I had a very strange experience last night. In a normal dream I went past a shop called “Dreams”. I thought “I haven’t been there before”. Now that is one MAJOR dreamsign. So why did this happen? Was there something in the back of my mind which knew it was a dream? I failed to become lucid that night. I did however remember 5 seperate dreams, with one awakening as well as my usual wakening. That was a record for me.
Looking forward to replies and maybe an in-depth discussion on the brain’s part in inhibiting/producing LDs.
I think that we make our brains into an incredibly complicated and incomrehensible machine when really there is a lot we can understand when we ask specific questions. So in answering whether or not your “brain” wants you to lucid dreams, just think: you are your brain. If you have been wanting to lucid dream, then there have been connections made inside the machine that is your brain, and these connections show up in your dreams (as do many others). I would only question this logic if someone who has never heard of lucid dreaming before had a dream character tell them how to.
It’s a mechanism of your subconscious not to be aware in your dreams. Otherwise, you would very easily notice you were dreaming. The whole goal of LDing is to overcome that supression of awareness in dreams.
I can understand why you asked this, Magicadam. I asked myself exactly the same question a couple of months ago.
I have dreams where I begin to think I am dreaming or question something which seems a bit odd, but some other part of my dream gives me an excuse which I accept, and I quickly forget that it was odd.
It does seem as if something is trying to ‘block’ lucid dreams when you are trying. I have since succeeded in inducing a couple of LDs, so I think perhaps it is a good sign that you are at this stage now.
Well heres the news-sciencists are now trying to prove the theory that theres actually two things:mind and brain…as separate.I guess its pretty interesting but i know youll ask me for link…again,i dont have any,again watched it on tv(dicovery sci-trek).
I hardly remember what else was on this documentary as there was party goin on and could hardly hear a thing.
Anyways…theres a lots of difficult stuff involved in that research like- magnetism,micro something,physics,and pretty much more complicated words and science fields.
I hope they will show it again one day and id be able to update you whos doing it.
And to your post magic Adam-i guess it was just because you think a lot about dreams during a day and stuff.So you had it in your dream.This explanation was easy…but i wish i knew “how”.
“How can you do research on perception if you have to percept while reasearching?”
I will have to remember that specifically for future reference, it is a funny (and very true) point. As far comments on “mind” and “brain” being different, I would have to disagree. Perhaps you misinterpreted your information, because there are a lot of theories recently on how conciousness and the brain are different, and how they interact. In general, the idea is that “conciousness” is our brain’s EM (electromagnetic) field, and that when we are paying “attention” to something we are changing our previously constructed neurological pathways on the fly, and when we aren’t paying attention to something, or doing it unconciously, (eg, breathing), our previously constructed neural pathways are already working correctly and we don’t need to “interfere”. I thought that most people already knew about this, because the theory in general sculpts a lot of what I believe about how our brain/mind works. Here is one of the most recent papers on it that I know of: surrey.ac.uk/qe/PDFs/cemi_theory_paper.pdf
I think you’re right Jack. I’ve read somewhere that the brain and mind are seperate. But there’s also a third thing. Your soul/spirit/astral projection is there too. It’s the thing that’s able to leave your body when you have an OBE. It’s actually been detected by scientist. I don’t know if it’s true or not so if you disagree with what I’ve just said go ahead. I don’t have a link to this right now but if you want it just ask and it will only take me a few minutes to find it. I don’t really feel the need to prove anything to anyone right now
Look at it this way: Your self is defenitely part of your brain, but not all of your brain is your self. It is a huge, wild and wonderful organ, and we may in our lives use many parts of it, but it still largely operates outside our awareness. Lucidity is an attempt to conquer some of that ground, and in doing so we encounter new and strange events. Many people on this board and elsewhere have commented on their lack of control on their own brain, and that just reinforces my idea that the self, the awareness is just a small island in the large and mysterious ocean that is the brain.
Are you referring to the NDE research of Pim van Lommel? This recent study does not prove your statement, but does not decline it either. Very interesting research and a must read if your interested in these kind of things. The full report (pdf) can be downloaded from the Lancet. (You have to register first, but it’s free) …
I have never heard of any real scientific proof for this actual leaving, so I am very interested in your link. Please provide us with your information sources.
Kaoisa-i guess the soul=mind in those researches.And yes,like someone said-its got to do with magnetic field.Anyways i just remembered they also said that they believe those are different things with mind controling the brain.
all i rem,sorry.
But its breakthrough idea itself.For ages we believed its all in the brain-mind/conciousness/spirit…so on they all jumping in the brain for unknown reason and in unknown ways.Now we think it might be separate.
and it also supports life after death theory a bit i guess
Yeah, its really annoying when things like that happen, I’ve had lots of dreams where I’ve been talking about lucid dreaming and stuff and I haven’t noticed at all… I think my mind is mocking me…
Hi. I think this is my first post. Yeah it is. Anyway, I just wanted to comment on the whole astral body thing. It is real. It is our consciousness. The brain is just an interface between it and the physical body. I got interested in lucid dreams a while ago, but kind of lost interest when I learned about astral projection. Now I have regained interest because they are related and I want to learn more about this relation. Anyway, have fun.
I’m not sure I our minds have alternate desires from our Sub-C or NC. But I know if an idea is implanted in your mind long enough it becomes Sub-C. And because we can’t control Sub-C some think it is another thought pattern altogether. But I disagree.
You are your mind. Your mind is one, your concious is influenced by your unconcious and likewise. The desires of both may be different but they hold the same hands.
The mind/body controversy lives on! This is certainly not a new debate. It seems we have gone back and forth in history as to whether or not a separate “mind” or “soul” entity exists. I cannot answer that question, but I can comment on what we know about the function of dreams! (I just took a class on the use of dreams in psychotherapy–fun stuff)
I agree with MONKFISH and FWONGO, who noted that our brains operate predominantly outside our awareness, and our brains tend to try to suppress lucidity. If you buy the ideas of Sigmund Freud (sorry, I’m in psychology, can’t seem to get away from Freud for too long…) our mind operates as a sort of system in which our human instincts (id) battle with socially-learned values and morality (superego) for behavioral expression. There are different theories on the actual function of dreams, the most popular being “wish-fulfillment” with the dream serving as a sort of safety valve to allow the unconscious self to (for example) kill someone, kill everyone, have sex with whomever they want, never go to work again, steal something impossible, whatever…without the conscious really “getting” what just happened (This is where all our crazy dream symbolism comes in) Supposedly, our basest desires (according to Freud, wanting to have sex with just about everyone or wanting to kill just about everything) are too SCARY for our conscious selves to handle, so we unconsciously create all these idiosyncratic symbols to represent what we REALLY want to be doing. For example, the “bad guy” that is chasing you could actually be the aggressive side of yourself that is angry at someone else. OR the high school professor you are having sex with (in your DREAM, of course) could represent a cold and distant parent whom you have always wanted to be closer to (in a normal, healthy way).
Anyway, the whole point of this long rambling is to support the notion that our minds probably do try to suppress our lucidity–it thinks it is “protecting” us from seeing some frightening truth. However, we obviously have been able to overcome this barrier… I have to wonder how much our dreamscapes might shift or change somehow (add extra distortions or symbols or something) to compensate for the fact that our level of awareness has grown…just a thought.
Heheheheh . Anima your last post just shot the hell outta magicadam’s topic. POW . Heh…any way I think I must agree with you… to some extent. I know humans are weak and I agree our mind tries to suppress certain things. It has to. It is like a saftey mechinism against ourselves. But since we are all different, each person’s subconciousness dicates differently from all the others what is and is not “too stessful for us to handle”. So what may me too much for this guy over hear may be right up this fella’s alley over there. Er…so how does this effect your opion now?
Here’s my take on this whole “mind suppresses lucidity” thing.
When you’re asleep, and having a non-ld dream, the logical side of your brain isn’t working. To become lucid part of that “logicality” needs to fire up.
Say you’re strolling around (in a dream) and just happen to see a sign saying “You are dreaming!” If the logic part of your brain is working you will stop to question this or just realise that you are. If it isn’t, well then the dream will carry on and you will get distracted by whatever happens next to you.
I don’t think your mind is trying to suppress anything. I don’t see how a defence mechanism in your brain would want to suppress such a safe (as compared to reality) thing. I could see how any defence mechanisms would make you avoid dangerous people/events in dreams since your brain doesn’t know the difference b/w vivid imagery and reality, but if you can control these events with lucidity I think you’re brain would want to encourage you to gian lucidity so you can overcome any danger in dreams.
. Anima your last post just shot the hell outta magicadam’s topic. POW 
. Heh…any way I think I must agree with you… to some extent. I know humans are weak and I agree our mind tries to suppress certain things. It has to. It is like a saftey mechinism against ourselves. But since we are all different, each person’s subconciousness dicates differently from all the others what is and is not “too stessful for us to handle”. So what may me too much for this guy over hear may be right up this fella’s alley over there. Er…so how does this effect your opion now? 