Thread: SilverBullet's Newly Revised Key to Lucid Dreaming

Originally Posted by Mirror

Oh, and don't be an hypocrite, it's pathetic, accept diversity, there's no need not to respect someone just because he can do something better than you do.

i love how you throw the hypocrite comment In there just to be an ass. Because do you even know what hypocrite means? Where was I being a hypocrite in that post?

Originally Posted by dakotahnok

I never said you offended me. I just said that unless you are a naural lucid dreaming takes skill. It pisses me off when naturals tell un naturals that lucid dreaming is easy. When it's not.

And yes it does matter that it's a placebo, because others won't benefit off of a placebo.

I'm not a natural, infact I've tried lucid dreaming before I joined dv, around when I was 14. I only managed to get 2 but they were very short and I didn't have any more after that.

This isn't a natural telling a non natural that it's easy. I am not a natural. I wonder how many more times I'll have to stress that.

I, AM, NOT, A, NATURAL. I simply have knowledge.

I'm sorry If I sound umm. Like a bitch. I Don't mean to sound like that. Just like you were having trouble explaining intent. I'm having trouble explaining my point of view.

Originally Posted by dakotahnok

I'm sorry If I sound umm. Like a bitch. I Don't mean to sound like that. Just like you were having trouble explaining intent. I'm having trouble explaining my point of view.

It's alright bro.

The easiest way I can explain how I become lucid is by simply feeling that emotion of awesomeness and love for lucid dreams without thinking about it.

That, is how I set my intent.

We're all good and happy now? None of us ever meant for this discussion to get so heated.

I think we can all agree that it matters not what other people think of your idea. If it works, then it works.

Originally Posted by Origami

We're all good and happy now? None of us ever meant for this discussion to get so heated.

I think we can all agree that it matters not what other people think of your idea. If it works, then it works.

I wasn't angry in the first place I was just frustrated with trying to get you to understand it.

And I wasn't angry at all, just frustrated that you couldn't give a better explanation- because you couldn't simple as that.

Look guys, at the end of the day this is a techniqe. It's a specific MILD, focused on auto-suggestion, Silverbullet's "intent". Now I believe (from my own experience) that intent is... the feeling of strong emotion that you will succeed? It goes hand in hand with belief really. That's what all the stuff in the OP on 'believing you are a born lucid dreamer' is about. The 'indirect' way of getting you to feel 'intent' is the coupling of belief with an equally strong feeling of your assured success. And that's MILD. It bypasses things like recall and mantras to aim squarely at influencing the sub-conscious.

I think the only barrier here is that Silverbullet has perhaps approached this in the wrong way. The technique is solid, but the first post was controversial in calling lucidity 'easy' and claiming that you don't need to keep a sleep journal (practically blasphemy for most DVers). Also, many get turned off by the meta-physical talk of 'intent' and 'sorcerers', fate, and stuff like that. To put it in a more psychologically sound way would be auto-suggestion or, going more leftfield, the power of attraction.

What I suggest is that we all drop the bias. We all have our opinions on lucidity, and we all like to think we're right. But I think that in this case it's just a simple misunderstanding of plain Semantics (the meaning of intent, for instance) that got out of hand. None of us here are hypocrites, we're just passionate in what we believe in. Perhaps Silverbullet could look at the technique and revise it again from a more psychological angle, I really do believe there is merit in this technique.

/My two cents

tldr; This is MILD. Everyone stop fighting. Silverbullet this is awesome but confusing.

Originally Posted by Ctharlhie

Look guys, at the end of the day this is a techniqe. It's a specific MILD, focused on auto-suggestion, Silverbullet's "intent". Now I believe (from my own experience) that intent is... the feeling of strong emotion that you will succeed? It goes hand in hand with belief really. That's what all the stuff in the OP on 'believing you are a born lucid dreamer' is about. The 'indirect' way of getting you to feel 'intent' is the coupling of belief with an equally strong feeling of your assured success. And that's MILD. It bypasses things like recall and mantras to aim squarely at influencing the sub-conscious.

I think the only barrier here is that Silverbullet has perhaps approached this in the wrong way. The technique is solid, but the first post was controversial in calling lucidity 'easy' and claiming that you don't need to keep a sleep journal (practically blasphemy for most DVers). Also, many get turned off by the meta-physical talk of 'intent' and 'sorcerers', fate, and stuff like that. To put it in a more psychologically sound way would be auto-suggestion or, going more leftfield, the power of attraction.

What I suggest is that we all drop the bias. We all have our opinions on lucidity, and we all like to think we're right. But I think that in this case it's just a simple misunderstanding of plain Semantics (the meaning of intent, for instance) that got out of hand. None of us here are hypocrites, we're just passionate in what we believe in. Perhaps Silverbullet could look at the technique and revise it again from a more psychological angle, I really do believe there is merit in this technique.

/My two cents

tldr; This is MILD. Everyone stop fighting. Silverbullet this is awesome but confusing.

Nah, in the original post I don't mention any of my beliefs. I think it's fine the way it is.

Hmm... I kinda, sorta get what you're saying SilverBullet... but I think one of the words you're looking for is doubt. You say not to let yourself think about it, because that will lead to doubt. Right? It's something I think could work, but not work well for me. I'm the analytical, cynical type. I can't even do affirmations without feeling like I'm lying to myself.

Originally Posted by Singularity125

Hmm... I kinda, sorta get what you're saying SilverBullet... but I think one of the words you're looking for is doubt. You say not to let yourself think about it, because that will lead to doubt. Right? It's something I think could work, but not work well for me. I'm the analytical, cynical type. I can't even do affirmations without feeling like I'm lying to myself.

No doubts, but no thoughts either when setting your intent.

haha I guess at least on some level I understood the intent part...had two lucid dreams last night

Originally Posted by Origami

Just because one person understands something, doesn't mean everyone should be able to, or that it's correct or real.

I was just saying that his results can be reproduced by everyone since he is human. It's not a factor of intelligence, you maybe just haven't thought about it enough or made the necessaire life experiences. Maybe someday in your life you do something and it clicks, and your like "ohhh....so that is what this guy meant with intent"...and you wont need any effort...

In respect to doubting, I think that the "don't think about it" is easier if you have practiced meditation.

And yeah, I LOVE how the so-called "scientists" or "rational skeptics" call things they cannot explain a Placebo. The concept of Placebo ASSUMES that the ability to achieve the expected result is INHERENT in the human body, so, technically Lucid Dreaming is EASY. By saying "this is placebo" you feel as if you knew a lot of psychology, but indeed you are claiming that you don't know how to explain the phenomenon with your theoretical background and that you know a word in the dictionary that


SilverBullet is not asking you to believe. Read carefully and TRY. I've tried, and now I know that AT LEAST FOR ME this works. LD is a thing that can be experimented easily, is a natural function of the mind. BUT, achieving the relaxed flow of LDs (say, one per night) is not so easy, you have to have a strong will and avoid doubting, even the thought of avoiding doubting. You know. Meditation.

And in respect to Dream plane, Astral plane, etc... well, you cannot prove they exist or not. Anything can be proved. Not even the previous sentence. Not even the previous... (repeat until tired).

Conclusion: experience things by yourself, it doesn't matter in what you believe (science? God?).

Originally Posted by Univorsus

And yeah, I LOVE how the so-called "scientists" or "rational skeptics" call things they cannot explain a Placebo. The concept of Placebo ASSUMES that the ability to achieve the expected result is INHERENT in the human body, so, technically Lucid Dreaming is EASY. By saying "this is placebo" you feel as if you knew a lot of psychology, but indeed you are claiming that you don't know how to explain the phenomenon with your theoretical background and that you know a word in the dictionary that

You misunderstand Placebo. It isn't a term scientists just throw at something they don't get. Placebo is when someone has an idea, and people who read it instantly believe in it and make it true for themselves. Much like god. People claim all this stuff about god which is rationally untrue, yet people want to believe it so bad that they trick themselves into making it work, when it clearly doesn't. I call this placebo because it is placebo. It's not like I can't understand this so I shun it and say it's fake or wrong or bad. Placebo is an effect, not a term for something.

The technique is a placebo! Well done, sir, you have finally grasped the gist of the concept 'intent'. The whole point of this technique is that you believe you will lucid dream, which in turn induces a lucid dream.

I said earlier that this is a MILD that is built upon auto-suggestion and subliminality, but it seems no-on paid attention. Yes it is a placebo, and like a placebo it does absolutely squat if you don't believe in it.

But how is that not a credible method if it does induce lucid dreams. Yes it lacks internal validity (what can say is really causing the lucids here?) it lacks external validity (it can't be used by everyone it seems). But what method is completely reliable.

Lucid dreaming is not a science, it is an art. There is scientific basis of how it works, but there is a scientific basis for how we see colour, and how many paintings have you seen that have been created through some kind of formula?

It is fair enough that you are skeptical, critical thinking is a good thing. But now I'm getting annoyed because you choose to assume some kind of scientific high ground and then use terms that are grossly out of context. How did you expect for this to work for you, Origami? With your singularly pessimistic attitude with lucid dreaming, why would you bother with a technique that is built upon belief? It's the only thing holding you back.

There is scientific evidence that even neurological changes may occur with the placebo effect, sham surgery and ECTs produce much the same effect of the genuine thing, that is the power of the human mind. Let your brain induce your LDs for you.

You seem to have this misinformed sense that the placebo effect is a negative thing in all contexts.

What you think I think is incorrect. Placebo is not a method. If it was, just telling people, random people on the street that they tonight will have a lucid dream, because this this and this, you can make up all kinds of stuff to get them to believe it, and convince them they will have a lucid. Some will, if they are susceptible enough. But real methods are ways of doing things. A WBTB involves you getting up to wake up the logic center of your brain so when you go back to sleep you will or should be "awake". That's fact. That's how the brain works. Placebo, i.e. this, would go like you wake up and then go back to sleep because you can lucid dream that way the easiest. It does say how, it just says you need intent. Intent, by definition is wanting or knowing in your heart/mind you will have something, even if it's not exactly guaranteed. That is not a proper method, that is an aid at best.

I'm arguing that this is not a method, it is only placebo. I'm not saying it's placebo because I don't understand it, thats not what placebo means. Placebo cannot be a method in it's own right, as it's just belief in something. It doesn't cause anything, like a WBTB or R.C.s do. You may think it causes lucid dreams, but that's just because the mind believes they will have it, which is basically super confidence, which is a central part of lucid dreaming as a whole. This is nothing new, nothing groundbreaking. I know it was never said to be groundbreaking, but I see people worshipping this when it's little more than PLACEBO.

Now can we stop arguing please? I thought we agreed to it before, and we all settled ourselves.

Goddammit this still bothers me so much because there's so much confusion here.

This method is almost certainly not the placebo effect.

It's a MILD, 'intent' is auto-suggestion. It's only placebo as far as you interpret auto-suggestion as a placebo (which I don't).

Where the conclusion that the technique is a placebo arises is because many who try this fail to carry out the technique correctly, perhaps due to the ambiguous instructions. However that is an issue in reliability and does not call the internal validity of the technique into question, merely the external, ecological validity (we cannot generalise the technique to all lucid dreamers).

I just had to get that out there, I'm not arguing the corner of the technique anymore, I arguing for proper analytical thinking, because the word 'placebo' is getting thrown around so damn much and it's really not that relevant.

The reason it makes no sense to label this technique as a 'placebo' is because 'placebos' are used to test the internal validity of already standing procedures. That's right, placebos are tools. Say we have a medicine to cure insomnia, you could say, 'but wait a sec? What if they think they will be cured and that is what causes their insomnia to vanish?' So you set up a study with an experimental group taking the meds and a control group who take the placebo. Here the 'placebo' is a tool while the 'placebo effect' is the original issue whereby the results of the med might have been psychological rather that physiological.

In a lucid dreaming analogy you could say DILDs only work because the dreamer thinks the reality check will make them lucid. So you would give them a pill that you said would cause lucidity to test this.

So to say that Silverbullet's technique is a placebo is ludicrous, of course the dreamer is going to have a dream because they THINK they will, that is the entire premise of a MILD and so the placebo effect cannot apply.

Phew...

[EDIT] I'm really not arguing about the technique, I'm arguing about the misuse of the term 'placebo' in this thread

Originally Posted by dakotahnok

i love how you throw the hypocrite comment In there just to be an ass. Because do you even know what hypocrite means? Where was I being a hypocrite in that post?

Yes, I know what hypocrite means, just used it in the wrong context and I apologise for that. I should have used another term.... incoherent perhaps? If you offend or provoke someone, then you can't say : but hey! I don't want to fight. If you say you don't respect someone because he says raping kids it's fine I agree with you but c'mon, is it so unbearable reading that lucid dreaming isn't that hard? You can reject this but face it, there's no special or universal training to attain lucidity, most of it depends on how determined and positive you are about it so, since no technique works for everyone this one is not an exception. It simply doesn't fit some people but it does for others. I quitted lucid dreaming for a while because I had to think about university but when I followed those few simple steps I had 7 lucid dreams in 3 days when I had 8 in two months dream journaling doing MILD etc.

^This

As I've said before, with something that is as psychological as lucid dreaming it's all based on your schemata, if your schema for lucid dreaming is that it's difficult, then guess what? You're in for a tough time.

I'm reposting this http://www.dreamviews.com/f14/master...-dreams-48095/ because it's something everyone in this thread should read.

Okay, I see your point but... Placebo is the effect where if your expectations are high enough, you think you get the effects of something, and in certain subjects it can take a physiological effect, such as the insomnia pill. If you truly believe a pill will help you sleep, then almost any pill will have that effect. It won't cause you to go to sleep, you will cause yourself to go to sleep.

I don't see how this is any different. This method requires you to have intent, which is a fancy word for wanting and believing you will have a lucid, which of course is an essential part of lucid dreaming, everyone knows that. But if this method is to have intent and believe you will become lucid, and that by doing this you will become lucid (or at least should, Silverbullet never guaranteed lucidity for everyone from this method), then that in itself is placebo. People see this and think "Intent is all I need? What is intent exactly?" Silverbullet would then tell them, and they would soak it up, now knowing that having this intent they can now have an easier time having LDs, and some do, due to placebo, when in fact all it is is this method saying "Do this, have intent, and lucids come easier" (as all methods say, do this, lucidity comes easier with this. That defines a method).

My gripe with this is that it doesn't actually do anything. It's like a method saying going to sleep is a key factor to lucid dreaming, if you all go to sleep, you have a chance of getting an LD. Well, yeah, having intent and believing and being positive is a key factor in lucid dreaming. MILD and DEILD and WBTB all actually do something, like familiarizing you brain with R.C.s so you have a chance at doing them in dreams, or waking up so you fall asleep more awake right into a REM.

tl;dr This method does nothing and tells nothing new that we all don't already know. Even day old newbies will know that if you take a negative attitude you will fail.

Originally Posted by Origami

Okay, I see your point but... Placebo is the effect where if your expectations are high enough, you think you get the effects of something, and in certain subjects it can take a physiological effect, such as the insomnia pill. If you truly believe a pill will help you sleep, then almost any pill will have that effect. It won't cause you to go to sleep, you will cause yourself to go to sleep.

I don't see how this is any different. This method requires you to have intent, which is a fancy word for wanting and believing you will have a lucid, which of course is an essential part of lucid dreaming, everyone knows that. But if this method is to have intent and believe you will become lucid, and that by doing this you will become lucid (or at least should, Silverbullet never guaranteed lucidity for everyone from this method), then that in itself is placebo. People see this and think "Intent is all I need? What is intent exactly?" Silverbullet would then tell them, and they would soak it up, now knowing that having this intent they can now have an easier time having LDs, and some do, due to placebo, when in fact all it is is this method saying "Do this, have intent, and lucids come easier" (as all methods say, do this, lucidity comes easier with this. That defines a method).

My gripe with this is that it doesn't actually do anything. It's like a method saying going to sleep is a key factor to lucid dreaming, if you all go to sleep, you have a chance of getting an LD. Well, yeah, having intent and believing and being positive is a key factor in lucid dreaming. MILD and DEILD and WBTB all actually do something, like familiarizing you brain with R.C.s so you have a chance at doing them in dreams, or waking up so you fall asleep more awake right into a REM.

tl;dr This method does nothing and tells nothing new that we all don't already know. Even day old newbies will know that if you take a negative attitude you will fail.

You midas well call all techniques placebos then.