First off it’s not me that I’m talking about.I’m talking about my parents.
One time several months ago my dad saw this website.I was with them trying to go to another site,but he said,"Lucid Dreaming eh,better not get in to that…"he didn’t even say anything after that,just trailed off.
WHAT!?! I wanted to shout.What did you mean by that?!He didn’t even give a reason like he usually does.
What I’m wondering is,why?He’s a Christian if you think that could be a reason or anything.
I’d like some of you’re views on this and how you think I could help this situation,but please don’t be insulting.
I’m sorry, but every single hard-core Christian I know is afraid of entirely to many harmless things. I think that if Jesus didn’t specifically say “and thou shalt LD three times weekly” then it’s probably the work of a demon. Ahh, the old stereotype “damn kids with their Satan music” (rock music). Whatever. You won’t change his mind, but you can have a lot of fun telling him that LDing gives you an outlet to sacrifice cats & drink wildebeast blood! Cheers
hint of sarcasmtupid: My first advice would be don’t listen to meow. Any mention of “sacrifice cats” will win you a trip to an exorcist. This coming from someone named “Meow,” how surprising.
I grew up in the deep south of the US, in the middle of the bible belt. Not far from the childhood home of Billy Graham, a well known American evangelist. I’m very well informed on the behavior of modern Christians. Meow is partly right when she mentions that most Christians view things as “demonic” if they don’t have “specific permission” written for them in the bible. It is however narrowminded to put such a definition on such a wide range of people. I’m Christian and I don’t think that, I think it is the exact opposite. LD’ing can be a spiritual path itself. Besides, the bible only mentions dream’s good uses. I havn’t read anything in the bible mentioning dreams as bad or evil. Dreams are always the platform where God speaks, angels appear, visions of the future shown, warnings of danger understood, and many life changing influences occur.
However, your Dad’s disapproval may stem from another direction than “It’s not in the bible … so it must be evil.” Lucid dreaming actually gets a bad reputation by people mistaking it for witchcraft. Many witches mention and practice lucid dreaming, they even have spells they perform within LDs. History shows that “flying witches” may actually have been lucid dreamers, …possibly drug induced. Evil witches also pray and chant, but this does not make praying and chanting evil or witchcraft.
I naturally started having LD’s after a visit to a Christian church. When I was young I was plaqed with demonic nightmares that involved me running from and being choked by demons. I would wake up and not be able to breath. I was losing sleep because I would force myself to stay awake. One day after discussing my problem with a same-age friend in Sunday school he advised “…my uncle always tells be to sleep on my stomach if I have nightmares. Why don’t you try that?” So I did, and I have not had 1 nightmare since. Shortly after that I began having many dreams where I “woke up” within the dream and would be filled with joy. I would be so happy that I was dreaming. I learned to love sleep and dreams again. Later in life I learned the term “lucid dream” and have been a fan since. I’ve seen many things and have conquered many fears consciously.
Dreams happen anyways. You can let them rule your nightlife and be haunted and harassed, or you can become lucid and start a dreamlife where you utilize your full potential. Don’t let your dreamlife be stolen from you, conquer any fear or resistance that stops that. Actively live it! It’s much more rewarding than sleeping through it.
I think people says it’s wrong because they have the narrow mindset of thinking that dreams reflects your real you, so anything “wrong” you might be doing in dreams, is just as wrong as in real life. So if you fall for a temptation in you dream, it is just like if you did it in real life. And in dreams where you can do anything, there are many temptations
But that was just my thoughts… I am not really sure.
All of this is thousands of years old. When the St Jerome translated the bible to Latin, he intentionally translated the Hebrew word for dream into the Latin word for witchcraft, and ever since then, dreams have been viewed as something not to be exploared.
Also, dreams of importance were also supposed to be God given to saints or kings, not common folk, another reason for “common folk” (who in those days were mostly christian or another religion) not to explore dreams.
Then came the Spanish Inquisition. Everyone was scared to share dreams.
If you look at all this, its understandable how the idea of not messing with dreams could be passed along by some Christians to this day.
I wouldn’t bring it up, but if your Dad mentions it again, juts explain what it is. Tell him its not Satanic or something, I dunno, I wouldn’t know what to say. My parents are pretty open minded and pretty unreligious.
Some christians find ld belonging to the occult witch is not so i think…but still some christians have difficulty in accepting this as a normal phenomenon…
I think u better talk with your parents and explain this good…or not at all but nothing in between…I think u know your parents best so make your choice…if u decide that u should not like John says…u can always do this if your father mentions this again…and then simply tell him and explain…
first of all lucid dreaming is a natural thing. sure sum people hve their own lil things they do to help but im positive no summoning of satan is done. and they have no right to accuse it at all in the first place unless they researched it and actually had 1 of their own. For example i as part of this lik catholic youth group and they had this special retreat they did but they wouldnt tell us wut was on it or wut happened and that it was a secret. Well sum kids started saying it was a brainwashing thing or an occult cus it changed a lot of people that went on it from bad to good. Then they complain to the person sayin he has no right to accuse it of that because he never went on it. Thats lik the same case. they can be hypocryts.
the second thing id lik to say is kinda a respond comment.
I dont think its right that any type of dream should be given a bad name or restricted. In the real world there are many rules and restrictions and bad things with everything. Dreams are supposed to be a way to get away from all that and do “our own thing” w/o having limitations of any means. Dreaming and Reality are two different worlds. Whether u choose to believe the dream world is a real place or not doesnt matter. The point im making is they r seperate and shouldnt be criticized or commanded by each other.
Dream Addict - Sorry, I didn’t mean to be offensive. I wasn’t referring to Christians in general - at all. I was referring to the over-the-top Christians. I actually use to belong to the United Methodist Church for several years and very much respect their values and ideals - even if they aren’t right for me.
Josh - Thanks for sharing that about the word origin - I love linguistics!
[size=92]Thanks for the concern Meow. I noticed your claim was directed towards “hardcore religion,” so I was not offended. I was actually partly agreeing with you. If you knew me IRL, you’ll probably think that most “normal Christians” would think that I was hell bound!
Though, I was hoping to make clear that some Christians do value lucid dreaming and don’t think of it as “bad.” but hell, I’m no “normal Christain” so don’t use me as an example.
I singled out your name at the beginning of my post, but only to joke about your “cat” comment. I was just pullin’ your leg, your post always seem to have a cat theme and that makes me laugh.
SO! with that said. I am however a hardcore cat lover! So you are pushing some buttons Just kidding, seriously! … Hmm? is that an oxymoron? Aw well, back to topic.[/size]
Thanks for the history lesson Josh. I wondered why so many people relate LDs with witchcraft. This explains the deep roots of this mistake. Interesting.
Hmmm, the best thing (actually the only working solution in my opinion) would be to ask it himself. We can talk all day about christians being this and that but maybe he just said that because it’s the first time he hears about LDing and he just finds it nuts? It could have been an instinctive reaction, we are all more or less inclined to this type of reaction when we see things we don’t understand or find strange. So the best thing is not to worry too much about it because the only way that will help you find the answer is ask it himself.
I think you’re probably right BrainHacker, although from Hiveminds description it dosn’t seem as if his father had near enough time to actually read what Lucid Dreaming was. It sounds like he simply saw the title on the browser, and recognised the phrase. If that’s the case, maybe he has had some experience with the practise? Otherwise, maybe he’s heard of it somewhere and thinks it’s a waste of time and dosn’t actually work.
It would probably be like aksing my parents to buy me some books on meditation. Chances are, they would laugh and ask why I wanted them. Best not to get your parents involved, I’ve found.
If your right Atheist, and he did just catch the lucid dreaming thing out of the corner of his eye and judged it right then, it probably had nothing to do with being a christian. I know lots of unreligious types that may say the same thing.
I’m certain it had nothing to do with his Christianity. What does lucid dreaming have to do with religion? Sure, some people might associate meditation + lucid dreaming with spirituality, but that is not the point I was making.
Putting religion aside, I’m only talking about peoples reactions to this kind of activity. I don’t think the average person would see the term ‘Lucid Dreaming’ and have any defensive reaction at all, hence my suggestion that perhaps he has had some experience with it in the past.
I dunno, I’ve had some defensive reactions before, they weren’t from religious people. I think they had just had those reactions because they arent exposed to that sort of thing everyday. Most new things are greeted with wierd reactions.
Anyway, your probably right. I’ve even met people who have been lucid dreaming thier whole lives, they just didn’t know what to call it because they had never been exposed to that term before. Perhaps thats whats going on.
I think HiveMind would not have mentioned his Dad’s religion if he did not think it was an issue. He quoted his Dad as saying “Lucid Dreaming eh,better not get in to that…”
That terminology leads me to think that his Dad believes LD’ing is dangerous. He says “Better not get into that” he didn’t say “don’t waste your time with that.” HiveMind was the only one there so he must of thought religion was an issue or he wouldn’t have mentioned it.
I happen to think that most Christians do have a problem with lucid dreaming. Just check some Christian websites that do mention LDs, most don’t have anything nice to say. They relate it to “conversing with spirits,” waking the dead, visiting other realms, opening yourself up to possession, and other spooky sounding things. All experienced LD’ers know this is horse hocky, but this is what they claim.
The only initial request that the author of the post asked was “Why did my Dad react this way?” All of our answers are useless, we can’t answer for his Dad. We can’t be certain on anything. The only way for Hivemind to have a correct answer is to ask his Dad himself.
Please be gentle to the LD bashers they know not what they do.
I came across a few a long time ago when I was searching for lucid dream references in the bible. I’m unable to locate some of them. I may have confused the term “astral projection” with “lucid dream,” since the terms can be interchangeable.
One site that condems “astral projection” mentions:
tupid: My first advice would be don’t listen to meow. Any mention of “sacrifice cats” will win you a trip to an exorcist. This coming from someone named “Meow,” how surprising.
they know not what they do. 