Thread: How do I stop lucid dreaming?

First of all, I am not a troll before you say so. So please do not be an idiot by suggesting so. This is a genuine question. I am 24. Do not work. Never have. The past year and a half since leaving university I have had strange sleeping habits. I get out of bed silly times. I go through phases. I will go weeks or months getting up 12/1 pm then 10pm then 4pm. Silly times. The last few weeks I am up anywhere between 3-5 pm (yes pm, not am). I have struggled to get to sleep since at least the age of 16. It takes me many hours to fall asleep, hence the times I get up.

Those times above are not what time I wake. I set my alarm clock every morning for anywhere between 7am and 10am. But when I get up I just keep resetting my alarm and getting back in bed. I do this numerous times. In between my alarm going off I am usually lucid dreaming. So some mornings I can lucid dream for hours.

I recently found out (via Google) that lucid dreaming is liked some sort of prized possession and many people would actually love to be in my situation. So what is the problem you ask? Well, as well as being aware that I am dreaming, I am also sort of aware at the same time that I do not want to be in bed right now. That I am wasting my life away in my bed. That I have goals I wish to work towards and lying in my bed is not going to get me anywhere. I know I should not be in bed and want to get out of bed. But I just cannot for the life of me get out of bed. I am always aware of a dream I am having.

I cannot get out of bed because the dream I am having is too enjoyable, certainly compared to my shitty reality. The only enjoyment I get out of life is in these dreams. I live a lot of fantasies in these dreams. But a lot of the time, I am not even sure if the dream is exciting at all, and I believe I am just convinced it is important, and that I must stay in bed so I do not miss something. It is like I am terrified of missing something. I also seem to be unable to move. I feel paralysed (it is not sleep paralyses). I want to get up, but I cannot get up. Something in me is aware that I do not want to be in bed but something is keeping me in bed. This is not just pure laziness, like I am awake and can't be bothered getting up or something. I am aware I am dreaming, every single morning, and for at least a couple of hours.

Another thing that has been happening lately is False Awakenings. This is horrible. I genuinely think that I have finally managed to get myself out of bed and do some morning (afternoon in my case) rituals and I may even feel a slight satisfaction that I have managed to drag myself out of bed. Yet suddenly I realise I am still in bed. I am pretty sure this is repeated a number of times. It is horrible because I just do not know when I am out of bed. I also seem to have a lot of scary experiences of a morning. It is hard to remember what they are thinking about it NOW, but I just remember feeling really frightened at times.

So what is the problem? You must be thinking if my real life is so bad and the dreams provide the only joy, then what is the problem? The problem is, I do not want to live my life in dreams. I want to live my life in reality. I have goals and staying in bed for so long I will never amount to anything. It would be impossible for me to even get a job or live a slightly normal life in my current predicament. The problem is, my lucid dreams are so good, they make it impossible for me to get out of bed. Yes impossible.

Another major problem is that sometimes I just do not know whether I am dreaming or in real life. I feel like Leonardo Di Caprio in Inception. You are probably thinking, but if you are lucid dreaming, then by definition, you are aware you are dreaming. Not entirely true. Yes I am aware I am dreaming when I am lying in my bed each morning. In other words, I am NOT lost in the dream, like in a normal dream. There is some awareness in the background of the dream. But, despite the awareness, these dreams still feel very real to me. In other words, they feel the same as real life. Also, the False Awakenings I am having (which I presume are linked to lucid dreaming somehow) seem so completely real.

Anyhow, I have gone on a bit here. I believe these are playing a major part in preventing me from getting out of bed of a morning and getting on with life. I want them to stop now. I am sick of living my life in dreams. I want to live it for real. Right now I feel like my life is a dream within a dream and I want to start living the dream instead (what I mean by that is, I believe life is just a dream anyway and a dream is actually a dream within a dream).

Help me please.