User talk:Redminec/sandbox

Synopsis[edit] This book attempts to teach the skills that can help you to have lucid dreams — dreams in which one knows he or she is dreaming. For the skeptical, lucid dreams have been scientifically demonstrated to exist. The ability to lucid dream will open your mind to a world of infinite possibilities as you become adept at taking control of your dreams.

We will start by explaining how lucid dreaming works biologically. Next, the book will prepare you for lucid dreaming by helping you to remember more of your dreams (dream recall). You will then learn a variety of ways of becoming, and staying, lucid. Finally, you will find suggested activities to try while in the dream world...

Contents[edit] Before each target there is an image with a subjective indication of how complete that target is:

25%.svg Means that there is little information or the information there may not be reliable. 50%.svg Means that there is some information, but it's not very detailed or extensive. 75%.svg Means that much of the information is there, but it needs to be touched up or organized. This is still usable. 100 percents.svg Means that the information is basically complete. However, more detail can always be added.

Introduction[edit] 100 percents.svg Disclaimer 100 percents.svg About dreaming 100 percents.svg About lucid dreaming 100 percents.svg Possible dangers of lucid dreaming 100 percents.svg Alienation 100 percents.svg Dissociation 100 percents.svg Controversial: Accidentally encountering “spiritual” entities 100 percents.svg Controversial: Creating bad habits or becoming a control freak 75%.svg Controversial: Exhaustion 75%.svg Controversial: Inability to stop 100 percents.svg Controversial: Undesirable false awakenings 75%.svg Similar techniques

Dream Recall[edit] 100 percents.svg Improving dream recall

Induction Techniques[edit] 100 percents.svg Preliminary 100 percents.svg Waking up and getting to sleep 100 percents.svg Reality checks 100 percents.svg Techniques 100 percents.svg WBTB 100 percents.svg Autosuggestion 100 percents.svg MILD 100 percents.svg WILD 100 percents.svg Eyelid Pattern 100 percents.svg Hypnagogic Imagery 100 percents.svg Counting 100 percents.svg Incubating dreams 75%.svg Chaining dreams 100 percents.svg VILD 100 percents.svg LILD 50%.svg CAT 25%.svg Tibetan methods 50%.svg Other techniques 100 percents.svg Other methods 50%.svg Drugs 50%.svg Food and drink 75%.svg Gadgets 100 percents.svg Software

Induction Techniques[edit] 100 percents.svg Preliminary 100 percents.svg Waking up and getting to sleep 100 percents.svg Reality checks 100 percents.svg Techniques 100 percents.svg WBTB 100 percents.svg Autosuggestion 100 percents.svg MILD 100 percents.svg WILD 100 percents.svg Eyelid Pattern 100 percents.svg Hypnagogic Imagery 100 percents.svg Counting 100 percents.svg Incubating dreams 75%.svg Chaining dreams 100 percents.svg VILD 100 percents.svg LILD 50%.svg CAT 25%.svg Tibetan methods 50%.svg Other techniques 100 percents.svg Other methods 50%.svg Drugs 50%.svg Food and drink 75%.svg Gadgets 100 percents.svg Software

Using[edit] 100 percents.svg Dream stabilization 100 percents.svg Hand rubbing 100 percents.svg Spinning 100 percents.svg Slowing it down 100 percents.svg Trying to recover your waking memory and cognitive capacities 100 percents.svg Falsely awakening 100 percents.svg Recovering from lost visuals 100 percents.svg Autosuggestion 100 percents.svg Visualising 100 percents.svg Getting objects into your dream 100 percents.svg What you can do 75%.svg Easy 75%.svg Medium 75%.svg Hard 100 percents.svg Conclusion

Glossary[edit] 75%.svg An alphabetical list of everything mentioned

Appendices[edit] Various posts from forums where people originally described their techniques Other documents (FAQs, etc.)

Lucid intro
Further Reading[edit] 100 percents.svg On the web and in print

FAQ[edit] A FAQ page for you to post any question you might have about lucid dreaming

authors that have lucid dreamers
Authors[edit]

In alphabetical order: Evilshiznat has had a few lucid dreams. Kaycee (cont) (talk) is a natural-born lucid dreamer who upholds a practical view on most things. KirbyMeister has only had one lucid dream so far, re-organized the entire Appendices area, and is a total Spongebob freak. r3m0t (cont) (talk) (15) has only had a few lucid dreams so far, but has written most of the information in the wikibook. Sourcejedi has just come out of anonymous lurking to demonstrate his ruthless editing tendencies by trying to clean up someone else's botched rename. He also has far too brief lucid dreams. Tharenthel (Talk) (Contribs) has had a few lucid dreams so far, and has done mostly reorganization. Xgamer4 has had many lucid dreams. He made (if you can call it that) the FAQ page, and monitors the page.

dream stabilization
Dream stabilization[edit]

Once you are able to dream lucidly, you may find that it is difficult to stay in the dream; for example, you may wake instantly or the dream may start “fading” which is characterized by loss or degradation of any of the senses, especially vision. Alternatively, a new lucid dreamer could easily forget that they are in a dream, as a result of the shock of the sensation.

Don't worry if you wake immediately after becoming lucid. As you gain more experience of becoming lucid, it will come as less of a shock and you’ll be less likely to wake up. Make sure you do a reality check to be sure you’re not still dreaming. As you gain more experience, you will have an easier time identifying when and remembering that you are dreaming.

You can avoid more gradual fadings by stimulating your senses. This means listening for sounds, feeling around with your hands, and paying attention to what you see and smell. The idea here is to load your senses with stimulation from the dream so that your senses cannot shift to the real world. If you close your eyes, you are removing a great deal of sensory information and might wake up. Staring at a single point can cause effectively the same problem if you stop seeing everything else in your peripheral vision, or don't see enough movement. If you hear something loud in real life and are hearing nothing in the dream, your senses may shift to the real world, causing you to wake up.

Ideally you should be able to use the techniques below to stabilize your dream before it starts to fade (or “black out”). As always, prevention is better than treatment - and the more stable and vivid your dreams are, the more enjoyable they will be. However, if that doesn't work you may be able to use stabilization techniques to stop the fading; the spinning technique is probably the most effective in this case.

If you still can’t stabilize your dream, you may decide to try and wake up with the aim of remembering your dream as accurately as possible while its still fresh in your mind.

Hand touching (for lcid dreaming
Hand Touching[edit]

Rub your hands together and concentrate on the rubbing. You should feel the friction and the heat of your hands. If you can concentrate on the feelings that this action generates, your dream is likely to stabilize and become more vivid and detailed. You can also keep one hand on your arm while exploring the dream for a constant sense of stimulation. This technique is most effective when used in conjunction with the “Slowing it down” technique, by staring at your hands while rubbing them together.

spinning (lucid dreams)
Spinning[edit]

You spin around in your dream much as you would if you suddenly want to feel dizzy in real life. The sensation of movement is the key here to stabilizing the dream. Many people report success with this technique, but it also tends to cause a complete change of your dream scene (see Changing the dream environment below). If the dream scene disappears completely (e.g., becomes black), it is necessary to visualize the dreamscape to return to the dream.

slowing it down (lucid dreaming)
Slowing it down[edit]

Some people like to stabilize the dream by “stopping to smell the roses” and slowly staring at a dream object until it becomes clear. The dreamer would then look around elsewhere, noticing how detailed everything is, thereby stimulating the visual portion of the dream. However, others find this can cause their lucid dream to end. If you focus on one object for too long to the exclusion of everything else, you will likely wake up or lose the dream. It works best to pay attention to everything in your vision, including your peripheral vision, not just the center of the object you're staring at. If staring at a single object doesn't work for you, try to let your eyes wander around instead.

regaining waking memory (lucid dreaming)
Regaining waking memory or skills[edit]

This is also likely to enhance your degree of lucidity. Try to remember facts from your waking life, such as your phone number, address, etc., or do some simple math. Or, start reciting the lyrics to your favorite song. Or perhaps try some sports practice you know well — this all depends on which senses / methods of thought process you tend to rely on most in your waking life.

false awakening (lucid dreaming)
False awakening[edit]

A couple of the users on the ld4all.com forums have had success with creating a false awakening to stabilize a dream. If the above techniques are failing and you find your dream still fading, and you really want to continue your lucid dream, do the following: 1.Expect to have a false awakening. 2.When you think you wake up, perform a reality check.

You will either have a false awakening, reality check, and then end up with an even more vivid lucid dream, or will really wake up, perform a reality check, and realize that you just woke up (bad luck!).

The most important part of this is the reality check. This is what will continue your lucid dream. You should be performing reality checks when you wake up. If you plan to induce false awakenings in order to stabilize a dream, the reality check that you perform as you wake up is as important as the one that got you lucid, if not more.

Perform every check in the book until you are positively, absolutely, and completely sure that you aren’t dreaming. A series of 10 reality checks is more likely to produce dream results in a dream, especially if you are expecting dream results. This technique is for those who are desperate!

If you have had a good experience with this technique, please go to the talk page and post your experiences, as there have not been many anecdotes of it working yet.

If you didn’t do any of these, your best option is probably to try to wake up. That way, you will remember more of the dream.

The general rule of dream-stabilization is to stimulate the senses. If you listen for sounds, feel around with your hands, and pay attention to what you see and smell, you will stimulate your senses. The idea here is to load your senses with stimulation from the dream so that your senses cannot shift to the real world. If you close your eyes, you are removing a great deal of sensory information and might wake up. Staring at a single point can cause effectively the same problem if you stop seeing everything else in your peripheral vision, or don't see enough movement. If you hear something loud in real life and are hearing nothing in the dream, your senses may shift to the real world, causing you to wake up.

recovering a lost dream (lucid dreaming)
There are a few things you can try to do if you lose your vision. Most of these are less likely to help prolong your dream than the above techniques.

You can also try these if you have just woken up and are lying in your bed. You may be able to return to your dream.

Autosuggestion[edit]

You can repeat over and over a phrase similar to “I can see my dream,” or otherwise enforce in your mind that you can see a dreamscape. (See Autosuggestion)

Visualising[edit]

You can visualise the scene as it would be if you could see it. You could take this as an opportunity to change the dreamscape by visualising a different environment from the previous one in the dream. This can be made easier by spinning as you visualize. (See Changing the dream environment below)