Lucid Dreaming - How to Lucid Dream

Consider this, there are no limits in dreams, you are free to do anything your only limit is your imagination. You can use lucid dreams not only to fulfill your fantasies, but to also conquer your fears and overcome problems.

Adventure and Fantasy

Usually what attracts people to lucid dreaming is the potential to fulfill any fantasy and wild adventure, among the favorites are the ability to fly. Just to give a few suggestions on what you can do: fly , explore a total new world, walk through walls, eat as much as you can, predict the future, compose music or poems, writing fiction, find your spirit guide.

Recurring dreams

Recurring dreams can be stopped through lucid dreams. the lucid dreamer can confront his own fear, control it and conquer it. Lucid dreaming may stop this nightmares, and can give you the confidence to overcome your fears in the real world.
Rehearsal

Since the brain activity during dreams is the same as during waking state, the neuronal patterns for a skill can be defined during a dream, this means you can use lucid dreams to rehearse for an artistic performance, a public speech or some other situation or skill.

Astral Projection

Lucid dreams are a perfect platform to induce a out-of-body experience (also called astral projection)

When we sleep our brains cycle through a series of stages, the most vivid dreams and the ones we remember most occur in the fifth stage, mostly know as REM(Rapid Eye Movement). During Rapid Eye Movement our brain is as nearly as active as while awake, our body is paralyzed to prevent us from acting out our dreams. However, two muscles sets are not paralyzed, one are the lungs (for obvious reasons) and the other are our eyes, in this stage our eyes flicker rapidly hence the term "Rapid Eye Movement".

Using this property of REM sleep, in 197? Keith Hearne in London and Stephen LaBerge in the United States, had subjects slept in the laboratory, while measuring their brain waves, muscle tone and of course, eye movements. the subjects were told to move their eyes in large sweeping motions left-right and right-left as soon as they realized they were dreaming. Analysis of the records demonstrated that the large sweeping eye movements occurred in the middle of REM sleep and on subjects that claimed to become lucid in that session.

You may be thinking "but i had a lucid dream, of course its true!", but since science dismisses most if not all anecdotal evidence, and requires instead that the idea may be testable and repeatable.
As the previous experiment demonstrated, not only are lucid dreams testable (a requisite of the scientific method) but they have been proven to be true. Further, any scientist group, can repeat this experiment.

Every night before you fall asleep repeat to your self "tonight i will recognize that i´m dreaming" or "tonight i will have a lucid dream. i will become aware that i´m dreaming". Keep repeating this until you have fallen asleep.

A similar but more effective method is a MILD (see below)

You can also use Affirmations to improve dream recall, with mantras such as "i will remember my dreams when i wake up". The most important is not the mantra itself, but your expectations, GENUINELY expect to become lucid in a dream or to remember you dreams.

This technique was developed by Stephen La Berge while he was writing his doctoral dissertation on lucid dreams. The MILD technique works by falling asleep while focused on the intention to remember you´re dreaming.

1. Setup dream recall - set your mind to recall your dreams as much as possible when awaken from them.

2. Focus on your intent - While falling asleep again, concentrate on your intention to remember to recognize you are dreaming. Repeat a mantra such as "Next time I´m dreaming, I will remember I´m dreaming".

3. See yourself becoming lucid - At the same time your doing Step 2, imagine that you are back in the dream from which you just woke up from, but this time imagine that you know you are dreaming. Look for a dream sign (something that demonstrates you are dreaming), when you see one, say to yourself. "I´m dreaming!" and continue your fantasy.

4. Repeat until you intention is set - Repeat the previous two steps until you are sure you are sure your intention is set or you have fallen asleep. If you start wandering, clear your mind and bring your focus back on your intention

This technique works by waking yourself up after 4 to 6 hours of sleep, staying awake for 1-2 hours and then going back to sleep. This technique has amazing results when combined with other techniques like MILD.

Tips:

If you found yourself sleeping too deeply when returning to bed, then instead return to sleep in another place like another bed, or a couch.

When you are awake read something related to dreams or lucid dreams.

Also, while you are awake keep practicing Reality Tests

This techniques work best when combined other techniques, specially MILD and WILD techniques.

What is reality testing

Reality Testing is a Technique that involves trying to determine whether you are dreaming or not. This is essentially achieved by doing routine reality checks and by looking for dream signs.

Reality Checks

A Reality Check involves repeatedly asking your self during the day if you are dreaming, the most common and popular method to do this is using a watch with a alarm, and every 30 minutes asking your self if you are dreaming, this method has good results, since ,once it gets routine, you will find your self doing a reality check in your dreams and becoming lucid. When doing the reality check try looking at your watch, can you see what time it is? can you read text? it is hard in dreams to see the time in watches or to read things, this two factors are good Dream Signs. (see other reality checks)

In a nutshell

Use a wirst watch or your mobile phone, every 30 minutes check the time and do one or more reality checks of your choosing (see other reality checks)

Dream Signs

Dreams Signs refers to dream elements that show that you are dreaming. By training yourself to recognize this signs you will notice them in you dreams which will induce lucidity. Examples of Dream signs are anything out of the ordinary that would not happen or very unlikely happen in waken life, such as flying, meeting deceased people, a complete strange place, strange animals, etc...
By keeping a dream journal you can keep track of common dream signs you have, and then by using autosuggestion set your mind to recognize them and become lucid in your dreams. It is important that whenever something strange happens you don't immediately dismiss it, but stop and really think about it to decided whether you are dreaming or not.

In a nutshell

Keep a dream journal, Check what dream situations or themes are most common to you, Use autosuggestion to set your self to do a reality check next time you see one this dream signs, e.g tell your self repeatably and with conviction before you fall asleep "Next time i see a flying cat i will realize I'm dreaming and have a lucid dream"

Reality Checks

Reading
Can you read text? does it change when you are reading?

Time
Can you see what time it is in your clock? are the numbers right? do they have strange symbols?

Jumping
When you jump do you float?

Vision
Do you see everything clearly? people who have blurry vision see clearly in dreams

Situation
Do you know how you got here, where you came from, why you are here?

Also known as Wake Initiation of Lucid Dreams, WILD refers to a technique where you consciously fall asleep, going straight into a lucid dream.
The biggest advantage of this technique is that it allows you to induce lucid dreams at will, on the other hand it may cause sleep paralysis, this technique can also be used to induce a out-of-body experience.

This technique work best in the early morning after waking up or in afternoon naps. the reason for this is you need to sleep 5-6 hours, which is mostly non-REM sleep after that time you will enter REM sleep much faster thus being easier to induce the lucid dream. If you plan to your WILD during the night, then you should set your alarm clock for 5-6 hours after you have fall asleep.

1. Find a quiet place where you are sure you wouldn't be disturbed or distracted , possible distractions are : your partner coughing, car headlights shining on the walls, telephone, or any sudden noise. If it is noisy consider using . The room should be dark or at least have a constant light illumination.

2. If you intend to have your WILD during the night and have set your alarm clock, then when you wake up it is important you somehow awake your mind enough so that you don't easily loose conscious and fall into non-lucid dreaming when attempting the WILD. There are many ways to accomplish this, you can work on a sudoku or crossword puzzle (just a few lines, so to awaken your analytical mind), do some calculations (e.g multiplication problems), etc... Alternatively you can drink a caffeine beverage or simply site in your bed with the lights on for a few minutes. The important is to awake your analytical mind so you are focused enough during the WILD.

3. The next step is to get back to bed and relax. Tense and relax your muscles in sequence, Breathe in and out, when you breath in tense the muscle, and when you breathe out relax that muscle. start with the muscles in your lowers legs and go on until you have to your head.

4. At this stage you might see random flashes of light and streaks of colors, this is the beginning of Hypnologic imagery, you may see images and even experience sounds. You should watch this imagery but not focus on it, just go with the flow, don't let your attention get caught up in the imagery, otherwise you will very likely fall into a non-lucid dream sleep. Sensations that your body is floating are also common.

5. By this time you will experience mild vibrations or a sinking sensation and you will likely have entered sleep paralysis. this is a essential stage, it is very easy to slip into a non-lucid sleep or wake up. At this point it is not so hard to keep concentrating, you should be aware of your surroundings, you will experience a short "blackness" and then you will find yourself in the dream world. It is possible you experience a false awakening, so you should do a reality check. if you still experience darkness, it is possible it is only your dream eyes that are close, so try to open them slowly. Remember don't be over excited when you find yourself dreaming, as that may wake you up. Remain calm and do stabilization techniques (see below)

It is a common problem for beginners to remain dreaming after becoming lucid. The dreamer becomes so excited that they immediately wake up. Sometimes the dream simply starts to fade, this can happen even with experienced lucid dreamers. There are many techniques to prevent this of happening.

Stay Calm

The first is step is to stay calm, you may feel very excited on the first times you realize you are lucid dreaming, the key is to stay calm and not overly excited. As you have more and more lucid dreams, it will be less of a shock when you become lucid, and so there will less chance that you will wake up.

Spinning

The sensation of movement can stabilize dreams, a popular technique is spinning around. This technique is effective, however after the spinning you may find yourself in a totally different dream scenario.

Rubbing Hands

Tactical sensations also work to stabilize dreams, a popular and easy technique that takes advantage of this fact is simply rubbing your hands together and concentrating on the feelings that the rubbing generates (i.e friction and heat). Use this technique when you don't want the dream scenario to change or when you want the dream to become more vivid and detailed.

Suggestion

Although not as effective as the previous techniques sometimes saying to yourself with intent "Stay in Dream!" works. You can also use Suggestion to improve the dream clarity "Increase Clarity now!", suggestion also works very well when you want to change the dream scenario, specially when used while Spinning.

False Awakenings

False Awakenings are common, you think you have awaken while in fact you are still dreaming, if you are lucid dreaming and suddenly wake up then make sure you are really awake, perform Reality Tests. Also don't be fool if it is your second time you "awake", more than three false awakenings are not uncommon.