Lucid dreaming is something practiced by certain Tibetan Buddhist traditions as a serious meditation technique. Very few of us have probably acquired the skill of not only remembering our dreams upon waking, but also of activating lucidity within our dream state. I have had perhaps only a handful of lucid dream experiences in my entire life, but it has intrigued me since I was a teenager.
While at college in my teens I was able to remember my dreams upon waking for six days out of seven. I used to write down my dreams upon waking and had a valuable ability there. Even then, the lucid dream was a very rare treasure that I hardly ever glimpsed. Some people are fortunate to have this gift to experience lucid dreams quite naturally. But they are few and far between.
When we pay attention to our dreams and focus upon them, we can cultivate the technique of remembrance, and if we take it a step further, we can actually activate the lucid dream experience. For the Bon Tibetan Buddhist tradition, this is an actual mediation practice on the path of awakening consciousness.
Why should a third of our lives be lost to ignorance or sleep, when it can also be a mediation time in its own right. Besides being a time of healing and processing activities of the day, sleep can be the opportunity to access our unconscious mind, or the hidden side of our personality. One can meet the sub-personalities who appear as characters in our dreams. They are all aspects of ourselves.
For example one can meet the inner guide, or helpful ally. This may be the positive aspect of the shadow, once befriended. At first we may be afraid of the shadow or unconscious side of ourselves, but it is actually a valuable friend, represented by a person of the same gender as us in the dream realm. The opposite gender is also there – anima (female) for men and animus (male) for women, as Jung labelled them.
If we can become lucid enough, we can remember to ask these sub personalities important questions and we could perhaps gain powerful insights or solutions to our challenges in daily life. Nicola Tesla, the greatest genius in modern history, was able to access the solutions to his problems in design by visualizing them as images fully formed within his mind’s eye. That’s where his astounding inventions came from. He saw them fully formed, as if they were not his but were presented to him from the astral plane.
Huge creative potential lies dormant awaiting our perception. Magic can happen if we are able to tap in. After all, we can do anything in the dream realm. Gravity and all the laws of nature are suspended. I recall breathing underwater in my dreams sometimes. We may all have felt ourselves flying at some point too. If we are good at it, we can even access the greater collective unconscious, the source of archetypal power for all humanity. It may be likened to meeting with the gods.
It’s not as easy as it sounds of course, and requires practice, like any mediation technique. It helps if we shift the lifestyle to facilitate greater dream remembrance, like eating lighter meals in the evening, so that the digestion is not too busy. Also it may be necessary to avoid alcohol and cannabis in order to facilitate greater dream recall. We all dream regardless of lifestyle, but it’s the remembering of the dream that is not so easy when our habits are too indulgent. Short term memory may be hampered.
It may be a lifetime of training or practice to get this right, but it is worthwhile. Tap into the skill of lucid dreaming and you will have not only the royal road to the unconscious, but perhaps the doorway to the astral realm, where past, present and future all exist for us to tap into. All the information you could ever want is there available to you. Besides that, training to be lucid in sleep is actually the same as training to be lucid during the time of death. And that is the goal of life. It’s the way to make a success of our entire life.
There is no better prize or goal to attain than the ability to be conscious at the time of leaving the body, so that the self or soul can focus on attaining the eternal destination by remembering the goal at that crucial point. So practice now by invoking lucid dreaming, and you will be more easily able to stay lucid when you most require it.
Let us know in the comments if you have had any personal experiences regarding dream recall and particularly lucid dreaming. It may benefit us all to learn from them.
(image pixabay)
Interesting topic we got here! :)
I started practicing lucid dreaming in 2005 consciously...
Writing in my dream journal and trying different techniques...
Actually I found maybe the biggest community worldwide, which still has the website:
https://www.ld4all.com/
As recalling my dream memories I was able to awake inside the dreams more often.
In the beginning the euphoria was very strong when this was happening and waking up followed... it took time to be able to focus and to stay awake inside the dream and experience the different realities...
After some years it became quite natural and I stopped practicing and just enjoyed.
It is still available for me as long as I have the time for a good sleep, whenever I feel it's ok :) ..even in the afternoons...
However at nights it is very accessible especially in the early mornings, when 3rd eye and pineal gland are more active, releasing a good amount of DMT :D
One thing that works for me is to wake and stay up for a while and then go back to sleep. Dreams come softer and the body is relaxed, so it's easy to notice the transition between both states and when found inside the dream everything is more vivid and recognizable ;)
Wow that's epic Trayan, I'm so glad to hear of your experiences. I will look up the website you mentioned. Indeed we need the pineal to be active for more profound dream activity and insights. Melatonin is closely related to DMT apparently, both coming form the pineal. You are indeed very fortunate.
I have particular issues with dreaming, in my childhood I remember that I have dreamed a lot, now in my adulthood I’m looking forward to recall those dreams when I’m awake and I can’t, any technique would be helpful, I took this 2 from this post:
No Canabis before sleep
Light eating in evening
But I think I could use some other dynamics to achieve the lucid dream.
Thanks for your post!
Yes we all dream, it's just the capacity to recall the dreams that escapes us. Regarding use of cannabis, you will need to abstain for about 48 hours to begin having improved recall. There is no way around this.
As for lucid dreaming, some people just have a gift for it, while others only glimpse it very rarely. One technique is to remind yourself before going to sleep, that you are going to have a lucid dream. If you do this every night, it may eventually bring some results. I hope you succeed.
Thank you for the tips, i will try them
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Thanks for the reminder, I will be aware of the details while in the dream space. There is so much available to us.
Being aware in dreams may sound like a utopia, but obviously it can be an achievable reality, only that we do not know the most successful techniques to achieve this ability. I like your post because you clearly state why it is important to fully live our period of dreams, that our soul, our spirit make the most of this period. A big greeting.
Greetings to you Sirena, good to be in touch with a like minded soul as yourself. There may be techniques though it comes naturally with practice. It's just about being observant and keeping the goal in mind.
My dreams are mostly pretty moronic, so I ask my inner guides about them and they usually tell me to ignore my dreams and just ask them.
But sometimes they contain a bit of wisdom, hell I think that's how I make about half my crypto decisions and that works out pretty well
Tesla was amazing, but now we are told to worship twats like elon musk
Hey I'm so glad that you can tap in to the insights revealed by your dream world. You are very fortunate.
As for Musk, at least he has brought the name of Tesla to the forefront of society so that people may want to find out more about the man.