# Sleep and Dreams > Sleep and Health >  >  Lucid dreaming and insanity

## halcyon

Yesterday in class my history teacher was (oddly) talking about lucid dreams. He was explaining that lucid dreaming can actually hurt your brain when it's trying to process and organize infomation obtained during the day. He also said that if a person were to practice lucid dreaming on a regular basis, that person would go insane!  :Eek: 


Is there any truth in all this?

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## Jonathan

No, there are quite sane members of the forum who _naturally_ have at least one LD per night.

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## Dizko

No truth at all.

For some people, all of their dreams are lucid, and always have been.

Lucid dreaming will not make you go insane. Having nightmares you cannot control, leading to lack of sleep and paranoia, may make you go insane. Lucid dreaming gives you confidence, knowledge and control of your own self. Insanity is the complete opposite.

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## Metaphyz1k

This is absolutely false as far as I'm concerned. Dreams are dreams, lucid or not, and there is no evidence suggesting the possibility of insanity through any type of dreaming whatsoever. Dreams are natural and actually quite beneficial. Although, I do find it funny how our minds seem to guard us from lucidity, through the use of false awakenings and the like. Also, when we are dreaming, our minds will constantly make excuses for the odd occurrences we experience, which we often accept, and we are fooled into thinking we are still awake. Why is this? Is there a hidden danger to lucid dreaming that we are not aware of, only known to our minds who are tirelessly working to prevent us from attaining this harmful lucidity? I think it's a stretch, but an interesting idea, nonetheless.

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## annsie

I have a medical degree and I naturally lucid dream since a child so no, no insanity here.

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## Dannon Oneironaut

In fact it makes you more sane since you are bringing consciousness to the unconscious. It will make you more in control over yourself and your life, become more aware of your subconscious reactions and mental/emotional habits that create your experience of life. It helps you to choose your experience in life rather than being at the mercy of your subconscious. 

Either your history teacher should stick to things he knows about, like history, or else you were actually dreaming. Did you do a reality check?

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## halcyon

Finding out Lucid dreams aren't bad really relieved me  :smiley: 

And after reading more threads on the forums, I'm wondering why my history teacher was even talking about lucid dreams...

Hehe, maybe I *was* dreaming  ::D:

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## aniki

The most insane thing in my life was, until I figured out that I am not crazy and that I am having a lucid dream or just a normal sleep paralysis.
And believe me, it took me many, many years until I found that out.

Now I feel free and not sick anymore.

It is very common, I'm not living in an asylum, I have finished school and I'm great in what I'm doing. Thus saying, I don't REALLY think, that being lucid will wreck your brains.
Maybe math or chemistry will do, but hell no, not LD.  :smiley: 

take care

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## Naiya

I have at least 1-3 lucids every single night. This has been going on for at least....hmm, five years? Maybe seven? 

Still sane!  ::D:  

I know at least a couple of other members who have had LDs every night for many more years than I have, and while they may suffer from common things like anxiety or depression, those are such common problems that you really can't  say that they're caused by the lucid dreaming. That and a little anxiety is a far cry from insanity.  :tongue2: 

Hope that helps.

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## Abra

The sniveling apples do not request the destruction of sasquatch pants factories. If all goes well, the number balloon should fog up even the pinkest of liberties. Kumquat banana titmouse leprechauninja. Be not! Pee not! Peanut!

I've been lucid dreaming for over a year now. Nothing wrong with me! =D

Even if dreams were organizers of the day's thought, lucid dreaming is still 70-99&#37; influenced by your subconscious processes. That, and the frequency of lucid dreams are relatively low. Even naturals lack _control_ most of the time, and control is crucial to redirecting the dream. They are simply aware that they are dreaming, and go along with the dream. I believe we are all lucid on some level, because if we truly believed we were in reality, we wouldn't risk such zany actions (driving super fast, yelling at bosses, jumping off cliffs because a friend said you would fly, etc.).

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## Dannon Oneironaut

I cured my panic attacks and anxiety partially with lucid dreaming (specifically the WILD technique)

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## Oros

I think that the one who is insane is your teacher who scares the students from LD without knowing about it properly.
It's not true, because you sleep just as you do normaly just that you know that it is a dream.

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## lucid4sho

Don't try lucid dreaming mckay. Lucid dreaming is bad mckay. It will make you insane mckay.

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## Halocuber

> Don't try lucid dreaming mckay. Lucid dreaming is bad mckay. It will make you insane mckay.



Haha Ownage!

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## DreamingGhost

I do not think there is any truth to this. As even though you are controling your dreams you are still using them to process the days events. You can not control 100% of your dreams just your choices in them. 

Also my sister naturaly LDs every night. In fact she tells me that she can not go to sleep unless she has already planed out her dreams for the night.

D.G. ::jester::

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## Hukif

I have dreams every day since 7 years ago, lucid since 4 years ago and controlled since 3 years ago, so I would asume I must be already crazy <.<

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## TempleGuard

It can be true, or it can be just me. I am a bit crazy anyway(a bit paranoid or somethin, when its dark/i am alone), but since I started ld-ing (probably a year ago) i think I got worse. And at the begging (and sometimes till today), I remember some things from my chlildhood, and like after a minute or so later I start wondering if that was real, or dream. I now have some jumbled up memories, but I think I still can distinguish the real and the dream ones. And I think that my mind got too mixed up, but I dont know if its the lds or not. And btw I dont have lucids on regular basis, I had tonight, but didnt had one in more than a month(or I cant recall them, I never do anything for the recall).

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## Croneus

Agreed with msot of the above. Lucid dreaming has been shown to help combat nightmares, deal with the subconscious and issues therin, promote mind over body healing, ect. Sounds like your teacher is uneducated and shoudln't speak on things they're not fully understanding. The only way I could see someone going "insane" is if they were already prone to mental health issues and were unable to distinguish waking life from dream life. Excessive drug use, schizophrenia, extreme forms of trauma or abuse in a mental way, and other mental disorders could lead to this.

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## Shift

I would've started such a debate with that teacher and probably found out who among my fellow students was a natural at LD  ::tongue:: 

LDing has helped me a _lot_, except for making me question reality probably more so than other (non-LDing) people. And I'm not exactly sure that that is a bad thing, and of course you would if you were constantly wondering where exactly the input from your environment is coming from. I don't have any problems now that I didn't before LDing. In fact I'm much healthier. Sleeping less than 5 hours a night and eating shit diets and worrying about anxiety for school and work is what drives people insane. Now that I'm really into LDing I spend enough time sleeping and feel happier and healthier overall.

You know your teacher has probably just seen too many people wandering around trying to push their fingers through their palms or staring at their hands or something  ::tongue::

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## MedicineCrow

Yes, but crazy people don't know they're crazy!  :tongue2:

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## Idolfan

I'd love to have every dream lucid, it must be like heaven! (if it's not and there's someone on here who does and hates it, no offence).

I would be proud to go insane through lucid dreaming.

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## Rachel

OHHHHHH....is that what is wrong with me !

I honestly don't think so or I would be in an asylum by now !!

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## Caradon

Sounds like your teacher needs a little schooling himself.  :tongue2: 

Maybe you should direct him to the proper information.  ::D:

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## theyearthreethousand

the mind boggles. i didn't think that there was any proper information regarding lucid dreaming, nothing is really concrete (...or so i believed). my mind was definitely more at ease when i did not practice lucid dreaming; more often i have questioned many things that have no answers and are completely pointless (and a waste of time), but over the last few weeks or even months i have began to enjoy my time more on this planet - largely due to my conscious decision to become short sighted and to focus more on the factors in my personal life that i have control/influence over: family, enjoying time with friends and getting myself a serious/lasting gf -- i also channel any of my creativity/mental energy into my art with no filtering. when i tried (and succeeded) to ld a lot and was at a stage where i began looking into similar subjects, it seemed as though i was on a downward spiral and in fact losing my mind (sprays). i almost envy people that are oblivious and wish that my brain had a stabilizing (i almost typed /off) function -- never mind, there are always drukqs!

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