Safety Regarding Lucid Dreaming

I just had a discussion over the phone with a friend tonight and told them about my new-found interest in lucid dreaming. They were very skeptical and warned me to be careful, since I was having my brain do something different than its used to doing.

While I wholeheartedly disagree with the idea that lucid dreaming is in any way dangerous (I imagine that lucid dreaming every single night to the point your body is getting no rest is not possible because, if you're too tired to be conscious during dreams, you're just going to be asleep and dream without becoming lucid!), I found I wasn't absolutely concrete 100% sure that lucid dreaming was truly never dangerous. At one point in the conversation, compared the act of inducing lucid dreams to overclocking a computer - when I went to correct him in saying that lucid dreaming does NOT push your brain to or close to maximum performance capabilities, I didn't have any proof outside of my own experiences to tell or show him otherwise.

So, I pose the following to you:

1. Is Lucid Dreaming in the ways that DV promotes it to be completely safe? I believe it is, I want extra input but most of all want some form of evidence that it is. (Can some of you more experienced dreamers support me on this?) I know methods like WILD and WBTB can cause sleep deprivation, but I'm not asking about the induction techniques, I am asking about the actual act of lucid dreaming, either in general or on a constant/semi-constant long-term basis?

2. To the above mention of the brain being "overclocked" while lucid dreaming, can someone help me find some kind of evidence (any kind of evidence - personal experience, credible publications if there are such a thing, etc.) that supports the idea that lucid dreaming is not pushing your mind to points of overworking? I believe lucid dreaming is a natural phenomenon (correct if wrong) and that it in no way pushes your mind to working during sleep, thus causing you to have diminished or no rest while sleeping.

I sincerely thank you for any enlightenment, support, or other input on this thread. (And yes, even just your opinion, backed by personal experience, is appreciated and will build my confidence in this case promoting lucid dreaming to be a safe practice.)

If dreaming is safe, how can a lucid dream not be safe?

When a person is in REM sleep, the brain operates the same whether a dream is normal or lucid, does it not?

I've never come across anything saying that lucid dreaming isn't dangerous.

Then again, I've yet to come across one single publication saying that it IS dangerous.

Clearly lucid dreamers aren't collapsing left and right. It's quite the opposite, actually. Only the people who have no success disappear from the site over time. The ones who do manage and master it keep coming back for more, or at the least move to the off-topic section of the site and are around for years.

Natural lucid dreamers are everywhere. People often learn to become lucid as small children. And then they grow up. They don't all just suddenly die at the age of six or seven.

So your friend is asking for evidence that it ISN'T dangerous, which I haven't come across yet and I've been trying to get my hands on anything and everything published on lucid dreaming.

Ask him to find you something published saying that it is dangerous. I think both are vastly underrepresented in the literature. Which to me means it's such a non-issue that no one worries about it because they haven't noticed any trends that would lead them to want to study it and all their lucid dreamers are perfectly healthy.

If he were to say something like "Unhealthy depressed people will flock to lucid dreaming to utilize it as an escape mechanism" then I'd agree- but since you said that it's more about the actual brain during lucid dreaming? Nah.

Here's another thread on the topic http://dreamviews.com/community/showthread.php?t=74798

Here is an excerpt from ETWOLD(page 29):

Q. Might lucid dreaming be dangerous for some people?

The overwhelming majority of lucid dreams are positive, rewarding experiences, much more so than ordinary dreams(to say nothing of nightmares). Nevertheless, there probably will be some people who find the experience of lucid dreaming frightening and, in some cases, extremely disturbing. For this reason we cannot recommend lucid dreaming to everyone. On the other hand, we are confident that for people no more than "normally neurotic", lucid dreaming is completely harmless. Different people will use lucid dreaming for different purposes; it makes little sense to warn the typical explorer of the dream world away from lucid dreaming because some people might use it in a less than optimal manner.

If, after reading the first 6 chapters of this book, you still have serious reservations about lucid dreaming, then we recommend that you not continue. "To thine own self be true." Just make sure that is is really your self to which you are being true. Don't allow others to impose their personal fears on you.

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Originally Posted by Shift

If he were to say something like "Unhealthy depressed people will flock to lucid dreaming to utilize it as an escape mechanism" then I'd agree

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:)

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Originally Posted by Flashdance

If dreaming is safe, how can a lucid dream not be safe?

When a person is in REM sleep, the brain operates the same whether a dream is normal or lucid, does it not?

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I had explained to my friend that by inducing lucid dreams, I was triggering my logical brain sector to begin functioning when in regular sleep it's dormant (my understanding of it, that is, correct if wrong!), which to him seemed like a risky area, since I was having my brain do something different than it was used to. I refuted the idea of it being risky to know that you're dreaming, but I wanted the community's input, to ensure I was on the right path.

A little point he brought up that made me see where his reservations on lucid dreaming came from: He illuminated to me that he had heard of some people who had mental disorders and conditions that would cause them to be completely shut-off from the outside world, and just simply stare, living within their own mind-created world, which to him sounded very similar to lucid dreaming - that's why (from how I see it) he was worried about doing such things like induced lucid dreaming, because it sounded so much like that scary kind of situation. It's clearly different, which he understood, but it just had "parallels" to it that to him were rather suspicious, but to me didn't seem suspicious at all. (I did, indeed, have a confirmation bias since I endorse lucid dreaming, but I tried fighting it and remaining objective in the interest of giving a proper analysis of the issue of whether or not lucid dreaming was potentially dangerous.) I suppose that part was largely because of the scare he'd had after learning about such mental disorders, and this just reminded him of it too much for him to find as a harmless and even interesting/cool activity.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Shift

Ask him to find you something published saying that it is dangerous. I think both are vastly underrepresented in the literature. Which to me means it's such a non-issue that no one worries about it because they haven't noticed any trends that would lead them to want to study it and all their lucid dreamers are perfectly healthy.

If he were to say something like "Unhealthy depressed people will flock to lucid dreaming to utilize it as an escape mechanism" then I'd agree- but since you said that it's more about the actual brain during lucid dreaming? Nah.

Here's another thread on the topic http://dreamviews.com/community/showthread.php?t=74798

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Thanks for the great input, this is much appreciated. :) Now, his idea was that I was doing something different with my brain, arranging my daily and nightly routine and training my mind to cause the induction of lucid dreams, something that my mind wasn't naturally doing beforehand. As mentioned above (sorry about the wordiness of it), he saw parallels with that and a mental disorder or some kind of disease that sounded like people could be trapped in a fantasy world within their minds, cut off from the outside world, which scared him when he thought of me doing anything new with my mind.

And in case I didn't make it clear or you might've missed it somewhere in the post, I have absolutely no reservations of any sort on lucid dreaming, but was wondering about the known or unknown safety of the practice, in case I was put to the question by someone else. So, I'm still trying to LD every night and won't stop until I get more lucid dreams, no worries about that! :D

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Flashdance

Here is an excerpt from ETWOLD(page 29):

Q. Might lucid dreaming be dangerous for some people?

The overwhelming majority of lucid dreams are positive, rewarding experiences, much more so than ordinary dreams(to say nothing of nightmares). Nevertheless, there probably will be some people who find the experience of lucid dreaming frightening and, in some cases, extremely disturbing. For this reason we cannot recommend lucid dreaming to everyone. On the other hand, we are confident that for people no more than "normally neurotic", lucid dreaming is completely harmless. Different people will use lucid dreaming for different purposes; it makes little sense to warn the typical explorer of the dream world away from lucid dreaming because some people might use it in a less than optimal manner.

If, after reading the first 6 chapters of this book, you still have serious reservations about lucid dreaming, then we recommend that you not continue. "To thine own self be true." Just make sure that is is really your self to which you are being true. Don't allow others to impose their personal fears on you.



:)

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Alright, support from ETWOLD! I have the book, but have yet to break into it and start my personal research, though I probably should have prior to starting this thread. Your input and that of Dr. LaBerge is very helpful.

I may have misconstrued my friend by not showing his understanding of my intentions and interest with lucid dreaming, since he was definitely not actually AGAINST me doing the practice, but was expressing why he would never try it. He made sure that I understood that he wasn't trying to discourage me from it, but wanted me to know why he wouldn't do it himself, and got me thinking I should look into facts about the safety (or potential dangers) with lucid dreaming, short-term or long-term or otherwise.

I'm very confident that lucid dreaming is completely safe for a typical healthy 19-year-old college student like myself, and this thread's responses just further enforce that, and I deeply thank you all for providing me with your insights into the issue.


I do have a question about a point brought up earlier:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Shift

If he were to say something like "Unhealthy depressed people will flock to lucid dreaming to utilize it as an escape mechanism" then I'd agree- but since you said that it's more about the actual brain during lucid dreaming? Nah.

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Can you re-word this, and explain it further? I'm not sure I understand what you mean by this section.

For the most part, something I have noticed especially on this website is that a number of people use lucid dreaming as a form of escapism- to get away from reality. The same way that someone might abuse drugs, or video games, or even books or movies or sitting alone away from other people. In the case where people are already severely depressed and going to find ones to keep themselves out of society and engage in a sort of fantasy world, I think this is really common. But, this is a totally different issue to what you and your friend are discussing. I just mentioned it because it's, literally, the only thing that I have really been able to see as being a negative effect of lucid dreaming- making depressed people more depressed and less involved in real life (I don't mean awareness,I mean getting out and overcoming depression!).

I totally agree. Maybe if you help your friend have a couple of lucids of his own he won't be as uptight? Really though there are a bunch of psychologists who have researched lucid dreaming so far and I haven't come across a single thing mentioning it being unhealthy or unsafe. Really I don't think there's any argument to be made against your friend except that, at the moment, there doesn't seem to be even an inkling of proof that scientists and doctors are even concerned enough to try to research it.

I definitely understand your view and agree with it in this discussion between you and your friend.

Thank you very much, Shift, now I see where you're coming from on that. :D As for the "bunch of psychologists who have researched lucid dreaming", I don't suppose you'd happen to recall where I might look into some of their findings? In case you aren't sure of specific names or where to find those results (I may or may not learn something from it, but I figure I should at least have a look at it) I'll have a google-go at it and see what I can come up with, but if you can pinpoint me in the right direction, that'd be a nice boost to go along with the great input you've given me thus far. :)

There are all sorts of people who study lucid dreaming, sleep paralysis, etc. I've only managed to come across a handful of researchers specifically discussing lucid dreaming but here are their names:

A. Durndell, A. Patrick, Adrian Parker, Brigitte Holzinger, Daniel Erlacher, Deirdre McLaren, Hangwi Tang, Jan van den Bout, Jayne Gackenbach, Kate Durso, Kenneth F. Whyte, Louis Hagood, Lynne Levitan, M. Blagrov, Marino Bosinelli, Michael Schredl, Miloslava Kozmova, Nimi Sharma, Patrick McNamara, PierCarla Cicogna, Richard N. Wolman, S.J. Hartnell, Stephen LaBerge, Timo Paulsson, Victor I. Spoormaker

Thanks a lot, I'll make time to look into them. In the meantime, looks like I've got enough support to believe that lucid dreaming (meaning, inducing lucid dreams using various methods commonly used by adventurous dreamers, such as DILD, MILD, WILD, DEILD, among others) is indeed a safe practice.