Thread: Perception of Time experiments.

When you say that your dream felt like a year, you mean that youre estimating that the events in the dream took place over a long time, not that you actually as a matter of fact lived In a dream for two years right? I find this topic very interesting

To quote one of my other posts:

Technically speaking, It's not possible.

Here is a direct quote from Stephan LaBerge's book "Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming".

Mind/brain/body relationships during dreaming One of the earliest experiments conducted by my research team tested the traditional notion that the experience of dream time is somehow different from time in the waking world. We approached the problem of dream time by asking subjects to make an eye movement signal in their lucid dreams, estimate a ten-second interval (by counting one thousand and one, one thousand and two, etc. ), and then make another eye movement signal. In all cases, we found time estimates made in lucid dreams were within a few seconds of estimates made in the waking state and likewise quite close to the actual time between signals. From this we have concluded that in lucid dreams, estimated dream time is very nearly equal to clock time; that is, it takes just as long to do something in a dream as it does to actually do it.

You may be wondering, then, how you could have a dream that seems to last for years or lifetimes. I believe this effect is achieved in dreams by the same stage trick that causes the illusion of the passage of time in the movies or theater. If, on screen, stage, or dream, we see someone turning out the light as the clock strikes midnight, and after a few moments of darkness, we see him turning off an alarm as the bright morning sun shines through the window, we’ll accept (pretend, without being aware that we are pretending) that many hours have Passed even though we “know” it was only a few seconds.

Consciousnesses occurs at a fixed rate. Neurons don't fire any faster, just because you really REALLY want them to.

Time is subjective even in physical life. If you ran a little social experiment where a group of people go inside of a amusement park for day and u timed the duration of the stay with a stop watch to say 5 hrs. I guarantee you'll get different answers about how long there stay was in the park some answers will be way off because their letting there feeling dictate how long the time was that passed. Some peoples day go by fast others peoples day go by slow fast years slow years it's all subjective. We just happen to have a universal clock system that everyone agrees on that doesn't mean the time that goes by isnt subjective for the one experiencing time it's self. With in the dream scape will power goes a long way and u have displayed that u could also verbalize your intentions with commands like "increase perception of time" IMHO ofcourse

I completely agree with dream catcher, this quote says nothing about trying to slow down, speed up time, I've heard of time perception changing and changing dream time.

I understand your quote, systems, but I am coming from the same point that dreamcatcher is, more so the feeling of that time passage, than it actually happening. @Metal It seemed like an entire year, with me more so actually living there. I had a dream character friend throughout the entire dream, who has now started to... I don't know, influence real life? Like a second conscience. Not me specifically hearing his ideas, but I automatically in my head ask how he would react, helping me make decisions in real life. It feels a lot less crazy than it sounds.

Last night I had a very interesting experience with this. My alarm goes off every 10 minutes when I hit snooze, and it went off at 11:41 AM (Was sleeping in). I distinctly noticed what time it was, hit the snooze, and went back to sleep nearly instantly. I had an INCREDIBLY detailed and seemingly lengthy dream that felt as if it occurred over a period of about an hour or two. My alarm went off again, it said 11:51, even though I could have sworn it was at least an hour long. Since the brain can create more rather than simply take in information, supposedly time can seem longer. It doesn't matter how long time actually IS, it matters how your brain perceives it.

This is a great example of time perception! namaste

Originally Posted by ThePreserver

Last night I had a very interesting experience with this. My alarm goes off every 10 minutes when I hit snooze, and it went off at 11:41 AM (Was sleeping in). I distinctly noticed what time it was, hit the snooze, and went back to sleep nearly instantly. I had an INCREDIBLY detailed and seemingly lengthy dream that felt as if it occurred over a period of about an hour or two. My alarm went off again, it said 11:51, even though I could have sworn it was at least an hour long. Since the brain can create more rather than simply take in information, supposedly time can seem longer. It doesn't matter how long time actually IS, it matters how your brain perceives it.

I love the idea of being able to make an hour long dream feel like a year. How do you go about learning this though?

A fellow dreamviewer has already done this. Here's what he said.

Well as I continued to experiment, I noticed that I would need to wake up while I was still in the middle of something. After a few days of this, I sat in thought and said "I wonder if I can just enter another realm where time equals x minutes which equals x minutes in my actual waking reality." In response to this pondering, an internal voice said "Why not?". I had no valid answer to this question, so I assumed it was something I could achieve. Sure enough, it was. At the realms of 1 hour in waking minutes = 1 actual waking minute, you are going to need some form of reminder that you are dreaming. You could get away with messing around in the 10 or 30 waking minutes = 1 minute realms, but when you wake up you're probably going to lay there for a while trying to recall your own name, especially if you spend your time in a form other than human. I approached my brother, knowing he was my brother because we look so alike, and asked him what my name was. He looked at me very strangely for a while then said "Alex, what the fuck happened?" and I told him about the dream and the experiment. He was surprised to say the least, but I believe I gave him some ideas of his own, as he's just exiting high school, and has been seeking time to practice his lucid dreaming.

This is how I got into that realm:

I had just noticed I was dreaming inside of an abandoned science building. I was in some type of lab with some older computers and other things. I remembered my objective and said out loud, "Open a portal to the realm where time equals 1 waking reality year per actual waking reality minute." On the wall in front of me, a portal opened and I jumped in. At this point there was nothing but darkness, but not the darkness of a collapsed dream, because I could feel myself falling, but I was not falling like one would fall with gravity involved, going faster faster. I was falling at a set rate that felt really floaty. I could not see anything, but still knew I was moving. Then I started to head to my left and then down again, and then there was an area that was dimly lit, and I could see a door. Above the door was a sign that read 1 year to 1 minute, and I stopped falling and had the option of moving. I floated up to the door, opened it and went inside. When I went inside, the area was the exact same as the lab I had been in. This almost fooled me, because I asked for a change of realm, not a change of scenery. I decided to have the dream drop me off in a random location within this realm, and I just started to explore.

So... Yeah.

I love it. I started doing this naturally, I would set my alarm clock 5 minutes early, and then hit the snooze. I would then re-enter my dream, and it would seem like I had hours before my alarm went off, 5 minutes later in "real" time. Imagine if you could spend years inside this dream? One could live for 1000's of years.

Is this something that the more we practice the better we get?
I want to try to live a decade in my dream.

It has pretty much been proven by LaBerge that dream time is almost exactly the same as real time.

Yet people still bring up this topic. Astounding.

I may be wrong, but it seems to me that LaBerge's original beliefs on time dialation were later modified. Other researchers have had contradictory results, and I think LaBerge himself now believes that time dialation is possible. I will have to check my sources and get back to this, unless anyone out there knows what I'm talking about.

Originally Posted by Kamil

It has pretty much been proven by LaBerge that dream time is almost exactly the same as real time.

Yet people still bring up this topic. Astounding.

Those experiments were done with lucid dreams. Also, if it FEELS like hours and hours, who's to say that it isn't? Doesn't matter how long it actually lasts, rather, how long it feels. The PERCEPTION of time in dreams is the topic, not the REALITY of time in dreams

Exactly!

Originally Posted by ThePreserver

Those experiments were done with lucid dreams. Also, if it FEELS like hours and hours, who's to say that it isn't? Doesn't matter how long it actually lasts, rather, how long it feels. The PERCEPTION of time in dreams is the topic, not the REALITY of time in dreams

Originally Posted by dreamcatcher81

Time is subjective even in physical life. If you ran a little social experiment where a group of people go inside of a amusement park for day and u timed the duration of the stay with a stop watch to say 5 hrs. I guarantee you'll get different answers about how long there stay was in the park some answers will be way off because their letting there feeling dictate how long the time was that passed. Some peoples day go by fast others peoples day go by slow fast years slow years it's all subjective. We just happen to have a universal clock system that everyone agrees on that doesn't mean the time that goes by isnt subjective for the one experiencing time it's self. With in the dream scape will power goes a long way and u have displayed that u could also verbalize your intentions with commands like "increase perception of time" IMHO ofcourse

People aren't terribly accurate at estimating time relative to each other, but that doesn't mean they're actually experienceing the time as more or less, it seems like more or less in hindsight.

True "time" is passing at a continuous rate for everyone though psychologists debate whether time even exists at all.

Time dilation is pretty much impossible to prove wrong given that if one is unsuccessful, that could be attributed to simply being unskilled rather than the phenomenon not being real. Because of this, you have to look the specific study to determine whether you want to use it as a basis for your beliefs.

I have to admit it's been a while since I've read EWLD, and I'm not familiar with any follow-up studies or contrary results, so this one study is all I know concerning the topic of time dilation. However, looking at the specific case, at best what I can take from it is that average dream time seems to emulate time in real life. In the study, I don't believe an attempt was made to actually augment the dream time before doing the eye movement, and it was not done with anyone who claims to actually be able to dilate time.

Just because something seems to contradict the science of the time doesn't mean it is flat out wrong. Given the amount of anecdotal evidence, I would not simply dismiss it because of that. I would just be skeptical but keep the idea in mind to try to experience myself.

I remember reading a thread a while back about someone who took themselves to a blank world with nothing but a clock in it and sat for hours to try and make lucids last longer. I think he said he could go in for months or years. I can't remember it too well though, wish I could find it now. :/

awesome :-)

Originally Posted by Stubert

I remember reading a thread a while back about someone who took themselves to a blank world with nothing but a clock in it and sat for hours to try and make lucids last longer. I think he said he could go in for months or years. I can't remember it too well though, wish I could find it now. :/

This is absolutely fascinating, and a little frightening as well if it is possible. I remember reading about a member on this forum named Hukif, who experimented with time manipulation as well. It would be great if he would give his thoughts on this, but I remember reading something about him counting very very slowly to manipulate the sense of time, but waking up with headaches. I think this is going to motivate me to have more ld's.

I'm afraid to go to sleep tonight actually. I really don't want to have a 100 year non ld dream or something like that..I know different discussion but got me thinking about it..

What if you had a lucid dream that seemed like a lifetime(literally) and because you were lucid, you fulfilled all your desires and fantasies. When you awaken from that dream would real life even be worth living anymore?

Originally Posted by SergSG

What if you had a lucid dream that seemed like a lifetime(literally) and because you were lucid, you fulfilled all your desires and fantasies. When you awaken from that dream would real life even be worth living anymore?

At that point, reality wouldn't be enough to satisfy us. (Thats from inception). So under no circumstances should you have a lucid dream for that long, if it is even possible.