Thread: I'm brutally forced into lucid dreams and I have other questions if you will

It sounds to me like your problem is not really the becoming lucid part, lucidity is kicking in because you are having very brutal dreams of being manhandled, and you are becoming lucid because you realize that this brutality is too much and thus it must be a dream.

There are two options for you I think.

Option 1: Figure out why at this time in your life you are having dreams of being brutally manhandled, and try to change things in your waking life to make more peaceful dreams more likely.

Option 2: Improve your lucid dreaming abilities so that you can be empowered in these dreams and stop the brutality within your dream.

There may be other options, but I can't think of them right now.

Best!

Hello Spunk, that's so strange that you've been having experiences with being dragged out. I've had one scary experience that was very similar to that. I woke up feeling the vibrations and before I knew it, it honestly felt like someone was gripping me around my ankles and dragging me (astral/dream body - not my physical one) off of my bed. I hung on for dear life, on to what I have no idea. I was just very resistant to go along with whatever was making me experience that. It was so scary at the time that I would deliberately refrain from having the vibrations on the chance that it might happen again.

What do your lucids consist of when you do enter the dream? Are the dreams themselves violent?

I've gotten over that event and now treat everything as a learning experience. If I happen to have it again I'd like to take some time and analyze it, or delve into it and try to come to terms on why it happened.

(I do know how you feel about RCs and all day awareness. I'm struggling to take the time to make it work for me as well. Sometimes my mind is preoccupied with the present and it takes a concentrated effort from me to make it into a daily habit. )

That sounds really unpleasant! Have you tried talking to whoever is dragging you around? "Hey, who are you, and what do you think you are doing in my dream?"

I think JoannaB hit the nail on the head. There might be something going on in your life that is mirrored in your dream (entry), and you might be able to benefit by working on improving your dream control. Of course, the latter might be tedious if you're really looking to stop lucid dreaming. If this tends to happen mostly during naps, is there any way you could avoid napping until you are so far out of the habit of lucid dreaming that it would no longer happen?

Also, I'm wondering what you meant when you described being fed up with reality checks. On one hand, you spend a lot of time doing them, and it seems that you are saying that this gradually became necessary in order for you to keep having LDs. On the other hand, you're saying that LDs happen even though you no longer want them to. So which is it? Do LDs require a lot of work (reality checks) or not? Or is it that you only want DILDs, and no WILDs? Because WILDs are quite easy to avoid if you just stick to a single block of sleep per 24 hours.

Good luck, and please give those sleep-disturbers a stern talking-to!

Wild theories here, but maybe your subconscious mind thinks otherwise from lucid dreaming like you do?

same thing with me, every now and then I'm brutally forced into my dreams, but to make matters even worse, usually after I enter the dream, I enter as a mutant where I can feel the sensation of an enormous throbbing head or something connected to my body, its utterly painful and I can't do anything to break out of it.

Originally Posted by Spunk

Hey, I've been practicing lucid dreaming for over five years now, and lately I've been forcefully dragged and pushed into my lucid dreams. I'll go to take a nap on the carpet of my house, and all of a sudden I'm being pulled around on the floor of my house. Someone is grabbing my legs and dragging me, and my back is just getting torn up from the ground. It's so real that even though I'm completely aware it's fake, I sometimes worry that perhaps I've joined into reality with this dream (supernatural) and that I'll break something or make a ruckus. During this time I can most definitely snap out of it and wake, but I'm too lax. Once I'm finished being dragged, I get shoved hard from behind so that I'll sit up. (I have no vision during all of this, I can only feel and hear.) After I'm pushed up to my knees and then onto my legs, it's only then that scenes around me begin to form and I have vision. I'm basically thrown into a dream, violently. I manipulate the world with ease, and I am not aware of any impairments. It's just the way I enter the dream that is so odd. It's been happening frequently as of late.

I'm aware that entering dreams lucidly is common (especially with naps) and of hypnagogia, but why am I being manhandled in such a way? I haven't had any desire to practice lucid dreaming in awhile now, so it's completely unexpected. Why can't I just peacefully enter lucid dreams like I used to do? To be honest, I'm not even interested in lucid dreaming anymore so the whole thing annoys me.

I began to lose interest in lucid dreaming after reality checks started to become nearly impossible to perform. I can still do reality checks, of course, but the amount of fucking effort I have to put into them nowadays is absolutely absurd. I don't have the mental strength to do them most of the time. Has anyone else experienced this tolerance? My dream checks now require two minutes to perform by just standing there, questioning this, questioning that, gazing at this, gazing away at this, gazing back at this, gazing at that, gazing away from that, gazing back to that, rethinking about my day, thinking about my future, taking a dream breath and just looking at my surroundings, dream objects, etc. This isn't reasonable to do when you're talking with friends or in a checkout aisle. I can't just stand there looking like a freak for two minutes whenever something odd happens (or when nothing happens). And if I only perform a few checks, most of the time it proves ineffective. My dreams have developed an antibody to my tests if you will. They have become so real and resistant. Even when I catch my dreams redhanded, I am restrained and can't free myself fully. It's as if there is this godlike force suffocating me in those brief moments that I open my eyes. I can only reach half-lucidity before I'm sucked back in into ignorance.

I was never interested in those cheap methods of tricking your body and whatnot that you're asleep and becoming lucid that way. Lucid dreaming is all about being aware, and idk I consider those methods unrewarding.

Anyway just interested to hear your thoughts on the matter, and any answers as to why I'm forced into lucid dreaming and how to lower my tolerance (besides just not lucid dreaming anymore). Glad to be part of the forum!

Your violent entry is just a pattern your mind has created during WILD. You are performing a WILD here, whether you are trying to or not. Basically, your body/mind go into SP and then all sorts of hallucinations can happen. In your case, you had a pretty violent WILD experience (which can happen from time to time). Now, whether you are trying to do this or not, part of your mind is expecting the violent thrust into the dream world. This expectation alone can cause this sequence to repeat. Your mind has created a process/pattern for entering the dream. Its all good though, because all you have to do is break this one time (stop it as its happening), and you can stop it every time from that point on.

Next time this starts happening, completely ignore the experience. Act like it isn't even happening and just stay calm and relaxed. If your body starts getting dragged, just act like it isn't getting dragged. Act like you are just laying there and transitioning peacefully into the dream. If you act as if something isn't happening, it will go away. Even if you know your body is being dragged, just simply pretend it isn't and it won't be. It sounds pretty simple, and it really is that simple.

Any luck changing your LD entry yet, Spunk?

These were fantastic responses. Thank you all. I haven't had any of the aforementioned experiences since leaving Asia a few months ago. All is well. I actually plan on dipping my feet back into lucid dreaming.

*tips hat to KingYoshi* I realize you posted a couple months ago, but it's good to see another familiar name since my reappearance. Hope all is well.

Anyway Spunk, I can't really comment on the violent dragging because I've never experienced that but I'm pretty sure Yoshi hit it, my first thought was that it sounded like a WILD also. In my first and only WILD, I kept having random annoyances from my dog and my mother that I thought were actually happening as I was trying to go to sleep, then slowly realized that I had already entered my dream without even knowing it. I was aware of myself the whole time, I just mistakenly thought I was still awake.

As for the reality checks being frustrating, I feel you. When I came back here I started doing them again with the aid of a random alarm on my phone (an app specifically for LD / RC) and it was nice to get back into the habit the first couple weeks but after a while it can be a little aggravating. Also I started to remember from a couple years ago when I was better at all this, that just as you said the reality checks were getting harder because the dream would try to negate them at every point. I remember one of my RCs back then was reading text because I could never read in my dreams, and after a while I would be able to read with perfect clarity in my dreams and it would no longer work. I think part of the problem is taking the reality checks too seriously and viewing them as a chore, as I started to recently. But as for the dreams being resistant, I'm really not sure how to work on that part. I'm struggling right now myself with these stupid "partial lucidity" dreams where I'll realize it's a dream but I just can't fully take control. I just go along with the original plot line and occasionally do something outside the norm "because it's only a dream anyway" and the clarity isn't up to par. I don't get that big rush of consciousness like I used to. Weird thing is, I never really just did a reality check during a dream and became lucid as a result. I would become lucid somewhat randomly, often by just noticing that something didn't feel/look quite right (which is where I think ADA I was practicing at the time helped), then confirm with a reality check and that's when I'd get the "rush." One of my favorite RCs to do was to look at my hand or try to push my finger through my palm, because my hand usually looked pretty funky in a dream.

I have an idea though (I know this isn't new, I've just never tried to USE it), that instead of concentrating so much on RCs maybe you could analyze your dreams for common signs. For example one of my dream signs is that I'm at work and everything that's going on is completely absurd. Or guns / violence. If there's a gun in my hand or I'm fighting, I'm probably dreaming because I generally keep guns put up and have no reason to use them in real life unless I'm out on the range, and I've only been in one or two fights in real life. Revolvers especially because in the dream world the cylinder never quite gets rendered right. Basically I'm wondering if there's a way we can keep in mind these kinds of common inconsistencies and meditate on that and try to remember "if x is happening, THEN do RC". I always did my RCs randomly in real life and not as a response to anything specific because if I only RC'd in response to dream signs I'd never get to RC, it's a catch 22. I'm just not 100% sure how to actually go about using those signs to help me become lucid.

Sorry for being longwinded, but I hope something in there was useful.

Even little unintentional expectation of having that brutal WILD might result in having it again and again. I did not have anything similar happen to me, I had my own strange events, but I also once tried to quit lucid dreaming.

And I faced a problem that I could not quit lucid dreaming and they started to annoy me more and more, the more I tried to quit the worse it was. At that time all my dreams were lucid, so even I did not want to lucid dream and dream at all, I still had lots of lucid dreams every night. During 4 month I was trying to solve this problem and I found one solution that worked really well.

Learn to be an observer, learn not to interfere in your dreams. Try to relax as much as possible and simply watch your dreams as a movie, would it be 3rd person or 1st person view just learn to observe. It will be not an easy task in the beginning, in case you fail from being an observe, control your dream and move your self to any place you like. For example I was teleporting my self on top of a mountain with a beautiful view in front of me, the whole dream I was simply sitting there relaxed and enjoyed great fresh air and nice nature around me. You can try to do the same

When I decided to come back to lucid dreaming, took me around 2-3 weeks to completely get rid of a habit of being an observer.

duke396, YOU ROCK. You nailed it completely. I agree, it was obviously unintentional WILDs. When you mentioned how you "don't get that big rush of consciousness like I used to", that's exactly what's up with me too. When I first started lucid dreaming I would feel this incredible ecstasy and no matter what I would just straight rocket launch up into the sky and fly. But now it's so dull and forgettable. Oh, I'm dreaming? Hmm... I'm glad to see you feel my pain with reality checks too.

Your ending suggestion is decent. Basically I just need to gain an extreme awareness, which is exhausting. It'd be difficult to realize when x IS happening since x RARELY happens, leaving me little room to condition myself.


I will try to let go more in my dreams, flowofmysoul, and just watch next time. That's actually what I ended up doing in the end because I had no desire to go out and be 'active' really. I'd just walk and gaze (one of my favorite things to do was go to an art museum and stare at all these absurd paintings). Perhaps that helped me too with dreaming normally again and not lucidly. Thanks!

Yeah, I'm with you 100 percent. Back when I was first having trouble with the "rush of consciousness" not happening, I would do something to assert my lucidity which included extra reality checks, stabilizing when it's really not necessary, or even just yelling out at the top of my lungs "I am lucid!" it helped a lot, but lately I don't even have the awareness to do that.

Surely someone has figured out a way to utilize dream signs better than I explained it. It just seems like the only way to continue without getting burned out on RC or the act of RC causing hyper realistic dreams that resist. My first thought is to try to use a mantra as you go to sleep to leave the thought in your mind. After all, I feel like mantras really helped me with becoming lucid in the first place and with dream recall during dry spells.

If you are aware that it is a dream while being dragged around and manhandled. Just let go. Go with the flow. See where it takes you. Also. I NEVER do RC's - whenever I have a lucid dream, its just because I suddenly become aware during a dream. This is how its always been for me, and I absolutely agree with you, Lucid Dreaming is about awareness. Using tricks and strange methods to induce them is definitely not as rewarding.

Originally Posted by opalwolf

If you are aware that it is a dream while being dragged around and manhandled. Just let go. Go with the flow. See where it takes you. Also. I NEVER do RC's - whenever I have a lucid dream, its just because I suddenly become aware during a dream. This is how its always been for me, and I absolutely agree with you, Lucid Dreaming is about awareness. Using tricks and strange methods to induce them is definitely not as rewarding.

Same here, when I appear in my dream I always know that I am lucid. I used RC's and reminders to start lucid dreaming, but then it became natural.

try the nose plug technique and from there once you realize it's a dream you do what you want no matter what character's appear etc. do what you want to do because it's your desires and nobody else's, your experiences, you decide what you're going to do. hopefully you choose to push yourself closer to the boundaries of what you imagine is possible.