Restraint in LDs

This is a starter to hear and discuss different perspectives on showing restraint in LDs. Your thoughts?

Interesting to run across this topic after reading some subject matter recently on effectively “denying yourself” all the tactile gratuity that can be enjoyed when lucid. It seems outrageous, given that truly anything is possible while lucid and being the one who steers the dream, endless options and sensations lay before us.

So I pose this question:

“What would be the best way to keep human consiousnes from reaching the next level?”

I’ve always found the idea of control being an illusion created by those with power to limit and/or decieve those without (ala The Matrix). And similarily, the answer to the question above is this…Keep us distracted. Fully occupied by possibility, we become paralized by options. But what happens when we pull back and observe?

Try seeking knowledge from the unseen creator of the dream, and realize that you don’t actually control the dream, but merely navigate the presented environment. Spawn matter, fly, perform lucid tests, sure…but part of yourself is creating your set of options in real time, and that is who I want to get in touch with.

Because that “self” propping up the LD scenery sure is a lot smarter than I am.

Why would this ruse exist to prevent us from tapping into our full potential? Because if it was easy, then everyone would be doing it.

How many average, everyday people even know about Lucid Dreaming? Then how many of those even have regular lucid dreams? And still, how many of them have lucid dreams often enough that they begin to build any significant skill in the dreamworld while concious?

The number starts to shrink dramatically. But those who succeed are then faced with the choice of living out their every fantasy, or playing around just long enough to catch a whiff of an elusive other that is both familer and foreign. And there, I belive, lies great discovery.

Good topic primatech!

First off, Primatech, you are a Heroes fan. That makes you allllllright in my book. :smile:

Anywho, in one of my few lucid dreams (not a natural :sad: ) I felt myself losing the dream. As a means to keep myself in said dream, I did just what this topic is about. I stood back for a second, and just reminded myself that I was lucid. Rather than opening up the closet to find my spirit guide right away (who, by the way, is actually two stoners, lol) I stopped, took a deep breath, and held back.

One of the sensations that one could feel, Perpetual, would also be the LACK of sensation. I think if one could really hold back then they could get in a very zen state of mind. In my dream I used restraint as a means to control the dream. But if someone could actually restrain themselves just for the sake of doing it, I think that lack of stimulus might be kind of nice for the time being.

Of course, afterwards you would have to become your favorite Heroes character and do as you please! (Hiro, woot woot!!)

Lack of stimulus…like Sensory Deprivation, but for your virtual senses!

Very cool, I like the possibilities that could hold.

Silence that loud could burst my virtual eardrums :wink:

Interesting question, indeed. I’m currently trying to reach “the next level” in my own dreams, but I usually find pleasure seeking gets in the way of my lucid dreaming experiments / goals. Whenever I realize I’m dreaming, my first instinct is to leap into the air and spend the rest of the time flying. It takes an effort to “ground” myself and remember my original intentions - I will learn nothing new zooming around as I have numerous times before.

The idea of sensory deprivation seems interesting, too. I get caught up in how real everything feels in my dream, once again distracting me from exploring my consciousness on a deeper level.

But it can’t hurt forgetting everything and having fun every once in a while, eh? :wink:

I really enjoyed all of these answers. I think a lot of what matters is what your intentions are for dreaming and your intentions for doing what you do in dreams.

I think it would be very interesting to take a step back and just experience what happens in an LD without trying to control it, or to try things such as sensory deprivation.

My worry would be though, if anything deeper does happen, how do you know this isn’t just you creating a change in the dream through expecting something profound to happen? For example, I tried meditating in an LD once, and it was a very intense experience. But once I woke up I was pretty sure that this was just because I expected it to be an intense experience, rather than an actual effect of meditating in a dream.

On the other hand, doing some things in a dream may cause profound experiences without expecatations. It’s an interesting topic.

My old roommate, who was a natural lucid dreamer and never really thought about just changing the whole thing completely, would just roll with what was going on. He basically knew he was dreaming, had control of his actions, but never thought about changing any of it. The result was very vivid dreams that he could detail to you every morning.

Dreamer: I meditated once in an LD as well and it was definitely intense. i remember not really knowing how it would turn out, but when i tried it, it was like i had been meditating even before i started, like i was already there. anything similar with you?

That definately sounds like it’d be worth trying some time

It was a long while ago, so I can’t really remember fully, but I think I snapped into the meditative state pretty instantly, which I think is similar to your experience. After that, I think everything started to vibrate really strongly. Can’t really remember anything else, apart from that it was intense.

yeah, that sounds about right. it felt really natural as well. i’d definitely like to try it again in future LDs.

Me too!

I thought The same when I thought I should ask my DC how to have LD ! This is always very intriguing because once you aknowledge that you have the possibility to do whatever you want, you are the author of what you create / ask to happen.
But don’t you think that afterwards, if you had control or not, you can still interpret what you did and learn something ? :content:

:happy: I like this!

Tibetan dream yogis regard the “entertainment” style lucid dreaming to be the opposite of what they are trying to do. They are on the path to enlightenment, and think that life is a distraction, so creating more distractions in your dreams is a really bad idea. It makes a bad situation worse. Instead of creating more Samsara, you are to use lucid dreaming for the purpose of furthering your progress. That means you should restrain yourself. Did everybody read the same thing I did? It is reflected here anyway.

i’d like to try this tibetan approach. i think one thing i need to work on in LDs is the moment after lucidity, taking a second to gather myself. i usually think ‘fly’ and am on a one-track course for the rest of the dream. chilling out a little would help me out i think.