I’ve got an LD!” can mean no more than a thought “Wow, I’ve got a modem!” and the dream can still be a usual dream about LD’s? I suddenly understand I am dreaming, I can even began to do something I am going to do first when I have a lucid dream, for example, to look at my hands or to go to my room, but I never finish it and soon forget about it, continuing it as a usual non-lucid dream, because it is a usual dream, because it is not lucid really.
I know the lucidity can be lost in the middle of the dream but why it happens so often and why is getting conscious of being dreaming so reasonless, like any action in a usual dream?
It is not what you call ULD, because you do realize that you are dreaming, but this realization is not full. It is not what is called low lucidity, because you have no doubt about you dreaming state. Such dreams are sometimes called semi-lucid, but I think there must be a special term for such think, because many people can think, as I did, that they have had several lucid dreams, and get disappointed, because it doesn’t seem to be interesting. Naturally, you can dream that you are a great scientist, or a Roman soldier, or a mutant ninja turtle, or a lucid dreamer staring at his own hands – the last dream obviously isn’t extremely interesting, but it has nothing to do with LD’s themselves!
There are many different levels of lucidity. Yes you can dream that you are lucid and carry out everything you would want to do while lucid, but you aren’t truely lucid. One method of increasing your level of lucidity is to rub your hands and yell “Increase lucidity” at the top of your lungs.
As long as you KNOW that your dreaming, then it’s a LD.
If you just say, ‘wow, i’m having an LD’ and don’t actually realise that your dreaming (I’ve done it, as strange as it seems) then it’s a FLD.
If the realisation isn’t full, then your still lucid, it’s just low level. I’ve had LD’s where i’ve believed that the DC’s are real, and treated them as such.
I still knew I was in bed and asleep and that this wasn’t real, and the chances were my brothers would wake me up in a minute (I even told one of the DC’s that, and he replied, ‘yeah, probally.’).
My definition of a lucid dream is:
=> You realize that you are dreaming (and)
=> Realize that you can control the dream.
You can have a dream where you do amazing things like flying, turn invisible or breath underwater but, do not realize that you can do these things because you are dreaming. So by my definition that would not be a lucid dream.
You can also have dreams where you may think, or even know you are dreaming yet you still to not fully understand what that means. Mainly that you can choose to alter the direction of or control the dream if you want. This also would not be a lucid dream by my definition.
If I understand you corectly I would consider this to be a LD. 1) you know youre dreaming and 2) you can control the dream.
I had a dream last night that fits perfectly with this discussion. I won’t go into detail, but basically I was driving along a road somewhere, and my car was unresponsive and hard to control. I noticed that I was suddenly on the left side of the car (wrong side in this part of the world), and I kept saying “I must be dreaming, this isn’t right”. However, I wouldn’t call it a lucid dream, because I wasn’t fully able to comprehend the situation. I may have been temporarily aware that I was dreaming, but I had no control, and no ability to consciously rationalize my condition.
It’s difficult for someone to tell you what qualifies as an LD, because it’s always possible that you simply dreamt of having lucidity and never actually became conscious. In my experience, though, you can usually be sure for yourself whether it was authentic or not, because you’re able to make the decision before actually waking up.
I still don’t understand why a dream cannot include awareness and control and be non-lucid at the same time. A dream isn’t a movie which we watch and make opinions about. It is sometimes more like a movie where we are main heroes, while the screenplay is been thought out by another part of our mind. What we see, hear, feel, smell is a part of the story. But all our actions can be a part of the story too, and so can be our thoughts, emotions, and all sorts of awareness. You cannot define anything, because any condition can be just a part of the story. It is impossible to count points to define if the dream was lucid. The only thing a beginner must know is that lucid dreams exist. “When the water boils, you’ll understand it”.
Maybe the problem is that I just don’t know English well enough. There can be a difference between “knowledge” and “awareness”, which I don’t see. The idea of awareness can include more information than just a bare thought: “I am dreaming”, in can also imply some logic, some clearness, some self-awareness… I don’t know what “self-awareness” means, I just met this word in T2, but the fact I cannot find it in any English-Russian dictionary led me to think that “awareness”, too, can be untranslatable sometimes…
You can have a non-lucid dream where you are aware that you are dreaming. You can even use dream control in non-lucid dreams; I do it all the time.
Lucidity is when your brain becomes fully awake, and you become “conscious.” When you’re conscious in a dream, you’ll always realize it’s a dream, but that’s the effect of lucidity, not lucidity itself.