I had an interesting lucid dream last night.

That’s all I can tell you — because I didn’t WRITE IT DOWN! I was too busy with the thought – why I am awake so early on a Saturday?. That didn’t last long though, as I turned over and passed out again.

Have a piece of paper or a notepad and a pencil beside you at night, and jot down a few words about your dream when you wake up. It’ll be easier to recall that way. You will also start to train yourself to pay more attention to your dreams.

Or as njosnavelin suggested, use an audio recording device (many smartphones have these) to voice record your dreams, and listen to them later to recall or even write them down. It really helps!

This is the last installment of the Introduction series. By now, you should have experienced atleast one lucid dream. You should be excited about this new part of your night life. The only problem is, it only lasted a couple seconds! The excitement is just too much.

(Cue Rocky theme)

You’ve improved your dream recall. You’ve been doing reality checks and writing in your dream journal. You’ve tried a couple induction techniques. Now it’s time to learn to control your dreams and how to make them last longer and become more vivid!

You may become lucid in a dream, but you find that you don’t have any control. This may be fun, but it’s much more fun to have God-like powers over your dreams.

To understand dream control, you have to understand that dreams are not a concrete scenery like waking life is. While awake, if you are in your house and open the door to the closet, the closet will be there. You know and expect that. There’s no possible way that can change. In a dream, you can do the same thing, and you know and expect your closet to be on the other side. Well, since that’s what you expect, that’s what is going to happen. Since you have the true belief that the closet will be on the other side of the door, it will be.

Understand that you are in control of your dreams. If you so choose, you can open that door and there will be a room full of candy on the other side. It may even be a link to the desert, or forest….you may walk out of a tree! But that will only happen if you believe it will. It’s hard since our minds are so engrained with waking life knowledge. My first ever lucid dream, i tried to walk through a wall. In waking life, there’s no way that is possible — you’d just hurt yourself, and i knew that. So when i tried to walk through the wall, i hit the wall and left a human-shaped dent in it.

Without the belief that you can do anything, you won’t get anywhere. Once you understand that, you can move on.

First i’ll briefly go over stability so you can understand where i’m coming from: dream stability is a measurement of exactly what it says: how stable your dream is. This reflects on the vividness of your dream, your ability to control your dream, and just how much your dream reflects on what you want to do. If something random and unexpected happens in a dream when you didn’t want it to happen, that’s a loss of stability.

There are two types of dream control: active control and passive control. Each one has its own benefits and drawbacks, and both are used depending on what you are trying to do.

Active Control
Have you ever seen anything materialize in front of your eyes? No, that magic show doesn’t count. Active control is when you force something in your dream to happen. An example is telekenisis: say you move a car with your mind. You are actually changing the scenery of your dream, manipulating it to fit what you want to happen. This is the fun type of dream control. The only problem is, you exert mind power on whatever you are trying to do. It sounds strange, but it’s not — you are making your brain work more to fit what you are trying to do. This has the effect that you may lose vividness and even stability in your dreams, since you start to concentrate on changing the dream and not on the actual dream itself.

Really, the only remedy to this is improving your dream control skill level. You should remember not to think about what you are trying to do, but what will happen. At first, when you try to move that car, you may imagine the car lifting up, floating ten feet away, and then settling down on the ground. This is typical; you want that car’s movement to be exactly right. You will be thinking, “I want to move this car with my mind. I’m going to lift this car into the air. I want it to leave the ground. Now i’m going to move it across the air. That’s a good spot. Now, i want it to hit the ground.” You should try not to think about each step in the process. Your brain knows what you want to happen already and it will make sure of that. Try to simplify your thoughts and actions; instead, think, “I want to move this car with my mind. I want to lift it off the ground. I want it over there.” With practice, you’ll find things easier to control. Remember to think about the end result.

Here’s another example. Did you see the movie “Bruce Almighty?” Remember that part in the movie where he moves all the cars on the road in his way into parking spots? If you want to do that, don’t think so much about the action of moving the cars into their parking spots. Instead, think about those cars already being in those parking spots.

Passive Control
This is when you don’t manipulate the scenery of your dream. Instead, you guide your brain into changing your dream. It’s called passive because it’s just that — you tell your brain what you want to happen, and sit back and let it happen. This saves stability and vividness, but it’s much less fun. It could turn out to be much more interesting, though — instead of your dream being a “sandbox mode,” where you control anything and everything, you may have more interesting encounters when you sit back and let the dream unfold.

It’s simple to do: instead of actively trying to pick up that car and move it, tell yourself you want that car in another spot when you look at it again. Turn away, look back, and guess where the car is? The example with the door is also passive control — instead of changing your scenery in front of your eyes (making a city grow into a forest), you open a door and you’ll already be in that forest. So you passively control your dream by expecting or believing something will happen. Then it does. Do you want to ride a motorcycle down the freeway at 200mph? Tell yourself you will find a motorcycle and an exit ramp around the next corner you turn. Walk around that corner, guess what happens? (Yes, that’s right, the motorcycle and exit ramp is right there!)

Stabilization Techniques
When you find yourself losing vividness and stability (you feel like you may wake up), there’s techniques you can use to help you stay in the dream or increase vividness. These techniques also increase dream realism.

Tactile stimulation – Rub your hands together. Feel the heat that the friction generates. This is a tactile stimulation, and will increase vividness and realism. Any other stimulation of your touch will do this as well. Reach down and feel the ground, feel what the floor feels like. Get creative!
Concentration – This is another stimulation of your senses, but instead of touch, use all your senses. Concentrate on one thing: the way it looks, the way it feels, the way it smells…you can taste it, but i’m not much into tasting random things. It would be cool to make a wall taste like ice cream, though! And yes, you can do that.
Dream spinning – Spin around in place a couple of times. I don’t know why this works, but it helps to increase stabilization, realism, and vividness. If you find yourself feeling like you are about to wake up, spin! You can also use this technique to teleport yourself somewhere — spin in place and imagine where you want to be!

Again, it takes practice. You may have success the first few tries, you may not. But you will start to learn what to do and how to do it. After a while you will learn how to truly and fully control your dreams and make them as vivid, if not more, as real life. I have had dreams more real than real life and it’s an indescribable feeling.

From now on, i’ll be discussing individual techniques and exploring new ones. New ways to do things! Stick around for the next one! Thank you for reading!

Related Posts:
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part I
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part II
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part III

This is not an article on how to increase vividness in a lucid dream. That’ll come later. This is an article on how to generally have more vivid dreams, lucid or not. You haven’t experienced anything until you’ve experienced a truly vivid dream. You remember that dream you had last night? It probably looked like this:

That’s not cool. Look at how much fun those ladies are having, and you can’t see anything! Well, follow my advice and your next dream will look like this:

Now that’s more like it, right? The answer is really simple, and it’s been stated many times before: Vitamin B6, AKA Pyridoxine. But that’s not the full answer.

Vitamin B6 is part of the Vitamin B complex. It’s important for brain and nerve function. It also helps the body break down proteins and sugars (namely glucose) and promotes red blood cell production. For normal function, you need about 1.3mg of Vitamin B6 every day, and you usually get that much through the foods that you eat.

For a great vivid dream, you should take about 250mg of Vitamin B6. You can find a bunch of B6 and B complex suppliments at pharmacies, nutrition stores, any place you can get vitamins.
I don’t want suppliments, what foods have B6? Bananas, oranges, fish, liver, beans, nuts, eggs, chicken, carrots, spinach, and other healthy foods like that.
Any bad news? Yes. At a repeated dose of 200mg, you start not to feel so good — tingling in the hands and feet, loss of sensation in the legs, some other bad stuff…
What? You said i need 250mg? Yes, you do. Or you could skip that advice, and i’ll tell you the REAL reason Vitamin B6 works.

Tryptophan.

Tryptophan is an amino acid taken by Vitamin B6 and converted into Serotonin. Serotonin can cause extremely vivid dreams at higher levels. So the reason such a high dose of B6 is recommended for vivid dreams is that it’ll convert more tryptophan into more serotonin. But why don’t we help the process and just add in the middle man?

Why not just cut out the middle man and take Serotonin suppliments? Three words: Blood Brain Barrier. It’s a pesky thing that won’t just let things into the brain directly. Instead, Vitamin B6 and Tryptophan can be metabolized in the body and sent to the brain no problemo.

Tryptophan is found in such foods as cheddar cheese, chicken, salmon, lamb, egg, flour, white rice, and milk. Cheddar cheese has the most amount of tryptophan, and is recommended highly.

So what do I do?
You have two options: foods or suppliments. For Vitamin B6, you should get some suppliments that will provide you with about 100mg of B6 (much less than 250mg, and not dangerous!). You’re going to have a hard time eating enough oranges to get that much. Take it about an hour or two before bed. For tryptophan, you should eat some cheddar cheese (or the other foods listed) a few hours before bed, around when you’re about to take the B6.

If you’re not willing to just go out and buy suppliments, then i have advice for you. Eat a banana or two, and then sprinkle a good amount of cheddar cheese on something. Not on the banana, unless that’s your thing, it’s not really mine. Do this about an hour before bed. The next day, i’ll be surprised if I don’t see you running to your car still pulling your shirt over your head in such a hurry to get to the store.

That’ll provide you with some intense dreams! Good luck, and enjoy. Remember, work on your dream recall so you can remember these vivid dreams. Also remember to do your reality checks! Did you do one? Are you dreaming?

We’ve covered Dream Recall and Dream Signs and Reality Checks. Hopefully by now you’ve had a couple lucid dreams and experienced that amazement at what it’s like! It’s time for…

A Lucid Dreaming induction technique is simply a way to become lucid. They are used in combination with reality checks, without relying exclusively on reality checks. There are many, and you can even make up your own, but i’ll go over the basic and most widely-recognized ones.

DILD: Dream Induced Lucid Dream This is the most common way to become lucid. It’s when you are in a dream and realize you are dreaming — you’re lucid! It’s very simple. Once you get into a routine of performing reality checks, you’ll do one in a dream, and BAM! lucid! You should also look for dream signs (i know you’re doing that already!). When you see something strange, for instance a purple room when you’ve never been in a purple room before, do a reality check.

MILD: Mnemonic Induced Lucid Dream
This is used in combination with a WBTB. Tell yourself before you sleep that you are going to have a dream, and that you’ll wake up right after your dream. It differs from a standard WBTB in that you don’t set an alarm to wake up; you wake up naturally. You’ll be waking up after a period of REM sleep, so you’ll remember your dream. Take a moment and think about the dream you were just having. Then go back to bed and envision yourself back in the dream you just had, doing a reality check and becoming lucid. You’ll be asleep pretty soon, and skip right back into a REM state. Since you are visualizing the dream you just had and becoming lucid, that’s the dream you’ll be having, and you’ll become lucid!

WILD: Wake Induced Lucid Dream This is the hardest, and the most sought after, induction technique. That’s because it’s the most vivid and realistic, and will ensure that you become lucid. This is when you allow your body go to sleep and keep your mind awake. Use this in combination with a WBTB — set your alarm clock for 3-5 hours after you go to sleep.

You’ll wake up around your REM period. Stay awake for about a half an hour, allowing your mind to wake up completely. It helps to read something about lucid dreaming – you usually dream about the things you’re doing right before you go to sleep. Make sure there are no noises or distractions when you go back to bed. After your mind is awake, lay back in bed. Any position you want is fine but laying on your back is the most helpful position. Allow yourself to relax; this is paramount. Try a relaxing technique, such as the 61 point relaxation technique. Memorize those points and concentrate on each one before you move to another. After you are relaxed, concentrate on your breathing — try breathing in, counting 1, and say, “i am dreaming.” Keep counting up as you breathe in and repeat “i am dreaming” as you exhale. If your mind drifts, don’t worry, just make sure to keep concentrating.

Soon you will start to see hypnagogic imagery. You’ll see colors and shapes. These colors and shapes will start to transform into ideas, images, and sensations. Your body will start to get numb and you’ll feel a rush over your body accompanied by some pressure in your head. This is sleep paralysis. Don’t be afraid; this happens every single night, you’re just not aware of it since you are asleep. The hypnagogic imagery will become more complex and your body will start to vibrate. You will lose all perception of your body. Soon you will see scenes you have no control over. I can’t explain well what happens in this next stage, since it’s a matter of knowing, and you will know when you get there — you’ll find yourself pulling into a dream, completely conscious and extremely vivid.

Try out these techniques, they help immensely when trying to become lucid. Start out with a DILD; it’s the easiest. Remember to keep doing your reality checks, and keep up your dream journal!

For next time: Stabilizing your lucidity and Dream Control!

Related Posts
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part I
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part II

I’ve been coming across a lot of accounts of shared dreaming. For those who don’t  know, that’s when two or more people share the same exact dream or when someone communicates with another person via a dream.

This idea comes up when talking about Lucid Dreaming a lot. People mainly ask, “since you’re in a dream and can do anything, you can go to other people’s dreams, right?” Well, no one really knows. There’s accounts, but those are just that — accounts. There’s also the Lucid Crossroads. It’s a place “created” quite a while ago where lucid dreamers could gather together and pretty much just hang out or do some dream karate in the dojo. Not many people have claimed to visit this place, and the ones who have claim they haven’t seen anyone else there.

What do you guys think? Does shared dreaming exist? Do you have any accounts or
experiences to share?

Take the poll!

Now that we’ve covered Dream Recall in Part I, we’re on to Part II:

These techniques should be used in correlation with practicing dream recall.

Reality Checks are when you test to see if you are in a dream. Some examples are:

–Plugging your nose – in waking life, if you hold your nose shut, you won’t be able to breathe. In a dream, you are holding your dream nose shut and your physical body is still able to breathe. So in a dream, when you plug your nose shut, you will still be able to breath. Cool, right? –Looking at your hands – Count your fingers. You have five, right? Count them again. Still five? Then you’re not dreaming. Sometimes in a dream you’ll have more or less than five fingers, or when you count them the number changes — You can count six fingers one way, go back and count seven the other way.

–Poking a finger through your palm – If you can poke a finger through your palm, you are either dreaming or you have just poked a hole through your palm, go to a hospital. In a dream, your hand is not your physical body — you’re even able to pass through walls and objects. That is, if you want to. I’ve had dreams in which I’ve tried to pass through a wall and ended up putting a man-shaped dent in the wall.
–Looking at the time – Digital time is preferred. The clock may have strange symbols or may not tell time. If you can see the right time, look away for a second and then look back. Has the time changed? No, you didn’t take six hours and four minutes to turn your head. You’re dreaming!
–Electrical failure – Sometimes in dreams a light switch won’t work or a computer won’t turn on. If this happens, do another reality check.
–Close one eye and look at your nose – Can you see it? Then you’re not dreaming. In waking life we don’t pay enough attention to our nose; this affects our subconscious mind (through habituation) so that in a dream, if you close one eye and look for your nose, it won’t be there!

You should do a reality check about once every hour. A good idea is to set an alarm on your cell phone to ring once every hour and remind yourself to do a reality check. Another technique is to do a reality check every time you pass through a door. You’re bound to pass through a door in a dream, right? And once you do — BAM! You’re lucid!

Dream Signs are things that are out-of-the ordinary, things you usually don’t see in waking life. Dreams have a weird way of making things…well, weird. The funny thing about dreams is that you can see the strangest things and think they are completely normal — you can see a Transformer walk down the street and wave to you, and you’d wave back thinking what a nice thing it was for Optimus Prime to be so friendly. You have got to train your senses more, be on the lookout for things that just aren’t normal. When you see something out of the ordinary, do a reality check! An important thing to remember is that you must BELIEVE that your reality check will fail (or pass, however you look at it). You have to believe when you plug your nose, you will breathe through it. And when it doesn’t happen, believe that next time will be the time you are in a dream.

This is where your dream journal comes in. Look through it, try to seek out things that re-occur in your dreams. These are your very own dream signs. Common dream signs also include your teeth falling out, being naked in public, falling, being in places you haven’t been in years or seeing people you haven’t seen in years. So next time you’re naked in public, do a reality check, and if you’re dreaming, walk around showing off your stuff. If you’re not dreaming, best of luck down at the police station.

Remember, always be aware of your surroundings. Every now and then, ask yourself, “Where was I an hour ago?” And do a reality check every hour and when you see something strange. Pretty soon you’ll start to recall more dreams and start to progress towards having more lucid dreams!

By the way, some of you may ask: how vivid is a lucid dream? And the answer is: it looks, smells, feels, and even tastes like real life. Sometimes it’s much more vivid than real life — after a few lucids, you’ll be able to awaken inside a dream just based off the vividness of your dream alone.

There’s nothing like that first lucid dream. You’ll see what I mean!

Got it down, take me to Part III!

Related Posts
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part I
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part III

 You can’t talk about Lucid Dreaming suppliments without talking about this killer combination. No “lucid pill” comes without these two; for this they are one of the best combinations that will provide you with a better chance at having a lucid dream.

Galantamine is mainly used as a treatment for Alzheimer’s. A reduce in the production of the neurotransmitter Acetylcholine is the reason for Alzheimer’s, and Galantamine inhibits the breakdown of acetylcholine. This results in more acetylcholine. I’ll skip the rest of the science stuff and just say this: Acetylcholine is present in REM sleep; it’s important for the generation and maintenance of REM sleep. Galantamine also acts as an agonist for acetylcholine, essentially doubling the amount you have and facilitating REM sleep even faster.

So what does this mean? Galantamine will cause an increase in REM sleep, resulting in longer and more vivid dreams.

So then how do I use it? All you need is around 4-8mg of Galantamine in combination with a WBTB. You can take it before bed but it won’t have as profound of an effect.
But Sam, are there any side effects? Yes. That’s why you shouldn’t take it more than 3 times a week max. If you do, you’ll find yourself dizzy, nauseous, and may even lose sleep. Now you don’t want that, do you?

Choline is an essential nutrient found within the Vitamin B complex. It’s found in…acetylcholine! You need choline to keep your brain strong. Basically, it maintains the structure of the signaling pathways between your cell membranes.

How do I use it? Not without Galantamine. Alone, Choline does nothing in terms of dream recall and vividness. All it does is the same thing it does everyday: help make acetylcholine. But when combined with Galantamine, it intensifies the actions of Galantamine, thus producing more REM juice (acetylcholine, in case you haven’t gotten it yet). If you are supplimenting Choline, 400-800mg will suffice for a lucid dream. More won’t help.
Side effects? Nope.
What if I want to take it naturally? Choline is found in such sources as egg yolks, soy, cooked beef, chicken, veal, and turkey liver. It’s going to be pretty hard eating enough choline to suppliment your galantamine, so I would suggest you go the vitamin route.

Combining the two
Putting these two together will be like loading yourself into a cannon and launching into a wall…If the cannon means sleeping and the wall means lucid dreaming. To help, take some B complex vitamins throughout the day (via a Multivitamin, you should be doing that anyway!) If you’re not taking a multivitamin, eat a banana or two a couple hours before bed. Then wake up after a couple hours of sleep (WBTB) and take your Galantamine and Choline. Or if you’ve chosen the natural Choline route, just the Galantamine. Remember, take 4-8mg of Galantamine and 400-800mg of Choline. From there, you can choose to WILD or DILD. You’re bound to have greatly increased dream recall and vividness. From there, it’s all about practicing your lucidity techniques!

Where do I find these?
You can find these at many online pharmacies. I won’t list any since I don’t support one over any other. You can also find them in combination together. I found a combination Galantamine/Choline pill at GNC a few weeks back. Your local pharmacies (CVS, Rite-Aid, Kroeger, any other ones around your area) probably won’t have it; most major retail pharmacies don’t carry these suppliments.

Recently, i’ve been reading this blog entitled Wonders of Meditation. I’ve liked it so much i’ve added it to my Blogroll.

In one post, the author writes about the benefits of meditation. Now, i’ve seen a million sites listing why you should meditate, but the post i found in Wonders of Meditation is more of-the-heart, and definately made me want to “stop and smell the flowers”.

Check it out here.

Last month, Dreaming Life held a panel discussion on whether there will ever be a Lucid Dreaming pill. A simple google search for “Lucid Dreaming Pill” brings up a plethora of results — doesn’t everyone want a pill that’ll bring INSTANT lucidity, every night?

These lucidity suppliments all contan a combination essentially the same thing: Vitamin B complex, galantamine, choline, melatonin — things proven to increase the ability for dream recall or vivid dreams. So really, maybe someone might hit it off right with the perfect combination of these things, right?

The pill I see come up the most often is Brilliant Dream’s pill. $40 will get you a 2-month supply of a combination of Vitamin B, Lycoris radiata (Galantamine), Choline, and Melatonin. My main problem with this pill is the lack of Choline. They use 100mg of Choline when the recommended dose for Lucid Dreaming is at least 400mg. Instead, they bank on Melatonin — a neurotransmitter made in your brain that regulates your sleep/wake cycle. Taking an excess of Melatonin may cause vivid dreams, usually bizarre ones. If I wanted this effect I’d skip this pill and stick with the 300 pills of Melatonin I got from Costco for $6.

Check out Dreaming Life’s blog for more information.

Since this new blog is all about Lucid Dreaming, the best place to start is with the basics. This introduction will be split into four parts to make it easier to read.

A dream is what happens during the Rapid Eye Movement (REM) period of sleep. It’s like a whole new world inside your head. A lucid dream is a dream in which you realize you are dreaming. Because it is all inside your head, you can manipulate the dream world and form your own experiences. This can lead to you doing whatever you want; you’re in a reality which you have created in your own mind.

You dream every night, whether you remember it or not. We experience around 4 or 5 dreams a night, due to having about 4 or 5 periods of REM sleep every night. So you can become lucid and not even remember it — in fact, you probably already have become lucid at some point in your life. What’s the point if you can’t remember?

The first step in the journey to lucidity is improving dream recall. This is just what it sounds like — the ability to remember your dreams when you wake up. Dreams are slippery; sure, you just had a vivid dream, but without practicing recall a couple minutes after you wake up you won’t even be able to remember the details of your dream. If you’re just starting, don’t worry if you have no recall; it takes time to develop.

Step 1: Don’t move
Remember, dream recall happens AFTER you wake up. So when you awaken, don’t move a muscle. Lie back in your bed and ask yourself, “What was I just dreaming about?” Dream recall has a correlation to sleep position, and you’re more likely to remember your dreams if you’re in the same position you slept in. Images, thoughts, sceneries, parts and maybe even your whole dream should come back to you. If you have a stray thought, don’t forget it — that’s probably your dream rushing back to you. Try to remember the major concepts, as details will come to you when you’re on to the next step.


Step 2: Write it down!
This is the most important step. Keep a pen and paper by your bed, write down the major things you remember, and then every last detail of your dreams that you remember. This will be your dream journal. If you don’t like writing, try a voice recorder. Do this as soon as you can remember your dreams, because every minute that passes, your dreams will fade. This happens until you develop good recall. Every now and then, read your dream journal and try to look for connections — these will be your dream signs, something we’ll talk about later.


Step 3: Self-Talk
Every night before you go to sleep, tell yourself that you are going to remember your dreams. Repeat it a couple times. If you engrain this into your subconscious, chances are that you’ll be a lot more likely to remember your dreams.

These are a few steps to dream recall, more will be discussed later. Remember, this is an important step in your journey to having a lucid dream. Don’t slack off on your practice, and don’t slack off on your sleep — the less sleep you get, the less you’ll dream. This should be practiced in conjunction with other beginning techniques discussed here. Don’t worry if you don’t get good results, recall takes practice. You can start to slack off when your recall gets better and you can remember dreams longer than a few minutes — usually it takes a couple weeks.

I’m ready, take me to Part II!

Related Posts
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part II
An Introduction to Lucid Dreaming: Part III