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Lucid Dreaming
Friday, October 21st, 2022 11:18 pmI finished When Brains Dream today while at work, about an hour before quitting time, so I kind of contemplated it in silence until I left.
There was an interesting chapter on lucid dreaming, which gave me a lot of hope, becuause it's been studied pretty intensively.
You might think there's no way to scientifically study lucid dreaming, because it's entirely subjective, and all you have to go on is people claiming they've done it, with no way to verify whether or not they're just lying.
But, they can study it, because, in a sleep research environment, lucid dreamers can signal to researchers that they've attained lucidity, while dreaming, by doing a pre-agreed series of eye movements!
Subjects in a sleep lab have electrodes monitoring brain waves, heartbeat, and a lot of other physiological variables, but one thing they can also record is eye movements.
And of course, REM stands for, Rapid Eye Movement, because when dreaming, our eyes dart around behind our eyelids just as they would while waking... according to what the dreamer thinks they're seeing and experiencing.
Lucid dreamers will... in their dream, roll their eyes left, right, up, or down, in some pre-arranged code to signal to researchers that they are lucid. And that shows up in the data, unambiguously... while other instruments prove they are actually asleep.
So, lucid dreaming is a real thing, that can be (and has been) scientifically studied!
--<>--
Only a small percentage of people can do it naturally, or easily. But a much larger percentage can learn to do it... to some extent.
But even for the best lucid dreamers, it's like walking a tight rope...
Fall one way, and you're back in the dream and no longer lucid.
Fall the other way, and you just wake up.
So... just being able to question the reality of a dream, for a moment... counts as lucid dreaming.
Knowing for sure, that it's a dream, even if you can't control it, is a little more advanced.
Once you know for sure, then, it's easier to opt out of it, than to alter it. So you could opt out by waking up, or you could opt out by hitting the reset button and starting a new dream... that you probably won't be lucid within.
It gets more complicated from there, with false awakenings... where you opt out of the dream and think you're awake, but you're not... and other such traps.
But being able to stay in a dream, and alter it to your will is quite difficult, and has it's different skill levels.
--<>--
The dream... doesn't like you taking control, and will actively fight back, and it's got the advantage.
In the book they say that not only will the dream always try to second guess and surprise you, but the dream characters, especially... will never behave or answer in the way you might wish them to... even if you manage to conjure one up out of thin air!
Dream characters will always try to convince you that you're not dreaming... just as real life people would, if you told them you thought you were dreaming.
But if you ask them simple math questions, or time, or date questions... they will always get cagey about it! They might act like you asked them too personal of a question, or too absurd a question. They'll ingore the question, or walk away. And in some cases, they'll even cry!
All that... according to the research, as related in this book.
--<>--
They didn't explain why dream characters are so bad with numbers, but they did say this was one of many tell-tale signs that you're dreaming.
Twisting or flipping light switches, with no light coming on... was another one!.. that I related I've experienced myself, two entries ago.
Looking into mirrors is another one... If you're dreaming, the mirror image will quickly dissolve into something strange.
Signs are another one... you won't be able to actually read a sign, unless it's message is extremely simple!.. but in that case, look away from it, and then look back to it. Is it still there? If not... you're dreaming.
--<>--
The key to lucid dreaming is... you have to just get into the mental habit of questioning your reality regularly throughout the day.
Always question if things seem a little ridiculous. But you should also question reality even when they don't. Do those sign checks. Ask people about time and numbers, and math, and money.
The idea is... if it's part of your normal waking habit, to question reality and check if you're dreaming, then you'll do that when you really are dreaming, naturally.
After that, you have to master the ability to hold on to the knowledge that you're dreaming... without freaking out and waking up.
And after that... you have to learn how to negotiate with the dream around you, and it's characters... to get some level of control... because they, and it, are very sensitive about such things, and will fight you tooth and nail, if you're too crude with your lucidity.
------------{=0=}------------
All of the above said, the book ended by pointing out that we still don't understand how exactly the brain is able to do all this.
To create whole worlds, populated by characters with their own free will, and props, and set details... and to take you by surprise, and shift unpredictably on a dime, without you knowing what will happen next... even when you're lucid inside the dream!
--<>--
The book touched on a lot of subjects, including precognitive, and telepathic dreams... and, in the early chapters, Freudian & Jungian ideas about the unconscious VS conscious minds.
And they seem to have not really put stock in any of it.
But they were silent on the whole idea of the right and left hemispheres of the brain... with one having a lock on math and speech and so forth, and the other having the lock on creativity and... soaking in the surrounding with insane detail that you're not aware of?
They did give a nod to the fact that, little background details in dreams have to come from things you saw or heard about, but did not remember concsciously, or... maybe just forgot.
That was how they debunked some precognitive dreams... by saying, the person had an even chance of predicting a certain thing, if their brain picked up this detail, and that bit of information beforehand... without knowing or remembering that they had.
--<>--
The upshot, here, is that we have two brains in our head! One of them can speak, and do math, and is you... the person who deals with the daily problems of reality, and makes that lazy animal, the body, do stuff to make money, and the laundry, and so forth...
And the the other brain is... just a silent room mate in your skull, who can't speak, and doesn't understand math... but soaks in every tiny detail you miss, and, can take control of the steering wheel when you're about to hit a deer and get you around it.
This link I'm embedding from CGP Grey doesn't cover the snapshot detail memory, or emergency reflex features of that side of the brain... but it does lay out the argument that you do have two brains, with their own autonomy.
We know this is true becuase when the connection between the left and right hemispheres get's severed... the left and right halves of a person begin to act like two different people, with two different agendas.
--<>--
So, my argument about, Dream Guy, still holds, after reading When Brains Dream.
They avoid the whole subject of the dichotomy of the two lobes, and also the older school concept of a subconscious and conscious... simply treating the brain as one whole that transitions between states of sleep and wakefulness.
But they do admit that we don't know how the brain can possibly fool itself, and that it can somehow capture details it doesn't know it catpured.
In fact, the whole theory of NEXTUP, hinges upon the fact that the brain is gaining new insight... that it doesn't know that it's gained.
They're... trying to have the cake and eat it... treating the brain like it's an indivisible consciousness... yet saying it can, in every way that matters, act like it's two distinct consciousnesses.
--<>--
For most people, both hemispheres of the brain are in communication, and that allows the right and left halves of our body to act in concert, to get anything done.
But, as CGP Grey pointed out, only one hemisphere is capable of speech, while the other is a mute observer.
That speech hemisphere is also the math hemisphere, and the one that has executive control over the waking world.
And my theory is that it's the other hemisphere... the other brain... which takes control when we sleep.
It paralyzes our muscles, and deprives us of neurochemicals that allow for rational thought... then locks us in it's own virtual world that we're unable to question, and puts us through our paces... maybe, as Zadra & Stickgold surmise, to do network explorations to undrstand possibilities that will help us survive.
But also, maybe... just as revenge, after having to sit mute and helpless all day, watching us maneuver the pysical body through the real world, and negotiate all the time, math, & reading problems it can't comprehend... and the mundane chores it has no interest in.
My theory remains, that this, non dominant hemisphere is Dream Guy. It's a mind unto itself, with it's own personality. And when it has control... while you're sleeping... it is LOATHE to let you wrest any of that control back!
No!.. not after you being in control all day!
This is MY time, to call the shots!
--<>--
That's why lucid dreaming is so difficult!
Because it's not just a question of you realizing you're asleep, and then running wild with your wildest fantasies.
It's you, playing an away game, in some other person's world. A person who knows you more deeply than you may know yourself. Your skullmate. A frienemy! A person in control of an arsenal of brain chemicals that can fuck you up!
--<>--
Maybe, as I read more contemporary scientific literature on the subject of dreams... and/or the brain... I'll back off from this stance.
But for the moment, my theory is that you've got a kind of, idot/savant living rent free in your skull, who may NEVER be totally cool with you, no matter how much you strive to integrate your left and right brains... and be both creative and rational... because they're just a different person, from you!
--<>--
I know that's... really freaky and unsettling!
And the CGP Grey video kinda hints at how unsettling that idea is.
------------{=0=}------------
The escape hatch, from the idea of having a frienemy skullmate... would be metaphysical.
It's possible that when you dream... your soul just goes to another astral realm. And all of the situations, settings, and props are just... part of that realm.
All the people you encounter, are just... inhabitants of that realm.
Everything that happens, is just... business as usual for that realm.
And your brain has nothing to do with it!.. except to keep your body running while you're gone.
Your mind, in such a realm, might effect the experience, because... that would just be the nature of the astral realm. It's just a very mental realm where thoughts and hopes and worries carry great weight and effect situations easily.
And maybe the inhabitants of that realm aren't all native... and many whom you meet are just other dreaming humans like yourself, who happen to be asleep at the same time as you are!
--<>--
I'm not completely opposed to such ideas.
I'm just some guy, afterall!.. I'm not a licensed scientist!
So... we will explore this whole dream world more deeply as we transition into winter!
But lucid dreaming is definitely a powerful tool for such exploration.
°¦}
https://soundcloud.com/snoozefestaudio
There was an interesting chapter on lucid dreaming, which gave me a lot of hope, becuause it's been studied pretty intensively.
You might think there's no way to scientifically study lucid dreaming, because it's entirely subjective, and all you have to go on is people claiming they've done it, with no way to verify whether or not they're just lying.
But, they can study it, because, in a sleep research environment, lucid dreamers can signal to researchers that they've attained lucidity, while dreaming, by doing a pre-agreed series of eye movements!
Subjects in a sleep lab have electrodes monitoring brain waves, heartbeat, and a lot of other physiological variables, but one thing they can also record is eye movements.
And of course, REM stands for, Rapid Eye Movement, because when dreaming, our eyes dart around behind our eyelids just as they would while waking... according to what the dreamer thinks they're seeing and experiencing.
Lucid dreamers will... in their dream, roll their eyes left, right, up, or down, in some pre-arranged code to signal to researchers that they are lucid. And that shows up in the data, unambiguously... while other instruments prove they are actually asleep.
So, lucid dreaming is a real thing, that can be (and has been) scientifically studied!
Only a small percentage of people can do it naturally, or easily. But a much larger percentage can learn to do it... to some extent.
But even for the best lucid dreamers, it's like walking a tight rope...
Fall one way, and you're back in the dream and no longer lucid.
Fall the other way, and you just wake up.
So... just being able to question the reality of a dream, for a moment... counts as lucid dreaming.
Knowing for sure, that it's a dream, even if you can't control it, is a little more advanced.
Once you know for sure, then, it's easier to opt out of it, than to alter it. So you could opt out by waking up, or you could opt out by hitting the reset button and starting a new dream... that you probably won't be lucid within.
It gets more complicated from there, with false awakenings... where you opt out of the dream and think you're awake, but you're not... and other such traps.
But being able to stay in a dream, and alter it to your will is quite difficult, and has it's different skill levels.
The dream... doesn't like you taking control, and will actively fight back, and it's got the advantage.
In the book they say that not only will the dream always try to second guess and surprise you, but the dream characters, especially... will never behave or answer in the way you might wish them to... even if you manage to conjure one up out of thin air!
Dream characters will always try to convince you that you're not dreaming... just as real life people would, if you told them you thought you were dreaming.
But if you ask them simple math questions, or time, or date questions... they will always get cagey about it! They might act like you asked them too personal of a question, or too absurd a question. They'll ingore the question, or walk away. And in some cases, they'll even cry!
All that... according to the research, as related in this book.
They didn't explain why dream characters are so bad with numbers, but they did say this was one of many tell-tale signs that you're dreaming.
Twisting or flipping light switches, with no light coming on... was another one!.. that I related I've experienced myself, two entries ago.
Looking into mirrors is another one... If you're dreaming, the mirror image will quickly dissolve into something strange.
Signs are another one... you won't be able to actually read a sign, unless it's message is extremely simple!.. but in that case, look away from it, and then look back to it. Is it still there? If not... you're dreaming.
The key to lucid dreaming is... you have to just get into the mental habit of questioning your reality regularly throughout the day.
Always question if things seem a little ridiculous. But you should also question reality even when they don't. Do those sign checks. Ask people about time and numbers, and math, and money.
The idea is... if it's part of your normal waking habit, to question reality and check if you're dreaming, then you'll do that when you really are dreaming, naturally.
After that, you have to master the ability to hold on to the knowledge that you're dreaming... without freaking out and waking up.
And after that... you have to learn how to negotiate with the dream around you, and it's characters... to get some level of control... because they, and it, are very sensitive about such things, and will fight you tooth and nail, if you're too crude with your lucidity.
All of the above said, the book ended by pointing out that we still don't understand how exactly the brain is able to do all this.
To create whole worlds, populated by characters with their own free will, and props, and set details... and to take you by surprise, and shift unpredictably on a dime, without you knowing what will happen next... even when you're lucid inside the dream!
The book touched on a lot of subjects, including precognitive, and telepathic dreams... and, in the early chapters, Freudian & Jungian ideas about the unconscious VS conscious minds.
And they seem to have not really put stock in any of it.
But they were silent on the whole idea of the right and left hemispheres of the brain... with one having a lock on math and speech and so forth, and the other having the lock on creativity and... soaking in the surrounding with insane detail that you're not aware of?
They did give a nod to the fact that, little background details in dreams have to come from things you saw or heard about, but did not remember concsciously, or... maybe just forgot.
That was how they debunked some precognitive dreams... by saying, the person had an even chance of predicting a certain thing, if their brain picked up this detail, and that bit of information beforehand... without knowing or remembering that they had.
The upshot, here, is that we have two brains in our head! One of them can speak, and do math, and is you... the person who deals with the daily problems of reality, and makes that lazy animal, the body, do stuff to make money, and the laundry, and so forth...
And the the other brain is... just a silent room mate in your skull, who can't speak, and doesn't understand math... but soaks in every tiny detail you miss, and, can take control of the steering wheel when you're about to hit a deer and get you around it.
This link I'm embedding from CGP Grey doesn't cover the snapshot detail memory, or emergency reflex features of that side of the brain... but it does lay out the argument that you do have two brains, with their own autonomy.
We know this is true becuase when the connection between the left and right hemispheres get's severed... the left and right halves of a person begin to act like two different people, with two different agendas.
So, my argument about, Dream Guy, still holds, after reading When Brains Dream.
They avoid the whole subject of the dichotomy of the two lobes, and also the older school concept of a subconscious and conscious... simply treating the brain as one whole that transitions between states of sleep and wakefulness.
But they do admit that we don't know how the brain can possibly fool itself, and that it can somehow capture details it doesn't know it catpured.
In fact, the whole theory of NEXTUP, hinges upon the fact that the brain is gaining new insight... that it doesn't know that it's gained.
They're... trying to have the cake and eat it... treating the brain like it's an indivisible consciousness... yet saying it can, in every way that matters, act like it's two distinct consciousnesses.
For most people, both hemispheres of the brain are in communication, and that allows the right and left halves of our body to act in concert, to get anything done.
But, as CGP Grey pointed out, only one hemisphere is capable of speech, while the other is a mute observer.
That speech hemisphere is also the math hemisphere, and the one that has executive control over the waking world.
And my theory is that it's the other hemisphere... the other brain... which takes control when we sleep.
It paralyzes our muscles, and deprives us of neurochemicals that allow for rational thought... then locks us in it's own virtual world that we're unable to question, and puts us through our paces... maybe, as Zadra & Stickgold surmise, to do network explorations to undrstand possibilities that will help us survive.
But also, maybe... just as revenge, after having to sit mute and helpless all day, watching us maneuver the pysical body through the real world, and negotiate all the time, math, & reading problems it can't comprehend... and the mundane chores it has no interest in.
My theory remains, that this, non dominant hemisphere is Dream Guy. It's a mind unto itself, with it's own personality. And when it has control... while you're sleeping... it is LOATHE to let you wrest any of that control back!
No!.. not after you being in control all day!
This is MY time, to call the shots!
That's why lucid dreaming is so difficult!
Because it's not just a question of you realizing you're asleep, and then running wild with your wildest fantasies.
It's you, playing an away game, in some other person's world. A person who knows you more deeply than you may know yourself. Your skullmate. A frienemy! A person in control of an arsenal of brain chemicals that can fuck you up!
Maybe, as I read more contemporary scientific literature on the subject of dreams... and/or the brain... I'll back off from this stance.
But for the moment, my theory is that you've got a kind of, idot/savant living rent free in your skull, who may NEVER be totally cool with you, no matter how much you strive to integrate your left and right brains... and be both creative and rational... because they're just a different person, from you!
I know that's... really freaky and unsettling!
And the CGP Grey video kinda hints at how unsettling that idea is.
The escape hatch, from the idea of having a frienemy skullmate... would be metaphysical.
It's possible that when you dream... your soul just goes to another astral realm. And all of the situations, settings, and props are just... part of that realm.
All the people you encounter, are just... inhabitants of that realm.
Everything that happens, is just... business as usual for that realm.
And your brain has nothing to do with it!.. except to keep your body running while you're gone.
Your mind, in such a realm, might effect the experience, because... that would just be the nature of the astral realm. It's just a very mental realm where thoughts and hopes and worries carry great weight and effect situations easily.
And maybe the inhabitants of that realm aren't all native... and many whom you meet are just other dreaming humans like yourself, who happen to be asleep at the same time as you are!
I'm not completely opposed to such ideas.
I'm just some guy, afterall!.. I'm not a licensed scientist!
So... we will explore this whole dream world more deeply as we transition into winter!
But lucid dreaming is definitely a powerful tool for such exploration.
°¦}
