Non-New Age Dreamers (spreading LD's to the world)

Quest for Lucidity General Lucidness
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Have you ever tried to tell a friend, family member or even that one guy you met on the bus last week about lucid dreams? How often have you been given a very weird look as if you are crazy, or that you’re dabling with something strange?

I’ve realized as I’ve gotten more active in the LD community that most materials relating to LD’s inevitable relate back to New Age philosophy or other spiritual matters (Astral Projection, spiritual OBE’s etc.). Why, even if you look around LD4all you’ll se advertisements abound on Quantum Jumping and all other… interesting items. Of course there is nothing wrong with these beliefs. I myself apply my own spiritual beliefs to lucid dreaming, but regrdless it seems near impossible to explain that I personally don’t take stock in the New Age beliefs that often suround LD’s.

That’s why I am trying to put together a group dedicated to explaining LD’s to the rest of the world. Regardless of whether you are spiritual or secular, you must agree that it would be great for more people to know about this gift. I would like to be able to show people that LD’s do not inherently clash with other beliefs or lack thereof.

Before I continue, I want to add a disclaimer: this topic is in no way designed to debunk or discredit New Age philosophy. On the contrary, it is meant to open LD’s to people of all spiritual walks. If that is not your pupose, please look elsewhere.

Just for starters, here are some things Non-New Agers can agree on, and some basic principles of this group:

*Dreams are a natural occurance.
*Lucid dreams are merely the act of becoming aware of the dream state.
*Interactions within dreams are only interactions within one’s own self.
*OBE’s, AP and other such things are examples of extremely vivid lucid dreams.

Of course, any of these can be tailored to one’s own spiritual beliefs. For example, I believe in God. I believe He gave us the ability to dream, and the ability to LD. If there is any spirituality to it, I believe it is between myself and Him, just like my prayer life. Again, that’s just one example, but the core remains the same. I can havea lucid dream and explore the various possibilities without having any inner conflict over my spiritual beliefs.

Anywho, I’d love to hear your thoughts/contributions. One last note, I gave my beliefs as an example, but I do not want this topic to become an agrument over whose beliefs are correct. Keep in mind, however, that this topic is dedicated to explaining LD’s to the world, not comparing religious notes. Finally, when it comes to spirituality, feel free to share but not to critique.

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"*Interactions within dreams are only interactions within one’s own self. "
do you really think this one is true ? it jumps out , the only thing i see as disagreeing with ,

you can learn so much about others by what you dream about them, whether it is subjective or objective, it still is objective, as it shows your relationship on a deep-meaning level ,

i’ve had many precognitive events show me what my family think, later confirmed in reality ,

i don’t think we present lds to people except to say "did you know you can be aware in your dreams and do what you want? "

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Personally I think there is the possibiliy of there being something more to it, however I have nothing to prove it with but with other’s claims. To someone who is secular, the concept of shared dreaming can be equated to believing in fairies. I actually have several friends who think this way.

While that is true, it is the concept of pursuing LD’s that so many I have talked about it with have issues. It takes effort, almost a lifestyle change, and to so many people it gives the appearance of being mostly based in New Age. I know I thought that way at first.

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I’m definitely in on this cause.
Every time I’ve tried to explain LD’ing to my family they think i’m messing with something I shouldnt be… haha. So now I never mention it, and I don’t think it should be that way.
My whole family is christian so i guess they have a super conservative view about it.
I too believe in god, and my reason for LD’ing is to see if i can get some answers.
I know that that may sound stupid but I think its possible.

Even though I have only read reports of shared dreams, I would never write it off, seeing as I don’t see reports of fairies being spotted all over the internet.
I would like to prove it to myself though. That would be awesome.
That would prove that there is some unexplainable force at work, if nothing else.

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Great post - I can’t tell you how many times I hear dreaming come up in normal conversation, and how much I want to tell people about lucid dreaming (Not to mention mentally picking through my last few dozen dreams to try and find the most interesting one, but by then they’ve moved on to something else :tongue:)

In my experience it’s actually been pretty easy to spread the word in small ways. I don’t initially mention control, goals, or the word lucid. I usually say something like “You ever have one of those dreams where you realize it’s a dream?” and that they’ve likely had at least one, and they usually say they have. They’re fun to listen to.

I also believe in God, but I tend to veer away from a spiritual view of dreams. I’m sure some dreams have important meanings or interpretations, but I just don’t know how to discern those. For the most part I tend to view them as raw material, something to use, control, and have fun with, especially since I learned about LD.

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Good topic. I often find myself avoiding the topic because unfortunately lucid dreaming, and even dreaming in general, is so attached to New Age and spiritualism that it’s almost taboo to talk about. That’s the way I feel about it, anyway. I feel uncomfortable bringing it up, and I’ve never told really anyone I know personally about my LD trek. Though, really, what makes lucid dreaming a different task than any kind of artistic creating, like writing or composing a song? Lucid dreaming is just that: creation. An exercise. Do I think I can get in contact with my subconscious and all that good stuff? Possibly. What easier way than coming to it in its own “realm”, so to speak. I do acknowledge, to a degree, precognition and symbolism in dreams.

As for my own beliefs, I’m a Christian. Albeit moderate, but still fairly orthodox. My whole family is as well. My sister I know for sure has lucid dreams. How often I’m not sure. She talks about it sometimes as if she’s a natural. “I can never control my dreams” I told her once. “All you have to do is take control and that’s it” she replied. This took me aback. I’m going to be insanely jealous if LDing is that easy for her … lol.

But I digress. Good topic Rhewin.

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I think I can be called a natural because I heard about LDs a couple of months ago and before that I used to have many LDs. Then it had stopped.

When I heard about LDs and becoming lucid for a purpose (enjoy, find answers etc…), this time I tried becoming lucid consciously and using a technique RC. After trying for couple of nights, the first dream I was able to become lucid was actually my long time nightmares (that is how I had started to be lucid naturally), I was in an elevator and the elevator did not have a bottom and not to fall down I was hanging on the walls of the elevator. Anyway I became lucid and there were two groups of men on either side of me. One group was with me but the other group was as if they did not approve what I was trying to do. And the men who were with me told me something like ‘they don’t want you to do this’. And I said why? The men said ‘they just don’t want you to do this’.

When I woke up I was scared a bit. I was scared that I am forcing my limits and I am going into the areas maybe I shouldn’t be going. But then I quickly got over this feeling. Dreams are the images from our subconscious and I agree that interactions with dreams are only interactions within one’s self.

As for spreading the concept, I am talking with my friends just to share my experience. Just like any new idea (new for them) some of them love the idea and some of them hate it and disagree so on…

I don’t feel like making this as a mission to spread or to hide. It is a good experience (at least so far for me. And only if I can pass through this dry period and be able to become lucid again…) and it is good to share when the audience and the time is suitable.

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Great idea Rhewin, I was in even before you posted this ^^

In order to people to get interested into LD’ing, you have to make it look like a normal thing to them, and to do so, you base your discussion on both yours and theirs experiences of lucidity, and most importantly, you tailor your discussion around his/her beliefs. The first thing you want is get him/her started, the fact that LD’s themselves can be used for spiritual search assures that they’ll find the true answers as soon as they start looking for them :content: so no real need for you to mention anything regarding that. That would only bring the discussion on a belief-clash level, and that’s the last thing we want.
And since most believe in science, of course the most natural thing is approaching the subject the LaBerge way, referring to dreams as simple happenings in the mind, and a LD as just a slight modify in the dreaming process.
If the interlocutor is particularly religious, of course you can approach the subject following those lines, to better get him/her interested.

I’ve already roughly written down my approach when talking about LD’s for the first time, and until now, I’ve got 4 college mates regularly interested in writing down their dreams and getting lucid.
Not to mention that casual conversation on the train I had. :content: You had to be there to look at his face. LD’s have such potential, and people who had them know that, deep down. It’s only a matter of sparking their interest again, and free them from their fears all of his could be a simple illusion (even if it still is, in a way :tongue:).
I’ve had another occasion of teaching a 8-year-old how to dream, and I missed that, and now I regret it. Lucid Dreaming is one of the most amazing and accessible experiences in the world, and now I feel guilty for not sharing that when I get a serious chance. So, I’m totally into this. ^^ Good luck to everyone else who will try opening people’s eyes during their own lives.

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I have created a thread on gtplanet.net forums linking too the ld4all homepage. I hope somepeople may come over from there and learn about the wonders of lucidity :smile:

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Wow, that picked up a lot of early support. I’m glad to see so many of you see the worth in this. I was worried the whole time I was writing that people might not see the necessity in a subject like this. Thanks for sharing so many of your personal beliefs on the subject. It’s my hope that we might eventually be able to use this to help each other out and give each other advice.

My big concern is for our younger LD’ers who have mentioned now and in the past that their family thinks they are getting themselves into trouble (mine did at first). I want them to be able to reassure the ones they love that there is nothing dangerous in this. Whether it is right or not, many families, especially around the Bible belt, associate LD’s with philosophies that they feel could be harmful to their childrens’ spiritual walk.

@Patches: I see you know firsthand what I’m talking about. The big thing with your family will be to remind them that dreams are natural. If God made everything, that also means he created dreams as well. Also, let’s not forget that He has appeared in numerous dreams throughout the Bible. If anything, it could help you find answers. The biggest thing you could do to help, IMO, is to avoid seeming obsessed with it. That seemed to help my parents a lot.

@Hex: There you go :content:. It’s all about presentation. If you care them with words like lucid, mantra and meditation (though there is nothing inherently New Age about them), people begin to feel weird. It’s all about taking it nice and easy. What’s ironic is I’ve actually said “hey, last night I had this dream and I suddenly knew I was dreaming,” and the person said they did too. They told me they were afraid the whole time and never wanted it to happen again :tongue:. I wonder why people have such an aversion to LD’s…

@littlenemo: Creativity, what a wonderful word to use for LD’s. Scribbles on note pad. You used another word, taboo, that also describes our problem. It frustrates me so much when I tell a friend about even just an ND and they act like I’m crazy. Since when was dreaming an unusual thing???

@immagini: It’s that fear you described that I think holds people back the most. I guess they end up frightened at the fact that they might not be at peace with all parts of themselves :tongue:. And your right, this isn’t necessarily a mission to spread to everyone, but in the event that you do have someone you want to tell, it’s good to find a way around these fears.

@tosxy: Is there anything you haven’t thought of :lol: ? That’s exactly the kind of approach we need, but there’s a surprising number of people who just jump out saying “hey! be a lucid dreamer and you can talk to your subconscious and…” It’s all about those words and the way we present it, especially after you have your first lucid dream. It’s really easy to get excited and come across as a raving lunatic.

@lbsf1: Cool, just make sure they’re the right kind of crowd for it :content: .

So many of us have found issues with words that turn people off. I guess the next thing we have to wonder about is that if all these terms are taboo what do we say instead? Note: there’s nothing wrong with these words, but they have an air of mysteriousness with non-LD’ers.

Lucid dream= dream where you know that you’re dreaming. This way of saying it is very simple and doesn’t use words like conscious or SC. Strangely enough my father-in-law had issues with the concept of being conscious whilst asleep. He didn’t think it was possible, and that little word, “conscious,” shut him down.

Subconscious= unconscious mind. SC has a lot of base in New Age. Heck, just look it up on Wikipedia, it’s not even accepted by the scientific community. The actual psychoanalytic terms are unconscious and preconscious.

AP or OBE= … probably best to avoid those terms at first, especially when dealing with a super-conservative.

What else, or any other contributions to the group?

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I have spoken to a couple of my friends about it a tiny bit. What I did first Is say “I had an awsome dream last night, I knew I was in a dream and could do whatever I wanted” (yes it is a lie, i havent had an ld like that yet) If they show intrest then continue an say you looked it up and found ld4all and try to draw them in, however don’t push it if they don’t seem intrested and
This way then you won’t seem wierd if they don’t care about it.

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i know people that can see fairies, they hang out in nature, they are not physical , hence, only people that are energy sensitive can see them, similar to how native americans could sense spirits and the westerners that came here disrespected them with superstition and fear and thought they were crazy , even though many westerns left their colonies to join the natives ,

it seems that living in a money oriented, business oriented, action oriented, desire oriented, frantic society , blocks all these abilities including lucid dreaming ,

case in point i am defending my back yard it is so abeauty with flowers right now that it would be a horrible crime against all holiness to mow it and make it flat and ugly , it is a beautiful enchanted meadow and i am not doing so until the flowers disappear and summer comes

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Help they are asking me loads of questions on the forum and when I direct them to the guide section on ld4all the acuse me of advertising on the forums.

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I have given some courses on philosophy and sociology, and there is always one moment where i have linked discourse about lucid dreams into the topic. It goes like: “Well, talking about dreams, have any of you had a dream where you knew that you were dreaming?” And always some hands rise up and some faces become very interested. Then i go on with brief introduction what lucid dreams are in scientific point of view and what are the benefits of having them.

I have never seen students looking at me: “Are you weird?”

Also i have had only a positive experiences when i talked about lucid dreaming with my friends.

I think that at first you need to ask: “Have you ever had…”, so he/she can relate to you, because many people have had lucid dreams in their life, althought they might not know that they are called “lucid dreams”. Only after that it’s time to start sharing your experiences, i believe :wink:

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@lbsf1: Sending them to LD4all can be good, but like I originally said there is a lot of stuff on here. They could get weirded out by some of the things on here. While it’s great we have it all here, you might want to get the person ready before directing them straight here. As far as gtplanet goes, I was a little worried about that :tongue:. It probably is their form rules not to link to other forums. Just try to answer their questions as best you can, if anything trips you up, just let us know.

@Presence of Light: So unless we abandon our ways and make a total reverse, we can’t have any wonders? We are incapable of seeing things for more than what they are? No, I don’t believe in fairies. Is that a crime? Does that mean there is no more wonder to my life? Do you even know why I don’t believe? I don’t think so.

You’re mistaken, sir, if you think I am closed minded. I am not a child of science, I do not base my life upon what it says is true or not. But I also do not live by your standards either. What am I? Do you understand what I am?

I enjoy your feedback, and will always appreciate hearing from you, my friend. I have no greater respect than to one who will voice their opinion without pause. But do not make the mistake of thinking that those of us who are a part of this great society are all blind fools.

@Cyrus: Yes, you are right, “have you ever…” is a great way to get things going. I will say that I have had people look at me as if I am weird, but I’m glad to know you haven’t gone through it. I’ll bet it helps to be giving the lesson, as your listeners will generally be a bit more open minded to what you have to say. Anywho, thanks for the personal experience :content:.

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I admire your willingness to show people LDs which you have discovered and found to be a deeply fascinating topic, but I don’t think it’s a good idea to say you have had a really awesome LD when you haven’t. There are a number of circumstances where it could become a problem, just say they do have an amazing LD. They then want to talk to you about theirs, and the details of yours. You could quickly find yourself in a very awkward situation, with lots of lies, and/or hurt feelings.

As Rhewin said, it may be best to answer the questions as best you can. It’s actually a good way to expand your own understanding, it requires you to understand something at quite a deep level to be able to explain it to somebody else. Just don’t be afraid to admit you don’t know something, or to try and learn what something is before you answer and indicate you are unsure. If people are interested they will likely continue to seek the answers if the answer you give is incomplete. They may pass judgement and shut-down if it seems complete but seems false to them.

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I think when attempting to share the experience and phenomenon of Lucid Dreaming, an important factor is your audience. Because realizing you are dreaming and then maintaining a stable environment to explore is a rare talent and a rather advanced dreaming technique, diving in espousing “anything is possible” isn’t easily processed by the masses.

Furthermore, many people I have talked to claim to not dream at all! This is of course, untrue…they merely lack the recall to bring their dreams back into waking conscious as memories. So I have attempted to break down the various tiers of “dream experience” and offered an example opening line to illustrate how one approach is great for one person and not such a good idea for another.

The Novice – This guy claims to never dream because he doesn’t remember any of his dreams.

I think this person could care less about Lucid Dreams, given that he doesn’t even have a basic understanding of normal dreams. I personally wouldn’t try to share anything about becoming Lucid in a dream with this individual, and would save my breath for someone more receptive.

The Basic – This person has fairly regular dreams and can sometime remember them enough to describe a particularly intense dream.

I would tread lightly when mentioning anything too spooky sounding, as this person may shut out the idea of exploring the dreamworld, due to personal lack of experience. However, easing into a conversation by asking about a reoccurring dream or a nightmare would be a great way to kick things off.

The Moderate – This person remembers at least fragments of 1 or more dreams almost every night and has a more general interest in their own dreams and their possible meanings. This person may be more receptive to improving their dream recall and even finding out about reality checks, since they already have a vague interest in their sleeping world.

You could jump right in with something like “Have you ever wanted to experience true virtual reality without a computer?” Especially if the person is also a gamer, a line like this would grab their attention and be tailored to their personal passions.

The Intermediate – This person has great dream recall, probably due to keeping a dream journal and practicing good sleep habits that facilitate their dreaming experiences.

I would expect someone at this level to be really excited if you were to tell them they could bring their conscious self into the dream and still stay asleep. They would be thirsty for more information, and may be ready to take on an apprentice/mentor relationship with you (assuming you like them enough).
So that is my general idea of taking the individual into account when approaching the topic of Lucid Dreaming.

I still want to say though, that for me personally, I am quite selective about whom I discuss Lucid Dreaming with. This is mainly because I don’t want to waste people’s time, and I hope they wouldn’t waste mine either. I can usually gage their interest with a few probing questions that have nothing to do with Lucid Dreaming, or it may be initiated from them (I keep having this nightmare reoccur and I can’t seem to get good sleep). Either way, unless my audience is interested, then I am not interested in sharing. Lucid Dreaming is a very personal, very powerful thing to me, and if people are too lazy or ignorant about their own minds to pursue it, then I will take my special secret world elsewhere.

Perpetual Lucidity

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Lucid Dreaming is not a common subject in this world, so not many people have heard of it. Therefore, if you tell someone about it, they often will think you’re weird person, because they’ll accept Lucid Dreaming as magic, religion, yoga… From my personal experience, I can say that it is easier to convince children about lucid dreaming than adults. My younger sister became actually interested in it, although my mother gave me a weird look saying “You are not able to become conscious in a dream, because you’ll wake up”. If there were a nice way to explain it to everyone…

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Great topic Rhewin. :content: I’ve been interested in telling people about LD’s and keeping “new-age” terms/ideas separate, mostly due to the fact that i’m a methodological Atheist and Scientific Skeptic. (ex. regardless of what I believe personally I do not inform anyone of something without evidence verifying the claim as true. So topics like SD and OBEs and the like are off limits to me, regardless of my personal feeling towards them)

And on the topic of peoples reactions to LD’s i’ve interested a few of my friends in LD’s lately. but my “favorite” reaction to sharing LDs with the world was being accused of doing “The Devils work”

SPOILER - Click to view

I live in the buckle of the “Bible Belt” can ya tell? :rofl:

needless to say, i don’t think they have many LD’s.

also, I’ve found a “soft” approach to work best, I’ll bring up dreams once to twice in conversation to see what they think of the subject, then I’ll tell them about an LD I’ve had and see what they think, if there interested I’ll take it from there and answer there questions and if there not I just drop the subject.

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@Perpetual Lucidity: Not a bad scale to go off of. The one thing I would disagree with is the novice. I know many people who claim to not have dreams every night, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t get through to them. Some of them are actually pleasantly surprised to learn that they can.

@Paulius: I learned to not use the phrase “conscious in dreams.” My father-in-law is the same way, just can’t grasp that concept. It might be easier to describe it as being aware that you’re dreaming. For whatever reason, the terms conscious and subconscious just trip people up.

@Slanderous: A fellow Bible-belter :grin: . I’m not an atheist, but I do find presenting myself as a skeptic (which I am), seems to help my credibility quite a bit. It helps calm people down I think. Being a Christian myself, it does sadden me to see some of us get so closed off and occasionally self-righteous. If you really look at LD’s (i.e. dreams you’re in control of), there’s nothing at all that conflicts with any belief system. It’s the interpretation that makes the difference.