In my dreams everything always keeps changing. It also seem to change if I'm concentrating on something too long. I usually am controlling myself if I'm in the dream, or if I'm like a watcher I look around, so it's like I choose my own actions, but I don't try to change what the dream itself is doing much, unless I'm trying to stop something from changing. Everything usually looks weird, but occasionally I have dreams where everything looks more real, but it doesn't happen much. I can also do something that's sort of like lucid dreaming with just using my imagination. I just close my eyes in the dark and start imagining and it's like it forms itself, and I change it but without fully consciously controlling it. I stop it when it gets out of control, and sometimes I see weird expressions with it.

I don't know if most of my dreams would be considered lucid dreams, because they don't seem very real, but I know when I'm dreaming most of the time. It's like I can control them but a lot of it is like stuff that doesn't make a lot of sense.

Well I just read this http://www.consciousdreaming.com/lucid-dreaming/how-to-lucid-dream.htm
It was pretty interesting and should be helpful to you if you haven't already read it before.

I think the key thing is to keep a dream journal.

I used to try using a dream journal. I don't use it anymore because I usually just like to lie there or drift back to sleep. Or I just think about it. It can be interesting to write down. It can become like a mind exercise.

Not doing it much anymore (though it still happens randomly on rare occassions) but http://www.dreamviews.com/content/ is a great source of info.

I had one, once, when I was about 7. I was thinking, is this a dream? Wait, of course it is! The world is in black and white! Now I want to lucid dream again :sadvaultboy:

^ Thats odd, I always dream in colour.

I tend to have as many as 5 or 6 lucid dreams a week (I usually have 3 or 4 seperate memorable dreams per night), but I've trained myself to do so over the past 15 years. I find that lucid dreaming takes far more energy than normal sleep though, and noises from outside tend to interupt them more easily than normal dreams. It is possible to slip back in several times if you try hard enough.

The technique is fairly simple: whilst on the edge of sleep, that moment where all of your thoughts start to intermesh and everything becomes a blur; say to yourself in an affirming manner "I am in control of my dreams", slowly repeating it several times whilst visualising yourself getting up out of your bed and walking out the door.

It will start to work wonders after awhile and all kinds of adventures await

Now I know what svcker Punch reminded me of. Lucid Dreaming. I have this phase once in a while where I can only do that. And as much fun as it is - who doesn't like turning their neighbourhood into a Nid hive once in a while -, I can hardly get real rest then. Though that is better than insomnia at full moon.

Yes your probably right about that. That is just an idea for a lucid dream, I am probably not going to do that.

If I'm having a nightmare I know it's a nightmare 80% of the time and am able to stop them at will 99% of the time :shrug:

Rather than stop it wouldn't you rather turn around and fight whatever is scaring you? Thats the beauty of lucid dreaming.

In french we have a word called "reverie" which seems to correspond to your lucid dream except reverie is much more a lazy way of doing it, more latin less "I control my dream" style.
Dream is a very complex process involving memory refresh and lucid dream is just a wrong name. It is like calling a piece of paper a soft stone. Lucid dream is anolog to dream in the way your imagination is not really limited and you immerse yourself in a world but it is completly different because it kills the unexpected of the dream.

On a way, lucid dream is a symptom of a society which wants security and cannot handle unexpected events.

What?

Exactly what are you smoking?

Thing is although I can stop when I want (usually have to close my eyes in the dream) I'm still scared during the nightmare :ahhh: and so I usually just want to wake up

P.S: although in the past years I very rearely have nightmares anyway so :shrug:

I had this one dream -no one believes me of course- that was basically like how narnia is, the kids go in, live their entire lives, exit, and return at the same time they left. It was very weird. It was kind of depressing and I don't remember much of it, but in the dream there were lots of things that didn't make any sense but were totally believable in the dream. But I lived a whole life, (or at least it seemed like it) in the 7-8 hours of sleep I got.

But I've never had a lucid dream, all my dreams are like a movie with all five senses. I have no free will in my dreams, I'm an observer almost. Sometimes I have dreams that I'm not even in.

:biggrin: ha ha.

In regards to lucid dreaming. I used to be able to do this consistently when I was younger, but now it seldom happens. I believe smoking weed also interferes with your ability to remember and or have lucid dreams. That might be my prob.

When I do have lucid dreams, it is not easy to control what I do. Whether it is commanding myself to wake, walk, or fly, it takes an extreme amount of mental effort. Maybe a good anology for the feeling I have would be attempting to command a partially paralyzed limb.

Often times after a lucid dream I awake and find myself sweating heavily, which I'm assuming is due to the mental /physical strain.

I used to be able to do that a bit, when I was younger, but never regularly.

Something I have done accidentally a number of times in just the last six months however, which is rather unpleasant is to get into a state where I'm very tired, and about to fall asleep and try to just shift my position slightly, or take a deep breath to sigh, and find that I can't. My muscles simply don't respond. It's like I'm paralyzed or something like that. Usually my response is to panic, sweat, and get short of breath (because I can't change my breathing). I can shake myself out of it after like 15-20 seconds however, usually with a jerk, or twitch type movement. It's very weird and creepy.

Interesting spin on the phenomena. I wouldn't necessarily call it a symptom, because I'm pretty sure "lucid dreams" are something that has been around longer than modern society. Maybe the fact that people are seeking to gain such an ability could be indicative that waking life might not be as satisfying for some people, so they seek new experiences and adventures in their dreams? I'm sure not everyone does however, I know a friend that apparently always has lucid dreams and always has. He didn't even know what he was doing was special until I brought it up to him.

I actually had a brief lucid dream last night after I saw this thread late last night. It's funny how that happens, you forget you can do it, it leaves your mind, and then as soon as your reminded it happens again. At least that's how it works for me. I'm still not very good at controlling it (HOW DO YOU FLY? HOWWWWWWWWWWWW?!), but I have gotten better at making people appear and stabilizing them. I also highly recommend http://www.dreamviews.com/ for anyone interested in the subject.

Tried again last night, failed again. Never even had a dream. Anyone no any good tones to induce a lucid dream? The ones I've tried have only produced regular stupid dreams.

I've never had a lucid dream and I'm so jealous. Going to try the http://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Lucid_Dreaming/Induction_Techniques#Counting tonight.

Well there is http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6IqgvXFaWU I remember that was posted from the youtube gold thread. Maybe give that one a try?

I used to do the technique described in the video, without knowing it could also work for lucid dreaming. Many of my dreams were lucid, and I hated getting woken up in the morning.

edit - The related video how to prolong a lucid dream seems more useful.

Flying is the most common theme in my dreams. In nearly every dream I've had over the past decade I've been able to fly. It's as normal now as walking around when awake, and I have to admit I'm sometimes disappointed I can't actually do it in real life, because in my dreams it's normal for me.

It's never true flying either, more like controlled floating, and once I'm floating it's hard to get anchored to the ground or floor again. I can't go too high outside (maybe because my brain can't process what everything would look like from an altitude higher than a treetop), sometimes I have to "swim" through the air with my arms and other times I can just do it by thinking. Every once in a while I see something happen that makes me open my shirt to reveal a blue suit with an S inside a diamond

I want an invention that lets us video record our dreams. If you think about it it should technically be possible, since they're neurons firing off inside our brains.

I think Japan came up with something that lets something like this be done. Idk if I would want to see what my dreams look like outside of them.

Does Dream Skyrim have people riding dragons whilst wielding a spear?

Not in the way you're asking.