Dreaming In Perspective, Guide to understand dreams Options

This topic is meant to help readers learn how to understand their dreams and to use them to better their lives by providing convenient and objective information on the subjects presented. This first post is an introduction to the content. I've tried to format it in a way that will be easier to read. Simply look at the bold text and you know what that section is about. If its not interesting you can skip on down to the next without any trouble.

For the most part these are just my thoughts. I do not dictate myself as an authority in any of this content. It is, however, based on years of learning, practice and legitimate higher education. As a psych major I have taken courses on dreams, interpreting them and understanding their psychological relevance. I have been using real techniques (that I will share at some point) to help people interpret their dreams for about 3 years now.

As always this is not my thread. Anybody who wishes to contribute may do so (If fact I kinda hope some of you help out as it would be easier on me (IMG:style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif) ) So if you have any articles or information to share it would be welcomed.

1. General Physiology: Dreams are a state of mind where the body is mostly paralyzed, unconscious and the brain fires neuro pathways at random. This random firing of brain cells produces the affect of a dream. A dream in and of itself is regarded as nothing more than the random formation of images and sensations. Any five of our senses can be experienced, though smell is the rarest, despite its connection to memory. There is no data proving or disproving that dreams carry any denotative meaning. Also there is no known single location where dreams originate in the brain. One can experience dream like sensations at any time in the sleep cycle. But the most vivid dreams occur during REM (rapid eye movement). REM lasts for a period of about 10-30 minutes during the stages of sleep. While the REM stage of sleep only lasts for part of the night, people can expect to go through 90 minutes cycles and experience this stage several times in one night. It is believed some times dreams may actually resume, as though set on pause when REM is over and then continues where it left off when a person reenters REM. We could get into the stages of sleep but they have little to do with dreaming (at least in laymen's terms) and its really boring.

Everybody dreams. Some, like about 10-12%, dream only in black and white. Most people actually have dozens (possibly even hundreds) of dreams in a single night even though the over all period of time that we dream only lasts for about 2-3 hours. Most dreams are short lasting, going from only a few seconds to minutes. Some last up to 15 or 20 minutes and only on rare occassion do they last longer than 20 minutes. It is estimated that people will have from over a billion to possibly even a trillion dreams in a life time. The problem with gauging this is in knowing when a dream begins and when it ends. Over half the total population experiences reoccuring dreams.

Dreams are strongly linked to memory formation and processing. The vast majority of people, something like 2/3, do not remember many of their dreams and for the most part of their life do not regard them as important, even though they spend about 6 years of their life dreaming. When a person wakes they lose about 90% memory of their dreams in about the first 10 minutes. People can be taught to remember how to remember, even control/manipulate their dreams. The most vivid dreams occur either in the latest stages of sleep (like early in the morning) or when people take naps in the afternoon.

Despite common belief only about 10 percent of dreams are of a sexual nature. The reason why these kinds of dreams are thought to be common is because they are the easiest to remember (who'd of thought that?).

When it comes to sleep disorders the only common ones are insomnia (too little REM) andf hyposomnia (too much sleep). Its estimated that 1/3 of the population will suffer from some form of insomnia or sleep apnea (episodes of snoring) in their life time. Other commonly known disorders, parasomnias, such as sleep walking/talking/eating (in rare cases even driving or sexual activity) only happen in a very small portion of people and they very seldom remember such occurances. Despite popular belief narcolepsy is not a sleep disorder. Its a neurological condition that results in sudden sleeping spells caused by brain seizures.

2. Why do we dream?: Really we don't know why for certain.

There are many theories. For example some believe that dreams serve as an occupant to the mind; the mind gets bored and it produces dreams to stay occupied. The thinking is that if the brain produces dreams it pascifies the body as a whole and makes it less likely to react as though it were under attack, in danger or dying.

Some believe we dream because the mind uses them as a mechanism to process sensory information. Sort of like rebooting a computer. In this way dreams are like an organic cataloging system and information we take in is committed to memory based on the degree of experiences.

Another theory is that the mind never really looses total consciousness and that dreams are forms of expression we are not capable of or willing to show. Thus under this model dreams serve to facilitate the basic human need to express itself in a way that doesn't cause harm or where such expression could cause harm in real life.

Still some believe that dreams are nothing more than a bi-product of natural human functions that serve to maintain the greater health of the whole body. Most theories agree that sleeping in general is a restoritive measure for the body. It is also known that if the body is deprived of REM sleep long enough, it dies. If the body is depeprived of its senses through sensory deprivation long enough, the mind goes insane and creates its own reality. Likewise, some researchers have looking into neuro-feedback for therapy purposes.

3. Do dreams have any meaning?: There are two main schools of thought for this. One dreams do not have any intentional/biological meaning at all. In other words we just dream and then give them meaning when we are conscious as a sort of way to justify their purpose.

The second theory is that dreams do have meaning, or more over purpose, that being to process information and act as a sort of second consciousness to help the greater mind realize repressed memories along with their emotions and desires. Under this theory, dreams act as a sort of diagnostic tool bringing physical and mental issues to the attention of the greater mind.

4. States of consciousness: There are four basic levels of consciousness during dreams.

- No awareness or control at all. The vast majority of dreams (about 90%) are spent at this level. These dreams are usually not the ones you remember - you can be not very commonly. In these kinds of dream the content tends to be wild and more like static from a radio than coherent imagery with detail and possibly meaning. People have no control over their actions within dreams at this state and do not know they are actually dreaming.

- Little awareness and control. Of the dreams people do remember these are the most common. They generally take place in a generic theme; like a school, church, home, favorite park, outerspace or under water. In this state people sometimes report flying, falling, talking or writing they cannot understand or see familiar faces. Also people are engaging is some activity like doing the dishes or taking a test, walking a dog - basically any common activity. Most people do not have control in this state but sometimes they get like a "burst" of awareness that allows them to control very simple details.

- Lucid dreaming; some awareness, some control. At this state a person is aware enough to realize they are dreaming. For the most part elements within the imagery and content is still out of control and random. But people at this state can control specific details by willpower alone. These kinds of dreams are vivid and easily remembered but tend to be shorter and only last from a few seconds to minutes. This is because once the mind is aware, its no longer unconscious and it begins to wake up. These kinds of dreams are also very rare, occurring in most only 3% of the time. Incidentally one of the most common themes for lucid dreams in men around the ages of 15-35 is sexual in nature.

- High lucid dreaming; total control, total awareness. In this state a person is able to control every detail, interact with their dreams, change dreams even explore theoretical ideas like magick and astral projection. Like lucid dreams, without practice, they last only a short time but are extremely vivid. However these kinds of dreams only occur naturally about 1% of the time.

5. Psychological relevance:

- Therapy. Psychologist have linked dreams to memory and memory function. It is believed that with the aid of council a person can recover repressed memories that can shade light on hidden desires, emotions, thoughts, experiences as well as help in the healing process of dealing with traumatic events. Dreams may be able to help amnesiacs recover lost identities, be used to help people with Alzheimers or other memory loss. Dreams in general can be used as a medium by therapists to facilitate recover from mental disorders - even schizophrenia - but especially with depression and anxiety and other mood disorders.

- Recreation. Dreams can be a good source of relaxation. In high lucid dreams one is basically God of their mind and can do anything they want; anything they can imagine.

- Exploration. We have machines to monitor brain waves and pin point what happens where and this gives some insight into the secrets of the brain. But to really understand the brain, more over unlock its secrets, we'll need to actually explore dreams themselves to gather empirical data. Consider this: intellect and memory could be related to our ability to dream. Now consider the really good stuff: Dreams might be able to help us understand paranormal sciences and do so irrefutably - things like psychic abilities, telepathy, shared dreams, astral projection, even telekinesis and mind over matter could be unlocked through our dreams.

- Self diagnostic. Dreams can alert us to health problems if we are able to recognize the proper patterns in our dreams.

6. Mystical/occult relevance: Dreams have long been associated with magickal powers. Shaman thought of the dream world as its own reality independent of this world in which supernatural beings existed and could be contacted for service. Dreams could be the keys to understanding metaphysical existence. We may be able to tare down the doors of perception and see the universe in a way that truly shows us reality for what it is. Dream magick in general is considered a powerful tool and its highly flexible, anybody can do it without having to be a master at some craft.

[edit] Information updated

This post has been edited by Acid09: Feb 24 2008, 08:00 PM

Lucid dreams are a potent way to induce an altered state of mind for spiritual exploration. Many Shaman have regarded the dream world as a reality seperate from this one. It has been consider a platform for magickal manifestion and mystical exploration for thousands of years. LCDs also has the psychological ability to allow people to explore and understand there own thoughts, desires, feelings and memories. The potential for LCDs is virutally limmited to one's imagination.

LCDs happen in two ways - either a person is dreaming and then becomes aware or they retain lucidity right into dreaming.

The following is series of techniques that are commonly used to induce LCDs.

"Wake back to bed"
First is the "wake back to bed" technique. I have learned over extensive observation that the most common times I naturally have LCDs is during the early morning hours. I do not know if this common in others as well. But it has allowed me to capitalize on this technique. Its relatively simple. The idea is that you wake yourself up after 5-6 hours sleeping using an alarm or drinking water before bed to make yourself get up and go to the bathroom during the night and then go back to sleep. When you go to sleep the second time you relax, slow your breathing - I generally lie on my back, and then allow yourself to drift off into sleep. Of course this takes practice and more often then not you'll either just fall right back to sleep or wake yourself back up. The key here is self observation, without disturbing the sleep process. What I mean is you observe your own bodily functions as you begin to sleep. Your breathing is slow, you are comfortable, you might feel heart palpitations (skipping heart beat, its normal) you might twitch or jerk your leg (this is also normal as it is your body resisting what it thinks is an attack). As you continue you will start to hear random noises and see things that probably won't make sense. Do not attempt to make sense of this as doing so will cause you to wake up. You have just started to fall asleep and this is where you will most likely either wake back up or lose consciousness. With practice you will learn to retain consciousness longer as you enter deeper stages of sleep. It does take practice.

A variation of this technique is to remain awake for a period time (at most an hour) recalling any previous dreams, perhaps eat a snack, drink some warm milk and then proceed with the rest of the WBTB technique.

"Mnemonic Induction"
Another technique follows the same process of following your sleeping patterns into a LCDs only you do this as you go to bed, there is no waking yourself up and going back to sleep part. The next difference is that one sets an intention to have an LCD. This can be done through writting out this intent in a journal (just as easy as "tonight I will have a lucid dream") and then place the journal under the pillow or bed. Like wise you can create a "dream doll" or blanket, basically to serve as a construct that has the ability to put you into a lucid state. You can also chant the intent out loud as a sort of simple sleeping spell, or it can be an elaborate ritual. You can also invoke any godform/archetype of dreaming. This is known as the mnemonic induction of LCDs.

"Wake Initiation"
The wake initiation technique is like day dreaming. With practice it is still a potent way to induce a lucid state. The idea is to train the mind to retain consciousness directly into the REM stage of sleep. There are certain times where one's success rate is the highest, taking naps in the afternoon, or being extremely tired, or in any state where sleep comes easy. How a person retains consciousness varies. One can count sheep, climb stairs, reenact a sexual encounter (in my opinion that just keeps me awake though). A couple things I have used successfully - meditation while visualizing being seating high on a cliff over looking an ocean. In this the focus was more on the waves of the sea or the clouds in the sky, sun set/rise, phase shifts of the moon - get creative. Then the other way imagining some fantacy (like what would I do in Luke Skywalker's place, would I use the force for good or bad?). This is actually probably the easiest technique to practice. It still takes practice to keep the mind from loosing track of itself and totally lossing consciousness.

"Cycle Adjustment"
There is also the cycle adjustment technique. This is where a person wakes and hour or so earlier than normal and repeats this for several weeks. This causes the body to readjust its sleeping patterns. This increases the likelihood that one will have an LCD if they alternate using their old sleep pattern on some days and the new one on others, like alternate every other day. If you also incorperate the process of following your sleeping patterns as you fall asleep and reinforce intent to have LCDs you will likely have them. However with this technique you are not really controlling when you have LCDs you just increase the chances of having them naturally. This technique also works better if you practice dream recall, which I will explain later on.

"Induction Devices"
Another way to induce lucid dream is through induction devices. There are actually devices that are scientifically proven to increase the odds of having an LCD. The way these things work is through monitoring an individual's sleep cycles until they reach REM. At that point the device flashes a red light over the person's eye lids or gives a very subtle electric shock. Some have theorized that by increase the level of electromagnatism around one's brain they will be more likely to be aware while they dream. Some devices emmit low frequency sound meant to mimic one's brain waves at a conscious level. There are various types of brain waves that are measurable at different states of consciousness. For example theta waves are what you might see in a person who is relaxed, meditating or doing some remedial activity, like nitting for example. Someone who is aroused, like laughing or curious, can also exhibit theta waves. Delta waves are what you see in people who are in deep sleep. Some induction devices claim they can be used to increase theta or alpha waves in the mind while in deep sleep to produce awareness while one sleeps.

Personally I have never really given much creedence to such devices though. These also apply to astral projection as well.

"Progressive awareness technique"
One of the most successful ways to have regular lucid dreams is through the progressive awareness technique. It does take the longest to learn, but its probably the most successful for that reason. This technique litterally trains the mind to not only have more lucid dreams, but to have more vivid and memorable ones too. This is also the most extensive way to have LCDs and I will only summerize this process. If you want to learn the whole technique I highly recommend the book "Lucid dreams in 30 days: The Creative Sleep Program" by Keith Harary and Pamala Weintraub. Its based on real research, its easy to follow, its short at like only 90 pages and its relatively cheap.

How this technique works is one first and foremost creates a dream journal, something portable and that can be kept near the bed. I'd even go as far as to write on it in bold letters "DREAM JOURNAL" and use only the same pen/pencil to write in it. This journal has a psychological impact on the mind. What it does is to start getting the mind to pay attention and actually remember dreams. Use it religiously to record your dreams. The next step is create a "dream temple". Essentially one needs to have the best sleep possible in order to have the highest chance of LCDs. A dream temple is just your bed room (or where ever you sleep), but in this respect it becomes a sactuary for sleep. By just walking into the room you are telling your mind "this is where I sleep, this is where I dream" and its affect is not unlike training a cat to use a litter box. You are telling your mind on a primal level to dream in a specific spot. Further more this temple needs to be comfortable, not too cluttered, not to messy, not too wild or have weird pieces of furniture in odds places. It needs to be a place you go and not be bothered by other people or outside noises as well. Of course, you'll can only make do with what you can. After about a week, start telling yourself you will have a lucid dream before you go to bed.

Now spend several days learning to recall your dreams. Basically what I do when I first wake (if you wake up at a regular time, start at least 10 minutes earlier to give yourself time) I lay in bed, I don't open my eyes and I try my best to remember as many details as possible starting backwards from my dream - what I dreamed of last to what I dreamed of first. I litterally try to replay the dream in my mind event by event backwards and then forwards until I have it commited to memory. Then I get up and jot it down in the journal. It is crittical to write in your journal every day as early in the day as possible. This journal alone largely increases the odds of having more LCDs.

Now to summerize the rest of the progressive awareness technique works on the basis of "reality checks" while you are wake. Dream incubation, roleplaying/reharsal, using media to induce theme specific dreams, challenge "scary" themese within dreams and learning how to retain awareness and achieve total lucidity. Reality checks are just that, every time you think about it ask yourself "am I awake? Or asleep?" Consider what is around you, what you are doing, even write it down in your journal. Dream incubation is wher eyou induce specific themes in your dreams by using mundane objects and pictures and placing them in your dream temple. This tells the mind what to dream about. Reharsal is where you script out a desired dream and reinact it while you are awake. Then you can use movies or cartoons and fall asleep while watching them to dream about the movie. Eventually you learn to confront dark corners, and entities within your dreams to learn what they really represent (repressed memories). And finally you work towards greater levels of dream awareness.

"Drug induced LCDs"
Finally we have the intoxication method. Its pretty simple, one uses a relaxing mind altering substance, in doses that are not so great one falls asleep but not in so low doses that one cannot feel the affects, to induce a lucid dream. Of course to me this technique is cutting corners and possibliy dangerous with the wrong substances. I would not recomend using any kind of stimulants or hard opiates like heroin. Opiates can be used but because of their addictive nature I highly suggest against it. Besides its kind of one those drugs where you think you took a low dose and suddenly find yourself totally wasted. I have had success using marijuana, alcohol and low dose seditives like percocet, seroquel and tylenol PM. With the exception of the tylenol, the doses I took were like 25 mg and just one pill. Marijuana has been the most common substance I've used. It is useful in that it is also a hallucinogen and from my experience has created some very vivid and wild dreams.

Several problems with drugs and LCDs, one drugs do not allow the mind to be trained to induce LCDs. IN fact over use can damage the brain (even in low doses) and totally prevent one from successfully ever having LCDs (amung a whole slew of other health problems). The other affect is that while one may experience awareness in a dream like state, really they are just loaded and seldom can one really control the dream. Thats not to say that drugs and dreaming cannot have a spiritual impact. While this technique is the least recommended if you are an avid dreamer and want a spiritual experience if you can find an expert, like a shaman or priest, intoxicants can be used successfully and with incredible results. But I can't over state the need for caution.

These are all the techniques I am aware of. Most of these are things I've just experimented on my own with and didn't even know they existed until I studied them in college.

Key themes to recognize and utilize:
1. Dream Journal - Absolutely essential. It increases your ability to recall dreams and your over all awareness. You don't have to write a book on each dream. You can use pictures or just phrases. I would keep it dated though. This journal will also allow you to recognize common trends within your dreams and allow you to interpret them as they relate to your life. It is a very powerful tool.

2. Recall - Your ability to record your dreams is limmited by your ability to remember them. By simply telling yourself you will remember your dreams before you sleep, you will eventually learn to remember more of them.

3. Consistancy - You must recall and record dreams as often as possible, prefferably with as much detail as you can muster. If you are not consistant you can condition your mind to do the exact opposite of what you want and you will adapt your efforts and learn to sleep as you did prior to practicing a given technique. You do not need to practice any given technique everyday, but the journaling is essential.

4. Your sleeping space matters! - Reread the paragraph on the dream temple under the progressive awareness technique section - it matters.

5. Mix and match - You don't have to use just one technique. You can try any of them and you can mix elememts from one and other.

6. Practice and patients - To really get good at having lucid dreams you have to not only be consistant but patient. It took me about 6 months to really learn how to have LCDs, let alone control them. Some people may take less time, other may take more.

7. Limmitation - Never neglect to record your dreams if you can help it. But designate 1 - 3 days of the week where you do not intentionlly practice a given technique. This allows your mind to adjust and helps ensure you do get normal REM sleep. Besides you will likely start to notice that you find yourself in the midst of LCDs without meaning to.

8. Have fun! - Getting good at lucid dreaming is not about following some riggid routine as though it were homework or a chore. If you want to be successful you have to want to be successful (as in LCDs actually interest you) and you need to be willing to enjoy your dreams. Sure there are some scary ones but those can be the most fun to explore too.

9. RELAX - Having a full blown lucid dream is sort of like a drug trip, only you don't OD or hurt anything. One of the biggest reasons people fail at having regular LCDs is because of the anticipation and expection to have them. Let them happen. You can't force LCDs.

10. Experiment! - Go ahead and indulge in your wildest fantacies there are no laws inside your head. Maybe you have a boss you don't like; go ahead kick his ass! Sure there are serious uses for dreaming, but while you're learning to be good at it you should be able to experiment with what ever you fancy.

This post has been edited by Acid09: Dec 19 2007, 07:46 PM