Can Anyone Become A Lucid Dreamer?

You have heard about people who lucid dream and think it is something you would like to do. That is a good starting point but exactly how do you begin and what are the steps to being a successful lucid dreamer?

So, what is so good about being a lucid dreamer? What would you gain from it? In order to understand the advantages of being aware when you are dreaming, we need to examine what regular sleep actually is.

How is lucid dreaming different? Have you ever considered the process of sleep before? Every night you make preparations, crawl into bed and go to sleep. You may have dreams or nightmares or all may just be dark for a few hours, it is rather boring isn?t it?

The human body has a built in requirement for sleep. It rests the body so that we are prepared to continue our lives. Without it, there is strong evidence for insanity. That is all well and good but there is nothing saying we cannot control certain aspects of sleep is there?

Consider the idea of taking control of your own dreams. What would it feel like to purpose what direction your dreams would take you? Explore new worlds that are only limited to your control and imagination. This is what it means to be a lucid dreamer, kind of the ultimate fantasy world where you call all the shots.

How can a person achieve this? How do you learn to be a lucid dreamer? DILD refers to a dream initiated lucid dream. You need to realize you are dreaming. In other words, if you are dreaming and know it, you are having a lucid dream.

Another popular method is to have a wake initiated lucid dream (WILD); this is a straight shot from awake to asleep with no lapse in your consciousness. This is usually achieved by purposefully retaining awareness during the hypnagoogic state, which directly precedes sleep.

How exactly do you induce either one of these lucid dream states?

Dream Recall

You will need to learn how to remember your dreams if you want to be able to have lucid dreams. It is referred to as dream recall, the ability to remember your dreams. If you can remember your dreams you are more likely to realize when you are dreaming because many of the dreams you have will be the same or almost the same.

Keeping a dream journal is the best way to learn this skill. A dream journal is for writing down anything which you can remember about your dreams for future reference. You should do this immediately after waking up; the longer you wait, the harder it will be to recall.

Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD)

This method was developed by top lucid dreaming researcher Dr. Stephen LaBerge. The idea is to affirm to yourself that you will remember something when you see it in a dream ? then when you do, you will realize that you are dreaming and begin to assert control over your dream.

Wake-Back-to-Bed (WBTB)

To use the wake back to bed method you need do little initially beyond setting your clock to wake you up. Set your clock for about five hours sleep give or take an hour, once the alarm goes off get up and do something. Read a book, your dream journal anything but going back to sleep, after approximately an hour you may go back to bed. In studies done this method has 60% of the time. When you are interrupted in the middle of sleep, you are interrupting rapid eye movement sleep. This is the time when dreams are the most active. Therefore, you stop in the middle of your best dreamtime only to return to sleep a short time later, improving your chances of entering lucid dream state.

Cycle Adjustment Technique

Cycle Adjustment Technique

Daniel Love came up with this way to accomplish lucid dreaming. Start getting up an hour and a half earlier. After you get used to this, go back to getting up at your usual time. Since you are used to getting up earlier but don?t have to now, your mind is still thinking you are awake, therefore you will be more likely to be aware in your dream.

WILD refers to Wake Initiation of Lucid Dreams

To get into this correct frame of mind if you will there are a few tricks you can use. Focus seems to be key so try to focus your mind on things like your breathing, counting, perhaps chant or meditate. In a way, you are practicing self-hypnosis. Use this technique when you are not extremely tired, perhaps during a late nap.

You need to stay aware; it is a lot like self hypnosis. This is not a good exercise to try when you are tired as your mind may not stay as aware. Try to focus on things that require brain activity such as doing math puzzles, jogging or anything to keep your mind active. Breathe evenly and focus on relaxing every part of your body.

There are also technological innovations which can help to induce lucid dreaming, among them strobe lights and dreaming masks.

However, the most reliable method of all is to listen to binaural sound frequencies (also called binaural beats) on headphones.

This type of sound can alter your brain and bring you to the REM stage of sleep very quickly. This is where your lucid dreaming will occur.

With a combination of self affirmations, self hypnosis and binaural sounds, being a lucid dreamer is something anyone can do successfully.