CONTENT

• ABSTRACT
• AIM
• OBJECTIVES
• LUCID DREAMS
• WHEN DOES IT HAPPEN, AND WHAT IS IT
LIKE ?
• WHAT ARE ITS APPLICATIONS ?
• TECHNIQUE FOR LUCID DREAMING
• DOES LUCID DREAM FEEL REAL ?
• IS LUCID DREAMING SCIENTIFICALLY
PROVEN ?
• THE MYSTERIES OF “LUCID” DREAMING
• LOST AND FOUND : THE ARTICLE THAT IG-
NITED MY PASSION FOR LUCID DREAMING
• LUCID DREAMING : CAN YOU CONTROL
YOUR DREAMS ?
• ENTER, SANDMAN : HOW LUCID DREAMING
‘ CAN HELP YOU TO CHANGE YOURSELF”
• THE ABILITY TO CONTROL DREAMS MAY
HELP US UNRAVEL THE MYSTERY OF CON-
SCIOUSNESS
• DREAM ON !LUCID DREAMING IMPROVES
 ABSTRACT
In lucid dreams the dreamers are aware that they are dreaming and can use this state for
a variety of different purposes., like - wish fulfilment, solving waking problems, over-
coming fears/ nightmares, spiritual experiences, physical/mental healing, and training
motor skills, with accessing your subconscious. Lucid dreaming is a dissociated state
with aspects of waking and dreaming combined in a way. Lucid dreaming is the expe-
rience of achieving conscious awareness of dreaming while still asleep. Dreams are a
window into the unconscious, and lucid dreaming is the bridge between the two. It has
been proven that lucid dreams are strongly associated with the dorsolateral prefrontal
cortex , this is the section of the brain that is “ uniquely associated with the subjective
experience of deciding when and how to act. In this report you will find in depth de-
scription of what is lucid d dreaming , it’s application, it’s advantages , how it affect your
waking life, how you can have an access to your sub-conscious , surey , how you can go
lucid , it’s benefits etc.
 AIM

1.) To acquire a indepth knowlege of lucid dreaming

2.) Exploring the world of lucid dream
3.) To understand our unconscious in a conscious
state
4.) How lucid dream effect our walking reality?
 OBJECTIVE

1.) To know what is lucid dreaming and how we can experience

them ?
2.) What are the advantages of lucid dreaming ?
3.) what are the techniques of lucid dreaming?
4.) what are it’s application
5.) In what ways we can use lucid dreaming to improve our
walking life
6.) To know our unconsciouss in conscious state through the
platform called ‘lucid dreaming
 LUCID DREAMS

Have you ever started dreaming and suddenly realized that you were in a dream? Have you
ever managed to gain control over your dream narrative? If your answer to these is "yes,"
you've experienced what is called lucid dreaming.
Typically, when we dream, we are not conscious that the dream is not real. "Well, dreams,
they feel real while we're in them right? It's only when we wake up then we realize that some-
thing was actually strange."
However, some of us are able to enter a dream and be fully aware of the fact that we are actu-
ally dreaming.
"A lucid dream is defined as a dream during which dreamers, while dreaming, are aware they
are dreaming," specialists explain.
Lucid dreaming is the ability to consciously observe or control your dreams.
It transforms your inner dream world into a living alternate reality - where everything you
see, hear, feel, taste and even smell is as authentic as real life.
Lucidity occurs during altered states of consciousness when you realize you are dreaming -
and your brain switches into waking mode inside the dream.
In normal dreams, your self awareness is shut down. That's why they often feel fuzzy and
distant. But when lucid, the conscious brain wakes up during sleep.
This is a safe and natural state. It is not anything spooky or paranormal (in fact, out of body
experiences are thought to be explained by the lucid dream state). With lucid dreams, you are
always asleep in bed. When you become lucid, your senses become alive. You can explore the
inner workings of your unconscious mind with total freedom.

The very first record of lucid dreaming appears to feature in the treatise On
Dreams by the Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle. In it, he describes an in-
stance of self-awareness during a dream state.
"[If] the sleeper perceives that he is asleep, and is conscious of the sleeping
state during which the perception comes before his mind, it presents itself still,
but something within him speaks to this effect: 'The image of Koriskos presents
itself, but the real Koriskos is not present,'" he wrote.
 WHEN DOES IT HAPPEN, AND WHAT IS IT LIKE ?

Like most dreams, lucid dreaming will typically occur during rapid eye movement (REM)
sleep. For some people, it occurs spontaneously. However, others train themselves to start
dreaming lucidly, or to become better at it.
As one experienced lucid dreamer told Medical News Today:
"My lucid dreaming occurs when I'm waking up, or sometimes if I've woken up briefly and
I'm going back to sleep. Nowadays I can pretty much do it on a whim, as long as I'm in that
half-asleep half-awake process."

The degree to which a person can influence their dream if they are lucid while dreaming
also varies to a great extent. Some people may simply wake up immediately upon realizing
that they had been dreaming.
Other people may be able to influence their own actions within the dream, or parts of the
dream itself. The lucid dreamer who spoke to MNT told us that she was able to manipulate
the dream narrative in order to create a pleasant experience for herself.
"Usually I can control the narrative in the dream, so for example if I'm unhappy with the
way things are going in the dream, I can change it," she explained.
 WHAT ARE ITS APPLICATIONS ?

In your virtual reality dream world, you can realistically fly over cities, meet your favorite celebrity in the
flesh, or become a ninja assassin. It is way more realistic than day dreaming or playing your favorite video
game. It's like it's actually happening to you.
Although the novelty value hardly wears off, you'll soon discover lucid dreaming has many personal
growth applications, too:
o Problem solving
o Increasing your creativity
o Facing your fears
o Improving your confidence
o Practicing new skills
o Developing your sense of self
o Exploring your unconscious mind

Lucid dreaming is certainly an attractive and fascinating prospect — being able to explore our own inner
worlds with full awareness that we are in a dream state is intriguing and has an almost magical flavor
about it.
However, can lucid dreaming have any practical applications?
Dr. Denholm Aspy, at the University of Adelaide in Australia, is a researcher who specializes in lucid
dreaming.
He explained for MNT that this experience can actually be therapeutic.
Its main application, Dr. Aspy said, is to address nightmares — especially recurring nightmares, which
may affect a person's quality of life.
The practice of learning to lucid dream in order to stop nightmares from occurring or reoccurring, he ex-
plained, is called "lucid dreaming therapy."
"If you can help someone who's having nightmares to become lucid during that nightmare," he explained
to us, "then that gives them the ability to exert control over themselves or over the nightmare itself."
"Let's say you're being attacked by someone in a nightmare. You could try to talk to the attacker. You
could ask them 'why are you appearing in my dreams?' or 'what do you need to resolve this conflict with
me?'"
"Some people," he added, "take on superpowers or special abilities, so they can fight back against the
attacker. And then you can also try to escape, so things like flying away, or even doing techniques to delib-
erately wake up from the nightmare."
Lucid dreaming also has the potential to help people with phobias, such as fear of flying or animal pho-
bias.
"If a person has a particular phobia, then their lucid dream environment provides an interesting opportu-
nity to do things like exposure therapy, where you gradually expose yourself to the thing you're afraid of,
in an attempt to gradually overcome that fear," Dr. Aspy said.
This is possible, he said, because dream environments can provide a realistic enough experience without it
actually feeling unsafe. During lucid dreaming, the individual knows that they are not in the real world, so
they may safely explore their fears without actually feeling threatened.
'Lucid dreaming is a kind of creative activity'
At the same time, lucid dreaming is also attractive as an unusual means of entertainment — kind of like
the immersive experience of virtual reality.
An experienced lucid dreamer might be able to "go on an adventure" and interact with people and things
in a way that they may not be able to do in real life.
The lucid dreamer who spoke to MNT said that she thinks of the experience as something akin to story-
telling, which makes her feel happier upon waking up:
 “Lucid dreaming for me is a kind of creative activity — I get to explore what my dreams are
telling me a little bit versus what my conscious mind wants. It’s not got much use apart from just
being interesting and it makes me happy usually I tend to wake up quite content.”
“I do lucid dreaming for fun,” she went on to say. “I enjoy it, and as someone who enjoys story-
telling it’s a similar experience to writing a story or playing a video game. You get immersed in a
narrative that involves you in some way.”
"I do lucid dreaming for fun," she went on to say. "I enjoy it, and as someone who enjoys story-
telling it's a similar experience to writing a story or playing a video game. You get immersed in a
narrative that involves you in some way."

1.) Access your subconscious

Imagine a computer that has billions and billions of files that contain every piece of data about your-
self, but 95% of those files are in a password protected folder.
This is essentially how your mind works and that password protected folder, with 95% of the data, is
your subconscious
This is the land of your dreams and if you’re not lucid dreaming, you’re not experiencing most of
what is happening in your mind! If you can imagine the benefits of having the password to unlock
that folder, you can begin to understand the benefits of lucid dreaming.
So much of what we truly fear and truly believe is locked away behind the gates of our subconscious
mind. Luckily, when we learn how to lucid dream, we get to process all of this information and try
to make sense of it all. One’s subconscious mind is considered as the bigger and much powerful part
of the brain.
This is used for controlling things such as internal temperature, breathing, interpreting millions of
signals that the mind gets every second.
It is also the part of the mind that you do not have much control and it’s in charge of the things such
as your emotions and feelings that make yourself.
With lucid dreams, you can talk to your subconscious as if it’s a person.
The dream characters in lucid dreams are the projections of the parts of the subconscious mind and
each one actually represents something different.
2.) Interpret your dreams
It’s easy to get lost in the confusing symbology of your mind.
When you have a nightmare about falling or a dream about flying, it’s easy to interpret
those experiences as literal.
It must mean you are afraid of falling or you wish to fly, right?
Think again!
A falling dream might just be about your fear that you’re losing control in your relation-
ship and a flying dream may be about your desire to be free from that relationship.
So, how do you figure out what these confusing symbols mean?
Lucid dreaming lets you take a front row seat to those dreams and experience them in real
time. Learning how to have a lucid dream gives you the password to your subconscious
mind and lets you actively seek to understand before your conscious mind has an opportu-
nity to interrupt and confuse you.
3.)Conquer your fears
One of the greatest benefits of lucid dreaming is the ability to truly conquer the fears that
plague your waking life.
Your subconscious mind wants to help you and it tries to play out these “fear dramas”
during your sleep, but if you’re not present to witness them, it’s hard to really get any bene-
fit.
When you have a lucid dream, you get the opportunity to experience and process those
fears right in the moment your mind attempts to sort them out.
Many people find relief from their anxiety and depression after a lucid dreaming experi-
ence.
You can even train yourself to have a higher pain tolerance. When you begin feeling pain in
dreams, you can control your dream and manipulate your reaction.
Lucidity is powerful in the dream world.
4.)Get better with no risks or worries of injuries
Professionals, students, and athletes who are skilled in lucid dreaming use their dreams to
solve problems and learn, and this can then bring a dramatic improvement into their real
lives.
Try to think of having the capacity to practice a certain skill, such as skateboarding, within
a dream environment.
5.) Stop nightmares
Along the same lines as conquering your fears, learning how to control your dreams can stop you
from having bad dreams.
Nightmares are so terrifying because we aren’t aware we are dreaming when we experience them.
Imagine a dream where you are being chased by a serial killer and then getting trapped in a house
with the murderer.
That would be a terrifying dream and you’d probably wake up in a cold sweat. However, if you
were able to lucid dream during that experience, you’d know that all of it was in your mind and
none of it was real.
The very act of knowing you are dreaming can stop the nightmare in its tracks. When you lucid
dream, no fear will stop you from jumping out of an airplane.
Aside from the fact that you will be totally safe, you can also slow down time and be in full control
of your fall as you gently land on the ground.
Many lucid dreamers have claimed that being able to do this in their dream made them feel much
better, and some were even able to overcome their fear in the actual waking world.

Having Lots of Fun, Experiencing the IMPOSSIBLE

Lucid dreaming isn’t just about deep, dark and scary stuff; it can be a lot of fun!
Lucid dreaming is probably the most fun things you could do.
Your wildest “dreams” can come true and you can experience them using all of your senses.
Your wildest “dreams” can come true and you can experience them using all of your senses.
You may do anything you want to imagine without a feeling of any fear of harming you or going
wrong.
Experience the impossible with lucid dreaming and wake up with the most beautiful dream memo-
ries.
The strains and stresses of modern life may be a bit overwhelming sometimes to the point where
there are cases that you aren’t having fun at all, which is crucial for a happy life.

You can do whatever you want in a lucid dream, and many people study lucid dreaming to live out
their wildest fantasies, from flying to having sex with their “dream partner.”
More immersive than a good book, a TV show or even a virtual reality game, a lucid dream defies
all laws of physics and logic and puts your right in the middle of to experience it in 5D (using all 5
senses)! Having fun can be done easily, it doesn’t cost anything and will not take up your valuable
waking time.
In lucid dreams, you can decide to have a road trip around the US in your dream car, sail a yacht,
ski down in the Swiss Alps or dance with your best moves in a nightclub.
Try making up for the lost time and relax or have fun in your own dreams because waking up feel-
ing stress-free and happy is worth it.
6.) Indulge in Complete Privacy
When you lucid dream, you create your own exclusive private fantasy. You can do all the things you
want and no one will even know about it.
You can just forget the rules and norms of real life and make your own rules instead.
Step into the unknown and the forbidden. After all, you need and deserve this independent time to
keep your senses and sanity together
7.)You can practice the proper form with no risks or worries of injuries.
This form of mental repetition can then effectively transfer to your waking life, thus helping you
improve much faster.

8.) Explore Beyond Imagination

If you have been a lucid dreamer for some time, you know that lucid dreaming doesn’t have any
definite roadmap to it.
Just like the entire universe, your dreams have infinite potential and boundless in every sense of
the world.
8.)When you lucid dream, you get the ability to do something that your mind hasn’t ever done
before.
The dream world is a mysterious world in itself with a lot of unknown things that are yet to be
explored. You can just imagine what you can discover once you get inside this world!

9.)Helps to Discover a Personal Meaning to Life

One more lucid dreaming benefit is that it can help you discover your life’s personal mean-
ing. It is said that life has no real purpose unless you make one.
With lucid dreaming, you can evolve your life’s meaning with consciousness.
You can even look at your purpose in the future with lucid dreaming.
Basically, being lucid enables you to examine the dream as it is happening rather than wait-
ing until you wake up.
This real-time analysis enables you to interact and question with your own subconscious.
10.) Practice for real life
Once you learn how to lucid dream, you can begin to steer the dreaming ship.
Have a big presentation at work? Ready to confess your feelings to someone? Want to practice being
more confident?
You can play out any of these scenarios and let your subconscious work out the best approach. It’s no
secret that many great problems are often solved during sleep and this problem solving is even more
enhanced when you have a lucid dream.
11.) Solve a problem
Speaking of problem-solving, imagine overcoming your writer’s block or solving a complicated equa-
tion during your sleep.
It happens. Mary Shelley, the author of the famous novel Frankenstein, dreamt about the plot of the
book before writing it.
Famous golfer Jack Nicklaus improved his score when he realized he was holding his clubs incorrect-
ly in his dreams. Countless scientific discoveries have happened during sleep, including the arrange-
ment of the Periodic Table of Elements.
Your brain can work out some incredible stuff while it’s sleeping, but if you’re not there to witness it,
you may forget it ever happened. So go ahead and understand how to have a lucid dream
12.) Improve Your Creativity
Unlike in waking life, your dreams have the ability to change and manifest instantaneously.
You can erase, rearrange, and create anything in a mere snap of a finger, letting you play inside your
mind fast and unravel things quickly.
• Einstein himself imagined riding on a light beam that spurred his special theory of relativity.
• Paul McCartney (from Beatles) composed the entire melody for the hit acoustic song Yesterday in a
dream!
• And the last one we will mention – Niels Bohr (the father of quantum mechanics) often mentioned
his inspirational dream that led to his discovery of the structure of the atom!
13.) Lucid Dream for Emotional Healing
Not everyone knows that you can use lucid dream for emotional healing. Basically, emotional healing
may be defined as one’s ability to heal oneself of emotional injuries.
Fear, stress, doubt, and deep-seated trauma due to terrible happenings are some of the things that can
be healed through lucid dreaming.
Of course, the results might vary from one person to another.
Others who have experienced traumatic things could have more work to do, yet it is also possible.
If you’re dealing with any ailment, whether it is a chronic disease or a minor ache, lucid dreaming is a
tool that you can take for consideration.
You may visit a doctor in your dreams or use your own power of intention to heal from deep within
your own consciousness. One’s mind is considered as a powerful tool, just think of the placebo effect.
For instance, If you have found yourself upset regarding several circumstances at work, you can con-
trol your dream to express your anxieties to your co-workers and boss.
You’ll feel more empowered and could find a solution that could translate into your own real-life
situation.
14.) Lucid Dream Sex
Lucid dream sex is another lucid dreaming benefit, which is a good release and it’s possible to sum-
mon any partner, whether anonymous or famous.
You can always have sex whenever you want in a dream and you can have sex with whoever you
want!
As a matter of fact, intimacy and sex are blinding lucid dream triggers for you because, in your wak-
ing life, you don’t expect to be with anybody else except your partner.
So, when you find yourself making out with another person, you are dreaming.
It’s also the reason why incubating sexy lucid dream is a simple trigger for becoming lucid.
15.) Practice and Improve Real-Life Skills
Would you believe that it is possible to practice your real life skills in your lucid dreams, and be able
to improve that particular skill in actual life?
This is one of the most notable and somewhat surprising lucid dreaming benefits.
For instance, you can attend your driving lessons in actual and practice the things you learned in
your lucid dreams.
This way, you can learn to drive faster than what it would have taken you if you just tried it in wak-
ing life.
It can help you save money and time, not to mention that you can become a better and more skilled
driver before you know it.
You could practice numerous life skills in your lucid dreams and make yourself better at them in
actual life.
16.) Can Help With Solving Important Problems / Taking Important Decisions
Many mathematicians and scientists consider this to be the best benefit of lucid dreaming.
This is because it is possible for them to think of a certain problem when they dream.
With the completely way of working of the brain, it often makes brand new connections you proba-
bly didn’t think of before, which makes it easier to conjure ways to solve important problems.
It is also possible to use lucid dreams for solving issues even in your interpersonal life by trying out
first various solutions and checking how each of them plays out in your dream.
You can simply use dream incubation to implant a question or problem to your subconscious mind.
Once a task is given, your subconscious is going to look for a solution and give it to you usually
through your dreams.
 TECHNIQUE FOR LUCID DREAMING
Yes, experts believe so. We all have dreams (whether we remember them or not) and so we all have
the capacity to become conscious within them.
Children learn to lucid dream intuitively. And certain medications for degenerative conditions like
Parkinson's Disease can cause lucid dreams. Age and cognitive ability appear not to factor into the
equation.
Having a lucid dream is not actually that hard, once you tap into the right mechanism.
Research shows that everyone will have at least one lucid dream in their lives, just by accident. And to
have lucid dreams on demand, all you have to do is get into the habit of recognizing the dreamstate.
There are many ways you can achieve this habitual recognition, such as:
o Meditation - to focus your mind on demand
o Visualization - to enter the lucid dream state from waking
o Reality checks - to produce spontaneous self awareness in dreams
o Dream herbs - to make your dreams longer and more vivid
o Dream journaling - to cement dream memories in the waking world
o Mnemonic techniques - to produce spontanous lucidity in dreams
You can practice one or all of these methods during the waking day or just before you fall asleep in
order to plant the seed of lucidity. It is up to your unconscious mind to trigger you during sleep.
The first moment of lucidity is the hardest - but this unconscious programming becomes easier over
time.
In fact, one study found that committed students of lucid dreaming were able to have their first lucid
dream, on average, between 3-21 days.
Your first taste of lucidity will provide all the motivation you'll need to continue your mental training.
It is like nothing else you've ever experienced before.
A study conducted by Dr. Aspy and colleagues last year tested the efficacy of three common tech-
niques.
The first is known as "reality testing." This might involve verifying whether you are dreaming both in
real life and during a dream.
For instance, throughout the day, a person may want to ask themselves "am I dreaming right now?" as
they try to make their hand pass through a solid wall.
This technique relies on intention. In real life the wall will remain solid and impenetrable, while in a
dream the hand will easily pass through.
Another "reality check" is re-reading a line of text. In reality, if we read the text on a poster, for in-
stance, it will stay the same when we re read it. In a dream, however, the text will constantly shift.
Conducting these experiments repeatedly throughout the day may make it easier to remember to
conduct them during a dream state, thus allowing the dreamer to gain awareness of the dream.
Another technique is "waking back to bed," and it requires setting an alarm to wake up the sleeper
after about 5 or 6 hours of going to sleep.
Once awake, the person should aim to remain awake for a while, before going back to bed. This
technique is supposed to immerse the sleeper immediately into REM, the phase of sleep during which
they are more likely to experience a lucid dream.
Finally, lucid dreaming may eventually occur through "mnemonic induction." Once more, this is a
technique that requires intent and lots of practice.
With mnemonic induction, a person must repeat to themselves, just before going to bed, a phrase
such as "tonight, I will notice that I am dreaming," so as to "program" themselves to achieve in-dream
lucidity.
Dream journals and meditation
It also appears that those who find it easier to lucid dream do not have much trouble recalling their
dreams on a regular basis.
"When it comes to lucid dreaming, the strongest predictor of whether you have lucid dreams or not
is how good you are at remembering your ordinary dreams," Dr. Aspy explained.
Therefore, some people who are interested in exploring their dreams with full awareness may find
it useful to keep a dream journal in which they record the dreams that they have each night in as
much detail as possible.
The lucid dreamer that we interviewed corroborated this idea by noting that, for a long time, she
used to enjoy writing down her dreams upon waking up.
Another practice that may aid lucid dreaming is meditation, or mindfulness, as it "trains" people to
become more aware of themselves and their surroundings, in general.
"A lot of people are interested in meditation and mindfulness as a way to have lucid dreams," Dr.
Aspy mentioned, explaining, "The idea there is that if you're more aware during the day, you're
more likely to notice that you're dreaming while you're asleep."
Set random alarms throughout the night
Everyone is different, so if the above tips don’t work, you might need to do some investigating. If
you’ve tried to record your dreams upon waking and you’ve set yourself up for success, but haven’t
had any luck recalling a dream, you may need to find your specific sleep pattern and work with it.
Most people dream every 90 minutes, but this varies wildly from individual to individual. Try set-
ting an alarm for a few different times during the middle of the night.
Set an alarm for 90 minutes after you go to bed and see if you recall a dream when you wake up.
If that doesn’t work, set an alarm for various random times during the night. You might discover
that you only remember dreams if you wake up at 3:20 am.
If that’s the case, you’ll need to get into the habit of waking up during that time to record your
dreams.
Perform reality checks throughout the day
It sounds silly, but to know you’re asleep, you must first realize that you are awake.
Successful lucid dreamers perform reality checks throughout the day to confirm that they are indeed
awake. Those same reality checks performed during sleep let them know that they are dreaming.
However, you can’t just perform a reality check at will while dreaming; it takes practice and training.
To do this, you’ll need to form the habit of reality checking every day.
Here are proven ways of performing reality checks that have been successful for other lucid dreaming
beginners:
1) Read something
Text and numbers seem to change in the dream world. In fact, it is reported that text read twice
during a lucid dream changes 75% of the time, the second time it is read.
That number goes up to 95% when it is re-read a third time.
This makes reading text or numbers one of the most popular reality checks around. A few times each
day, remind yourself to look at your watch or read a piece of text in front of you and then re-read it
two more times. If it stays the same, you can tell yourself, “I know now that I am awake.”
2) Defy physics
The laws of physics don’t apply to the world of lucid dreaming, so testing them is a great way to find
out where you are. You can do these reality checks by trying to push your hand through a solid object
or jumping off the ground and seeing if you can fly.
You obviously won’t succeed when you’re awake, so when you fail, you can tell yourself, “I know now
that I am awake.”
2) Defy physics
The laws of physics don’t apply to the world of lucid dreaming, so testing them is a great way to find
out where you are. You can do these reality checks by trying to push your hand through a solid object
or jumping off the ground and seeing if you can fly.
You obviously won’t succeed when you’re awake, so when you fail, you can tell yourself, “I know now
that I am awake.”
3) Make something happen with your mind
Whether you want to move objects or make something appear or disappear, you might be able to do it
when you’re dreaming. When you’re awake on the other hand, unless you have some incredible gifts,
you’re going to fail.
Just like the other reality checks, when you attempt to do this when you’re awake, remind yourself that
it didn’t work because you are not dreaming.
4) Make it consistent
The key to successful reality checks is keeping it consistent.’
You’re going to be performing these in your lucid dreams, so don’t confuse yourself by making too
many of them. Try to practice 1 or 2 of the same reality checks a few times each day. It only takes a
few seconds and it will greatly improve your ability to lucid dream.
5) Do them in bed
Many first-time lucid dreamers have an experience known as a “false awakening.”
When this happens, you think that you have woken up, but really, you are lucid dreaming. These can
be frustrating experiences because it’s difficult to distinguish between reality and the dream world
when they look exactly the same.
To prevent this, do a reality check before you go to sleep and right when you wake up. Make this a
habit and every time you
Lucid Dreaming Music
There has been a lot of advancement in the science of using technology and sounds to induce a lucid
dreaming state.
Playing off our natural brainwave patterns, sound can influence certain states of awareness and make
lucid dreaming more likely. If you’re interested in trying this technique, listen to the 8 hour video
below using headphones while you sleep.
 DOES LUCID DREAM FEEL REAL ?

Think of a dream or a nightmare – any dream you’ve ever had – and try describing it using as much
detail as possible.
You may experience a common phenomenon of being unable to really articulate the profound feelings
you experienced during your dream.
You might be able to describe the details and events with some accuracy, but when you attempt to
convey the emotion and strength of the dream, words just come up short.
Dreams are so powerful, and they can enhance or defy everything we know about reality.
When you dream, you get the experience all of these exciting and mysterious worlds, but you only
experience them as a memory when you wake up. Lucid dreaming lets you experience those worlds in
real time; lucid dreams are dreams that feel real.
In the real world, your sensory experiences (sight, touch, taste, smell, and feel) are just processes in
your brain that are triggered by something in your body.
For example, when you touch something, signals fire off in your brain and let you experience the
touch. The same thing happens in your lucid dreams, which means you can fully experience every-
thing in your dream world.
Lucid dreaming is like a hyper reality where you sense and feel everything around you, except every-
thing around you is a construct of your infinite imagination!

Concerns and risks

One concern that people express about engaging in lucid dreaming, if they are able to achieve it, is
that they may get "stuck" in a dream and find it more difficult to wake up.
However, Dr. Aspy explained to MNT that this is not a worrying risk; normally, an individual is only
able to sleep — and dream — for a set amount of time every night, so it is unlikely that anyone would
get "stuck" sleeping.
He told us, "The main reason for that is — pretty much no matter what you do you are only going to,
on average, only have a certain amount of sleep and dreaming every night. There are some things that
you can do to increase it a little bit, but you can't really sustain that for very long."
Another concern is that engaging in lucid dreaming requires focus and effort, which might mean that
the sleeper does not get enough rest.
However, Dr. Aspy again reassured us, noting that the lucid dreamers with whom he has worked in
the past have not reported more tiredness or poorer sleep quality as a result of lucid dreaming.
At the same time, in speaking to us, he also issued a warning to aspiring lucid dreamers:
 IS LUCID DREAMING SCIENTIFICALLY PROVEN ?

Tibetan Monks have used dream control for more than a thousand years, in the philosophy of
dream yoga.
However, the modern term "lucid dreaming" was not created until the 1800s by the passionate
dream researcher Marquis d'Hervey de Saint-Denys.
The concept of lucid dreams became popularized by Celia Green in the 1960s, who pointed
out the scientific potential of self awareness in dreams. She was the first to make the link with
both REM sleepand false awakenings.
The first scientific evidence of lucid dreaming was produced by the British parapsychologist
Keith Hearne in 1975. He did it by catching the pre-determined conscious eye movements
from a lucid dreaming volunteer.
Hearne's research slipped under the radar of the mainstream science journals, and it was Ste-
phen LaBerge at Stanford University who became famous for replicating this experiment and
formally publishing his findings.
A prolific lucid dreamer himself, LaBerge founded The Lucidity Institute in 1987 to explore
the question: what is lucid dreaming? His mission is to research the nature and potential of
consciousness in dreams... A riddle that may one day offer considerable advances in our un-
derstanding of the human mind.
Lucid dreaming is a powerful psychological tool and an enriching conscious experience.
As a beginner, intermediate or expert oneironaut, I hope you find this website and its com-
plete guide to lucid dreaming useful in your quest for self awareness in the unconscious
dream world.
LITERATURE REVIEW
 ARTICLE NO. 01
THE MYSTERIES OF “LUCID” DREAMING

0ne of our most mysterious and intriguing states of consciousness is the dream. We lose conscious-
ness when we enter the deep waters of sleep, only to regain it as we emerge into a series of uncanny
private realities. These air pockets of inner experience have been difficult for psychologists to study
scientifically and, as a result, researchers have mostly resorted to measuring brain activity as the
sleeper lies passive. But interest has recently returned to a technique that allows real-time commu-
nication from within the dream world.

The rabbit hole between these worlds of consciousness turns out to be the lucid dream, where peo-
ple become aware that they are dreaming and can influence what happens within their self-generat-
ed world. Studies suggest that the majority of people have had a lucid dream at some point in their
life but that the experience is not common. As a result, there is now a minor industry in technolo-
gies and training techniques that claim to increase your chance of having a lucid dream although a
recent scientific review estimated that the effect of any particular strategy is moderate at best. Some
people, however, can reliably induce lucid dreams and it's these people who are allowing us to con-
duct experiments inside dreams.

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When trying to study an experience or behaviour, cognitive scientists usually combine subjective
reports, what people describe about their experience, with behavioural experiments, to see what
effect a particular state has on how people reason, act or remember. But both are difficult in dream-
ers, because they can't tell you much until they wake up and active participation in experiments is
difficult when you are separated from the world by a blanket of sleep-induced paralysis.
This paralysis is caused by neurons in the brainstem that block signals from the action-generating
areas in the brain to the spinal nerves and muscles. The shutdown happens when Rapid Eye Move-
ment or REM sleep starts, meaning that dreaming of even the most energetic actions results in no
more than a slight twitch. One of the few actions that are not paralysed, however, is eye movement.
This is where REM sleep gets its name from and this window of free action provides the lucid
dreamer a way of signalling to the outside world.
Using a procedure discovered by Keith Hearne and later verified by sleep researcher Stephen
LaBerge, the sleeper can signal to researchers when they have begun their lucid dream by using
pre-arranged eye movements. The person moves their eyes in the agreed way in the dream, which
occur as genuine eye movements, which are recorded and verified by electrodes that are placed
around the eye sockets.

This simple but ingenious technique has allowed a series of experiments on the properties of the
dream world and how they are reflected in brain function. These neuroscientific studies have been
important for overcoming an initial objection to the concept of lucid dreaming: that lucid dream-
ers were awake but just relaxed, or perhaps even fraudulent, claiming to be experiencing a dream
world when they were not. Studies led by neuropsychologists Ursula Voss and Martin Dresler have
shown that the brain activity during lucid dreaming bears the core features of REM sleep but is
distinct from both non-lucid dreaming and the awake state, suggesting that it is not just a case of
wishful thinking on the part of either the participants or the researchers.
Some of the most interesting studies involve in-dream experiments, where participants are asked
to complete pre-arranged actions in their lucid dreams while using eye movements to signal
the beginning and end of their behavioural sequences. A recent study by neuroscientist Daniel
Erlacher and his colleagues at the University of Bern compared how long it took to complete dif-
ferent tasks while lucid dreaming and while awake. These included counting, walking a specified
number of steps, and a simple gymnastics-like routine. They found that the "mental action" of
counting happened at the same speed regardless of whether volunteers were dreaming or awake,
but the "physical actions" took longer in dreams than in real life. The research team suggested
that this might be due to not having the normal sensory feedback from the body to help the
brain work out the most efficient way of coordinating itself.
There is also an amateur community of lucid dream enthusiasts keen to explore this unique form
of virtual reality. This stretches from the fringes of the New Age movement who want to use
lucid dreams to access other planes of existence (best of luck with that), to a more technologi-
cally oriented community of dream hackers who sample scientific research to try to find reliable
methods for triggering lucidity. The connection with established studies can be a little haphazard
and methods veer between the verified and the barely tested. In some online discussion boards,
there have been reports of people using medications intended for Alzheimer’s sufferers, which
have the side-effect of causing vivid dreams, based on little more than hearsay and data reported
in a patent application.
Some researchers have highlighted the potential of lucid dreaming to advance the science of
consciousness but it’s a difficult area to study. The currents of consciousness run unpredictably
through the tides of sleep and the science of dreaming is still very much in the age of explora-
tion. It’s also a conceptual problem that some feel unequipped to tackle. After all, what can we
make of consciousness when it creates a new world and our experience of it?
 ARTICLE NO. 02
LOST AND FOUND : THE ARTICLE THAT IGNITED MY PASSION FOR
LUCID DREAMING
Life is But a Dream by Chris Kenworthy
Dreams are still largely a mystery of the mind, offering alternative realities. Chris Kenworthy explores lucid
dreaming, one of the most exciting areas of dream research, where the dreamer seems to have a conscious
control and awareness of his environment.
Everybody dreams, but
sometimes, it is possible for
your dreams to shift a gear. In
a lucid dream, you are fully
conscious and it is possible to
control the dream, You
become aware that you are
dreaming, while still within
a dream.

In dreams, we normally accept

the bizarre dream world
as reality, running from
nightmares, believing we can
fly and so on. In a lucid dream
you know it is a dream,
which gives you power to
enter the state more deeply and
become fully awake.

In most dreams, no matter how clear and beautiful, there is the sense that you are only semi-conscious,
partially aware of what is going on and unable to think clearly. In a lucid dream you wake up, but only
within the dream.

To the outside world you’re still fast asleep, but inside you may be experiencing a bright, imagined world,
more real then the waking world and much more intense. Many people describe it as a form of enlighten-
ment, waking up to reality for the first time; the clarity of mind is akin to a religious experience.

“In lucid dreams, you know it is a dream, which gives you power to enter the state more deeply and become
fully awake.”

When you wake from a lucid dream, there isn’t the feeling of, ‘Oh that was just a dream’, but simply that
you have been conscious for a while and one reality has been exchanged for another. There is no sense of
waking up because you were already awake. All that has changed is that you have left the unpredictable
world of dreams for a more predictable reality.

Many researchers have compared the clear, conscious awareness of lucid dreams to the state of conscious-
ness achieved through deep meditation. This could be why lucid dreaming is a gateway to paranormal
experience. It is a state of mind that would take years of practice to attain through ordinary methods and
yet it can happen to anybody at any time, almost by accident.
Exploiting Dreams
During dreams the laws of physics are abandoned, which is why they seem so weird. We usually just
accept this weirdness, but sometimes there is a realisation that something peculiar is going on. In the
dream you may notice that a message you write as changed, or that the mountains are moving, or that
your mind will think logically and you will say to yourself, "This must be a dream." That moment of
realisation brings on lucidity in a flash.

The lucidity referred to is the clarity of mind, not the clarity of the images. The dream may be vague
and full, but your mind will be clear. In most lucid dreams however, the dream world is as real as in
waking life, making Technicolor movies seem bland by comparison.

It is common for people to claim that an ordinary dream was 'just like reality', but this is an exaggera-
tion. In a lucid dream, all the senses can be employed. If you stand in the rain in a lucid dream, you feel
every drop, the breeze on your skin, the shoes on your feet; you can smell the grass, the river, hear the
birds and cards in the distance, taste any food you eat. The colours are incredibly rich and intense, with
the dimensions of objects feeling extreme and detailed.

At first, this state can be confusing, because although you know it is a dream, it is genuinely as real as
waking reality, in ever sense. If you look around the place you are now while you are reading this and
feel how real it is, that is how lucid dreaming feels. In a lucid dream there is also a strange eerie feeling.
After all, you are dreaming.

"At first this state can be confusing, because although you know it is a dream, it is as genuinely as real as
waking reality in every sense."

For some people, dreams are a distraction or even a problem, if they are bothered by nightmares. It has
been shown that nightmares and frustrating dreams are probably the result of trying to solve everyday
tasks in the dream world. By applying ordinary thinking to the dream world, you end up in a pointless
loop. The best was to use dreams is to let creativity flow freely; this allows for new ideas and thoughts,
with creative solutions.

Lucid dreams are a way to ensure that your sleep is used productively. Rather than simply trying to
solve problems, you can use the dream time creatively, to free your mind. In lucid dreams the monsters
can't hurt you. You can tell anybody to do anything you want and with an act of will, it will happen, If
you want to fly, or build a cathedral, create a planet, write a symphony or visit alien worlds, it will hap-
pen in a moment.

It is this vast potential that has led many people to use lucid dreams as a jumping off point for paranor-
mal experience.
Dream Bridges

We tend to think of the real world as being ‘out there’, solid and tan-
gible, while dreams are seen as a hazy by-product of a fuddled mind.
The truth may be more exciting.

Tests have shown that dreams may be a cross-over point between in-
ternal and external reality. An experimenter asked lucid dreamers to
perform certain tasks, such as clicking their fingers while dreaming
and noticed that slight muscle contractions occurred in the relevant
muscles.

Conversely, it is possible to influence dreams from the outside. If you

touch a sleeping person’s face, they may dream of being touched, or
even punched. If you played sounds of the sea, they may dream about
being at the seaside. External cues can influence a dream in a direct
way.

This shows that there is no absolute dividing line between dreams and
the waking world; the two are capable of interacting.

This could be why dreams allow us to access paranormal power. If

dreams interact with the real world, the lucid dream state can allow
you to experiment with paranormal activities.

One of the most pleasant ways to utilise this is for people to share
dreams. This can occur in ordinary dreams, when two people dream
of being in the same place, experiencing exactly the same dream. This
usually happens when two people are emotionally close, such as lovers.
This experience is quite common and it is perceived as a real form of
telepathy, a meaningful contact.
It's a Kind of Magic
Ordinary dreams often [appear to] predict the future. You dream of an aeroplane crash and then
see it on the news, exactly the way you dreamt it. Statistics now show that every few years, this
is bound to happen to you, just by chance. In some cases however, dreams are so complete and
accurate, that paranormal intervention cannot be ruled out.

You can [try to] use lucid dreams as a form of divination, to see the future. Again, guides can
be useful for aiding in this, but it is also possible to just hold an idea about a time and place in
mind, and see what happens. Any predictions will be based on the [alleged] psychic abilities of
your inner mind, however, so be cautious.

"More adventurous dreamers will use the lucid state as a form of magic. In many types of magic,
visualization is seen as the key to causing change."

More adventurous
dreamers will use the
lucid state as a form
of magic. In many types
of magic, visualisation
is seen as the key to
causing change in the
world. If you visualise
wealth, it will come
to you. These visual-
isations should not be
used as power other
over people, but to
attract things that you
desire. Many people
howev- er, find it is
difficult to visualise
clearly. In the lucid
dream state, the imagination is at its best. If you want to imagine a different future, you can do
so with total clarity, making it the most powerful form of visualisation.

Perhaps the most exciting use of the lucid dream state is to induce an out of body experience
(OBE), also known as astral projection. In this state, the mind [appears to] leave the physical
body, floating above it, observing calmly.

OBEs are experienced by people by chance, especially during accidents or moments of stress.
Studies show that between five and thirty five percent of the Western population have experi-
enced this sense of being 'out of body' at some time in their lives.

Although some people claim that OBEs are a form of lucid dream, this seems unlikely. In a lucid
dream you know that the event is not real; you are awake and you know that you are dreaming.
In an OBE you feel that your mind has left your body and that it is a real experience. This is an
entirely different type of perception. It is possible however, to use the altered reality of lucid
dreams to step out of your body, inducing an OBE.
The simplest way to achieve this, is to direct your dream so that you are back in your own bed-
There are several methods for inducing lucid dreams. Firstly, you should improve your dream recall.
Each morning, write down your dreams as soon as you awaken. This is also a good way to check whether
your dreams are predicting futures, or reflecting important aspects of your life. You will notice recurring
themes which are personal to you; study anything which recurs closely, because it may reflect an aspect of
your personality. Take an interest in your dreams and they will become more memorable and clear.

When you can remember at least one

dream a night, you can try to induce a
lucid dream. Lucid dreams occur when you
realise that you are dreaming, but how
do you switch this critical faculty on while
asleep?

Dreams tend to play with reality, using

the recent events as source material. This
being the case, you can train yourself
to perform certain actions in your dreams,
by repeating them while awake. During the
day, ask yourself every hour or so, "Is this
a dream?" If you like, find a cue which
will make you ask this. Every time you see
a seagull, hear a person sing, or look at a
clock, ask yourself, "Is this a dream?" Pick a
cue that will work for you, and don't just ask
the question blank- ly, but test your reality.
Try floating, or try to change the scenery
through will power. If possible use something
electric, such as a calculator, or a light
switch, as these tend to fail in dreams.

This may sound ridiculous, but if you practise this while awake, the same will happen in a dream. At some
point, you will dream about your cue and you will automatically check your reality. You will find that per-
haps you can float, or a light switch will refuse to switch on. At this moment you will realise that you are
dreaming and become lucid.
“Each morning, write down your dreams as soon as you awaken. This is also a good way to check whether
your dreams are predicting futures or reflecting important aspects of your life.”

Research has shown that most lucid dreams occur a couple of hours before waking, and you can use this
knowledge to your benefit. Set your alarm to wake you two hours earlier than normal and however tired
you feel, get up for ten or fifteen minutes. Allow yourself to become fully awake and think about your
dreams. Then, without too much effort, go back to sleep. This will be easier than you think, if this is gen-
uinely earlier than your normal waking time. The technique stimulates your consciousness, bringing it to
the surface, vastly increasing your chances of dreaming lucidly.

It is even possible to buy dream machines, from a company called Life Tools, which you strap over your
face while asleep. When the machine detects that you are dreaming, by sensing rapid eye movements, it
flashed lights in your eyes to stimulate consciousness and thus lucid dreams.

Lucid dreams are safe, but be wary of sleep paralysis. When we dream, the body’s muscles are restrained.
If they weren’t, we would act out our dreams, causing untold havoc. For lucid dreamers, it is possible to
wake up, being fully aware of your paralysed body, when in fact you are still dreaming. Your body cannot
 ARTICLE NO. 03
LUCID DREAMING : CAN YOU CONTROL YOUR DREAMS ?

Imagine falling into a peaceful slumber only to find yourself in the world’s greatest virtual reality
game room. You can do anything you want to do. If you’ve always wondered what it felt like to fly,
you suddenly sprout wings and take flight. If you’ve been struggling with a decision, you can call in
specialists to help you work out the answer. If you want to go to Paris, you’re there in a blink of the
eye.

Is this possible? Some people say it is. It’s called

lucid dreaming.

Lucid dreaming is the practice of altering your

dreams. In a lucid dream, you know you are dreaming
and can change the course of a dream in the blink of
an eye. Although lucid dreaming has only been
a part of our everyday vocabulary for the past few
decades, it has been a part of many cultures since the
beginning of humankind. Native Americans use it as a
portal to the spirit world, while Tibetan Buddhists have
been using a variety of it for centuries.
‘Frederik van Eeden, a Dutch psychiatrist, coined
the term “lucid dream- ing” in 1913 during his study
of dreams. He started by documenting his dreams in a
journal, eventually com- ing up with nine different
types of dreams. He felt that dreams weren’t strictly
arbitrary and that there was a derivative meaning
behind them. His studies were groundbreaking, leading
others to pick up where he left off, advancing the study
of dreams to new levels.

Lucid dreaming has a scientific basis to support it. It’s not just theory. Typically when we sleep, the
dorsolateral prefrontal cortex part of our brains is disabled. This is the part of the brain where work-
ing memory occurs. People who experience lucid dreaming actually activate this part of the brain, in
a sense, turning on their awareness.
While lucid dreaming has entertainment purposes, it also has beneficial side effects. People have used
lucid dreaming to help them solve problems by replaying the issue repeatedly in the dream, looking
at the various outcomes. It’s also helpful for emotional healing and for stopping nightmares in their
tracks. Imagine turning the tables on a monster by controlling its behavior.
 ARTICLE NO. 04
ENTER, SANDMAN : HOW LUCID DREAMING ‘ CAN HELP YOU TO
CHANGE YOURSELF”

Maybe the vast majority of your recollected dreams involve public speaking in the nude, or repeat-
edly failing your college chemistry final. Or maybe you don’t recall having any dreams at all. Accord-
ing to Thomas Peisel, both scenarios are a profound missed opportunity: while you were helplessly
flunking exams or snoring into a subconscious abyss, he’s been flying through the sky like Magneto
and receiving sage advice from flame-covered monsters. And doing it all with complete cognizance.

Peisel, a long-time lucid dreamer, is the co-author of A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming: Mastering
the Art of Oneironautics (Workman, 2013). The book is a collaboration between Piesel, Dylan Tuc-
cillo, and Jared Zeizel, all three of them filmmakers and avid lucid dreamers (who also happen to
be roommates). Designed as a step-by-step manual for lucid dreaming novices, the book offers tips
on how to achieve lucid dreams — essentially sleep states you can consciously control — and sage
advice on how to navigate and master them. It also digs into the centuries-old history of dreaming,
and the current social and scientific lenses through which dreams (lucid or otherwise) are perceived.
For particularly fervent readers, the trio are now working on a website, Dream Labs, that will offer
"an interactive dream university" with video lectures and experiments users can partake in. On a set
break in Wisconsin, where his day job has him filming a bacon commercial, Peisel shared a few more
thoughts on adventures in slumberland.
Most adults, myself included, have never experienced a lucid dream — but you’ve been doing it for
more than a decade. When did you start lucid dreaming, and what was the experience like?

“I WAS ACTUALLY A CLOSET DREAMER, YOU COULD SAY, UNTIL A FEW YEARS AGO.”
I actually first had lucid dreams as a kid, but I didn’t really know what they were or that they were
anything special. I’d tell my mom about them and she’d just tell me I had a really vivid imagination, so
I didn’t think much of them and they went away for awhile. But when I was a teenager, they actually
came back, and they came back as nightmares, which was quite scary. By then, of course, I was lucky
enough to have the internet — I started looking this stuff up online, and found the support I need-
ed to actually train for lucid dreaming and learn to control the dreams. But I was actually a closet
dreamer, you could say, until a few years ago. When I mentioned it to people, they seemed to think it
was really weird, like “whoa, what is with this guy?” And my former girlfriend was definitely weirded
out by it, so I mostly considered lucid dreaming something to keep for myself, instead of sharing it
with other people.

There’s obviously a lot of scientific research in the realm of sleep, and a lot of questions that remain
unanswered. How has scientific inquiry yielded insight into lucid dreaming, and how do you respond
to those who don’t take it seriously?

To be honest, I don’t think that scientists still know a lot about lucid dreaming, how it works, why it
happens, what it means. I mean, we still have no firm consensus on what dreams really are, or why
we even need to sleep. One really interesting experiment at the University of Hull, which dates back
to 1975, used EEG to chart the brain activity of a patient who was familiar with lucid dreaming. They
were able to show using EEG that he was sleeping, and he was able to move his eyes in a certain pat-
tern to show researchers that he was dreaming in a conscious way.
Research like this is neat, but I also think that science tends to look purely at the physical: well, what
happens in the brain? How can we show this? That’s not the bigger picture for me, and I encourage
people to just know what lucid dreaming is through experience. If you’re skeptical, give it a try. There
will be a moment of lucidity, whether it’s tonight or nine years from now, where you’ll realize that this
phenomenon is valid.

Lucid dreaming actually freaks me out a fair bit, and I don’t think I’m the only one. What do you and
your co-au- thors tell people who aren’t
sure they want to give it a shot?

"WE AL- READY BREATHE, BUT

WE CAN CHOOSE TO BREATHE
MIND- FULLY. THE SAME
GOES FOR DREAMING."
People can have a lot of trauma
around dreaming — maybe they
have a his- tory of nightmares, or
they asso- ciate dreams with feeling
uncomfort- able or uneasy. But look:
we all have dreams, for around two
hours every night. That’s just the way
it is. So the way I like to see it is that we each have two hours every night to access a rich area of expe-
riences. We already breathe, but we can choose to breathe mindfully. The same goes for dreaming. We
can decide to do it in a different way, and we can all train ourselves to do exactly that.

And the best part is, when we dream mindfully we can actual control what’s going on. Even if the situ-
ation is terrifying, we’re the ones who can alter it, we’re the ones in complete control. We’re always safe.
I give this suggestion to kids, when I train them to lucid dream, but it can work for anyone: I tell them
to put on their "dreaming parachute" before they fall asleep. And if the dream gets too scary or over-
whelming, they just pull the cord on that parachute, and it’ll wake them right up.

In the book, you describe society’s relationship with dreams as "a bit ass-backwards." I’m wondering if
you could elaborate on that perspective?

I don’t think we value dreams for the unique experiences that they are. Instead, I think there’s a tenden-
cy to brush them off, or ignore them, or think of them as a distraction. We’re not taught to be curious
about dreams, or to consider what their meaning, or their value, might actually be.

We’re missing out on something important and universally true for all of us, I think. Which is that each
one of us has access to these unique events, and that these events can be as meaningful and transforma-
tive as anything that goes on in our waking life. They can teach us things, they can help us grow, and we
can all access them. This should be empowering: whatever is going on with you, if it’s conscious or even
if it’s subconscious, you can take ownership over and responsibility for.

For people who aren’t lucid dreaming, maybe they dream about their day, or something from their past,
or they dream about the future. Maybe they dream about visiting old friends or lovers, or someone who
has passed on. And that’s all great. But lucid dreaming gives dreams the capacity to be so much more
powerful — I think that lucid dreaming changes the way you move through the waking world. It does
for me.
 ARTICLE NO. 05

THE ABILITY TO CONTROL DREAMS MAY HELP US UNRAVEL THE

MYSTERY OF CONSCIOUSNESS

But some people - lucid dreamers - have the ability to experience awareness during their dreams
by "re-awakening" some aspects of their waking consciousness. They can even take control and act
with intention in the dream world (think Leonardo DiCaprio in the film Inception).

Lucid dreaming is still an understudied subject, but recent advances suggest it's a hybrid state of
waking consciousness and sleep.

Lucid dreaming is one of many "anomalous" experiences that can occur during sleep. Sleep pa-
ralysis, where you wake up
terrified and paralyzed while
remaining in a state of sleep, is
another. There are also false
awakenings, where you
believe you have woken up
only to discover that you are in
fact dreaming. Along with
lucid dreams, all these expe-
riences reflect an increase
in subjective awareness while
remaining in a state of sleep. To
find out more about the tran-
sitions between these states -
and hopefully consciousness
itself - we have launched a
large-scale on- line survey on
sleep experienc- es to look at the
relationships between these different states of hybrid consciousness.
Lucid dreaming and the brain
About half of us will experience at least one lucid dream in our lives. And it could be something
to look forward to because it allows people to simulate desired scenarios from meeting the love of
their life to winning a medieval battle. There is some evidence that lucid dreaming can be induced,
and a number of large online communities now exist where users share tips and tricks for achiev-
ing greater lucidity during their dreams (such as having dream totems, a familiar object from the
waking world that can help determine if you are in a dream, or spinning around in dreams to stop
lucidity from slipping away).

A recent study that asked participants to report in detail on their most recent dream found that
lucid (compared to non-lucid) dreams were indeed characterized by far greater insight into the
fact that the sleeper was in a dream. Participants who experienced lucid dreams also said they had
greater control over thoughts and actions within the dream, had the ability to think logically, and
were even better at accessing real memories of their waking life.
Another study looking at people's ability to make conscious decisions in waking life as well as during
lucid and non-lucid dreams found a large degree of overlap between volitional abilities when we are
awake and when we are having lucid dreams. However, the ability to plan was considerably worse in
lucid dreams compared to wakefulness.
Lucid and non-lucid dreams certainly feel subjectively different and this might suggest that they are
associated with different patterns of brain activity. But confirming this is not as easy as it might seem.
Participants have to be in a brain scanner overnight and researchers have to decipher when a lucid
dream is happening so that they can compare brain activity during the lucid dream with that of non-lu-
cid dreaming.

Inge- nious studies

examin- ing this have
devised a communi-
cation code between
lucid dreamer
partici- pants and re-
search- ers during
Rapid Eye Move-
ment (REM) sleep,
when dreaming
typical- ly takes place.
Before going to sleep,
the participant
and the researcher
agree on a specific
eye movement
(for example two
movements left then two movements right) that participants make to signal that they are lucid.

By using this approach, studies have found that the shift from non-lucid to lucid REM sleep is associ-
ated with an increased activity of the frontal areas of the brain. Significantly, these areas are associated
with "higher order" cognitive functioning such as logical reasoning and voluntary behavior which are
typically only observed during waking states. The type of brain activity observed, gamma wave activ-
ity, is also known to allow different aspects of our experience; perceptions, emotions, thoughts, and
memories to "bind" together into an integrated consciousness. A follow-up study found that electrically
stimulating these areas caused an increase in the degree of lucidity experienced during a dream.

Another study more accurately specified the brain regions involved in lucid dreams, and found in-
creased activity in regions such as the pre-frontal cortex and the precuneus. These brain areas are as-
sociated with higher cognitive abilities such as self-referential processing and a sense of agency - again
supporting the view that lucid dreaming is a hybrid state of consciousness.

Tackling the consciousness problem

How consciousness arises in the brain is one of the most perplexing questions in neuroscience. But it
has been suggested that studying lucid dreams could pave the way for new insights into the neurosci-
ence of consciousness.
This is because lucid and non-lucid REM sleep are two states where our conscious experience is mark-
edly different, yet the overall brain state remains the same (we are in REM sleep all the time, often
dreaming). By comparing specific differences in brain activity from a lucid dream with a non-lucid one,
then, we can look at features that may be facilitating the enhanced awareness experienced in the lucid
dream.
 ARTICLE NO. 06
DREAM ON !LUCID DREAMING IMPROVES SELF AWARENESS AND
METACOGNITION
Dreams, a series of images, emotions and sensations that flow from the unconscious during
sleep, belong to the mysterious, unquantifiable side of life. We all experience them, yet for many
they are quickly forgotten or disregarded. However, for those who bother to pay attention to
dreams they can be potent tools of self-discovery that not only help us to understand ourselves
at deeper levels, but also allow us to play and explore in a way that is not possible in normal
waking experience.

Usually when we dream we are not aware that what we are experiencing is occurring in our
mind’s eye. Though the content can be illogical, confusing and downright strange, most of us
generally just float along through the experience, often recognising that the events we are wit-
nessing are bizarre, but not arriving at the level of awareness where we understand that we are
immersed in a dream. However, as more people are discovering, it is possible to become con-
scious that we are dreaming; this is the phenomenon known as lucid dreaming.
In a lucid dream we are self-aware, and our ability to control dream events is enhanced so that
the dreamscape becomes our personal playground. With practice we can become fully active
rather than passive dreamers. There are ultimately no limits to what we can do in the dream
world. We can choose to soar through the galaxy, have a conversation with Plato, attempt dan-
gerous feats, or indulge in a naughty fantasy without worrying about limitations or consequenc-
es.

“The lucid dream, located as it is at a crossroads between worlds and states of consciousness,
places the magician in a unique position to influence the delicate balance of consciousness and
the interplay it has on matter in the waking state, and is thus an opportunity to test one’s ability
in the art of adjusting the mutable fabric of Maya.” ~ Zeena Schreck
My first lucid dream was an experience I will never forget. It began as a normal dream, but as the nar-
rative unfolded I suddenly became aware that I was dreaming. I decided to attempt actions that I could
not do in real life. I started by doing a flip in the air, and was astonished by how real the experience
felt. As I wondered what I should try next a man appeared next to me. “You should fly,” he said. ‘Of
course’, I thought and took off into the air. Conscious dream flying was more difficult than I anticipat-
ed. I coasted along, but found it challenging to stay more than a few feet above the ground. Just before I
woke up I decided to do the splits. As I sat with my dream body stretched into a pose that was normal-
ly impossible for my physical body, I touched my dream-legs and marvelled at the fact that I knew that
my ‘real’ body was curled up in bed.
Lucid Dreaming and the Mind
While it is difficult for science to observe the dream world to the same extent as it can the physical
world, technology and brain mapping have made it possible to provide a degree of insight. A recent
study conducted by researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Human Development in Berlin, and
the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry in Munich, compared brain structures of frequent lucid dream-
ers with participants who never, or only rarely had lucid dreams. The neuroscientists involved in the
research discovered that the anterior prefrontal cortex, the brain area which enables self-reflection, was
significantly larger in subjects who were capable of becoming lucid in their dreams. [1] Based on this
finding the researchers postulated that lucid dreamers would likely be more self-reflecting when awake.

As part of the study the participants were asked to solve tests that related to self-reflection while awake.
The researchers then took images of their brains during the process. Those images demonstrated that
the brain activity in the prefrontal cortex was more prominent in those with the ability to dream lu-
cidly. “Our results indicate that self-reflection in everyday life is more pronounced in persons who can
easily control their dreams,” said Elisa Filevich, a researcher at Lifespan Psychology at the Max Planck
Institute for Human Development. The difference in size of the anterior prefrontal cortex between lu-
cid dreamers and non-lucid dreamers suggests that lucid dreaming and the capacity for self-reflection
are closely linked.
Though the distinction between lucid dreamers and the general population was identified in this study,
the researchers were not able to establish whether training subjects in lucid dreaming could help im-
prove the capacity for self-reflection or vice versa. They hope to explore this in a follow-up study.

Other studies have shown that lucid dreamers are more creative, have a better ability to use divergent
‘outside-the-square’ thinking, have better dream recall, and have a higher level of personal significance
in the content of their dreams Lucid Living
Though only a small proportion of the general population experiences lucid dreaming I believe this is
largely due to lack of knowledge or interest rather than innate ability. The human brain has an amazing
capacity for change and improvement at any stage of life. Anyone who is committed can learn the art
of lucid dreaming. There are many simple tricks and techniques that a person can use to improve their
likelihood of becoming lucid in a dream. The important keys are awareness, practice and consistency.
One of the most common exercises used to encourage lucid dreaming is to develop the personal habit
of regularly checking the status of the reality we are immersed in. In lucid dreaming communities
when this approach is practiced consistently it is known as ‘all day awareness’ (ADA). In ‘all day aware-
ness’ one focuses on the subtle aspects of daily life that the majority of people ignore or take for grant-
ed. As a person gets into the habit of paying attention to details in their surrounds, it becomes second
nature to continue this practice even when dreaming. Often it is the awareness of illogical or impos-
sible details that act to alert a dreamer that what they are experiencing is not regular waking life. It is
interesting to note ADA shares many common traits with mindfulness practice, which has also been
shown to enhance self-awareness, and many people who practice mindfulness report discovering lucid
dreaming as a natural bi-product of their enhanced awareness.
John Bargh, a social psychologist from Yale, estimated that by the time we are adults the majority of
us operate on autopilot up to 95% of the time. When we operate in autopilot we are essentially just
going through the motions and largely living our lives unconsciously. This sees us operating in an
increasingly contracted, limited version of reality, which is the opposite of how we initially experi-
ence the world. As children our outlook is an open, expansive perspective, one that is saturated with
newness and wonder.

“As in lucid dreams, you see yourself or others with new eyes; your senses awaken and grasp an
experience more fully than ever before; suddenly, you find your ears are open to hear with a deeper
understanding.” ~ Jenny Davidow, Embracing Your Subconscious: Bringing All Parts of You into
Creative Partnership

So the more we focus on increasing our awareness, the more we can rekindle that child-like per-
spective that allows us to experience the greater whole of existence. Through learning how to
consciously interact with all of life in every moment, we open doors to richer, more meaningful and
exciting experiences and opportunities in both our dream and waking realities.
 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

1.) primary data - primary data is original research that is obtained through
first hand investigation.

2.) Secondary data - secondary data is the data that has been already collect-
ed by and is really available from other source.( like websites, books, mag-
zines etc

Data collection

Research type - quantitive research- survey

Number of respondents - 76
SURVEY RESEARCH
 CONCLUSION
Did you have a dream last night? Trick question, everyone has dreams, whether you remember
them or not. Now how many of you can actually say that you can fully describe the dream that
you had last night? Well, there is something better than even that. It is called lucid dreaming. Not
only can you vividly remember your dreams, but from there, you are able to control them. It is
like this other world where it feels like real life; you are in control of all your senses, including
smell. Now lucid dreaming is actually pretty rare; only about 20% of the world’s population is
able to lucid dream.
If anyone is like me, you can’t remember any of your dreams. So this thing called lucid dreaming
is impossible, right? No, lucid dreaming is learnable but takes patience and persistence. There are
three main things you need to do to learn how to lucid dream, but first, let’s talk about why you
would want to lucid dream. First off, it’s cool! You can control your dreams!
You can fly, meet your favorite celebrity, or walk on the moon, it is all in your imagination. Sec-
ond, you can overcome your fears and improve on your real life skills! For example, let’s say that
you are afraid of heights. You dream that you are on top of the Building, and you jump. Since you
are in control of your dreams, you can let yourself fall slowly, landing on a soft pillow, and also
because lucid dreaming feels so real, in your waking life, you will feel much better about it.
lucid dreaming just not helps you to overcome your phobias ,but also it does lot’s of things
it improves your waking life and also gives an access to your sub-conscious in your conscious
state. Subconscious or a awarness which is present inside you but you are not familiar to it . Ac-
cessing your subconscious is like getting a password of all your files. By accessing your subcon-
scious you will meet the real and a better version of you.

Lucid Dreaming is a journey to know your self.

“ The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational

mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that
honours the servant and has forgotten the gift.”- Albert
Einstein
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