Growing Up As A Lucid Dreamer

Quest for Lucidity
1

I just wanted to know if there are others out there that have always, as far back as they can remember, had Lucid Dreams??

I have never had to try and have always, always just been able to control, remember and play with my dreams. I am able to make up what I want to happen and I also feel, taste, experience everything that goes on, everything I dream stays with me as much as anything would that happens in my waking life. Even when i don’t try to make stuff happen the dreams that I do have are as real as me sitting here typing (which doesn’t say much because what is real??? a different post all together)…

I started to realize as I got older and I would tell my friends all the great stuff that happened, or for that matter the terrifying stuff that happened in my dreams, they all responded (90%) of the time, “I never remember my dreams”…I soon discovered it was not very common to dream the way I did and then just recently in the past year I had decided to look into it, and of course thanks to the internet have stumbled across a ton of information that I am sifting, very slowly through. But what I have discovered is that most of the people who post, are trying to find out how to Lucid Dream, and have other experiences while in a dreamlike state. I have had more then just the lucid dreaming, i have had obe, sleep paralysis, shared dreaming, etc…none of which I ever tried to do.

Truth be told there are nights that I stay up and try to avoid sleep, because not a night goes by that i don’t wake up the next morning and have to work through everything that happened in my dream life…

Is anyone like me … where this has just been a part of their lives and they have not had to do anything to make it happen but have actually tried to think of ways to get some sleep without a whole other life going on???

Thanks
Willow_Mae

2

I have no idea why you would want to halt lucid dreaming and/or dreaming altogether…you sound like you have a wonderful innate ability.

You shouldn’t be alienated by this…just seperate your dream memories from your memories of reality and all should be fine. I think.

Well, I’m not exactly sure myself because I’ve only started - however, I hope my words help you in some way or other :slight_smile:

3

I suppose I am tired…I do not by any means want to shut down lucid dreaming, as I do enjoy most of what is going on, but whenever I am asleep I dream and I always know that I am dreaming (except for the few recent dreaming in a dream experiences), and so if things are going on in the dream I don’t like, I have to get and there and at least make it go the way I want or wake up and start over, however, I am tired when I wake up, I feel like I never sleep, like my mind never shuts down and my life never rests…(uh oh am I sounding a bit like a control freak??? :eh:

Sometimes I feel like it is so hard to explain…

4

Try falling asleep in your dream.

5

Try sleeping more? Sounds to me like the only reason you’re tried is because you’re not having enough sleep. LD’s are generally more relaxing then normal dreams (you don’t have to worry about the consquiences, don’t have to run away from bad things, you don’t have to work to get what you want etc) - so you actually feel more refreshed in the morning.

Anyways, natural LD’ers (like yourself) are pretty rare. No one is exactly sure what makes naturals different from everyone else in their ability to know their dreaming all the time.

Anyways, if you don’t like something in a dream, you don’t have to start the dream all over again (or even put any sort of effort into it). Just click your fingers and the bad thing will go away/change.

6

I have tried to fall asleep in my dream, but then I have had a dream while asleep in my initial dream.

When I said that I wake up and have to start all over, I didn’t mean the same dream started over, just the whole, falling asleep thing.

I think I get enough sleep, generally 7-8 hours, I think that is about average, should I be getting more???

Willow_Mae

7

I think Willow you should stay as you are; i envy natural LDers. I prefer don’t having much sleep but having LDs everytime that having sleep and trying hard to have one.

8

No, that’s usually acceptable, most people feel at least ‘sleep satisfied’ after that amount of time.

9

I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT. On one of my recent posts you wrote that you too are a natural LD-er, like me, never tried or anything, it’s just how we dream. I wonder how many of us there actually are in the world? I mean, I think I was 18 when I found out that the way I dream had an actual name (but I sure knew no one else could recall a dream like I could/can). I can even remember my favorite dreams from when I was a child, seriously like nine years old, and as I am 21 now, that’s a good couple decades of natural LDing. I’m pretty excited that we “met”, quite honestly, because NO ONE but us knows that sometimes, it’d be nice to actually get some rest for once. I can sleep for DAYS and LD the whole time, LD the most wonderful amazing thrilling dreams, and dreams within dreams, etc., but NEVER do I wake up feeling like my head hit the pillow. I slip into an LD right away. I KNOW EXACTLY WHAT YOU MEAN BY THE ANNOYING “PROCESS” that you encounter day after day you wake up–my whole day, and I really mean the ENTIRE DAY I am thinking and pondering my dreams–and with so many LD’s within a single night, it can get a bit distracting, TO SAY THE LEAST. Sometimes I am confused for HOURS (and can’t really do much in terms of productivity) after awakening because it does become hard to switch from dream to reality–and deciding which I am in at the present! For example, it’s 3:29 PM on a Saturday, and I am still currently thinking of my dreams in the back of my mind even though I got up hours ago, 11:30 to be exact. I call it “brain fog.”
It’s funny that you must think the same things I do when I read replies to your post–people saying you should be happy and satisfied that you actually can LD without even trying–usually I am laughing because, well, you don’t know until you know. From my experiences of LD-ing every night, ALL THE TIME, it just gets plain EXHAUSTING. Yeah yeah yea, the LD’s are a great way to pass the time of sleep, but unless you actually feel like you slept, it’s hard to “praise the LD gods” when all you want is to be able to go to the bank without feeling exhausted afterwards–I get tired from even sitting up (as I am now)!! And yes, no diabetes, depression, and my thyroid levels have been extremely stable since I was put on synthroid.
I mean, it’s excellent that I’ve never had a nightmare and my dreams play like a virtual reality video game (by the way, you must wake up time to time thinking what a great video game/movie your dream scene would be–if only we could get a plug into our brains while we dream and have it projected on a screen for the world to see…), but I am TIRED. Maybe the “naturals” have some sort of new sleeping disorder that hasn’t been classified yet. And if I could get paid to LD somehow for a career, I would care less that I am always tired. Unfortunately, there is no such job for us, so we are stuck–are the LD’s really worth it? For me, I’m not so sure. And that is coming from someone who spends hours telling her friends the wonder that is my dreams, and feeling lucky that I don’t have to try to LD, and who just plain LOVES her LDing ability. But, I think Willow_Mae, that just like everything else, too much of a good thing CAN be bad, even dreaming.

-Jennifer

PS-feel free to contact me anytime, as I find it interesting that there seem to be so few of us here:
jen_xoxo@hotmail.com
(I also have AIM and MSN messenger)

10

Raises hand Not that I like screaming that all over a forum, since people tend to get jealous. Stories of both of you (kashmirqueen and willow mea) sound very familiair though :smile:

I figured, that since my perception of reality is in fact reality (you can never know how others see ‘reality’, only your own), there is no difference anymore between dreaming and real life. Its all part of your mind, and therefore, who you are. And thats how I seperate the two states of mind, or rather, not seperate. Don’t have to :smile:

11

Hello kashmirQueen, I have a question, perhaps you or some other natural LD-er could answer this.

I dont really understand how this can be. As far as I have lucid dreams (im not a natural in your way though, “just” a few dozen a month), I always know that it is a dream, and I never confuse it with waking life once I am lucid. Also, when I wake up, I also know for sure that I’m not dreaming anymore, although on occasion I need a short while to adapt to waking life (for sure when I had a long vivid nice LD), but that never takes more then a couple of minutes.

So how come that someone who always dreams lucid has this problem? If all your dreams are LD’s I would tink that you would know exactly what the differences are between being self aware in a dream state and during waking life? Well, it would be nice if you could explain this so I can perhaps understand your problem a bit better. Thank you! :smile:

12

I have also had lucid dreams as long as I can remember. When I was a child, I used to dream about a “dream friend” putting a symbol on nightmares, so I could recognize it and become lucid. Later on, lucid dreaming has been a welcome “escape”, a happy break from whatever reality might be. I consider it a gift. They have never been more common than about once a week, though. I can still remember dreams from early childhood, even if I only lately have learned techniques to stay in the dream world longer. There has been times where I have been concerned about not getting enough rest too, but it is proven that we get deep sleep before we get REM sleep, and most of dreams go on in the REM. At least, most of lucid dreams do. :cool:

I see no difference between experiencing a different reality in dreams every night, and experiencing books, movies, TV series etc. every day. I don’t own a TV and have no wish for one, either. Of course, the impressions from a LD can be very strong! It leaves a “mark” on me for a whole day after a really good one, but there has never been any difficulties keeping dream from reality.

I wonder if any other of you naturals have other lucid dreamers in the family? Both my mother, and two of my brothers can LD. One of my brothers has been complaining about the same thing, he says he is sometimes conscious all night and can’t rest properly. It isn’t that strong in me. :cool:

13

First of all, I just wanted to say that I hope no one takes anything that I say the wrong way, and I hope everyone knows that when I talk about (and complain too) being able to naturally LD, I’m just being perfectly honest. I would like to hope that no one thinks that I may be bragging or anything silly like that, because after all, we all came here to learn, and I believe that this board is the best LD board out there in cyber space. :wiske:

Anyway, I guess I was a little confusing about how I am when switching from the dream world to reality, so hopefully I can explain it better. I know that right now I am not dreaming and am fully (well, haha, as fully as possible) awake. And usually, usually, I can decipher this difference. When I am asleep, and LDing, I am aware that it is only a dream in the back of my mind, and I think I have always been aware of this, but never really thought much about it until I was much older. However, sometimes my LD’s can get really confusing in terms of what is real, and what isn’t. I often have at least 2 different LD scenarios in a night, sometimes dreaming about one and then the other, other times switching back and forth between the two the whole night. It’s when I switch back and forth at will–that’s when it starts to get tricky. Say, for example, I am LDing 2 separate scenarios in a night, and am switching between them as well. I also sometimes “dream within a dream” in both of those 2 separate scenarios as well–so it gets even trickier. Often when I am dreaming within a dream, I think I wake up–into the “real world”, even though I am still asleep and just dreaming that I am dreaming that I woke up (but I’m not paralyzed or anything like that). When I “wake up” in a dream within a dream, it is MUCH different than the visuals from an LD–almost foggy, and like a hallucination. I swear that I am up, but of course it is just a dream. Usually, when I have these “hallucinations”, they are brief, because in my dream I am just waking up from a disturbance–say I think my father is in my room fixing my computer, and the clicking of the keys “wakes me up”–I really do believe that this happens (and when I REALLY wake up, I find out from him that no, my dad was not working on my computer while I was sleeping). After I “fall back asleep” in my dream, I remember it like I would remember any other dream scenario, although I still think it was real until I question the person in waking life. This is an example of a dream within a dream, where I confuse reality with dream life. I’ll give you another example–one time in waking life, I was looking for some stickers, and I swear I remembered putting them under my friends’ bed in some folder. Of course, she told me I was nuts, but I couldn’t believe her that it was just in my dream until she let me look under her bed, and then helped me actually find them in my room, where they always were. In this example, I didn’t even have a clue that I might’ve just been dreaming it until I found out the truth–I don’t know how or why I didn;t just immediately think “oh, it was a dream again”, because usually I do since it happens a lot (confusing things in dreams with reality). Does that makes sense? It’s so hard sometimes to explain these things sometimes!! :wink:

It takes me longer than some of you to adapt to waking life after awakening, and I’m not really sure why, but with me, when I really wake up, my brain is in this fog, much like it is when I have those dream within a dream “I thought I really woke up” hallucinations. But, although at times when I am dreaming I think I am awake, I have never been awake and thought I was dreaming–I think there is a huge difference between the two scenarios, at least with me.

I also should tell you that I am a really “active” sleeper, meaning I kick and punch and yell in my dreams, usually awakening myself briefly (I know that I screamed outloud in real life in correlation to my dream in “dream life”). When I awake, I remember my dreams of course, but I also remember yelling in my dream, and why, and that it briefly woke me up. I really don’t know if this has to do with anything other than a sleeping problem, that I think is unrelated to my LD’s.

Anyway, I hope I cleared away some confusion, although it’s quite a confusing thing to explain. :cool:

~Jennifer

14

KashmirQueen thank you for explaining your situation a bit more, I think I understand a bit better now what your experiences are like. It seems you have the gift to be lucid nearly every night indeed, but your average level of lucidity seems, from your stories (“aware that it is only a dream in the back of my mind”), quite low. I think this may also be part of the problem, because when you reach a high level of lucidity, stuff like you write about (mixing 2 LD scenario’s, falling asleep in a LD and waking up to think it is waking life, etc), won’t happen so much anymore, at least that is what I know from my experience and probably from a few others too. Compare a high level of lucidity with waking life awareness (as it comes very close), you never think you are dreaming in waking life, its the same in a LD with high lucidity, you always know very well that all is a dream (even if you have one within a dream).

So what you could practise is increasing lucidity once you realise you are in a dream, there’s several methods to do so. One is to just “want” your awareness to be as high as possible, trying to become as aware (or even more aware!) as you are in waking life. Others involve thinking about for example, who you are, what you did last day, what you are planning to do next day, all in all keep thinking about yourself and your real life situation so you don’t go with the flow of the dream so easily (which mostly means losing a high level of lucidity).

Well perhaps this was useful, perhaps not… :razz: Anyway good luck with your lucids, I wish you a lot of high level ones :smile:…

15

Oh, I don’t think thats part of the problem, I’m sure she knows how to get higher level lucids. The thing is, after one dream after the other, you get a little tired of it. (In more ways than one). Its more a “Snort, I’m dreaming again…” then “Yay! I’m dreaming!” Going with the flow is the easiest thing to do, it gets the dream going untill you finally fade into a real sleep. :smile:

16

Hahaha this made me laugh, but you’re absolutely right. I think that my level of lucidity is pretty high, as I do think about what I’m going to do the next day, or how I can’t wait to wake up an tell my friend about how cool my dream is (was?). I think it just depends on, like Kawaii said, how much I’m willing to participate in them. Sometimes, I let the dream take me for a ride, instead of the other way around. I just don’t choose to participate as much sometimes. Other times, esp. when a majorly attractive guy is in play, I am a little more “focused”, heh heh.

17

I’ve had many natural LD’s and vivid, memorable dreams as a child, an ability that seemed to diminish with the stresses of being an adult. When I began to conciously try to LD, it was very easy for me and I think that was because I had reawoken a natural ability that had been surpressed. I am familiar with that feeling of being mentally and sometimes physically exhausted from your dream life.
It seems to me that Willow Mae and Kashmir Queen may not always be totally lucid in these tiring dreams, although they have excellent control. If you’re fully aware that you’re dreaming and in total control, why do you do things that you know will make you tired the next day? I’ve had many dreams where I was very concious and making decisions in the dream but I really didn’t know I was dreaming. These dreams have often left me very tired. If I had known I was dreaming, I would have chosen to have a more relaxing serene dream experience instead something active and taxing, which is what real life is for :eek:
I know that feeling where you just want to lose conciousness already. If that happens and you are fully lucid, I suggest changing the dream to remove all people and anything else that is very active and stimulating. Go somewhere outside; beautiful, natural, and serene. Try meditating or sleeping in the dream. Even if you can’t lose conciousness you can still relax more that you will flying around and talking to DCs. “Going with the flow” helps to. You could also try sleeping aids ( I’d try something natural like melatonin before anything over the counter ) on nights when you just need to zonk out. Drinking chamomile tea or smelling lavendar before bed can help you relax. Also, I’ve found that marijuana helps me sleep and sometimes makes it difficult to LD. This doesn’t work if I actually fall asleep while high, only after I’ve come down when I have that foggy feeling. This is different for everyone, some find that it helps them LD. I’m not suggesting that you turn to substance use/abuse to solve all your dream problems; you many wind up with even more problems. But on nights when you really need some rest these things may help you .

18

When I am dreaming, I don’t ever think about how a dream will affect me in the morning–does anyone else, I’m very curious? I think about what I’m going to do the next day, or blah blah blah, but I guess with me, it’s pretty inevitable that I will wake up tired. And this goes for those occasions when I don’t LD (I figure this happens if I wake up and don’t remember my dreams). I can’t say whether I am more tired after an LD or just a normal dream, because I rarely do “normally” dream, I’d say max. once a month, but at the moment I can’t even remember the last time.
As for trying to clear away all the action in my dreams–I’ve actually never thought about it or tried it, but I sure will give it a try tonight! My dreams are pretty action-packed–there have been times when I have been a little “overwhelmed” and tried to shush some of the action away–it works too at times, but sometimes someone will come back and keep annoying me, no matter how hard I tell myself that I already got rid of them (my little sister is a frequent pain in my dreams, and although we get along great in waking life, in dream life, she is evil, and no matter how hard I try to kill her–yea it sounds weird but dreams are, eh?–she always comes back alive to annoy me!!!). I have a feeling part of the reason why I wake up so tired is because of the action in my dreams–so it really would make sense to try to clear it all away, you’re absolutely right SoaringSpirit.
Oh, and sleeping aids–I’ve tried 'em all, from melatonin to prescript., and none of them do a thing–I always feel awful in the morning, even if some do put me to sleep quicker. And I have tried at least 6-7 diff. over the counter meds (I really do have awful luck with sleeping, or at least feeling like I did). I also very frequently “toke up” in the evenings, and have found that I can LD just the same as when I do not smoke pot–but I have been “participating” for quite some time. I also have found no difference from falling asleep high, “foggy”, or au natural. My LD’s and my ability have no difference. It def. does help me relax and wind down from my day, however, which is why I imbibe.
My sleeping problems have been going on for quite some time, and I have tried a lot of different methods in search for peace, but as of yet I have found nothing! However, I still have hope since I have an appointment coming up at a sleep disorder center–so until then, unfortunately, I think I will have to keep trucking as usual :wink:

19

Looks to me like mostly women are natural lders, though i met few males too.
Just noticing cuz apart from saying that id love to have this ability ,i have not much to add.
In generall dreams are kind of automaticall thingo to work our problems for us while we are asleep- in your cases this is somehow happening conciously and i understand that it may be causing you to not fully rest.
If i were you id write emails to Stanford University in States or any known clinic dealing with sleep disorders.They could have some explanations or advices for you.
take care.