As lucidity goes up, motor control goes down!

[Woop]

I hope someone can offer me some pointers: So, I'm quite a newbie when it comes to lucid dreaming. I have been able to become fully conscious several times these past six months, mostly during afternoon naps and in every case by consciously falling asleep (wake induced lucid dreams is the term, right?). By fully conscious I mean that I've remembered my intention to realize that I'm dreaming, remembered my preferential state testing (counting my fingers), and firmly resolved that all my perceptions are intrinsic in nature. So far so good. The down side to this (since I'm extremely fascinated by both the idea and the experience of lucid dreaming) is that the moment I gain lucidity, I'm left with a severly impaired motor control. Sometimes I can move with some serious mental effort (literally dragging my legs behind me) and sometimes I can't consciously move at all! I haven't read about this problem anywhere. I'm wondering if the problem is a lack of consciousness or lack of understanding on how to control my dreams. I've even speculated about the possibility that it is some general mental restriction in me that makes my mind mess with me! Any thoughts on this?

[Deere]

I'm not an expert, but as noone else has posted yet.... As far as I know, it is usually not a problem to move in a lucid dream. And since you state that you really did feel aware of the dream, I think that you could be right about the mental block. Do you have a certain fear of being paralized? Maybe it's a well hidden nightmare you are experiencing. Another thing that might be interesting to know is that when you WILD (consciously falling asleep) your body will get paralized. When your close to dreaming you'll probably get HI(hypnogogic images -- hope I spelled it right ^^), which is basically the starting of getting into a dream. It could be that you're still in the state of transition from awake to asleep. Hopefully someone with some more expertise can give you a better expanation.

[Badger]

i got an idea, do theese 2 things, tell yourself you are a god of this place and command everything also either try and percieve yourself not having a physical body, that you are just a prescence (that way u wont have a body to drag around), u may also want to try and percieve urself as an animal such as a bird or a fish etc

[KuRoSaKi]

Okay did a little researching found that many people have this problem where they cannot move and cannot talk etc. Some said it might be ghosts or something lol noobs anways i have had this problem i was laying in my bed and my friends came in (mind you i was dreaming) and they were talking to me and told me to grab this bag so i went to grab it and could not move. I tried very hard but it took alot out of me just to move my head on my pillow. I think this comes from being close to waking. Without the dream fade. Or being aware you are dreaming (or not) but not having enough control in the dream to do antying. I have only had 3 dreams top like this and they do not occur often. So i would just try to make your self as lucid as possible and fly or do something that requires you not to move i.e. teleporting or something or command yourself to move. Other than that i am also new to not being able to move in dreams.

[Woop]

Thanks for your thoughts. I think now the answer might be related to sleep paralyzis and being in a transitional phase where my consciousness isn't as deeply rooted as I've previously thought. I know that I'm dreaming for a fact, but since I've only managed to WILD I really don't know anything about the different levels of lucidity (I guess you can talk about higher and lower levels of lucidity, right?). But then, if it's easier to get yourself in more of a transitional phase (with less dream control) when attempting WILDs, how can I improve my lucidity while inducing LDs this way? (Maybe you're right, Badger, that simply (or not so simply) accepting my decisive role in my dream and just take on any form I want it or me to have might do the trick. But for doing this I think I still have to overcome the first problem of my low lucidity level, inducing the LD correctly and get myself in a stable dream state (on a sheer physiological level).)

[KuRoSaKi]

Are you talking of how you can achieve a DILD or dream iniatiated lucid dream if so there is a tutorial on this in the turorial forums let me get the link. http://www.dreamviews.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12067 hope that helps if not let me know.

[bzteam]

Loss of motor skills sounds like you are thinking with your body instead of your mind. Try thinking about the end and not the means to get there. That is, if you want to raise your hand, just think of your hand as being raised -- not lifting it up.

[NullAshton]

Try just standing there a while, focusing on getting 'rooted' into the dream. That seems to help, especially when you get back into a dream, and everything looks like it's going to evaporate soon.

[dream-scape]

Some say this is just part of learning to lucid dream and goes away fairly quickly. This has not been the case for me, and I have been actively lucid dreaming for 4 or 5 years now. So consider that it may either not go away for a long time or possibly not ever go away. To me it almost seems like you are dying quite a horrid death. Quick loss of motor skills, extreme difficult trying to move, difficult breathing, feelings of suffocation, eyes growing heavy, (death), awaken. So why do I still actively try to lucid dream if all I get is dying over and over again? because about 1 out 10 times, this does not happen, and so I continue doing it for that chance. I don't know exactly what causes it, but my current speculation is that it either is that some people are sensitive or prone to the mind becoming aware of the body's physical paralysis, which occurs during REM sleep (and when doing a WILD), that then manifests itself in the dream; or that one may not be in a deep enough sleep; or a combination.