Thread: Lucid Dreaming Fundamentals -- With Q & A

I haven't checked this thread in a while, but now I will delightful catch up with the new pages ^^

Q: You talked earlier about being a hard journey to gain discipline in order to achieve a high state of awareness. What would you say it's this discipline? Do you "forced" yourself to it, or did you simply took it for granted while pursuing specific goals, rather than hoping for lucids? I know the way that some one achieves their goals is rather personal and unique, but could you give us some insight ?

Q: Mental blocks. As dreams are somewhat a bridge between the unconscious and the conscious self, we may not always be aware of a particular racionalization regarding our dreams. Why we dream with this, why we can't do that. This seems to take especially importance regardings techniques: many people have their first lucids without having a clue, and then when they get "informed" seems the lucids are harder to come by. This subject is also very present in certain degrees of dream control (eg "I could never do that!" "my control is always low"). What would you say it's the cause for these mental blocks? Can we really overcome them by rationalizing, or is not that simple? For last, dream control: product of intention or understanding ?

Ah, you always ask questions that make me think, zoth00; thank you.

That said, let me see if I actually have answers for them...

Originally Posted by zoth00

I haven't checked this thread in a while, but now I will delightful catch up with the new pages ^^

Q: You talked earlier about being a hard journey to gain discipline in order to achieve a high state of awareness. What would you say it's this discipline? Do you "forced" yourself to it, or did you simply took it for granted while pursuing specific goals, rather than hoping for lucids? I know the way that some one achieves their goals is rather personal and unique, but could you give us some insight ?

When I used it, I wondered if the word "discipline" might have been too harsh a choice, due to the negativity attached to it. But real awareness does indeed come from discipline -- from intentionally and repeatedly channeling your mind toward places it is not used to going. I would say that the discipline is uniquely simple: build your self-awareness by constantly exercising it. And yes, I did force it upon myself, in the name of stronger LD's. Sadly, I suppose, self-awareness must be forced; it is not a natural event (not yet, anyway; I have a feeling that the next step in evolution will be one of awareness, and not physicality -- but that is for another time). Now, if you're looking for a specific discipline, I can't help you. This is for three reasons -- first, I must have tried two dozen different disciplines over the years, all of them valid, and some reasonably effective, but there is no space to go into them all here (I also don't want to). Second, the form of the discipline must be changed regularly, so that you don't fall into a habit. As soon as you get "used to" doing something, no matter how helpful or impressive it was at the outset, it loses all its power, awareness-wise. The mind exercises you do must always feel fresh, especially if you're using them with stronger LD'ing as a goal. LD's are driven by novelty, not by routine. Third, since it is a very personal thing, the discipline I practice may be completely useless to you; you really need to set up your own regime -- it is best not to use someone else's design in this department. I hope that made sense, because it's very important -- if it didn't, and you care, let me know.

Q: Mental blocks. As dreams are somewhat a bridge between the unconscious and the conscious self, we may not always be aware of a particular rationalization regarding our dreams. Why we dream with this, why we can't do that. This seems to take especially importance regarding techniques: many people have their first lucids without having a clue, and then when they get "informed" seems the lucids are harder to come by. This subject is also very present in certain degrees of dream control (eg "I could never do that!" "my control is always low"). What would you say it's the cause for these mental blocks? Can we really overcome them by rationalizing, or is not that simple?

First, a quick note about that first, accidental, LD: Think of it in terms of a person being introduced to the game of darts, and on his very first throw gets a bulls-eye. That doesn't mean he is proficient at darts, it simply means that that is where one of his darts randomly landed. He might spend many hours practicing before he ever gets close to another bulls-eye, on purpose. In other words, that first LD has nothing to do with the skill of LD'ing, save that it gives a person a brief glimpse at the potential of the state. So, It might take years of practice and preparation to get to the second LD, but it's not from a mental block.

Now to what you were actually asking: rationalization, or lending reason to your dreams, can do more harm than good. That doesn't make it a bad thing, just a dangerous tool. This is because the last thing you want to be doing when establishing lucidity (or preparing for it) is adding intellectual explanation to your actions or experience. So yes indeed, if you get caught up in techniques, and all the rules or expected conditions that accompany them, you might effectively "block" your awareness from simple communion with your dreaming mind (aka: unconscious). As you already noted, rationalization is also a problem because you do not want to find yourself in a dream saying something like, "I can't do this." Ever. If you think nothing at all during a dream, and have strong self-awareness & memory, you will simply be able to do anything you want, period -- you do not have to think about it, or call up some defined technique, because that will only complicate the situation by the attachment of alien decisions and rules. When this happens, your dreaming mind tends to respond with lost lucidity. Oddly, that replacement might be a non-lucid dream that you are lucid, according to all the rules, so you might not notice the change until you wake up.

So yes, mental blocks can definitely be caused when you fill your head with techniques, complex (or overstated) expectations, or someone else's description of what the LD should be like. And yes, we can overcome them with rationalization, but it would be better if that weren't necessary. Make sense? I hope so!

For last, dream control: product of intention or understanding?

Yes.

You need both, with understanding being the priority. Your mind, your self, needs to simply "know" it has the ability to do anything in a dream, and there is where all that discipline comes into play. Once you have the right mindset, though, you need focus, and that focus comes from intention. It is best to form that intention before sleep, but you can gather it during a dream as well, especially if the dream scenario is unexpected -- this can be hazardous to lucidity as well, though, because your intention during a dream can be enveloped in the dream itself, and you start doing things as defined by the dream, or the DC "you," rather than things defined by your waking-life self. Here again it is helpful to have strong self-awareness so that you can notice things going astray and take a pause to allow your awareness to step away from the dream to gather strength.

I hope these answers made sense; let me know if they did not....

Originally Posted by Sageous

When this happens, your dreaming mind tends to respond with lost lucidity. Oddly, that replacement might be a non-lucid dream that you are lucid, according to all the rules, so you might not notice the change until you wake up.

I've seen this eluded to in other posts before, and have always wondered about it. I can't quite wrap my brain around it. Can you elaborate on what this means?

On awareness. I have been experiencing... I guess you could call it mental fatigue. I cannot seem to have the gumption to try to hold my awareness or even remember to practice it as much as I did before. I have a very mentally taxing job and have to focus a great deal on the task at hand. Is it detrimental to my progress to sort of back off once and a while? Or am I just regressing? I think it would be like working out your physical body. Yes, take breaks but don't slack off too much. I just feel tired some days during the week and just can't practice my awareness like I want to. Or maybe instead of trying to hold awareness for so long, I should just do a quick thing but more frequent?