So from what I have been reading about dreams, it isn’t “anything goes”. Our dream world seems to have its own set of rules we cannot change, and many of these are universal.
Most reality checks are based on one of these so I thought it would be cool to compile a master list of what cannot be done in a dream universally.
So far some of what I have read:
*You cannot read in a dream. You cannot define symbals. You can “know” what is written, but you aren’t actually reading it. (This is because the side of the brain responsible for reading is the part swiched off during sleep.)
*You cannot walk. You can glide or move, but you dont actually lift your feet to get places.
*What goes up, won’t come down. Propelling something in the air, will just propel it in the air. Jumps are included here. If you jump, you need to will yourself to get down in order to get down.
Id love to see this list grow. Please feel free to contribute!
I wouldn’t be so sure about this. The thing is that you can do whatever you wanna do in a dream as long as you are able to do it. Which comes from experience, mindset, believe and once again experience.
Only difference is that I believe you cannot control the whole dream meaning if you are in a landscape and you are flying you might effect only parts of this experience on which you are focused. Let’s say you are flying and the grass is green not made by you consciously but subconsciously and you decide to turn it into red or gold color. As you find yourself flying you again can change that and start walking but the sky will stay the same until you focus to change it.
As it goes for RCs they all work but we think wrong about them. We think that we will see 6 fingers on our hands or less doesn’t matter just because that’s how dream hands work. It’s not that it’s because you are able to make your hands to have more or less fingers then usually. That’s what RC is. If you make a conscious decision that you will make more or less fingers on your hands you succeed then you are in a dream. That’s why people might have more or less fingers then usually and they don’t figure it out because it wasn’t conscious decision. Same goes for reading, if you are able to make stable text unstable then you are dreaming. Most of the times it goes that the text is already unstable so making it stable proves that you are in a dream as long if it’s conscious decision.
I was successful with reading, having normal hands, breathing through pinched nose and not being able to breath through pinched nose because I decided that I am not able to do so. In a dream it’s always about choice as long as you are focused on the part you wanna control/change/alter and so on…
I hear you, and although you are right and it isn’t completely accurate to call it a “rule”, and I use the word loosely for lack of a better one to come to mind yet, as there is nothing that can’t be done. As long as you can imagine it, it can happen.
For the sake of semantics maybe we should call it consistencies, because it seems in almost every dream, if you count your fingers there won’t be five. Unless of course you will it to be otherwise. The title was intentionally slightly sensational, but of course nothing is actually absolute in a dream.
Consistencies - yes. But they also turn into misconceptions. If you stay open minded and not let yourself to be bound by something someone said(including me ) then you can really get the most of every experience, whether WL experience or dream experience!
So you are saying that by defining consistencies across dreams you are limiting your abilities? But what about this knowledge helping you? Like spinning or dropping backwards to change your dream setting? Or rubbing your hands together to stay lucid? These tips seem to have a pretty consistent result across the spectrum, and while there might be a simple biological or neurological explanation for these things happening, and while knowing them does not necessitate an absolute --I’m sure you can spin and will yourself to stay in your current location–, however it seems to me that knowing and recognizing these consistencies helps us broaden possibilities in our dreams instead of limiting us as you suggest.
Well I meant on the consistencies that are actually wrong assumptions. Like you can’t do this or that.
And doing something consistently in a dream is ok if it works for you, what I meant is that you shouldn’t limit yourself just because I might say you can’t do it or someone else…
You can do anything in a lucid dream, if you truly believe that you can do it.
In this sense, lucid dreaming is pretty much a lesson in self-confidence, and I find that really beautiful.
I’ve actually been able to read/see numbers/letters in all of my dreams. I think it’s uncommon, but possible. I even had a dream once where I changed the time on my alarm clock, and the next morning I was so confused as to why it still went off at the old time xD. Haven’t thought about walking, I’ve found even with really vivid and lucid dreams, you still need to really focus on EVERYTHING going on, or weird things like there being no sky happen. I’ll try throwing something in my next lucid dream and see what happens. (If I remember)
words numbers or ‘symbols’ have always been clear to me. actually i fail reality checks in my dreams when it comes to this lol. because they stay the same! When I’m lucid, I walk, i remember feeling the wetness of the grass on my feet when i went lucid one night.
as far as jumping, oh i’ve fallen down. alot. actually i would try to jump to fly and its kind of funny when it doesnt happen.
anyway, i believe each person has their own limitations.
it’s not necessarily universal.
Non-lucids are ruled by the subconscious, the things we read on sites like this will influence them greatly.
If you were to read that oceans don’t have tidal patterns in dreams, then it is highly likely that in your next dream with an ocean, it will have no tide.
Reading I can do perfectly 98% of the time. The rare times I simply can’t read are usually due to mental exhaustion.
Walking is debatable, when I have a physical body I do walk/run. But often times I don’t have a body at all.
Jumping is completely contrary for me. Gravity works like expected in all my dreams, sometimes to the point jumping would be very difficult, but never in a dream have I had to use any will to land again, though it takes a lot to get of tee ground.
Personally I feel that these limits are set by ourselves through what we read, for me it makes more sense for gravity to work normally as I am more scientifically minded.
I can’t really comment on reality checks as I don’t use then.
False beliefs, engrained in stone by ignorance and external influences.
There is no “cannot be done”. The only “cannot be done” is based on your sole beliefs and understandings. Being that this is widely different dependent on whom it concerns, there are no universal laws. Reality checks fail for me. I try to press my finger through my hand, and what happens? My hand stops it. I look at my hands, and what do I see? Five fingers.
But what about elsewise? I’ve no limits within my dreams, because I believe that anything and everything is possible. I can still press my fingers through my hands if I wish to. But being that in my eyes, both are possible, it is just as possible for my hands to stop my finger, as much as it is for finger to pass through it.
You’ve never read in your dreams? I’m certain everyone has. I read quite often in my dreams. Both reading and writing. I’ve filled out graphs, forms, and done school homework. Granted, it seems vaguely true that words tend to change, as I’ve very quite often gone back to find things that I’ve read, and cannot relocate them. This idea that they change, would not be present, if it were that we just “knew” what we were reading, rather than reading it. Or we would not even notice a change.
I had a dream recently, where somoene from this forum was directly teaching me to walk… It was specifically about walking. While I give it to you, that this particular example could lean towards your idea here, as I was having a difficult time, the idea behind the dream was about walking. In my past dreams, I’ve had times where I’ve walked carefully around broken glass, and have even accidently stepped on things. Cut my feet, tripped and fell over things that I was walking past.
I am not even sure where this comes from. I’ve never even heard this one before…
Having to “will” something, is co-related to something common in lucid dreaming, which is a fight against your control for the dream. This isn’t by default present and definitely not a normal practice.
Though I think you have good intentions, and I admire you for taking the lead in constructing something like this, the honest truth is, that nothing is impossible. And noting things as such, is only an encouragement that it is.
You’ve read about dreams. Have you experienced them yourself? Do you believe anything you have written here? The best thing to do is not what you hear. But to experience it yourself. At that point, you may say what is difficult or “impossible” for your current ability, but ultimately nothing is.
) then you can really get the most of every experience, whether WL experience or dream experience!