Thread: Dream Yoga Basic Skills: Lesson #1

Version 1: Listening to a Noisy World.
Level 1) Sit in a some what quiet setting, but not a place free of sound. At first just get comfortable and quickly with no special effort determine if any sounds are already being consciously perceived. Sit and just notice which noises you where aware of before paying attention. Now, with your eyes closed, casually explore each noise starting with the most obvious ones. You may first have been aware of the sounds of children playing, and traffic from a near by street. Listen to any of the obvious ones for a moment. Try to visualize in a casual and light manner, what each sound is. Now, your only goal in level 1 is to move around your environment not physically, but with your sense of hearing. You should acknowledge the sounds that were already obvious, then move your awareness of sound around. Try to pick up on the sounds you had not been fully aware of. They will be sounds that are not extremely quiet, and will be easy enough to find. You are simply trying to become aware of the fact that while the sounds were there the whole time, you did not consciously perceive them until you focused.
In an average attempt at this meditation I can often identify about 8 sounds my brain was choosing to ignore. Make a list in your head that tells you which noises you had clearly been aware of and any new sounds that you begin to perceive while meditating. You will find that at most times the world is full of sound we are choosing not to hear.
Level 2) Repeat the level 1 meditation, but this time you will attempt to maintain aware focus on as many sounds as you can. Take the most obvious noises and pay attention to them. Think to yourself about what you are hearing, then while continuing to listen add the next most obvious noise. You may experience something strange here. This level is actually much harder! At about the time you are aware and focusing on 4 or 5 noises, and when you are scanning for more noises, your brain will attempt to ignore the first most obvious noises. Do not get frustrated; just watch the process with interest. Do not stress or become intense. This level may be practiced for years. You are learning to force your brain to acknowledge multiple sensory inputs. Try to get to where you can stay relaxed and keep a full awareness of 8 sounds at one time.
Level 3) To complete this version get to a point where you can perform daily actions while maintaining the same level of awareness as level 2. Here is an easy example. While a person is walking, they will almost always blank out the sound of their own feet hitting the ground. In level 3 do something like go for a walk. While your eyes are open and your feet are moving start to go through the process involved in #2 above. You will be surprised on how foreign trying to hear your own foot steps is if you do not allow your focus to be taken off other things. It is not enough to be able to walk and hear your foot falls. You need to be able to walk casually, hear all the standard noises, and maintain awareness of the sounds of your own feet. If you get good at that add in one more item. Listen to all the normal noises, while being aware of the sound of your feet and the sound of the air moving past your ears, or some other subtle noise your body would normally ignore.

Version 2: Feel an Intense World. I should be able to go over this one quickly as the concepts are the same as above. However this version will deal with the sense of touch.
Level 1) Sit in a quiet setting as above. Now notice the physical sensations that come to you as obvious and that you already were aware of before starting. The normal touch related sensations we are aware of are itching, pain, hunger, cold and those impulses that warn us that we should change our environment. List in your mind all of the most obvious sensations, such as back pain, dry mouth, itchy nose. Now close your eyes, and start noticing the subtle sensations you had not been fully aware of. Notice obvious things at first, like the pressure of your bottom sitting on a surface, then move to subtle things such as being aware that your left sock has slipped down, or that one shoe is tighter than the other. List in your head at least 12 things you were feeling and had not been fully aware of.
Level 2) Repeat level 1, but try to maintain full awareness of as many of these touch related sensations as you can at one time.
Level 3) Repeat level 2, but this time with your eyes open and other distractions to make it more challenging.
Level 4) Lay in bed before sleep and start this meditation. If you fall asleep before you are done that is fine. Start by trying to feel your left foot, then your right foot, and in order, your knees, you hips, your shoulders, elbows hands. Do not move them about in order to feel them. You should be able to feel the bedding or gravity or dry skin at each place. You never really focus on being aware of what each small part of the body is feeling.
Level 5) Repeat level 4 however, you should now work on being able to move through every portion of your body, and perceive the sensations from every small joint and part all the way down to you little toes. Work your way through your entire body starting with the toes. Get to where you can become fully aware of any physical sensory impulse from even the most minor contact with part of your body.

Version 3: Mixing it up.
Level 1) Place a hard candy in your mouth. It should have a strong taste like peppermint or lemon drops. Your goal in this meditation is to maintain awareness of the candy and its flavor. Sit comfortably and close your eyes. You may now day dream or listen, but maintain focus on the flavor of the candy being in your mouth. You are allowed to play with the candy or worry it using your tongue. What you are not allowed to do, is space off paying attention to the candy being in your mouth. Do this long enough to realize why this is difficult. After your taste buds are covered with the flavor for long enough, your brain will try to erase the taste. It always happens during normal life. You basically lose track of the fact that your mouth is covered with a strong flavor.
Level 2) Repeat level 1, but this time you should take the finger nail of your right thumb and gently rub it across the tip of your right middle finger. You will now attempt to maintain full awareness of both sensations. Your body will attempt to erase the subtle feeling caused by your thumb. Stay fully aware of both sensations.
Level 3) Repeat level 2, but this time you will have to be walking while attempting this. Keep fully aware of the candy in your mouth, and the sensation caused by your thumb nail. Here is the big challenge! Do not bite the candy! At levels 1 and 2 you can chew the candy, but to finish level 3 you must maintain full awareness of the candy, the feeling from the thumb nail, while walking, and you must be so aware, that you do not accidentally allow yourself to bite down on the candy. You have succeeded when you can stay aware of both things, while walking, until the candy has completely dissolved.

The above material is going to provide students with plenty to focus on. I will be releasing new lessons fairly often, but I want everyone to spend time practicing. Start your notebooks now, and feel free to post questions in them.

Homework for Basic Skills: Lesson #1

Pick one of the three versions listed above. Work on it each day for a few days, then report any observations in your notebook. Tile your post “Basic Skills: Lesson #1
You can post about all three versions if desired, but only one is required. You do not need to write a book report, but write enough for me to have an idea of what you experienced.
You should also come up with a version of this form of meditation on your own, and suggest it in your post.

I am locking this thread for now. Please start notebooks and use them to report or ask questions. Thanks!

Hi again. So, every body has now had 12 days to practice. These meditation skills are ground work for training your brain for lucid dreaming, and they will also enhance your awareness in daily life. I would come back to them many times a year for many decades. I try not to hand out true knowledge, but instead to give you the ability to discover amazing things on your own. I will leave lessons unexplained at first, so I can see which students "discover" what I was trying to teach.

So now for some "Gold Stars" or "Thumbs Up" to some of the students. They have discovered or wondered in print about why I may have taught these meditations. After a lesson has been posted over a week, if a student has 'discovered' something, I will acknowledge them and the whole class gets the bonus of me explaining how to use the discovery. Sorry, I just can not hand out knowledge up front, but I want the serious students to ge the thrill of figuring out what I am teaching you something for.

Originally Posted by hermine_hesse

At this point, I would start over at my toes. I extended up a few inches past my ankle again and just held my awareness here. I noticed two strange sensations. First, after a while my feet began to feel heavy, a bit like a force pressing down on them and a bit like being pulled towards to the ground. At first I thought that this may have been a symptom of falling asleep, but upon further reflection I think I may have been actually perceiving gravity. This makes sense to me since when we are in a lighter or heavier gravity we perceive this change. Normal everyday gravity must be something we can perceive, but instead just filter out since it is constant. The second sensation I perceived was a tingling through my feet and ankles.

Great job hermine_hesse! Gravity! You were the first person to mention this, and you make a great observation. I will now share (below) how you can use this discovery in your LDs. Every one give her a hand!

Originally Posted by Dark_Merlin

I've also been learning to balance between the major and minor sensations that I can pick up on, and trying to also mentally make note of what is making the noise and where it's coming from, becoming more involved in it. The level of focus this has is great - and I've found when I'm focussing on enough sensations at once my inner monologue stops - something which is normally quite hard for me, which has also made meditation difficult. I think this is because I'm paying attention to so many things that it replaces the spare attention that would normally go to distracted thoughts

Very good Dark_Merlin! Normally when I hear the average meditation explained it involves making the mind silent. It is one of the hardest meditations of all and they do not explain how it can be done. If the mind is opened to so much awareness of the sensations and sound of being alive it can stop the inner monologue, because you are using your brain more like a detecting device than a thought generating machine.

Originally Posted by Sanjayb

5 layers was very very hard and I could not hold it for too long before realising that I had lost awareness of one layer of the song (usually after a period of about 1-1.5 mins). One thing I noticed towards the end of my practice was that mental disposition affected the number of layers I could achieve awareness of. I'm not sure I can explain this well in words, but i'll try.. it seemed to me that 'reaching out' for awareness of an additional layer caused me to lose awareness of a previous layer; so the best strategy would be to let the awareness 'come to you'. Only when I followed that maxim was I able to hold awareness of 5 layers.

Thank you Sanjayb! I think you explained that as well as I can. In meditation the way you handle your awareness will effect the results. In many advanced meditations a very subtle change in the way attention is used will be the key to success. I can not 'explain' to you the way you adjust subtle awareness, but in this case Sanjayb found out what shift to make through exploring. The brain is amazing and if you learn to adjust the way it is going about its tasks, you open amazing doors.

Originally Posted by Beefer

So in a certain point I decided to try and focus on as many objects as I can in the dream. For a short period of time I was able to notice so many specific details such as wooden chips on a tree trunk. Even though I woke up a little after that because of a friend in the dream which pulled my legs while I was flying (just kidding I can not really blame him I guess I just lost stabilization and woke up). Anyways I am interested to know if you have ever tried focusing as many objects as you can in a lucid dream? or if you can do it and keep yourself stabilized.

Very nice Beefer! You actually got to try some thing from the class out in an LD! You have also related the act of focusing on multiple objects and stablizing. I will now share how to use this with the class (below). Every body thank Beefer.

Originally Posted by Spyguy

One last thing I would like to note is how awareness seems to make the world much more vivid. In the same way as a dream becomes much more vivid after attaining lucidity and stabilizing, the world suddenly becomes a lot more realistic when realizing that I should be more aware. Even without lucidity, that would be enough reason to practice this on itself! Is it normal for that to happen when training this, or is it just me?

Powerful observation Spyguy! These skills do increase the vividness of everything. You have discovered one of the core things I wanted everyone to find. If you use and develop these skill you "wake up" to your real life. I will now reveal to the class (below) how the skills are used to cause lucidity. A very good observation.


So the following students get a Gold Star (thumbs up) on their homework and will receive 15 hall points as a bonus! hermine_hesse / Dark_Merlin / Sanjayb / Beefer / Spyguy

OK we are finally here. How do these meditations help me with LDs?

I will not reveal every apsect of what they are used for, but the examples I give should lead you to discover other uses for them. I also need you to get very good at these as they are required skills for learning some of the more advanced skills. Keep practicing all of these for the rest of your lives.

1) Version 1 builds a needed skill. It is an exercise. Use it to train your brain into being able to maintain focus on at least 4 items and even more eventually. Here is why. In order to maintain a long and vivid LD you will need to flawlessly maintain focus on a minimum of 3 items. Those three items are a nice solid dream body, the thought "this is a dream", and finally the main object you look at in the dream. Many of you have now found that three items are easy but trying to add a 4th is hard, and adding a 5th is bewildering. It is much harder to think or focus in a dream. Unless you train your brain to be able to hold 5 items in awareness while awake, you will have a horrible time trying to maintain 3 in a dream. That equals loosing stability. Also, what if you want to add a forth item, like remebering a dream goal? So, work on version 1 and you will end up being able to maintain long dreams in which you have a good solid body, and remember your goals. It makes sense now? Sorry I did not just tell you up front, but I explained why above.

2) Version 2 teaches you the skill needed to form and maintain a vividly clear dream body. If in waking life you are barely aware of your body, what chance do you have of staying fully aware of it in a dream? Now, when you get very good at feeling every inch of your body you will have a template to use when visualizing in order to form a body. Then while dreaming and after having formed the body you can stablize your legs and arms without looking at them.

3) Gravity RC. Version 2 will teach you to be aware to gravity. It is always acting on you but it is erased most of the time. If you have gotten good at feeling the effect of gravity on every part of your body, you will be likely to notice if it feels wrong. Use version 2 when you do your normal RC. Stop and feel gravity, ask if it feels right, later attempt to float like in zero G. Gravity does not feel right in a dream! The brain has a hard time recreating the exact pressure over your whole body that gravity causes. If you can feel gravity and add it into your RC it works great. Imagine you are walking in a dream, but a slight quicksand feeling is present. If you are good at version 2, you will feel that gravity is all screwy prompting a full RC.

4) Dream Sex Version 3 teaches you to be able to hold awareness on multiple items while in motion. You will need this skill to be able to stay lucid when exciting or crazy things happen in a dream. The hard candy represents a very subtle item and equals holding the thought "I am dreaming" in focus while active things are happening. Biting down on the candy represents you loosing enough focus that you would have lost lucidity. It is so hard not to bite the candy. You will be able to use the brain training to hold the thought even when engaged in dream sex or other distracting events. You have all been told that giving in to dream sex will end your LD? Well not if you master Version 3~


Ok, those are the big "secrets" I am willing to just hand you, as far as lesson one. Explore these for many decades. The skills will also be needed to learn more advanced Dream Yoga.


********************************This thread is now open to Q & A !!! ************************************************

Everyone, even those with no notebook may now use this thread for comment or question!

Refering to Version 2

Originally Posted by hermine_hesse

.....I had actually just begun to discover this a few days before you posted it. I was focusing on feeling my body from the toes up as before right before sleep. My girlfriend was in bed next to me and I could sense part of her leg touching mine. I must have fell asleep almost immediately, because I began to be aware of her body too. Not in the sense that she was next to me, but actually experiencing her toes, legs, ect., at the same time as experiencing my own - like she had suddenly become my Siamese twin. I realized that I was entering sleep, and that after only a few sessions of learning how to map my body, I could now not only continue to map my body without any sensory input, but could also extend that feeling beyond what I normally experience. This skill could certainly be useful in a LD in forming and maintaining a dream body, although that is not something I have ever found to be a challenge. I imagine this could also be used in WILDing. The few times I've had a successful WILD, I would let my body fall away, float in a void, then form the dream around me. Instead of this, I could now simply maintain the feeling of a solid body and just step right into a dream. Also, if I can already create a feeling without any sensory input, this skill could be used to create a different dream body. For instance, I have always wanted to add fully functional fairy wings to my dream body.

As for the gravity, I've seen you mention before changing your direction of gravity in a LD to do things like climb walls or walk on the ceiling. I couldn't wrap my brain around how to accomplish this before, but now I get it!

It may be a few weeks before my LDs return, but I can't wait to try out these new skills!

Wonderful! You are at the head of the class! You made a powerful connection and predicted where I was going with this. I reposted the second paragraph of this in the actual lesson. Not only do I want you to get recognition for such a huge leap in understanding, but I told the class I would wait until students stumbled on the meaning of why you should learn this. Re-posting this will benifit the whole group.
You are absolutely correct! This is in fact how I do my advanced body transformation. If you read some of my WILD journal entries, I talk about actually experiencing what wings, or hooves, or what ever feel like. It is an extension of this method, but you found it through your own exploration! Now, isn't that more exciting than if I had just handed it to you? Great job!

As far as WILD goes you are almost correct. You should still let the true physical sensations fade away, so you disconnect from the waking world, but as soon as I find myself being all floaty, then I quickly use the body template idea and reform a dream body long before REM hits. Then I am ready to go. You can actually do LD type body transformation in nREM and I think you should. The result can be great fun. You may not get anything but blurry dark visuals that early in the WILD attempt, but it gives you something to do, is fun, and you can be fully transformed when the real LD begins.

You have also actually figured out how I do such amazing gravity manipulations. That is some very advanced stuff and it will be covered in a 'select topic' after awhile. But, for now, yes, Version 2 is required to do the advanced gravity tricks. I am very proud of you, in one post you uncovered two of my 'secrets' and came more or less within inches of how I use version 2 in WILD attempts. That is another Gold Star for hermine_hesse! So, you will get another 15 hall points.

Wow I would never have been able to make some of those connections from class exercise to LD-ing! Kudos to hermine_hesse too.

Here is a very nice write up made by Beefer in his journal. He is really working at this, and making great progress~ Another 'Gold Star' for Beefer!!!

'Gold Stars' now earn 30 hall points!

Originally Posted by Beefer

I haven't read lesson 2 yet even though I saw it was out , but before I will read it I feel like sharing my experience from my last meditation. Since all day long I tried to study for my big test without much luck thanks to my little siblings and their friends who shouted, cried and whined all day long (I love them very much ,but can't they have a little respect to their elder brother especially when he tries to study!?) I have decided to go to my balcony and meditate. I sat down at my usual place ,near the glass wall (you can also refer to it as a window ,but you can't really see anything through it so I refer to it as a wall ),closed my eyes and started to meditate.

I mixed version 1 and 2 like I really like to do and in other words I tried to listen to the world around me and maintain the feeling of my body. I heard the sound of a sprinkler in my yard, a dog barking, far away cars, cars in my street and a loud voice which was of a party I think (or was it just my mind fooling me? ). I tried to feel my body in the same way I could hear the sounds around me ,but I couldn't for some reason. I could sense my body ,but it wasn't in the same way! I tried to open my eyes since I read that some people meditate with open eyes ,but it still didn't help.

Now I suddenly realized that I gave my sight too much attention. "So then ignore it" I thought to myself. I tried to ignore my sight and relieve my body (which I figured by now that was really tense!). Suddenly, the world I saw through my eyes became blurry , just like the things I usually notice that I ignore . Only maybe one spot on the ground of my balcony was clear. My back started to fall until I leaned against the glass wall. I felt my eyes closing ,but this time they closed naturally . I felt so relieved at that moment so in order not to ruin it I didn't even let myself swallow the spit inside my mouth (After a while I did...). Anyways at this point I started to feel my arms being pulled backwards by my back and suddenly I realized that my but and legs are moving forward!!! I always knew that there is a tiny slope in my balcony ,but I never actually really felt it had any effect on me some how. I opened my eyes to see if I was moving ,but according to my vision I was completely still. MY EYES WERE LYING TO ME!!!! I knew it! I could feel this slight movement of my lower body, sliding forward. I let my eyes close again and now in addition to these forces I felt my hand sliding across my leg. I knew this feeling already from falling asleep ,but this time I didn't 'help' my hand slide. I let it slide by itself. It took a while until it reached the ground ,but I was patient this time and at last it did (Actually everything I described took a while to happen I just write everything so fast so it seems it took a short period of time). Now my hand was on the ground , on it's back ,but my fingers were still curled. Then I remembered that hesse wrote something about 'feeling gravity' so I asked myself "can it be that I am feeling gravity?". In order to check that patience was required. I let my fingers loose and didn't interfere with their movement. I could feel the joints between the bones in my fingers slowly open and move toward the ground. Then I accepted the fact that all of these forces I felt were actually a result of gravity. I sketched in my mind a sketch of all the forces that influence my body just like I learned to do in physics class (Which I remember so well that I can upload it on paper). Actually at this moment I can say that I was aware of all of my body or at least of it's interactions (Well I can't say I was aware of my kidneys and my pancreas ).

The next thing to happen and maybe one of the most weirdest feelings I felt is that I lost feeling of my legs ,but in the same time I could feel them. I am not really sure how I can explain it properly ,but it was like my legs didn't weight anything, like they were asleep ,but I was aware of that and could feel them ,but not like I feel them right now. Maybe I just interrupted the flow of blood in my vessels when I put them on top of each other ,but I am not sure about it and can't really explain it well. After that I was able to stand up even though I couldn't feel my legs even though I could feel them in some sort of way ,but I had to use my hands in order to walk properly and it felt like I can fall really quickly if I won't pay my legs enough attention. After a while this feeling was gone and I sat here where I sit right now and started to write this long post. I am sorry this post is so long ,but I couldn't describe what I felt in a shorter way without missing parts (Now that I think about it I might have missed a few like the breathing and some of my thoughts ,but I wrote the most of the things i felt and thought so it is fine ).

Now my conclusions from this experience are:
1.Don't rely to much on sight , it can blind you!
2.Tension will distract you so let yourself loose
3.Don't force things to happen ,you will just waste energy. let them happen by themselves.
4.There are many things that I haven't experienced yet and now I will quote Socrates: "As for me, all I know is that I know nothing".

Hermine_hesse got to walk on walls using her new Dream Yoga skills!!!

<***30 points***>

Originally Posted by hermine_hesse

I finished my big move a week ago and am finally feeling a little settled. Last night I had my first LD after a long dry spell! As soon as I got lucid I decided to try out my new LD skills. I ended up in a living room after soaring through the void for a while, and attempted gravity manipulation. I was able to throw myself at a wall and shift my gravity to the wall. I did this up the wall, across the ceiling, and back down again. As I did this, I would recall my experience of gravity from meditation, and apply it in a different direction. It didn't happen effortlessly or smoothly - I suppose new LD skills are like learning to ride a bike and take a bit of practice.

How exciting to be able to apply what I've learned in the class in the dreamworld. I'm starting to feel that my waking life meditation and dream world activities are falling in sync.

Very cool! Congrats, you are going to be a very advanced LDer! I am thrilled you were able to use a basic skill to complete an advanced skill before it has even been formally taught!

Thank you very much for the information.

I look forward to applying theses forms of meditation later today.

after doing this music becomes much clearer and more beautiful

Any comments on smoking weed whilst meditating? Positive or negative effects for you? Open to anyones opinion, i'm sure there are different answers to this question.

Originally Posted by iJustwannasleep

Any comments on smoking weed whilst meditating? Positive or negative effects for you? Open to anyones opinion, i'm sure there are different answers to this question.

Using things like that while meditating can create interesting experiences similar to H.H. or H.I. The portion of the brain that can create colors in the dark ramps up a little, so you may see patterns. However, meditation and LDing are based on self-discipline and fine tuning of the awareness. I have found that getting high has a serious negative impact on Dream Yoga. We all need to find a balance between our drives and hobbies and paths. If weed is part of a persons vices, they can still LD, but should be moderate and accept that you will advance slower than others.

I'm focusing on Version 1 and 2 (mainly version 2, because it appeals to me the most for some reason). Are these exercises meant to be practiced in a quiet/semi-quiet environment that you would meditate in? Because today was the first day I've been practicing this, and I was trying to do it at work (I work at a real busy restaurant), and...I wasn't very successful. I'd focus on what I'm feeling physically for maybe 10 or 15 seconds (terrible, I know), and even then I was only able to focus on one area of my body, as opposed to everything (usually I was focused on my hands or feet). Sitting here, it kind of makes more sense to try to attempt this while I'm meditating instead of when I'm trying to get people through the drive-thru in under 3 minutes (). I'm probably going to wait until I can focus on physical/auditory stimuli proficiently before even reading lesson 2.