Thread: Hey I'm new :) & my own experiences

I have very few nightmares so I have not practiced some of the techniques used to eliminate them. But in principle - the fact that you're lucid should give you all the tools you need to control and eliminate your nightmares.

There are different methods I've read. Laberge addresses this in "Exploring the world of lucid dreaming". Rinpoche addresses it in "The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep". But the gist is you need to relate to the dream characters with compassion and acceptance - understanding that they cannot hurt you in any sense. That should eliminate the immediate unpleasantness of the situation.

In principe, if you understand the deeper root cause of the nightmare, you should be able to eliminate that as well.

Example - let's say you have a nightmare about being unprepared for an exam. If you get lucid - get up in front of the class and tell the teacher this isn't important, I graduated a long time ago and I don't care to participate. Furthermore, I'm not going to let this bother me going forward. Then just walk out.

To help your dream control try to take deep breathes and relax in the dream (do you breathe in dreams?):p Well any way once you know you are dreaming just keep thinking that "This is a dream". Then try to slowly lift up your arm, just try to be gentle and slow and do it carefully.