And I got so close to lucid dreaming I could taste it. I’ve looked into lucid dreaming a lot and thought about experimenting with it, but never got around to it. I’ve read that one technique leading to good results is getting up early, being up about an hour or so and then going back to sleep. Then, when you suspect you’re in a dream, there are a number of techniques to check and once you prove you are in fact dreaming - bang, lucid dreaming.
I got up early, watched an episode of Deadwood and then feel asleep on the couch. In my first dream, I was an actor on Deadwood. I had a character but had to make up my own lines along the way, and I’m not sure if all the other people were actors or the actual characters. It was a great episode, anyway. They should totally hire my subconscious to write scripts. I gave Swearengen a kickass speech.
Then I woke up, and went driving. I don’t have a license but fairly frequently dream that I’m driving and have to focus really hard to not fuck up. During the drive I asked myself if I were still dreaming and answered that it could very well be the case. I tried to remember the checking techniques, only remembered that pinching my arm was one of them, and then never tried it for some reason.
When I woke up I was amazed. I have never been aware that I was dreaming before, I have never had a recursive dream before, and in all honesty I had suspected that they were confined to the area of fiction. I’m gonna have to try this again.
I once dreamed that I was dreaming and couldn’t wake up. In my dream’s dream, I was also dreaming that I was dreaming and couldn’t wake up. And so on. I’m glad there was someone around to wake me when I started screaming. It was both the strangest and most frightening dream I’ve ever experienced.
The few times I’ve realized I was dreaming while I was dreaming, the sudden realization startled me so much I woke up.
My uncle learned how to do lucid dreaming to deal with the truly horrific chronic nightmares he’d been having. Once he’s aware it’s a dream, he’s then able to control it somewhat and make it less frightening.
I occasionally have a dream where my teeth are crumbling horribly or otherwise falling out of my mouth. In the dream, I always say to myself, I wish this were a dream, but I know it’s not. Then I wake up. The other night I had this dream, but when I woke up, I was still in the dream. And I thought, well, it finally happended, this time it really wasn’t a dream. And then I woke up. It had all seemed so real. I’ve never been more relieved at anything in my life.
I’ve never been able to do the lucid dreaming thing – every time I realize I’m in a dream the house of cards comes down.
Well, not every time. Sometimes something in my subconscious will notice that I’ve got the sleep-paralysis thing going on in real life and I start moving very slowly and my dream-vision gets blurry because my eyes are partway open and the real world is interfering with what my brain’s trying to invent. Fighting my way out of those can be a bit of a chore, and my heart’s usually racing by the time I’m fully awake even though I’m not particularly worried.
Oh, me too! That’s one of my worst recurring dreams, and every time, in the dream, I remember dreaming about it before and being freaked out because now it’s happening for real.
Don’t read Tommyknockers, okay? Just trust me on this one.
I have semi lucid dreams all the time. These include things like eating all the chocolate I want as dream food has no calories, using telekinesis, floating and flying, and ignoring anybody who gets in my way (sometimes while saying “Screw you! It’s my dream.”).
I’ve come close to lucid dreaming a few times. I can do it pretty reliably when I’m having a nightmare, particularly if it involves something like horrible monsters. I don’t usually take control of the dream, so much as realize it’s not real and force myself to wake up. The best one was when I had a dream that a gigantic monster was attacking the city. Someone asked me what we should do, and I said, “You know, I’m pretty sure this is a dream. Which means I can probably kick that thing’s ass.” And then I did.
As I’m getting older, though, my nightmares more often involve things like getting in car accidents, or losing all my money. Which makes it a lot harder to realize that it’s not real. I keep having nightmares where I’m driving, and for some reason, the brakes on my car are incredibly inefficient: they slow me down, but they won’t stop me. So I keep getting in low-speed, rear-end collisions. One of these days, I expect I’m going to sit bolt upright in bed, screaming, “My insurance premiums!”
My dreams are lucid pretty much all the time. I once had a series of interconnected dreams that lasted off and on over a period of a few years. I remember meeting someone at a party and trying to remember where I’d met him, and he told me “We met in your dream last November.”
Kyrie Eleison, I had a similar dream when I was feverish with pneumonia. In my dream, I kept getting up, walking to the living-room and looking out the window, only to realize what I saw was in the wrong season or time of day. When this had happened a few times, I panicked and yelled “Non! Je ne veux pas!” (No, I don’t want to). My dreams are bilingual, I sometimes switch language in mid-sentence, and when I wake up I usually remember exactly the words I used.
Recursive dreams can be so annoying. For the last few years, I’ve had them every couple of weeks worse than anybody else I’ve discussed dreams with. I think what happens most times is I’ll partially awake in a state of sleep paralysis, blink my eyes to try to wake myself completely (since my eyelids are the only thing I can move) and accidentally slide back into dreamworld mid blink.
In these looped dreams, I always “awake” the first time in my current bedroom in a very accurate state (I’ve noted the position of things laying on the floor in my dreams and that’s exactly where they are when I wake up). In subsequent loops I’ll “awake” in either my childhood bedroom or a very messy fictional room with tons of potential that I can’t wait to fix up. I know that arises from my subconsious realizing that I have tons of potential but my life is in shambles at the moment due to me letting things get “messy”.
For the first couple of minutes of every loop I’m convinced I’m awake until I tip myself off that’s I’m still dreaming. The twisted thing is, after a couple of loops I deliberately “kill” myself by jumping out of windows to scare myself awake. It gets very frightening after about 5 loops when I start to think I’ll never wake up. Even more frighteningly, I “wake up” in sleep paralysis during every single loop.
Every one of these sequences has lasted at least 5 loops and I’ve counted as many as 17 loops one night. When I finally do awake, it’s again in a state of sleep paralysis and it takes me a few minutes to convince myself that I really am awake this time. A sleep/REM researcher would probably have a field day with me as I’ve been lead to believe that this is not common.
If anyone else has situations like this and is frightened, I do have one tip. If you wake up in the morning and are in a state where you may drift back to sleep (you have no appointments / work so you might "rest you eyes for a few more minutes), don’t lay on your back. This seems to be a contributing factor for me.
I don’t remember ever having a lucid dreaming episode.
But once, when I was a kid in grade school I had an odd dream that I still remember. I was watching myself in the dream. I was an adult, and looked nothing like I do now, but I knew it was me. There was plot, and a man in the dream too. We looked at each other, started leaning forward towards each other for a kiss, then I heard my name called. I could see myself look for whoever called my name.
Now, my folks both went to work earlier than we kids got up. A woman from up the street did some housework for my mom, got us up, made breakfast, and we’d go to school. What I heard as my name being called in the dream was this lady at my bedroom door, calling my name and telling me I needed to get up.
Very strange to have a dream character react to something happening in the “real” world.
I did something like that once. I was dreaming that I was trapped in my dreams - so really, Iw asn’t dreaming it, because I was. I was in my room asleep, and often I would be dreaming that I was in my room and just woke up. I was convinced the only way to wake up for real was to reach the dining hall, a couple hundred metres from my room, but whenever I got close I would wake up, back in my room.
Then I “woke up” in a casino. Tried to escape from casino security, because I had to make it to the dining hall. I didn’t.
Woke up again, in my room. Tried to get up, made it to the door, then I woke up in bed. Again.
Then I woke up in a hospital bed, surrounded by family. So, these dreams were all part of a coma fantasy, I suppose. I couldn’t move, could barely see. Then I woke up in my bed again.
I think I made it to the dining hall in the end by bestowing myself with superpowers - phasing comes in handy when you are in a rush to get somewhere. Even then, it took a few tries to succeed.
By the time I woke up for real, it had happened so many times I was convinced I was still dreaming. Eventually I realised it was the real deal this time, shuddered, then went to the dining hall.
Good to know I’m not the only one with nightmares of my teeth falling out.
I’ve had quite a few recursive dreams. Mostly I go from nightmares and “wake up” to a more pleasant dream. On a few occasions I’ve realized that I’m dreaming and I can somewhat control the general flow of things.
It usually starts with ‘wow, this really sucks that all my teeth are falling out’, followed by the thought of ‘well, it’s probably just a dream, so no matter’. Still a little bit frightening (in the dream that is).
The other one is the ole’ going to school in only your underwear dream. In fact, I think it was one of those dreams where I first realized it was just a dream. Before that, I was all embarassed about standing outside after recess, lined up to go back inside, wearing nothing but tighty whities. Then one time all of a sudden I had the thought ‘oh, this again? sigh its just a dream. At least, it better be’
Wow, pretty much every single dream I have is lucid. I always know I’m dreaming, and can usually direct the dream, though this doesn’t always work. Does that, uh, say anything about me? that all my dreams are lucid? Serious question.
I’ve had a couple of those. The strangest one was when I had this long dream where, at the end, a few guys bicycled past me and I shouted at them to be careful or something, and one of them turned his head and started singing Every Breath You Take by Sting and the Police. I slowly woke up and realized I could still hear it; it was playing on the radio.
Priceguy, interesting to hear someone else had a similar experience.
I’d like to have a dream I could direct, it sounds…interesting. Anyone got any pointers? Further upthread one poster did say that if you woke up in the night, to be active for maybe an hour, then try to go back to sleep.
One oft’ recommended technique is to give yourself a test point in the waking world, and use it when you dream. For example, every time you walk through a doorway, pause a moment, touch the doorjamb and seriously ask yourself if you’re dreaming. Do it so that it becomes second nature. Then when you dream, when you go through a doorway, you’ll do the same thing, and you may realize you actually are dreaming, and then see what you can do! Fly, maybe? Fight dragons? Meet up with the one who got away?
