Thread: Massive ,meditation Madness (MMM)

Hello ezzo,

I too have found the information regarding your specific question conflicting. I am going to give you my personal experience, and what I have known to work. I practiced ADA a while ago (and still do to this day, it's become second nature) in order to increase the number of DILD's that I have.

After practicing ADA for a few months, I did find that my DILD frequency increased dramatically, and not due to my normal dream signs. I was becoming lucid more and more in dreams from simply picking out the typical oddities that accompany our nightly adventures. With that said, practicing "mindfulness" on a daily basis DID result in a significant increase in my LD count.

There are many different ways to meditate. The most common ways are probably concentration, mindfulness, or open awareness as well as matra or metta meditations. In theory these are different paths to the same destination.

Likewise there are many different ways to practice critical self awareness. ADA and mindfulness are 2 of these ways.

Improving at lucid dreaming is first and foremost a result of practice. Choose the meditation style that most appeals to you and the critical self awareness exercises that most appeal to you and practice both. Continue daily for at least a month before you experiment with other methods/switch it up.

In short, there is no right or wrong way. But stick to whatever you decide and you will start to see results.

The thing is... If you are not aware of your dreams to begin with, there is not very much to be critical of.

Meditation (in my experience) help you get a better quality of sleep, with thoughts and emotions sorted out and in a calm state of mind, I tend to become more aware of my dreams.

And sometimes I don't even need to be critical because I am so clear and aware to understand that it is a dream already from the start.

But what you should do, is to look less for given answers by other people's experience, and experience the right and wrong way for yourself. It's all that matters in the end anyway.

Lucid dreaming can't be fully explained by the science we got right now, what awareness in itself is even not possible for us to grasp yet. Which means...

That all we can do is to form interpretations of what it means and how to increase it.

Meditation though is the oldest and most effective way of becoming aware of the only thing that will ever matter in your life, and that is the NOW.

Which is again why meditation in my experience is a great aid for lucid dreaming. Because if you are in a dream but focus your awareness on your thoughts such as "Oh my GOD it's a dream, so cool!!!!" then your awareness have shifted from the dream to your thoughts, which make the dream unstable. It didn't colapsed before when you were unaware that it was a dream because you was still directing your attention to the dream! Which is why practising awareness of the present moment (the now) during the day is a great way to practise dream stabilization.

If you drive your car to work but are focused on the radio, your thoughts, your plans and future, emotions. Then you aren't really there. But since our physical reality is somehow more stable and not dependent on our directed awareness to exist, it doesn't colapse. A dream however is fully there because of YOU, so the person you need to control to control the dream, is YOU. And what is you? Your awareness I guess..

Again meditation is the most effective way to practise this.

Hope that helps. If you need more advice on how to meditate and become present, read my guide, try it, and then ask again.

Peace.

Originally Posted by MasterMind

The thing is... If you are not aware of your dreams to begin with, there is not very much to be critical of.

Meditation (in my experience) help you get a better quality of sleep, with thoughts and emotions sorted out and in a calm state of mind, I tend to become more aware of my dreams.

And sometimes I don't even need to be critical because I am so clear and aware to understand that it is a dream already from the start.

But what you should do, is to look less for given answers by other people's experience, and experience the right and wrong way for yourself. It's all that matters in the end anyway.

Lucid dreaming can't be fully explained by the science we got right now, what awareness in itself is even not possible for us to grasp yet. Which means...

That all we can do is to form interpretations of what it means and how to increase it.

Meditation though is the oldest and most effective way of becoming aware of the only thing that will ever matter in your life, and that is the NOW.

Which is again why meditation in my experience is a great aid for lucid dreaming. Because if you are in a dream but focus your awareness on your thoughts such as "Oh my GOD it's a dream, so cool!!!!" then your awareness have shifted from the dream to your thoughts, which make the dream unstable. It didn't colapsed before when you were unaware that it was a dream because you was still directing your attention to the dream! Which is why practising awareness of the present moment (the now) during the day is a great way to practise dream stabilization.

If you drive your car to work but are focused on the radio, your thoughts, your plans and future, emotions. Then you aren't really there. But since our physical reality is somehow more stable and not dependent on our directed awareness to exist, it doesn't colapse. A dream however is fully there because of YOU, so the person you need to control to control the dream, is YOU. And what is you? Your awareness I guess..

Again meditation is the most effective way to practise this.

Hope that helps. If you need more advice on how to meditate and become present, read my guide, try it, and then ask again.

Peace.

Very well said. Meditation/self-awareness was never my strong suit as far as explanations go

Glad you liked it Chewnie91!

As I said this is just well sounding theories and our language is limited to give the full picture, but here is another way to look at it.

If we ask ourselves a few questions to come up with a rational and clear answer.

We want to become aware of our dreams, let's leave the problem of defining awareness and let's focus on another problem.

What is a dream? There are many answers and ways to explain that, but let's keep it simple.

- Dreams are hallucinations that happens during deep stages of relaxation (of the mind and body.) - Common view.
- Dreaming happens when our focus of awareness is shifted from our waking consciousness to the subconscious. - Psychological view.
- Dreams are our experiences, memories and emotions getting sorted out during the night. - Brain scientific view.
- Dreams are a portal into the astral dimension, our consciousness is like a radio, the frequency we focus on is where we are. - Spiritual view.

Ok so no clear answer of what a dream actually is... Just as problematic as the awareness definition.

Luckily for us, no matter what view of a dream you have, meditation is the easiest way to practise conscious dreaming.

Here are my and other people's experiences:

During meditation I usually slip into a deeply relaxed but focused mind and what happens is that I sometimes nod off and experience strange scenarios and weird things.
Either I am riding a horse but is convinced that I should go and write that my puppy is purple because the girls in charge wants to keep me busy.... Then I wake up from this strange experience and am surprised that I didn't realized it was very strange to think and experience that. It's like having a micro-dream. So this is an example of a mix experience between the common view and psychological view of dreams. You can even test out Freud's theory yourself, which says that our dreams are a necessary way for us to act out what we surpress during the day, if you are a guy and abstain from sexual content, masturbation and orgasm for 2 weeks you will notice it in your dreams. Can't talk for girls since I have no ability to test it. Just a fun way to play around with psychological theories.

The scientific view is something that happens automatically, what we focus on is our memories emotions and worries in the future, but when you meditate and become aware of the now (which is a feeling of complete relief, because you realize how much thinking affect your state of awareness - Your state become as pure as a child's mind again) all the memories, emotions and worries vanish and you are focused and calm. Sometimes this happen as we go to sleep as well but unconsciously, for example you might feel stressed out and really anxious about something, but then you go to sleep and the next morning you realize that it isn't that bad and you are back in your default state. This is why I meditate AND take powernaps by the way.

The idea that dreams are a portal into another layer of existence is something that Robert Monroe talked about, I have not experienced anything to support that theory myself, but since he is such a pragmatic and critical thinking man, it's very hard to not believe that he is authentic. He started a business but not for money, he was already earning good money, he did it by curiosity and that is what separates him from other people claiming to have had spiritual experiences. However, I have had a friend explaining the exact process Monroe went through without even knowing about lucid dreaming nor astral projection so I am very currious and open minded for the possibility that we are more than our physical body.

My friend's experience was this:

When he couldn't fall asleep he decided to not move and just focus on his breathing, after some time of practising this he noticed that his breath dissapeared and he got a little shocked but he trusted that he wouldn't die and then he floated up throguh his ceiling through all the appartments in his building until he reached the sky. He saw his house from above and entered the clouds, then he told me that he choosed to fall asleep... He later experienced talking to his dead relatives and got information that he had been a secret and when he asked his mom about it she got shocked and wondered how he possibly could know. If this is true or not, doesn't really matter.

Because we can conclude one thing.

Meditation is always the answer. Meditation IS conscious dreaming. Meditation is to be aware of your true self, when your memories, emotions and daily concerns and EGO is gone...

Only the pure YOU and AWARENESS remains!

So.. The less your brain need to sort out subconscious memories, emotions and thoughts during the night OR... shift into another state of consciousness.
The more time you can spend in a vivid hallucination OR another layer of existence with awareness.

This got a little longer than expected, as usual... But I hope it was of value to you.

Peace.

Originally Posted by MasterMind

Glad you liked it Chewnie91!

As I said this is just well sounding theories and our language is limited to give the full picture, but here is another way to look at it.

If we ask ourselves a few questions to come up with a rational and clear answer.

We want to become aware of our dreams, let's leave the problem of defining awareness and let's focus on another problem.

What is a dream? There are many answers and ways to explain that, but let's keep it simple.

- Dreams are hallucinations that happens during deep stages of relaxation (of the mind and body.) - Common view.
- Dreaming happens when our focus of awareness is shifted from our waking consciousness to the subconscious. - Psychological view.
- Dreams are our experiences, memories and emotions getting sorted out during the night. - Brain scientific view.
- Dreams are a portal into the astral dimension, our consciousness is like a radio, the frequency we focus on is where we are. - Spiritual view.

Ok so no clear answer of what a dream actually is... Just as problematic as the awareness definition.

Luckily for us, no matter what view of a dream you have, meditation is the easiest way to practise conscious dreaming.

Here are my and other people's experiences:

During meditation I usually slip into a deeply relaxed but focused mind and what happens is that I sometimes nod off and experience strange scenarios and weird things.
Either I am riding a horse but is convinced that I should go and write that my puppy is purple because the girls in charge wants to keep me busy.... Then I wake up from this strange experience and am surprised that I didn't realized it was very strange to think and experience that. It's like having a micro-dream. So this is an example of a mix experience between the common view and psychological view of dreams. You can even test out Freud's theory yourself, which says that our dreams are a necessary way for us to act out what we surpress during the day, if you are a guy and abstain from sexual content, masturbation and orgasm for 2 weeks you will notice it in your dreams. Can't talk for girls since I have no ability to test it. Just a fun way to play around with psychological theories.

The scientific view is something that happens automatically, what we focus on is our memories emotions and worries in the future, but when you meditate and become aware of the now (which is a feeling of complete relief, because you realize how much thinking affect your state of awareness - Your state become as pure as a child's mind again) all the memories, emotions and worries vanish and you are focused and calm. Sometimes this happen as we go to sleep as well but unconsciously, for example you might feel stressed out and really anxious about something, but then you go to sleep and the next morning you realize that it isn't that bad and you are back in your default state. This is why I meditate AND take powernaps by the way.

The idea that dreams are a portal into another layer of existence is something that Robert Monroe talked about, I have not experienced anything to support that theory myself, but since he is such a pragmatic and critical thinking man, it's very hard to not believe that he is authentic. He started a business but not for money, he was already earning good money, he did it by curiosity and that is what separates him from other people claiming to have had spiritual experiences. However, I have had a friend explaining the exact process Monroe went through without even knowing about lucid dreaming nor astral projection so I am very currious and open minded for the possibility that we are more than our physical body.

My friend's experience was this:

When he couldn't fall asleep he decided to not move and just focus on his breathing, after some time of practising this he noticed that his breath dissapeared and he got a little shocked but he trusted that he wouldn't die and then he floated up throguh his ceiling through all the appartments in his building until he reached the sky. He saw his house from above and entered the clouds, then he told me that he choosed to fall asleep... He later experienced talking to his dead relatives and got information that he had been a secret and when he asked his mom about it she got shocked and wondered how he possibly could know. If this is true or not, doesn't really matter.

Because we can conclude one thing.

Meditation is always the answer. Meditation IS conscious dreaming. Meditation is to be aware of your true self, when your memories, emotions and daily concerns and EGO is gone...

Only the pure YOU and AWARENESS remains!

So.. The less your brain need to sort out subconscious memories, emotions and thoughts during the night OR... shift into another state of consciousness.
The more time you can spend in a vivid hallucination OR another layer of existence with awareness.

This got a little longer than expected, as usual... But I hope it was of value to you.

Peace.

Hi. to receive answers as detailed, interesting and long as all the above makes me feel like like my follow up questions may be irritating to all of you so please bear with me, I really appreciate such detailed responses and feel a little awkward coming back with more questions but here goes

As there seems to be no clear concise answer, it would seem that Yoshis ADA, Sageous SADA, mindfulness seated meditation etc can all go towards achieving the same end goal in their own way, which is to increase DILDS

I guess if there was a road (meditation path) along a desert that ended at a mountain (frequesnt dild success) then all the meditation techniques could be seen as different vehicles - Yoshis ADA is a car, seated mindfullness is a bycycle, Your meditation guide is a train etc (this is my first analogy - hope it works lol) It dosent matter what vehicla you jump in they will eventually lead to the same destination (self awareness in dreams)

So everything given and taken into account, please critique the following which i will undertake

My planned routine: Daily seated Vispanna meditation followed by mindfullness in all i do throughout the day with sporadic quality reality checks. The only purpose of me doing this is to increase dilds. Im aware of all the other amazing benefits that accompany meditation but for now i just want to start having dilds. Should I add anything else into the mix?

At the moment i have just read 'The Phase' and i am going to soley concentrate on the indirect technique methods and hopefull when combined with the above Vispanna, will lead to many frequent lucid dreams

Thanks everyone for your replies, I guess to get a definite answer is not possible as we, as humans dont fully have the answers ourself s, i just dont want to waste time using wrong meditation techniques (either seated of walking), i wanna be llluuuucccciddddddd!!!!

Thanks Guys
Ezzo

And then it happened ... I read a thread saying that mindfulness meditation WILL increase awareness but it wont help to make you lucid in dreams! For that we need critical self awareness

I searched on how to tweak my life into a critical self awareness mindset but not 1 single thread explains exactly what to do, they mainly say ' yes you need to be critically aware during the day' but give no explanation on practical steps to undertake

Quick summary/explanation:

- According to this study, yes mindfulness is associated with lucid dreaming frequency, although the relationship was "only present in those participants who reported acquaintance with meditation".
- Be careful since most "awareness" talk is based on personal ideas/views and many times doesn't work under scientific definitions of the word. (May the author of the term correct me if he sees this), critical awareness refers to a posture of seeking awareness and interacting with it (what does being me means? Is the reality around me also part of me?), or in more simple terms, it also seems to relate to a term presented in the two-dimensional model of self-awareness: acceptance and presence (for the record, the mindfulness that most helps you in terms of lucidity is presence).

In the end, just simplify things and focus on actions rather than ideas: you need to recognize you're dreaming. To do that:

1. Recognize the fact that you might be dreaming at any point during your wakefulness moments.
2. Get in the habit of being aware and questioning whether you might be dreaming.
3. Introduce salient cues that might aid you reach this "target" more easily (for example, put a bunch of sticky papers in the walls of your room, put some alarms during the day, meditate, improve your prospective memory, surround yourself with dreaming resources, gamify the process, etc).
4. The more you practice, the more automatic your behavior will become, and the less you will have to force yourself to consciously perceive cues and recall this thought of "am I dreaming?".
5. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Consider that here in DreamViews we have loads of long-time lucid dreams that preach very different perspectives to obtain lucidity. What this means is that there are several ways to gain this self-awareness that allows you to become lucid.

As in many things, stick with the fundamentals. This concept of critical self-awareness might be useful, but rather than reading 100 threads on other people's experiences, prioritize creating a system that works for you.

PS: ADA is mindfulness.

Nice question ezzolucid - Thanks Zoth - I really like your breakdown of " awareness' a word so often used and any times at risk of simply becoming inexplainable through its obviouse connection to " experience" . I find it interesting to ponder your explanation of ' critical awareness' verses ' self awareness'
I have been getting a bit of critical awareness popping up in my dreams of recent like ' where am I?' Although it didn't get me lucid I noticed it made me broaden my dream scape horizon - in WL I feel a cirtain amount of critical awareness important but more so the self awareness of what you nicely termed

" the two dimensional mode of self - awareness; acceptance and presence "

because in this state we can be relaxed and alert which I think can lead to a more creative dynamic being - great for living and dreaming! The critical awareness can get a bit dry and intellectual ...- I suppose it's a balance as always !?

Let me just begin by saying that you should never apologize for asking questions, even if I can see why you did it.

QUESTIONS leads to reflection and possible answers. And if you hadn't asked and started this thread, I might not had sorted out my view of the topic myself.
So in a weird way I should thank you for making me think.

Your plan looks fine ezzolucid, now just get started.

Have fun and good luck on your journey.

Peace!