No, this isn’t going to be a cheesy inspirational post. This is probably going to be quite silly. Because one of my New Year’s resolutions this year has been to learn to lucid dream.
It took me this long to learn, and I've been lucid a couple of times. First, I would start to notice strange things in my dreams—like, when a pet who passed away years ago was in a dream, I thought it was strange to see him, but couldn’t figure out why. Or, when I was yelling at someone, I couldn’t yell cuss words, but I could yell the rest just fine. Normally when I’m very angry in dreams my voice breaks, and as hard as I try, I can’t yell. This time it was only the bad words. In the dream, I thought, “Maybe I can’t cuss at my dad because he’s my dad,” and that made sense in the moment.
Anyway. Here are some methods I’ve tried for lucid dreaming:
In one lucid dream, all I could think to do was start singing and make everything around me a musical. So, that was pretty cool... In the other one, I was trying to tell someone "hey, this is a dream!" but she didn't believe me. So, I jumped in the air, flew around the room once, and then flew out the window.
Why am I trying so hard to lucid dream? Go and Google what percentage of our lives we spend asleep. Just go check real quick. I'm not going anywhere.
A THIRD of our lives (or I guess you could have kept reading... but Google for yourself if you don't believe me). If I'm already spending that long in dreams, I want to have as much fun as possible.
For the first few weeks, I did pretty well writing down my dreams every morning. Lately I haven't been keeping up with that, but just for fun, here are a few random clips from various dreams:
We played a lot of games, the last one being a real life sized version of Candy Land—don’t know why, there was no candy. At one point I stood up to agree with something and my head hit the ceiling.
I thought I was on vacation but was scheduled at work for literally ten minutes.
I’m yelling at my dad for looking at things on my computer. He said my stories were too dark.
We got to ride wales under water. Mine didn’t want me to leave, because after a certain point we were supposed to float back up to the surface. We had little bubble things on our faces so we could survive under water.
Exploring a mansion, but it was like an obstacle course. I kept doing it again and again, trying to see how far I could get in a certain amount of time.
I was singing “Carry on my Wayward Son” in an acapella group, and everyone else was screwing up so I took the lead and totally crushed it. Afterward these people from some school came to talk to me and offer opportunities. I wasn’t wearing a shirt but I wasn’t embarrassed, just a little cold, and very excited. I asked if I could put one on first, did so, and went in to talk to them.
Actually, several of my dreams lately have involved mansions or acapella groups. Funny how sometimes night dreams do relate to life dreams. Just about every part of the mansion in “The Mansion’s Twins” was inspired by recurring dreams. And now, I’m going for both types of dreams, and it’s incredible.
And now I’m going to end this post because dammit I just said we wouldn’t go cheesy and inspirational. Happy Wednesday!
It took me this long to learn, and I've been lucid a couple of times. First, I would start to notice strange things in my dreams—like, when a pet who passed away years ago was in a dream, I thought it was strange to see him, but couldn’t figure out why. Or, when I was yelling at someone, I couldn’t yell cuss words, but I could yell the rest just fine. Normally when I’m very angry in dreams my voice breaks, and as hard as I try, I can’t yell. This time it was only the bad words. In the dream, I thought, “Maybe I can’t cuss at my dad because he’s my dad,” and that made sense in the moment.
Anyway. Here are some methods I’ve tried for lucid dreaming:
- Meditations
- Reality checks throughout the day: “Am I dreaming?”
- Writing down dreams every morning.
- Having a plan for when I become lucid. There are all sorts of things I could do. Do I want to fly? Explore? Talk to people? Sing? Walk through a mirror into an alternate dimension? Maybe this is why I’m not quite there yet. My brain wants too many things.
In one lucid dream, all I could think to do was start singing and make everything around me a musical. So, that was pretty cool... In the other one, I was trying to tell someone "hey, this is a dream!" but she didn't believe me. So, I jumped in the air, flew around the room once, and then flew out the window.
Why am I trying so hard to lucid dream? Go and Google what percentage of our lives we spend asleep. Just go check real quick. I'm not going anywhere.
A THIRD of our lives (or I guess you could have kept reading... but Google for yourself if you don't believe me). If I'm already spending that long in dreams, I want to have as much fun as possible.
For the first few weeks, I did pretty well writing down my dreams every morning. Lately I haven't been keeping up with that, but just for fun, here are a few random clips from various dreams:
We played a lot of games, the last one being a real life sized version of Candy Land—don’t know why, there was no candy. At one point I stood up to agree with something and my head hit the ceiling.
I thought I was on vacation but was scheduled at work for literally ten minutes.
I’m yelling at my dad for looking at things on my computer. He said my stories were too dark.
We got to ride wales under water. Mine didn’t want me to leave, because after a certain point we were supposed to float back up to the surface. We had little bubble things on our faces so we could survive under water.
Exploring a mansion, but it was like an obstacle course. I kept doing it again and again, trying to see how far I could get in a certain amount of time.
I was singing “Carry on my Wayward Son” in an acapella group, and everyone else was screwing up so I took the lead and totally crushed it. Afterward these people from some school came to talk to me and offer opportunities. I wasn’t wearing a shirt but I wasn’t embarrassed, just a little cold, and very excited. I asked if I could put one on first, did so, and went in to talk to them.
Actually, several of my dreams lately have involved mansions or acapella groups. Funny how sometimes night dreams do relate to life dreams. Just about every part of the mansion in “The Mansion’s Twins” was inspired by recurring dreams. And now, I’m going for both types of dreams, and it’s incredible.
And now I’m going to end this post because dammit I just said we wouldn’t go cheesy and inspirational. Happy Wednesday!