Dylan Tuccillo

This is quite an exciting book. The authors provide us with extensive knowledge about lucid dreams and practically promise that if we follow their advice we will have one or some.

I myself have not had one yet (though I perhaps have had a few previously), but then I haven’t tried everything suggested.

Lucid dreaming is the ability to know you’re dreaming while you’re dreaming.

Another name for lucid dreaming is oneironautics and a lucid dreamer is called an oneironaut.

The authors teach us 1) how to reconnect with our dreams 2) how to have a lucid dream and 3) what to do once you’re lucid.

The first important thing to do when preparing to lucid dream is several times a day ask ourselves the question: “Am I dreaming?”

Then we should try to answer the question, We can do this by pressing our finger into the other hand. If we re dreaming, it wil go right through.

If we constantly ask this question, we will eventually ask it in our dreams too, thus giving us a chance to become conscious and lucid.

In lucid dreams we can have conversations with dream characters, fly across a mountain range, pass effortlessly through walls and travel over large distances.

The book includes many true accounts of people’s lucid dreams.

The authors assert that everybody dreams though many do not remember their dreams. I find that if I take my B-vitamins before going to bed, I remember my dreams.

As far as I recall, it is B6 that is valuable for dream recall, but the various B-vitamins should be taken together, so we shouldn’t take B6 alone.

All ancient cultures set store by dreaming. These include the Sumerians, Ancient Egyptians, Ancient Greeks, Romans, Hindus, Tibetans, Chinese, Hebrews and Indigenous tribes.

The period when we dream has been termed REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep.

It has been argued that REM sleep and wakefulness are essentially similar brain states. The only difference is that during the day our experience is shaped by the sensory input coming from the external world, while when we dream our attention is turned inward

In the beginning hours of sleep our REM (dream time) is relatively short, five or ten minutes at most. But as the night progresses, the amount of time spent in REM increases, The last two REM stages can last up to 50 minutes each.

We should make an intention to have lucid dreams, Before bed, we should say to ourself: “I am lucid and aware in my dream.” It is important to put the statement in the present tense.

Picture your desire coming to fruition – imagine yourself in a dream realizing that it’s a dream.

Imagine breathing dream air, flying, looking around.

An advanced lucid dreamer goes to bed looking for a lucid dream.

“Concentrate on your intention until sleep pulls you under.”

“All that is required to become lucid is to go to bed with the confidence, expectation, and intention to realize when you are dreaming.”

It’s important to mentally rehearse becoming lucid.

Visualize yourself in a dream, feeling the excitement of recognizing the dream state.

Feel a sense of gratitude that you have experienced a lucid dream before having one.

Cultivate a strong desire to lucid dream and make such desires your dominant thoughts before bed.

The authors claim that dreams are real experiences. Of course they are!

We should keep a dream journal and have it next to our bed.

We often dream about the same, specific things. For example, if you realize that you often dream about your old girlfriend, you can tell yourself before bed: “The next time I see my exx-girlfriend I will realize that I am dreaming”.

Writing down our dreams is the most effective way to remember them.

We have to perform reality checks to see if we are dreaming. As stated, ask if we are dreaming and try to put our finger through the palm of our hand.

One man looked at his hands and noticed that he had eleven fingers, so he knew he was dreaming.

Jumping is a great reality check. If you jump, do you float down, or is there an absence of gravity?

Does your reflection in the mirror look normal?

Can you read the same sentence twice without it changing?

Ask whether you are dreaming five to ten times a day for three days.

Perform a reality check, for example,

Every time you answer your phone

Every time you walk through a doorway

Every time you see a dog

After every meal

When something strange happens.

Don’t try to force it. If you stay focused and relaxed, the dream will simply come to you.

The easiest way of becoming lucid is with a technique called DILD, or a Dream-initiated Lucid Dream. A DILD is simply a dream where you become lucid after the dream has already started.

There is lots of further information that I’m not mentioning here.

I will provide a few things more, though. The authors tell us of the beings we can meet and communicate with, whom he calls the natives.

The natives don’t always look like human beings.

They include the following:

1) The sleepwalker, who lacks awareness

2) The friend. This native’s awareness is medium-normal.

3) The guide, who has a high awareness.

The latter may have important information to communicate and have a powerful presence. They know much more than you do. They don’t necessarily have human form.

You should interact with these various characters whom you can think of as your guides.

You can get guidance and healing, and the authors also mention dream sex.

Other than DILD, there is another method of becoming lucid called WILD.

WILD = Wake-Initiated Lucid Dream.

In this method you go from the waking state directly into a lucid dream.

You want your mind to stay awake while your body falls asleep.

I have personally experienced something like this a while ago.

I found that I was sleeping, but conscious. I knew this because I was snoring slightly. But I was not dreaming, just sleeping.

Also, years ago I have had experiences which indicate that I was lucid dreaming though I was not in fact conscious of being in a dream.

I lived south of Elsinore in Denmark, and I became aware of the fact that I was flying north along the railway line from where I lived to Elsinore. I was heading for a town north of Elsinore, where my younger daughter lived with her father. I realized that I went there every night to check that she was okay.

But this time I decided to change course and visit a female friend I knew in Elsinore. I flew through the town and noticed many other dreamers flying around. As far as I could make out, these dreamers were not conscious.

I recognized some people I had seen around, though none I knew well.

I flew to my friend’s house and went through the wall into her living-room.

She came out of her bedroom and greeted me.

I said to her “This is a dream. Please remember it. I’m really here visiting you.” I felt like shaking her to make an impression on her, but realized this would wake her up.

The next day I asked her if she remembered my visit. She said she didn’t but that when she woke up that morning she had felt excited and knew that something had happened during the night.

On other occasions I have been aware of flying around inside a house, and doing this at will, though again I did not know that I was dreaming.

I found this to be a useful, absorbing and exciting book and strongly recommend you to purchase it if you are at all interested in lucid dreaming.

Should I succeed in having a lucid dream, I will ask for healing, and, if possible, try to meet Christ for the same purpose, though it will not be necessary to meet up with him since any being in the dream may be able to heal me.

This is a valuable book.… (més)

I have very vivid dreams and even experience occasional sleep paralysis when I nap (my brain wakes up before my body is physically able move, which is terrifying), so I feel like lucid dreaming is something that I should be able to teach myself to do. I had one lucid dream many years ago, but I couldn't stay in it for very long. This book gives practical advice that I have already put to use, but some sections are pretty boring and useless if you can't actually have lucid dreams yet. Hopefully the techniques I've learned will pay off soon with nightly practice.… (més)