Question for all those better educated

[PessimistOwl]

So recently I heard a method that is a semi-good way to self-induce a lucid dream.

For all of those that don't know what a lucid dream is it is a dream in which you can control your own body within the dream.

HOWEVER

that is all I know.

I am thinking that I am going to try this method in the near future however, I would first like some other opinions.

The method is basically keeping yourself still and aware while your body goes into a state of paralysis or "sleep paralysis". (usually takes 20-30 minutes from what I have heard)

The only problem is that I have a bad case of ADD and ADHD which means that it is hard focusing my thoughts for a prolonged period of time. What are some tricks that I can use to keep focused while my body goes into this state of relaxation?

And for shits and giggles, what are some fun little hobbies that people that have had lucid dreaming. (i.e shenanigans that you couldn't pull off in real life, pranks, other).

 

[Duskwaith]

Well it sounds both rediculous and stupid or just stupidly rediculous.

I extremely doubt it works at all. Where did you hear of this?

 

[PessimistOwl]

Granted it is all in the entire "all our knowledge of the human brain and stuff, blah blah blah blah." But it sounds like it would be pretty cool if you could get it down. Saw a wiki page on it and then googled "lucid dream" tis the way I find out all my information.

 

[Furioso]

I commonly have lucid dreams. make a dream journal where you write down your dreams immediatly after you wake up and eventually you will realize you are in a dream while having the dream, thats when the fun begins!

 

[Subzerowings]

Lucid dreams?
Sounds like an LSD-trip to me.
You could look up what Terrence Mckenna did while he was still alive.
He actually used trippy drugs to come up with an elaborate computer programm which predicts future events until either the end of humanity, or it's evolution.
It could be accurate, even though alot of people are still cynical about it.
I'm sorry where was I going with this?
............
Uhm.....drugs are bad. M'kay?

 

[DazZ.]

Why is this just for the "better educated" group? Lucid dreaming is hardly related to intelligence.

I managed to lucid dream for about a solid week once and then lost it and can only do so every week or so.

Watch the film "Waking Life" which heavily features and discusses lucid dreaming, after seeing that and thinking about it enough it just came together and worked.

 

[Outright Villainy]

I don't think I'd be too good at lucid dreaming, I've a hard enough time sleeping as it is, so I try and encourage my brain to relax. It does sound like fun though...

 

[klakkat]

I've had lucid dreams before, and no, drugs are not involved (though the experience can be described as 'trippy').

A couple things, as Furioso mentioned, look for patterns in your dreams. Writing down what happened and every detail that stands out as soon as you wake up is a good method. Then, when dreaming, look for those cues in your dreams (training yourself to do that is a *****, but it can be done). Once you know you're dreaming, you can take control and do whatever you want.

I've done lucid dreaming a few times; in one of the accidental ones, I was climbing Mount Everest, and stopped to think about that. See, I would never climb Everest, so I figured I must be dreaming, and found out I could just fly to the top, and then generate a large town up there to explore around in.

Even with lucid dreaming, you don't have 100% control since your available processing power is limited while sleeping, but it does give you some power and you can have a lot of fun with it. If you dream a lot of superheroes, you can get the next best thing since you'll sometimes dream of yourself having a superpower (which can change as the dream goes on).