Hi all,

So the story that brings me here is that I've been trying to develop mindfulness through meditation for some time now and with some success, but felt I'd hit a block not so much with the actual meditation practice but as a result of dreams during the mornings, which would knock my mind right out of the present/awareness into busy thought streams...

Following some wondering about how Buddhists deal with unconscious dreaming interrupting their practice there was some helpful synchronicity: a friend told me she had started attempting lucid dreaming and another herbalist friend introduced me to the use of mugwort for developing dream. Anyway, it all came together when I was given a book called 'Living, Dreaming, Dying' by Rob Nairn, which is a Tibetan Buddhist/Jungian integration on the skilful use of dreamtime (including REM lucidity) on the path to the Buddhist enlightenment.

I've seen that there is discussion on the forum of the transcendental possibilities of lucid dreaming, which is really encouraging: following what I've read about the 'dream bardo', what I'm really keen to achieve is, through the following of the Buddhist Vajrayana vehicle (tantric Buddhism), the conscious transition from lucid dreaming during REM to non-REM sleep, or what the Tibetans call 'the clear light of sleep'. The belief is that this is among the fastest of methods to bring a soul to enlightenment within the Buddhist tradition (possible in your own experience in this life/death).*

I'm aware that I'm many years (or maybe even lifetimes(!)) and a tantric guru or three away from that, to be honest, and what I'm looking at is improving dream recall as the realistic first step. But I'm really excited by what I've read so far, and am glad to have found what seems like a rich and active community for support and sharing - can't wait to get started! *waves*

* As the transitions of the dream mind states are analogous to the transitions of the death mind states and if it is possible to recognise this 'clear light' it's possible to escape the cycle of rebirth. A lot of this is just stuff I've read, rather than experienced, so I'm naturally skeptical - however I have a strong instinct about the truth of the potential of the dream work.