Lucid dreaming

Haha! I was going to write about this two days back, and now, today, Kit has written about Chuang Tzu's 'Butterfly' dream in a post on sleeping and meditation. See HERE. 

I was introduced to lucid dreaming (becoming aware you are dreaming in a dream, and gaining some control over said dream) in about year 11 (if I recall correctly..), by my best friend; who had found out about it via the Internet, or a book.  I had an instant excitement about it (as many have), and played around with it on and off for a while.  I bought a read the classic Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming - Stephen LaBerge. As well as trawling the internet forums (as you do). 

There's a sense of adventure when two friends are working towards getting lucidity in the dream state, that makes everyday life more interesting (especially when you're testing for dream signs and the like). 

I vividly remember my first real lucid dream; one where I had full awareness and a large amount of dream control.  I flew down a big grassy hill, that dropped off a massive plateau onto a plain that was hundreds of kilometres wide.  The sky above the plain was the most incredible thunderstorm with orange lighting.  Everything was so crisp and sharp.  Blue-ray and 3D movies have nothing near it! 

Besides the shear awesomeness of flying, and the hyper-vividness of the dream, I was struck by the fact that this was perhaps the most real experience (where I had felt most alive) I had had in my whole life (or at least top 5).  It had a profound effect upon me. 

So, besides flying around (which is easily reason enough), why learn to lucid dream? Well, as I said, if you've not done it before, it can make things in everyday life much more exciting and adventurous.  You can also do things you find hard in daily life; get better at public speaking, or whatever.  Having more fluidity than the 'real world', I dare say that practicing with lucid dreaming may have an effect of enhancing creativity and problem solving. 

If you've never practiced becoming lucid in a dream (or if this is the first time you've heard of it, if you missed Inception or something) - you should seriously give it a go!!  I am putting some energy into it again at the moment.  Why not?