Do you want to dream lucidly? Knowing that you want to have a lucid dream is a good start, but it’s not all you’ll need to do. There are several different methods you can use.
So, what is so good about being a lucid dreamer? What would you gain from it? In order to understand the advantages of being aware when you are dreaming, we need to examine what regular sleep actually is.
Why lucid dreaming? When you go to sleep, you normally get into bed, close your eyes for a length of time, and then you either dream or aren’t conscious of anything for a while before waking up. Normal sleep isn’t very interesting!
Normal sleep just seems to serve the purpose of simply refreshing ourselves in order to live out the next day. But what if you could control that period of time that you have dreams?
Would you like to stop just being a passive observer and make sure your dreams are whatever you want them to be? That’s what being a lucid dreamer is all about. You’re totally in control of your dreams, and able to explore new worlds that aren’t bound to the real world’s laws.
How can a person achieve this? How do you learn to be a lucid dreamer? DILD refers to a dream initiated lucid dream. You need to realize you are dreaming. In other words, if you are dreaming and know it, you are having a lucid dream.
Method number two is a wake initiated lucid dream, or WILD. This is when the dreamer begins awake, then goes to being asleep, but without losing consciousness. The dreamer enters their dream as though via a door, instead of waking up inside a dream he or she is already having.
So what are the actual methods used to induce these two types of lucid dream experiences?
Dream Recall
If you’d like to lucid dream, perhaps one of the most successful way of doing so is known as dream recall. Dream recall is simply the ability to remember one’s dreams. By remembering your dreams, you are able to recognize them when you are sleeping, because most likely, you will have the same dream, or at least aspects of it, more than once.
The best way to practice dream recall is through keeping a dream journal. This is a tool in which you write down whatever you can remember about your dream so you can recall it in the future. Do this right after you wake up – dreams are harder to remember the longer you wait.
Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD)
This technique was developed by Dr. Stephen LaBerge, one of the lead scientists in the field of lucid dreaming. To use this method, just tell yourself about an object or element that you will remember. When you dream, there’s a good chance you’ll see this element, then realize that you’re dreaming.
WBTB refers to Wake Back to Bed
The way you do this one is, only plan on sleeping for a few hours like five or six. Set your alarm if you need to so you will wake up. After you have slept the few hours and wake up, stay up. Find something to do to stay awake. Do a little house work; Think about what you might like to do in your lucid dreams. Return to bed in an hour.
According to Stephen LaBerge, there is a 60% success rate of this technique. The reason why is that you would have woken up during the process of sleep, meaning that your mind is not fully aware of this, and are still in the middle of REM cycle. So basically, it’s like going to your mind and telling it that you want to lucid dream.
Cycle Adjustment Technique
Daniel Love came up with this way to accomplish lucid dreaming. Start getting up an hour and a half earlier. After you get used to this, go back to getting up at your usual time. Since you are used to getting up earlier but don?t have to now, your mind is still thinking you are awake, therefore you will be more likely to be aware in your dream.
WILD refers to Wake Initiation of Lucid Dreams
The trick is to keep your conscious mind aware and let your physical body sleep. This can prove to be very interesting. Lay back, close your eyes and wait for your dream to begin. Imagine you have put a movie in the DVD player and you are waiting for it to begin. Focus on the black screen until your dream begins to play out.
You need to stay aware; it is a lot like self hypnosis. This is not a good exercise to try when you are tired as your mind may not stay as aware. Try to focus on things that require brain activity such as doing math puzzles, jogging or anything to keep your mind active. Breathe evenly and focus on relaxing every part of your body.
They now have tools you can use to make it even easier to induce lucid dreams. You can get dreaming masks and devices with strobe lights to help you get into the right state of dreaming.
The best and easiest way to achieving the state of lucid dreaming is by using headphones.You should listen to sounds that naturally alter your brainwaves, these are called binaural beats.
These work by synchronizing the two hemispheres of the brain and have the effect of almost instantaneously changing your brainwaves to the REM frequency needed for a lucid dream to occur.
Combined with self affirmations and sessions of self hypnosis, these methods make it easy to become a lucid dreamer. You just need the practice and determination