nomadic thoughts

I have always been extremely interested and intrigued by dreams. This is due largely to a training program I casually began inspired by frustration. These experiments I tried were very simple, took little time of my own…but an enormous mental effort. Prior to my sudden interest, research, and training, I never dreamed…or at least never remembered them. There is a widely circulated myth/rumor that everyone dreams, regardless of whether or not they remember them – but there are a lot of challenges to this theory. The fact is, we can’t positively know if those who don’t recall dreaming do or do not in fact dream. It is however widely accepted that we do all dream.

I was intrigued by people describing their dreams so vividly and it created a curious envy – as I could never recall having a dream. I started doing some casual research and learned there are ways to improve dream recall, and to even go as far as being able to control your dreams. While most of the population consider dreams to be completely out of our control, Tibetan Buddhists – for centuries – have had complete mastery of their dreams while practicing a form of dream Yoga. Lucid – or conscious – dreaming suddenly became a passion I fervently pursued. The thought of not only being able to dream – or remember – but also to be able to CONTROL my dreams was something that seemed so amazing. I could potentially create any type of world I wanted, and act out as I saw fit. I could, pardon the pun, achieve any dream I wished.

Dreams are thought to be experienced during the R.E.M. stage of sleep, which occurs approximately every 90-120 minutes – about the time it takes to complete all stages of sleep. The number of times this cycle occurs is based on how long you are sleeping and the actual length of the R.E.M. stage – so if you sleep for 7 hours and one cycle of sleep takes 120 minutes, that means you enter the R.E.M. stage approximately 3-4 times. This was affirmed after I progressed to the stage where I had trained myself to wake after each dream to allow myself to transcribe everything I could remember. I was waking – normally – 3 times a night. The longer I went through this process the more detailed my recall had become. With this I began to develop new goals and expectations.

I wanted to not only be able to recall my dreams in great detail, but to be able to control them. To be able to will light switches off, to fly, to meet inspirational figures…the possibilities are by all means vast and endless. This was never a step I took very seriously. To achieve this is to cue yourself to consciousness without ever waking. There are many methods to achieve this but I had some specific methods I had subscribed to. I was training myself to come to consciousness in sleep based on cues that I was mentally ingraining in my waking life. For instance the position of a light switch in relation to the condition of the lights (lights on, switch off), or the effect of moving the position of the light switch has on the condition of the lights. In a dream, events don’t occur entirely with logic. For instance, if the clock on the wall reads 3:30pm and it is pitch black outside, this is a cue. And that is what you “train” for. Walking through the day noting the common effect of normal things helps you to cue to consciousness in a dream as simple logic is too complex to follow in a dream. Observing your reflection properly is thought to be impossible in a dream. It would require too much detailed memory recall. Distorted or no reflection at all, cue consciousness. From what I gather from the research I have conducted, it is difficult for the brain to coordinate these complex and subtle cause and effects. Light switch on, no lights come on. From this subtle event, cue consciousness.

I have achieved this but it takes strict discipline to not awake upon discovery that you are dreaming. It is the most difficult and time-consuming step. If you are blessed with the gift of already dreaming or remembering your dreams, or even better, to regularly dream and recall in vivid detail, the hardest part is already out of the way. Some people can even naturally come to the conclusion they are dreaming but lack the training or knowledge to take control of their experience. 20% of the population report having a lucid dream at least once a month.

A first-step exercise in increasing dream recall frequency and detail: focus on a single object, a candle flame for example, and envelop this object in total blackness. The object should start at a fair distance, and the closer you are to sleep, the closer the object will get (typically, often). It takes some practice, but it is good for concentration. At the same time you are focusing on this object and drifting towards sleep, repeat two to three phrases regarding your sub-conscious goals. Repeat these until you are asleep. some examples:

* “I will remember my dreams in vivid detail tonight.”
* “Dreams are important to me and I remember each one tonight.”
* “I will wake after each dream tonight.”

Do not let any other thoughts enter your mind and follow these focused thoughts until you drift into sleep. To even further your dream recall, keep a notepad by your bed and when you wake after a dream scribble down every detail you can remember. You don’t have to spend a lot of time on it – the point is to focus and think about what you have dreamed. To help to prevent the dream from fleeting from your memory do not move when you wake while you commit the dream to memory. You can program your sub-conscious to do anything you want. You can wake yourself up at a certain time in the morning, same process but a lot simpler. Repeating that you want to wake up at a particular time, it’s important to you… I was a little skeptical of all this in the beginning, but Ithink dreams are an important part of your life, primarily your self-expression and release of feelings and thoughts that cannot be expressed appropriately in your waking life.