Lucid Dreaming...

[TheLuckyBlackCat]

Lucid Dreaming: When you are aware you are dreaming.

Sometimes when I have lucid dreams I am able to control what happens in the dream, what I am and etc. Do any of you have reasons or beliefs on why you can sometimes be aware you are dreaming and control what is going on? I'm curious about your beliefs. Do any of you think spirits or magic are involved?

[hecate8]

Lucid dreaming is similar to shamanic dreaming. One of the goals (called a gate) is to take control of the dream. Read "The Art of Dreaming" by Carlos Castaneda.

[TheLuckyBlackCat]

Okay. I have never tired to fall asleep in a dream before so I have never done shamanic dreaming before but I will do some more research on it.

[RosieMoonflower]

I have had a few lucid dreams where I can control myself and what I do and say. But very rarely can I control others in my lucid dreams. Neither have I ever changed the scenery of a dream or anything like that on purpose, except for once when I ran from something, I ran into a different scene. But, recently I had a dream where I was practicing flying. Like, I know I was dreaming and so I knew that human flight was possible because it's MY dream. But, my real mind was struggling to tell me that flight is not possible. So I practices flying around in a little circle close to the ground. I would be flying and the I would think, I can't do this and start falling and thing think yes you can it's a dream as then I would fly back upwards a little bit. That's my most interesting lucid dream experience to date.

Rosie [GREEN HEART]

[Seraphin]

I don't do it.

Especially after denying myself the awareness that I was no longer getting good, deep REM sleep because I'd 'programmed' myself to not recall my dreams unless they were significant, so I was completely unaware when I developed sleep apnea, which resulted in some serious health issues for me over the winter, I'm reluctant to mess with my sleeping consciousness.

I prefer (at this point, anyway) to let my sleep be sleep. But that's just me.

[RosieMoonflower]

Here's the thing, I don't lucid dream on purpose. At least I don't think I do. I'm just in a dream, realize it's a dream, and so I do something I wouldn't or couldn't normally do in real life. I saw a national geographic special on dreams once and it presented a theory that dreams are a way of problem solving with no consequences. That dreams allow you the opportunity to try things out before actually trying them out. They attested to the idea that potentially hunting techniques and possibly the invent of fire were the result of primitive humans having dreams. And that's what I feel like my lucid dreaming is like. It's ALWAYS centered around something is an "issue" for me. But I am aware it's a dream.

Rosie [GREEN HEART]

[Vesca]

I'm curious as to what reading you've done on lucid dreaming so far? It may help, even if just to better your control of when those dreams occur and your ability to take control of them. Couldn't hurt, if you have any spare time to do some reading, that is.

As for your initial questions, I don't feel that spirits are the cause of lucid dreaming but I think that if you have guides you've allowed into your mental spaces that they can interact with you on that level of consciousness (or subconscious, as the case may be).

I also wouldn't consider lucid dreaming to be a "magical" act, but that would really reflect an individual's definition of "magic." I feel as if it's more the ability to cross the streams of your conscious and subconscious when you're not distracted by your body's physical state or the physical world around you. Often when I enter a lucid dream, it feels almost like a trance. Except that I know I decidedly went to bed first and the dreams must have occurred at some point around 3-6 hours after having fallen asleep.

When I was younger, I could never lucid dream "on purpose." In fact, most of the people I know had actually kind of fallen into it at some point in their life for varying reasons and they in turn did a lot of reading and exercises to better control it so it wasn't so disruptive in their sleeping patterns (possibly relating to what Seraphin said earlier).

By "controlling," I mean that they set up personal conscious and subconscious boundaries as to only lucid dreaming on their terms, with their schedule, and often being able to choose the topics of the dream before they turn in for the night.