From: Harvey Newstrom (mail@HarveyNewstrom.com)
Date: Fri Mar 07 2003 - 11:15:50 MST
nanowave wrote,
> Over the course of the past five days, and nights, I have been working
> (hard) to developing the skills necessary to successfully
> achieve Lucid
> Dreaming. For anyone unfamiliar with the term, it means consciously
> realizing that one is asleep and dreaming, when one is, in
> fact, asleep and
> dreaming.
Excellent. I have had this ability since childhood. It resulted from
watching monster horror movies and then having nightmares about them from
age 4. I soon learned to recognize the monsters and remember that they were
from a fictional movie or TV show. Then I realized that I was dreaming and
would try to wake up. Later I learned that the monsters couldn't hurt me,
or that I could change the dream.
> After researching the topic from a transhumanist angle (the
> only angle I now
> possess), I've become convinced that LD may offer an
> extraordinarily high
> resolution "sneak peek" into what complete immersion in a
> seamless virtual
> reality, or life as an upload may be like (minus the
> mind-mind networking
> capability of course).
Definitely. I have deliberately created many different landscapes or
experiences, like in a Star Trek holodeck. Once created, the items continue
as if they are real. It takes no effort to continue them once they start.
The real difficulty is making things appear or disappear, or to fly, or to
do things that normally don't happen. It is very hard to learn to control
the dream, and the subconscious dream generating software seems to want to
keep things consistent. I find it is easier to close my eyes in the dream
(so everything disappears), and then to visualize what I want to dream (to
make it appear), and then I open my eyes to a completely new dream
environment.
> I am very excited about this! Although I have yet to achieve true
> intentional REM lucidity (the literature does explain that such early
> successes are fairly uncommon) I do believe I'm making
> excellent progress.
What you need to achieve this is to keep checking to see if you are
dreaming. Do it now. Keep doing it whenever you think about it. When it
becomes enough of a habit, you will start dreaming about checking to see if
you are in a dream now. Then you will start checking and finding yourself
in a dream more often.
This test would be different for different people. Some people perceive
dreams differently, lacking color, or something that they instantly
recognize when they check. You can try to move objects with your mind, or
float off the floor. Assuming that you can't do this in real life, it would
indicate a dream. My personal trick is to see if I have continuous memory
of how I got to my current time and locations. Dreams do not have
indefinite histories. Right now I am at the computer, before that at lunch,
before that at work, before that in a hotel, before that driving to the
hotel, etc. I have a whole life history up to this moment. In a dream, I
can't remember any further back than when the dream started. This is not my
final test, since I could start having memory problems. If I can't remember
a continuous history to the present time, I would then start other testing.
Flying or floating is a good one for me, or closing my eyes and changing the
entire dreamscape.
> 1. Five days ago I could not have described a single dream
> that I've had in
> 2003, or even in the present century for that matter. Not a
> single one.
> Prior to this experiment, the only thing I could have said
> for certain is
> that I'm reasonably sure I was indeed having dreams, but the
> details have
> all but vanished.
Dreams are stored in temporary memory. The brain does not mark these
memories as important things to save, so they are ignored. It is like
driving down the road and not remembering exactly every car you passed. You
saw them and remembered them while you passed them, but didn't save the
memory. Most dreams are remembered immediately upon waking and forgotten in
a few minutes. I have tested this many times without trying to remember the
dream, I just note how many dreams I could remember. A few minutes later
after waking up, I remember the number of dreams I just noted, but I can't
remember any dreams.
To remember dreams as important, go over them in you mind when you wake up.
Act like you are telling yourself the story, and go through the sequence in
order. Try to remember the story as if you are going to tell it to someone
else later. You will then probably remember the story you told yourself.
Sometimes I can remember the story in my own mind's words, but cannot recall
any images or details of the dream. In other words, I forgot the dream but
still remembered what I said it was about.
> thing - my
> dreams seem to be getting more vivid and in some ways more
> disturbing. This
> combined with some other recurring themes lead me to believe that my
> subconscious may actually be putting up some kind of concerted defense
> against my conscious mind breaking through. Incredible!
I have had similar experiences. I concluded that my dreams were probably
always as vivid and interesting before, but that I just never remembered
them.
> 3. I have also had one poignant success at maintaining
> conscious awareness
> well into the first stages of sleep. I knew I was falling
> asleep, yet I
> remained completely aware that my thoughts were becoming oddly random,
> colors were shifting and textures were changing. Ambient
> sounds were became
> hollowed out and were replaced with different sounds. The last thing I
> remember is a sense of complete wonder that I had never noticed these
> presumably daily events from this detached calm frame of
> reference before.
I have done this when I used to meditate. I have gone from a waking state
into the dream state without losing consciousness or having a gap in time
(as far as I could tell). Of course the real question was whether I really
went straight into REM sleep or whether I just went through a normal sleep
cycle and when I reached REM sleep I dreamed that I was just falling asleep.
> - "the poker hand" (remembering to remain emotionally cool
> and detached the
> moment I first realize I have achieved success - lest the
> excitement wake me
> up - a commonly reported occurrence)
This is common to wake yourself up. This is especially true when
manipulating the dream into some exciting or specific sequence you want.
You are constantly thinking how cool it is and that you hope you don't wake
up. I have occasionally been able to go right back to sleep and continue
the dream.
> - and "dream spinning" (physically spinning my dream body
> around in a circle
> in an effort to restore a lucid dream that appears to be fading)
Omni magazine reported this due to surveys in the 1980's and did not have an
explanation for it. For me, the explanation is obvious. While spinning,
the view changes constantly. Your subconscious dream-making subroutines
have to kick in to invent new objects and visuals as you rotate. This helps
you focus on the dream imagery instead of your real-world sensations of
lying in bed. I have found that going fast through scenery, watching a
changing movie, or visualizing new dream images also helps keep the dream
going. Any focus on external sounds or feeling of lying down will switch
attention from the dream to reality and cause you to wake up.
Here are some things I have tested in dreams.
1. I do not have a photographic memory. Trying to remember details of real
life doesn't work. Reading a sheet of paper and trying to recite it and
memorize it in the dream results in random stuff, not what I read.
2. I can do logical thought and produce work results in a dream. I have
worked through engineering design problems and methodically when through
each point and devised a workable plan. When I woke up, the entire plan was
done and workable. The entire solution was developed while I was asleep.
Real work could be done during sleep.
3. I can visualize very complicated scenes in dreams. I can play chess and
maintain all the chess pieces and positions. I have invented complicated
math problems such as long division, worked them out and memorized the
answer. When I woke up, the answers were accurate. I could maintain the
paper calculations and really do the math.
4. Memory of the real world is often disrupted. Sometimes I can't remember
what city I am in or what job I am currently working on, or the date.
5. I have been working long hours and taken a vacation in my dreams. I
went to the beach and relaxed without working. Even though I worked just
before going to bed, I felt like I had time off when I woke up. There was a
conscious memory of off-time, and I felt like going right back to work. (Of
course sleeping overnight probably helped too.)
6. Sometimes dreams are bogus but seem reasonable at the time. I have had
great ideas in dreams that made perfect sense, when seemed absurd when I
woke up.
7. I can feel pain in dreams, even though many people insist that you
can't. I can see bright lights that get brighter. Some people claim that
dreams are at maximum brightness or can't increase brightness for some
reason. I do not know if you can die in dreams, but I have simulated
falling and hitting the ground, leaving my body like an angel, losing all
sensation and pretending I was unconscious, except that I knew I was doing
it. I'm not sure what death would be like. I seemed to be like a cartoon
character who couldn't die. Although I often woke up at the moment of
impact.
-- Harvey Newstrom, CISSP, IAM, GSEC <www.HarveyNewstrom.com>
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