How would lucid dreaming help? I’ve heard mentions on the site before but I don’t really get it. I’m interested because it seems like a way to effectively be alive longer but I don’t see how it can make you smarter.
I discovered in high school that I was a lucid dreamer when I learned that I could study
complicated mathe-matical and geometry problems before going to bed and discovered that I
was able to solve the problems when I awakened.
This phenomenon followed me through college and medical school. When I was in medical
school, I began to apply my sleep-solving abilities to medical problems, quickly running
through the questions of the day and usu-ally finding useful solutions or useful additional
ques-tions in the process (even today I will occasionally wake up at 3: 00 in the morning and
call the hospital to order a special laboratory test on a problem patient, the pos-sible solution
of which had occurred to me in a lucid dream).
At this point, the greatest use to which I have been able to put this facility is in the practice of
surgery. Each night before retiring I review my list of surgical cases and I actually practice
these cases in my sleep. I have gained a reputation for being a rapid and skilled surgeeon with
almost no major complications. This surgical “practice” has allowed me from the very
beginning to constantly review the anatomy and to refine and polish technique by eliminating
unnecessary motions. I am presently able to perform most major complex procedures < 35
percent to 40 percent of the time taken by most off my peers. (R. V., Aiken, South Carolina)
I recently pulled second place in a math competition. When I received a copy of the problems
(five in all), I spent most of the day mulling over various approaches. When I went to sleep that
night, I dreamed lucidly of looking through a particular math reference book I own. I don’t
think I dreamed of reading anything in particular in the book, just the act of flipping through it.
Subjec-tively, the dream was only a couple of seconds long. When I woke, I didn’t have an
opportunity to look through the book until that evening. When 1 did, 1 discovered the trick I
needed to solve one of the problems. (T. D., Clarksville, Tennessee)
A little over a year ago, I was in a linear algebra class that introduced me to vector spaces. I
was having a lot of trouble understanding the topic on more than a superficial level. After
about a week of serious studying, I had a lucid dream about an abstract vector space. I
perceived directly a four-dimensional space. The dream did not have a visual component, but
such abstract dreams are not uncommon for me. The best I can describe that dream is to say
that I perceived four coordinate axes that were mutually perpendicular. Since that night, both
math and dreaming have been more fun for me, and I’ve had relatively little trouble
understanding vector space calculus. (T. D., Clarksville, Tennessee)
There’s a lot of mostly-unexplored territory in lucid dreaming. For instance, people have reported growing more eyes and seeing through all eyes simultaneously, or even being able to see in all directions at once. I once opened a poetry book in a lucid dream and found a poem I hadn’t ever seen before, and on waking the poem actually seemed pretty good.
Though speaking from my personal experience, it’s pretty fun, and for that you don’t have to be good at it; my control was pretty limited (flying is easy).
My personal experience is my visual imagination is far more vivid but my verbal reasoning is much diminished. I’ve semi-consciously thought through and planned social situations, and I hazard that it might be useful in artistic fields or in design, where what is important is to ‘experiment’ with lots of possible visual designs then pick a single one, which diminishes the problems caused by not taking notes as you only have to remember the final result. (Plausibly the reports of people waking up with fully formed paintings/music are semi-subconscious instances of this.)
That’s fair. Do you happen to know if one can do difficult math in this state. Is it exactly like being awake except that you’re, y’know, not? You can’t write things down (lastingly) obviously, so I think that would limit the usefulness of lucid dreaming in those cases, and you can’t learn new things. I’m might be discounting it because most “cognitive enhancement” I’ve done so far has been through assimilated already known knowledge rather than by new-to-the-world insights, in which case it would make sense for people who ARE coming up with new valuable ideas but probably less so for me.
I recall that one popular reality check method (i.e. a reliable way of telling whether you’re dreaming or IRL) is to check the time on your watch, look away, then check again. So you can see why any activity that involves having to write stuff down and have it remain unchanged while your attention is elsewhere might not be the best LD activity.
If you’re remembering the time on the watch well enough to know whether it’s changed, won’t you remember it well enough for it to be the same?
Other reality checks include counting your fingers (you’ll have more in lucid dreams) or flipping a light switch (the lights will flicker). Clearly, what determines whether a check works is whether you believe it works.
Also, see the quotes I posted above. With practice you can focus on things as well as when you’re awake. I agree that you shouldn’t do things that absolutely require you to write stuff down for future reference, like evaluating integrals, because if you really can’t remember them then your written records won’t persist.
The ‘what you believe works’ thing definitely has something going for it. There’s a certain logic that can apply, though. Obviously having more than five fingers or lights flickering sound like just ways of asking yourself ‘is this lucid’. But I’ve had somewhat lucid dreams* since I was a kid, and one of my earliest ‘checks’ was reading a book: my dreaming mind simply did not or could not make up text that way, so I’d pay attention to whether I was actually reading or thinking ‘I am now reading a book’ without any actual words being involved. Any very close attention to detailed works: my dreams, and indeed my usual observations, tend to run as a narrative about what’s happening rather than a close inspection of circumstances.
On the ‘what you believe works’, what appeals to your imagination is obviously relevant. I used to be able to get out of lucid dreams by shutting my eyes, which as I was 8 or something is probably a pretty classic response. When that stopped working I found I could shut my eyes and tip myself forward, giving the sensation of tumbling over into some sort of endless abyss (honestly) and that would get me out of the dream. One time I got out by grabbing the surface of the dream and ripping it to reveal the purple static behind, and stepping into that got me out. I had been reading His Dark Materials, though.
precisely, I tend to go in and out of being aware I’m in a dream, control what I do to a significant extent and the surroundings/rules to a varied extent, never remain stable long enough to do anything massively fun/productive. I think this may be related to the fact that my earliest/main lucid dreams have been nightmares, or at least very creepy. Also to the fact that I rarely have particularly detailed/involved dreams anyway.
When I’m reading in dreams, there appears to be text, and I feel like I’m recognizing little bits of ideas in it, but it’s very unstable. It’s an odd sensation.
I occasionally get tiny amounts: but it’s not just reading. I’m fairly sure that when I have conversations in dreams this often works by me accepting that ‘I said X they said Y’ rather than bothering with noise. I wasn’t sure if I dreamt in sound or colour at all until I had a couple of dreams where those two things were particularly vivid.
Lucid dreaming is fascinating, but I do sometimes wonder about how UNlucid dreams tend to be. How much we construct the bare minimum. Although IIRC we also lack real colour vision in bits of our peripheral vision and similar weirdnesses without noticing, and we don’t really notice colour loss in bad lighting.
in which case it would make sense for people who ARE coming up with new valuable ideas but probably less so for me.
The mere fact that you aren’t deriving earth-shatteringly new heretofore unknown insights does not make the usefulness of contemplation null-and-void.
Of course, lucid dreaming still suffers (for me anyhow) from the problem of it being difficult to actually recall what occurs in said dreams long after the fact. But still; being given more time to ‘muddle through’ personal troubles would give one more ability to derive answers than otherwise would be the case. Of course, this isn’t a particularly useful strategy to me personally (my history has included attempts to refine/inform/understand my intuitions thereby allowing me to reliably make more-rational decisions ‘instantaneously’.)
The mere fact that you aren’t deriving earth-shatteringly new heretofore unknown insights does not make the usefulness of contemplation null-and-void.
This is clearly true, but if I ever get around to mastering lucid dreaming I’ll probably just fly around, blow stuff up, and generally have fun before I start using it for anything reasonable. I wonder if then I’ll feel like I need to spend less time while awake on time-wasting activities.
Do you know of any good tutorials? How did you learn to do it (if you had to learn it) and do you lucid dream all the time?
How did you learn to do it (if you had to learn it) and do you lucid dream all the time?
I am somewhat unusual in that I never “learned” to lucid dream, and I don’t know that I ever do dream any other way.
This is clearly true, but if I ever get around to mastering lucid dreaming I’ll probably just fly around, blow stuff up, and generally have fun before I start using it for anything reasonable.
How would lucid dreaming help? I’ve heard mentions on the site before but I don’t really get it. I’m interested because it seems like a way to effectively be alive longer but I don’t see how it can make you smarter.
From Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming:
There’s a lot of mostly-unexplored territory in lucid dreaming. For instance, people have reported growing more eyes and seeing through all eyes simultaneously, or even being able to see in all directions at once. I once opened a poetry book in a lucid dream and found a poem I hadn’t ever seen before, and on waking the poem actually seemed pretty good.
Piotr Woźniak doesn’t seem to think lucid dreaming is worth pursuing.
Though speaking from my personal experience, it’s pretty fun, and for that you don’t have to be good at it; my control was pretty limited (flying is easy).
My personal experience is my visual imagination is far more vivid but my verbal reasoning is much diminished. I’ve semi-consciously thought through and planned social situations, and I hazard that it might be useful in artistic fields or in design, where what is important is to ‘experiment’ with lots of possible visual designs then pick a single one, which diminishes the problems caused by not taking notes as you only have to remember the final result. (Plausibly the reports of people waking up with fully formed paintings/music are semi-subconscious instances of this.)
… more time to think means more thought-hours to dedicate to a given problem?
That’s fair. Do you happen to know if one can do difficult math in this state. Is it exactly like being awake except that you’re, y’know, not? You can’t write things down (lastingly) obviously, so I think that would limit the usefulness of lucid dreaming in those cases, and you can’t learn new things. I’m might be discounting it because most “cognitive enhancement” I’ve done so far has been through assimilated already known knowledge rather than by new-to-the-world insights, in which case it would make sense for people who ARE coming up with new valuable ideas but probably less so for me.
I recall that one popular reality check method (i.e. a reliable way of telling whether you’re dreaming or IRL) is to check the time on your watch, look away, then check again. So you can see why any activity that involves having to write stuff down and have it remain unchanged while your attention is elsewhere might not be the best LD activity.
If you’re remembering the time on the watch well enough to know whether it’s changed, won’t you remember it well enough for it to be the same?
Other reality checks include counting your fingers (you’ll have more in lucid dreams) or flipping a light switch (the lights will flicker). Clearly, what determines whether a check works is whether you believe it works.
Also, see the quotes I posted above. With practice you can focus on things as well as when you’re awake. I agree that you shouldn’t do things that absolutely require you to write stuff down for future reference, like evaluating integrals, because if you really can’t remember them then your written records won’t persist.
The ‘what you believe works’ thing definitely has something going for it. There’s a certain logic that can apply, though. Obviously having more than five fingers or lights flickering sound like just ways of asking yourself ‘is this lucid’. But I’ve had somewhat lucid dreams* since I was a kid, and one of my earliest ‘checks’ was reading a book: my dreaming mind simply did not or could not make up text that way, so I’d pay attention to whether I was actually reading or thinking ‘I am now reading a book’ without any actual words being involved. Any very close attention to detailed works: my dreams, and indeed my usual observations, tend to run as a narrative about what’s happening rather than a close inspection of circumstances.
On the ‘what you believe works’, what appeals to your imagination is obviously relevant. I used to be able to get out of lucid dreams by shutting my eyes, which as I was 8 or something is probably a pretty classic response. When that stopped working I found I could shut my eyes and tip myself forward, giving the sensation of tumbling over into some sort of endless abyss (honestly) and that would get me out of the dream. One time I got out by grabbing the surface of the dream and ripping it to reveal the purple static behind, and stepping into that got me out. I had been reading His Dark Materials, though.
precisely, I tend to go in and out of being aware I’m in a dream, control what I do to a significant extent and the surroundings/rules to a varied extent, never remain stable long enough to do anything massively fun/productive. I think this may be related to the fact that my earliest/main lucid dreams have been nightmares, or at least very creepy. Also to the fact that I rarely have particularly detailed/involved dreams anyway.
When I’m reading in dreams, there appears to be text, and I feel like I’m recognizing little bits of ideas in it, but it’s very unstable. It’s an odd sensation.
I occasionally get tiny amounts: but it’s not just reading. I’m fairly sure that when I have conversations in dreams this often works by me accepting that ‘I said X they said Y’ rather than bothering with noise. I wasn’t sure if I dreamt in sound or colour at all until I had a couple of dreams where those two things were particularly vivid.
Lucid dreaming is fascinating, but I do sometimes wonder about how UNlucid dreams tend to be. How much we construct the bare minimum. Although IIRC we also lack real colour vision in bits of our peripheral vision and similar weirdnesses without noticing, and we don’t really notice colour loss in bad lighting.
The mere fact that you aren’t deriving earth-shatteringly new heretofore unknown insights does not make the usefulness of contemplation null-and-void.
Of course, lucid dreaming still suffers (for me anyhow) from the problem of it being difficult to actually recall what occurs in said dreams long after the fact. But still; being given more time to ‘muddle through’ personal troubles would give one more ability to derive answers than otherwise would be the case. Of course, this isn’t a particularly useful strategy to me personally (my history has included attempts to refine/inform/understand my intuitions thereby allowing me to reliably make more-rational decisions ‘instantaneously’.)
This is clearly true, but if I ever get around to mastering lucid dreaming I’ll probably just fly around, blow stuff up, and generally have fun before I start using it for anything reasonable. I wonder if then I’ll feel like I need to spend less time while awake on time-wasting activities.
Do you know of any good tutorials? How did you learn to do it (if you had to learn it) and do you lucid dream all the time?
I am somewhat unusual in that I never “learned” to lucid dream, and I don’t know that I ever do dream any other way.
That gets old far quicker than you’d think.
I’d be willing to bet that other parts of the ‘generally have fun’ would get old far more slowly.