Developing An Ongoing Storyline

Do you think it is possible to have an ongoing dream? Every night you sort of "load" where you left off. I'm really really interested in this idea. It's the reason I became interested in LDing. To live out the kind of adventure that is only attainable in video games or movies or books. I don't want to live inside Harry potter though, I want to try to sort of create one as I go along, with constant antagonists, allies, and maybe a little romance? no? I dunno. does anybody have any experience/information or thoughts as to how incredibly awesome that would be? I could be content with flying around and meditating in impossibly beautiful landscapes, etc. but... This would be just so great.

Great idea!
It would be very hard. It requires good dream control (for LDs) or good dream incubation skills (for non-LDs).

I think that I sorta learned to have ongoing dreams (LDs). When I was little I had dreams which continued on and on. but those were dreams I could never change.
Well,several years ago I've been playing video games a lot and I also got stuck a lot. At night I usually went to the place in the game and I tried to figure out what I could do and usually it worked in the game itself (I tested the day after).
Well, with this I started to "load" settings and the actual "problem" and it taught me how to resume dreams.
At first I've been really "saving" a dream like a game in some engine. I just imagined that I saved the dream in some file. when I wanted to continue I induced myself a lucid dream starting with this saving sequence.

Now I just induce my LD with last scene of the dream I want and it works.

I have plenty of ongoing dreams, but usually its just the setting, i.e. the dream landscapes, and some DCs, that stay the same, so its like episodes. So usually these (very vivid) dreams resolve themselves (occassionally with complex twist-in-the-tail endings - Oh the wonders of the subconscious!!!) or, when lucid, I resolve them myself - so the epsiode ends there. However I also have epics that seem to last a lifetime even if just occuring over one night. Not sure if its 10 REM cycles blurring into each other or one long one. (I would love to check out the length of my REM cycles - because I'm sure I don't follow the 'normal' pattern, and in fact wonder if lucid dreamers generally also do not?)

STsung: just read your dream journal - WOW!!! :bowdown: Have you tried selling the movie rights? Very inspiring - I will now try to create sequels to some of my best epics next time I'm lucid! Can you say any more about how you used to 'save' your dreams? How lucid were you when you did this? How often do you lucidly restart a story - or do you just find yourself in them? Do you WILD or DILD or what? I love the whole thing about being different characters - I think I've only ever been me, although I have shapeshifted, been a woman etc, it has always been me (of course!) - but then I never asked myself my name!!! The way you describe it almost sounds like split personalities?

slimslowslider: I never tried to sell the movie rights^_~ hehe. even though it would be nice to see something like this while being completely awake.

About those WILDs and DILDs. I've read the "definition" somewhere here on the forums but I can't really say that my method is one or the other. well for me there two possibilities of becoming lucid (if I won't count in "daydreaming"). There is one method I use if I really want to become lucid - I call these dreams induced LDs. (described a bit over there => http://www.dreamviews.com/forum/index.php?...p;#entry390435)

well the method consists of creating the setting before falling asleep. then getting myself into that setting and then doig something which makes me lucid (check the post...I can try to explain more if you don't get that).

this method is not DILD but neither WILD I would say. The WILD seems to be more similar to what I call daydreaming. (for me) It's the possiblity of dreaming while being awake (but I get to this state via meditation and I'm always awake - takes about 50 minutes to get to the "dreamy" state. your body while at this state is aware of what is going outside of it, it just can't move or react to anything).

the other method I use can be considered as DILD I guess. I just wake up in my dreams, I check my body and if I find a scar on my belly I wake up in the dream. then I do what I have to do to become lucid (=> the other post...somewhere on the forums).

and BTW being all the characters in a dream and taking care of everything is somewhat tiring. when I wake up after something like this. I don't usually have the feeling that I slept. I need to "save" these kind of dreams. and that means no LDs after that night. (I need one night to save the whole epic)....
=it's more like...ex. I'm awake for two days without sleep. But I'm not tired or anything. My body is working fine. But my brain becomes overloaded with data (memories). To free the memory of this (which makes me quite tired because it's difficult to search in that for something) I have to sleep for about 6 hours and more. and this is exactly the same state when I wake up after such epic LD.

about that saving. well, can't really describe it more. I freeze the time in the dream so nothing moves, nothing happens. then I quit the dream (I change the settings. if I can't do that I just summon someone to come to make me fall unconscious.) Falling unconscious in a body in a dream makes me fall asleep. when I want to continue the dream I create the freeze scene. when I wake up into a lucid I'm there and it continues on.

but sometimes I don't even need to induce it. sometimes it just comes and continues on its own.

STsung - thanks for your detailed reply - curiouser and curiouser! The saving/freezing reminds me somehow of when I've got a particularly annoying song on my brain, which can sometimes be for a week or more. I wake up and its still there even though I haven't been dreaming it - as if it's different parts of conscious mind are doing some parallel processing... Anyway to get rid of it I slow it down until the last note stretches to infinity, decreases in volume and then fades out. This usually works. Another method is to replace the song with an equally anoying but different one!

I'll definitely try 'saving' in my next lucid dream - didn't have any last night :(
It would make a great Lucid Task of the Month IMO... will mention it when I eventually get into the club!

The seppuku thing is also fascinating. I wonder what is going on there? Does it hurt?! Is the timing important? I.e. do you have to attain a certain level of vividness before doing it? And if you have already fallen asleep into your created dream scene and are aware that you are dreaming (and must commit seppuku to attain lucidity) are you not lucid already? Or is it a question of levels of lucidity? For me once I know, or even suspect I'm dreaming, I go lucid, and the only time I need to up the level is when I feel I'm waking and don't want to; in which case I shout , spin, 'pluck dreamstuff' or whatever. I guess I'll just have to try it as you describe, but I'm not sure my WILDing is good enough anymore, i.e. I can visualise well enough, but my mind is so chaotic at the moment I get distracted... I suppose the shock of plunging a tanto into your belly might well raise the level of awareness--adrenalin?--but its interesting that this doesn't wake you! I can think of a quite a few WILD attempts where I'm almost there--i.e. the vividness of the scene goes up suddenly several orders of magnitude--then I lose it (I have to be very relaxed--usually on holiday--for WILD to work) A few years ago (when I was unemployed - but relaxed!) I used to WILD/AP alot and sometimes played with the point of lucidity going back and forth across the 'threshold'; usually with a tantric thingle/aum type visualisation, but also a 'sleeping with eyes open' method. This is why I ask about timing - perhaps if I did something shocking like harakiri, that might in reality make me fall uncoscious (is this the defining point?) at the threshold point I would slip into a LD?

BTW regarding movies - why not go for it? Your dream journal isn't far off being a film script!!! I'm trying to do one at the moment which blends several of my epic dreams - a kind of supernatural horror themed hero's story.

Also can sympathise with the problems you mention (escape etc) and I can imagine having ?false memories? with dreams as involved and vivid as yours seem to be - but does it matter? Just don't mention it to a psychiatrist!! And regarding mental tiredness - yes my epics have also been exhausting, but exhilarating. After what seems like a whole night of LDing there really is a load of processing to do! I would try to write it all down, but even the abridged versions could take hours to describe. So I pulled back from it a couple of years ago - however I now feel like delving in again, especially with a film script on the go.

Sorry about all the questions/length of post!!!

sweet dreams

a bit offtopic:
well about that seppuku. there is something more to it why it is so important for me. but ok..I will tell you this: there is one "epic" dream missing in my first post in my journal. it's yoshitaka shiratori's real life. (I suppose that it is considered LD..but I had no control over that dream) yoshitaka was no hacker, he was a yakuza member and was gathering information for yakuza. he fell in love with a girl of an opposing clan and was supposed to die for that. he could save his honor by commiting seppuku. he did it. it was at night at some kind of zen park (? a garden with stones...).
well, the first time I saw this it made me really cry for my life. I was the person holding tantou in my hands it was ME who wanted to finish his life. I didn't want to do that but I saw my hands stop shaking, taking a better hold of the weapon and then plunging it to my belly. I wanted to wake up as soon as possible but I couldn't. when I finished my "kiri" I just fell in front and I was waiting for death. those where the most scariest two minutes of my life. after this darkness came...I knew I was dead...but suddenly I woke up. I woke up in the same place, still lying in a warm blood. I got up not feeling any pain, seeing just the darkness around me. I looked at my belly and found a long scar instead of (don't imagine). it was confusing, it was scary but it felt also good. I felt kind of reborn that day.
I was still in my dream ...but not the very same dream. this time it was me who was in control. it was me the real conscious me who decided to look down on the scar. that night I just took my swords and went back to yoshitaka's/my house. I lay there thinking about what i could do with this life and eventually I LDed the whole life again but in the contemporary world (hacker version). (it was a bit cheerer version of that dream)

for me these two dreams mean a lot. from this day on I always get up in a dream with the scar on my belly. it's something which makes my mind really sharp and awake (that scar is something which is a part of me, even though I don't have that scar in real life). the first shock I got when I plunged that blade in my body really made me think about my whole life, about everything I've done in my life and what I haven't done yet. it made me think about people I love about yoshitaka's girlfriend and about life in general. everything happened so fast, it happened in about two minutes..but it was something which made me ...how to say that..."aware of everything".

the memory of this make me always aware and it makes me take control over my body. (I was so frightened when I saw what my hands were doing...you just can't imagine what I went through.) I wouldn't recommend this to anyone..but it happened to me and why not use it now when it is over?

EDIT: it does not wake me up. I couldn't wake me up the first time even I was really horrified. but now I know it's a dream and that it is my way to become 100% lucid. but it's true that the 100% lucidness comes after the blackout. I always have a blank area for a while in that already lucid dream. what happens at that moment? I don't know that...

Still I become lucid often in dreams and I don't need to induce them...I'm fine when it comes and I don't really have a full control. it's more relaxing and gives you more freedom to think about what you are doing. also it means that you can fail in the dream..unlike in dreams you fully control yourself. in not fully controlled dreams there are often surprises and you can challenge yourself. both has it's pluses and minuses...

Very possible. You can make sequels, prequels or even relive the same dream making differnt choices and leading it down another path.

If you want an epic dream full out LDs are actually not the way to go. Seeded Semi-lucids will give better results. (New stuff i've been playing around with, i'll be making a topic bout it sooner or later)

Anyways, this topic should help you in your story enjoyment.

Thanks TSung -
we may well be wandering off topic... so just to say I see now that the seppuku is much more for you than just a shock! So presumably it wouldn't have quite the same effect if someone else were to try it expecting the same results.

Without reading the other posts which I am going to do now, I just want to say that I really look forward to creating an ongoing storyline in my dreams, I have to wait till my Lucid dreams are longer however, the longest one was like 10 minutes so far, being a writer it would be great to live out what I have written in my book with the characters I've created, or live out video game scenarios like Shadow of the Colossus.

The most important part to me would be static DCs. Because I believe that the relationships and bonds that are formed during times of trial are very very powerful. Plus I need friends who I can depend on to kick some ass when the time comes. Same goes for a villain.