How do you create permanent DCs?

[JakeMcDake]

Hi! I have wanted to create some permanent DCs for a while now and I just thought up a plan. What if I interview a person in my dream and try to memorise the DC's face and the answers I got. When I wake up I will draw the DC's face and write down the answers I got during the interview. I think this will create a deeper connection and it will be much easier to visit the DC in another dream. It would also be fun to compare different interviews and try to find similarities. I find this very cool because you take your DC to the real life and have him, her or it on a paper IRL. With permanent DCs you can have a different kind of DJ. Instead of having a normal DJ you have different files with different DCs and write what you did with them after each night. After a while you have different files on DCs and what you have done with a specific DC. Here are my questions to you: Have you created any permanent DCs? Did you do it intentionally? If you did it intentionally, what strategi did you use? What are your thoughts on permanent DCs?

[Hilary]

Hi! I have wanted to create some permanent DCs for a while now and I just thought up a plan. What if I interview a person in my dream and try to memorise the DC's face and the answers I got. When I wake up I will draw the DC's face and write down the answers I got during the interview. I think this will create a deeper connection and it will be much easier to visit the DC in another dream. It would also be fun to compare different interviews and try to find similarities. I find this very cool because you take your DC to the real life and have him, her or it on a paper IRL. With permanent DCs you can have a different kind of DJ. Instead of having a normal DJ you have different files with different DCs and write what you did with them after each night. After a while you have different files on DCs and what you have done with a specific DC. Here are my questions to you: Have you created any permanent DCs? Did you do it intentionally? If you did it intentionally, what strategi did you use? What are your thoughts on permanent DCs? My thoughts are this. Permanent DCs are guides. I have two. One is male and changes form (but always the same energy), and he narrates my dreams. The other is an old woman - she never changes form. I did not "create" them. They brought me to them in major lucid dreams. There may be other conscious or seemingly conscious DCs. I don't know, interesting questions.

[JakeMcDake]

My thoughts are this. Permanent DCs are guides. I have two. One is male and changes form (but always the same energy), and he narrates my dreams. The other is an old woman - she never changes form. I did not "create" them. They brought me to them in major lucid dreams. There may be other conscious or seemingly conscious DCs. I don't know, interesting questions. Thanks for your thoughts! I like how you describe them as guides, sometimes I get overconfident and try to rule my dreams when I actually need to be guided.

[Occipitalred]

Have you considered immersive daydreaming? The equivalent of a dream character in immersive daydreaming are called paras. You imagine them, so you can definitely imagine persistent paras. Then, you can look them up during dreams. (I'll add this: How difficult or easy is it for you to deliberately choose to have recurrent dream places or dream characters? If it's easy or you find some success with it after a while, go for it. If it's difficult, before you give up, just play around with immersive daydreaming. You'll have more control and will get more out of it). I just don't think dreaming is about what you want it to be. It's an indication of your psyche. Recurrent places and characters are generally recurrent because they have some importance, and they arise naturally, not just for fun. Anyway, disregard this if it's not the case for you. But lastly, let me ask this: is it important that the character be the same? Sure, it's fun, but they are not real so any dream character is just an idea. Let's say you're interested about a dream character playing the role of a guide, there's no rule that they must be a specific person with specific traits with a specific name, etc... Any character that plays this role... is effectively playing this role. You can consider all such dream characters to be a representation of your relationship with guide figures or what not. Anyway, I just think instead of waiting to meet one mysterious dream character that persistently acts like a guide... and perhaps never getting results... just find the patterns already existent. What roles do your dream characters play? Even if they don't all have the same hair color, if a lot of your characters are antagonists, you can just treat them as a pattern and figuring out how you want to confront them (no need to wait for a specific character antagonist).

[DarkestDarkness]

I also think a permanent dream character doesn't necessarily need to be completely consistent. In the same vein as what Occipitalred is saying, I think that variations in a character can be representative of our current state of self. As a simple example (unless we are really uptight about it I suppose); our face, our hair and even other features like clothing are often inconsistent throughout a week. We are always "me" but our mood and appearance shift around a bit. If we dress up actors and give them different makeovers, they appear like entirely different characters, but they are still the same person and will still have certain biases in their acting that they probably can't help or are even desirable for. In any case, for myself there are certain character archetypes that reappear every so often. The characters themselves aren't always consistent between each appearance but they are effectively representing similar things or filling in certain roles each time. I get a lot of this when I have dreams about World of Warcraft, which is a game that I spent a lot of my time on. Often there are friendly and hostile player characters in these dreams that are effectively randomly generated from my personal memories of how random characters can be. In terms of character consistency, I find that things like TV show characters are often very consistent in how they look and behave (because they are perfect moulds in the TV too) but I think this also makes them slightly less interesting and they often don't reappear after a while or when I stop being interested in the show. There are characters that I would like to create as consistent dream characters, but I think this is one of those things (for me) that if I try to think about too hard, I can't exactly get it to happen then - in the same way that you can't usually force dream recall.

[JakeMcDake]

Have you considered immersive daydreaming? The equivalent of a dream character in immersive daydreaming are called paras. You imagine them, so you can definitely imagine persistent paras. Then, you can look them up during dreams. (I'll add this: How difficult or easy is it for you to deliberately choose to have recurrent dream places or dream characters? If it's easy or you find some success with it after a while, go for it. If it's difficult, before you give up, just play around with immersive daydreaming. You'll have more control and will get more out of it). I just don't think dreaming is about what you want it to be. It's an indication of your psyche. Recurrent places and characters are generally recurrent because they have some importance, and they arise naturally, not just for fun. Anyway, disregard this if it's not the case for you. But lastly, let me ask this: is it important that the character be the same? Sure, it's fun, but they are not real so any dream character is just an idea. Let's say you're interested about a dream character playing the role of a guide, there's no rule that they must be a specific person with specific traits with a specific name, etc... Any character that plays this role... is effectively playing this role. You can consider all such dream characters to be a representation of your relationship with guide figures or what not. Anyway, I just think instead of waiting to meet one mysterious dream character that persistently acts like a guide... and perhaps never getting results... just find the patterns already existent. What roles do your dream characters play? Even if they don't all have the same hair color, if a lot of your characters are antagonists, you can just treat them as a pattern and figuring out how you want to confront them (no need to wait for a specific character antagonist). I love your idéa about immersive daydreaming! When I read it I knew it would work on me. There is a memory technique where you try to visualize pictures with some meaning to them that I use. Immersive daydreaming seems like something I could use a lot. I have never tried to choose a dream place or DC yet, but it is one of my current goals. I often analyse my dreams and try to figure out my psyche and what is truly important to me. Today I will hang out with my old friend because I had a dream about him being in trouble. The only recurrent place I know about are schools, home and arenas and I have already analized them. Actually I got really excited about the thought of having a master avatar bender as my dream guide. It would be fun to ask him, her or it what new cool bending moves I could learn. I guess it would be okey if the DC is different each time. As long as the master can teach me new techniques. Thanks for the reply !

[JakeMcDake]

I also think a permanent dream character doesn't necessarily need to be completely consistent. In the same vein as what Occipitalred is saying, I think that variations in a character can be representative of our current state of self. As a simple example (unless we are really uptight about it I suppose); our face, our hair and even other features like clothing are often inconsistent throughout a week. We are always "me" but our mood and appearance shift around a bit. If we dress up actors and give them different makeovers, they appear like entirely different characters, but they are still the same person and will still have certain biases in their acting that they probably can't help or are even desirable for. In any case, for myself there are certain character archetypes that reappear every so often. The characters themselves aren't always consistent between each appearance but they are effectively representing similar things or filling in certain roles each time. I get a lot of this when I have dreams about World of Warcraft, which is a game that I spent a lot of my time on. Often there are friendly and hostile player characters in these dreams that are effectively randomly generated from my personal memories of how random characters can be. In terms of character consistency, I find that things like TV show characters are often very consistent in how they look and behave (because they are perfect moulds in the TV too) but I think this also makes them slightly less interesting and they often don't reappear after a while or when I stop being interested in the show. There are characters that I would like to create as consistent dream characters, but I think this is one of those things (for me) that if I try to think about too hard, I can't exactly get it to happen then - in the same way that you can't usually force dream recall. Interesting read. When you say that they have certain roles, in what sense do you mean? Do you mean for example: "There is a good person that is helping me" or "Someone that I need to stop"? There is a role that is coming back to me sometimes: Mothers who want me to save their babies who are about to die. Thanks for the reply!

[KarlaB18]

Another university semester means I've been off here for ages; but I've still tried to keep a grasp on the direction of my dreams. I agree that either permanent characters are either guides or good dream friends. I also agree with the fact that they do not have to have the same appearance all the time. For instance, my 8th dream guide in the timeline, 18-Volt; sometimes he'll appear in his cartoonish style (he is actually a Nintendo character) and other times, he's come portrayed as real human flesh. More recently he's default appearance seemed to be in-the-flesh, meaning my SubC must be focusing on the reality of his existence rather than him JUST being a video game character. I keep a dream journal on the computer and a task journal on paper. I find that to make a dream character permanent, I set the groundwork for them. I write a letter in my task journal asking for them to meet me and also teaching a them a little bit about my world. And then once they appear, I 'discuss' their appearance with them through the task journal and state that I want to either get to know them better or try and give them a challenge to work towards. Though for it to work, you can't expect them to meet the challenge on their first next visit; it's a progressive thing and working towards it gives an excuse to do things together. And recently, I've just introduced another dream guide into the timeline; he's the 10th. I've managed to manifest Riku since the 22nd of May and just last night, he managed to pull off 'automatic assistance'.

[DarkestDarkness]

Interesting read. When you say that they have certain roles, in what sense do you mean? Do you mean for example: "There is a good person that is helping me" or "Someone that I need to stop"? There is a role that is coming back to me sometimes: Mothers who want me to save their babies who are about to die. Thanks for the reply! Well, when I say certain roles I mean that in the character archetype sense, so yes, it is quite similar to that I think. For example I have a recurring female character that fits into a role of an intelligent and guiding female presence. She doesn't represent any specific person I have ever met and her appearance has recurring traits but otherwise she tends to look different each time. But I tend to identify her as a single or unique character because she only appears from time to time and there is only ever one of her. Another example is simply like I said; as in game-world dreams, certain dream characters take on antagonistic or helpful roles where their sole purpose is to create a conflict or situation requiring resolution and things of this sort, as this is effectively the role many players did have within the dynamics of a player-vs-player environment. These characters don't really recur as unique individuals, perhaps because I don't have unique identities they can have anyway, since you end up forgetting the details of many encounters in waking life. It's the same thing as in another dream going into a shop or doctor's office, and there is a certain dream-generated character there with which most of the interactions are likely to occur. I find that the brain (mine anyway) tends to organise things into packages like that; but I mean, this is pretty much just the same concept as schemas. You have certain moulds based on your expectations and biases and dreaming reality is built out of things cast from these moulds. Thinking about it a bit further as I write, I think for permanent dream characters in any sort of sense, you have to work on these moulds over time and I think what KarlaB18 said is particularly relevant in that regard.

[cedwards105]

Have you considered immersive daydreaming? The equivalent of a dream character in immersive daydreaming are called paras. You imagine them, so you can definitely imagine persistent paras. Then, you can look them up during dreams. This might be a little off-topic, but do you have a link to some information on immersive daydreaming? That sounds fascinating, but when I try to look it up online most of the links are about "maladaptive daydreaming".

[Sangfoot]

I keep a dream journal on the computer and a task journal on paper. I find that to make a dream character permanent, I set the groundwork for them. I write a letter in my task journal asking for them to meet me and also teaching a them a little bit about my world. And then once they appear, I 'discuss' their appearance with them through the task journal and state that I want to either get to know them better or try and give them a challenge to work towards. Though for it to work, you can't expect them to meet the challenge on their first next visit; it's a progressive thing and working towards it gives an excuse to do things together.. This is a very intriguing concept to me. Creating persistent dream environments and dream characters has been one of my primary goals since joining dream views and becoming interested in lucid dreaming. I have never thought about "inviting" a dream character to join me before like you suggest, with a solid intention while awake. It seems like you have had some success with this method, could you maybe share a little bit more about what you do? What do you mean by set some groundwork? What do you tell them about your world and why is that important? Do you have some type of idea of what they might look like before you meet them in a dream or what do you mean by you "discuss their appearance" when they show up? I have been wanting to meet some type of dream guide that would be able to help me learn and explore more about my dreams. I have never thought about trying to have a dream guide that might actually help me with the actual barriers I have to lucid dreaming. For instance, I hope this isn't tmi, one of my current barriers with lucid dreaming is that as soon as I become lucid I instantly become horny and want to waste the dream on sex. Maybe using your example I could set some groundwork and a task to meet a dream guide that can in effect cock block me when I am lucid and remind me of my goals or something. Haha that seems like a silly example but if that could work it seems like that could be very helpful to me. Is that at all what you mean by giving them a challenge to work towards lol!

[Sangfoot]

I was researching around this idea more and found this quote from Sageous that got me thinking. He says: "In the end, and definitely in the context of LD'ing, you are your mind. To become lucid, you are not convincing your mind to do anything; you are convincing your self. Assuming that there is some other entity "in there" that can be convinced, coerced, or forced by will to allow you to be lucid is to take a step away from lucidity, not toward it -- becoming lucid is a decision you make, and not, ever, the result of some trick or act of willpower you play on a separate mind. Willpower, and its little brother, focus, is a powerful tool, and can certainly help a dreamer hold her attention on a goal of lucidity. But it cannot cause a lucid dream on its own, because lucidity is the presence of waking-life self-awareness and memory, and if they're not there, willpower or not, then you are not lucid." I liked and agree with what he had to say here about there not being anything else "in there" that has any control over lucidity. But, it seems less "fun" to me that this is true. I WANT there to be something "other" in my dreams, like persistent dream characters. I don't mean this in a spiritual sense or anything, but in the sense that is seems less fun to always have a plot that only revolves around me as the only character. I guess one of the problems I'm facing in trying to describe the this lack of integrity in my thinking is that I haven't ever bothered to really figure out "why" i desire persistent dream characters. What benefit is there to a dream guide, specifically? Why is it that since the beginning I have been fascinated with persistent dream characters and environments? Is it hindering my lucidity, my self-awareness and memory, to try and set an expectation that there could be a dream guide that can help me achieve these things? For instance what if I could imagine a dream guide that would greet me every dream saying "self-awareness and memory are the keys to lucidity". Could that be a dream sign to increase and even spark my own lucidity? I have confused myself enough while writing this so I can't imagine I am making much sense. Someone else please chime in now.

[KarlaB18]

Right Sang! Let's see how well I can answer all this. I figure the best example to answer your question would be go through how I acquired my most recent 'dream guide' and pick out different details to discuss. Then I may also link that situation to my dream journal entries you can see the effect my real life action had in constituting a dream later on. So IRL I binge watch YouTube; and I went through a phase of watching Kingdom Hearts videos. During that time, I was also struggling with some university subjects (not due to the binge watching lol! But instead due to a character I tried to make a dream guide but was not cooperating; and I had made that dream character the 'academic specialist'; so I had to find a replacement fast to clean up the mess that this one caused with a faulty commitment). So yeah, as I was watching some Kingdoms Hearts videos, I just seemed to click with Riku and I'm thinking 'right, you're coming with me'. That's exactly what I said to myself. I've got my IRL task journal open and apparently the 21st of May is the first time I wrote with the intention of putting Riku on the dream guide team (therefore, the path to making him a persistant character). At first, I didn't use his name but rather (for fun really), I decided to give him an ID number to allow him to voluntarily show up first of all. So with the first letter I wrote to him, I started my name, age, and the country I'm from. If you treat them like real people, then they are likely to be more real to you and treat you like a person when you do meet them. Hence always make sure you introduce yourself and put yourself out there for the dream character you want, to get to know you better. And then if they know you, my belief is they also know how your brain works and therefore what your dream tendencies are. EG for you. You write a letter to the person you want to recruit. You go: "Dear xxx, I'm Sang, I'm 30 (eg) years old and I'm from the United States". You then might go on to say "I was wondering if you could come and see me one night to help me with a problem I have. I'd like someone to teach me how not to be so horny when I'm in a lucid dream". Have fun and write the letter the way you want it. Give some history about yourself but also state what you want from them and ask if it's possible to have their help. So the first time I wrote to Riku was on the 21st of May and I immediately had a dream that night. Go to both instances of Dream No. 658 to see the fall out of my first letter. By me treating Riku like a real person in my journal, I reckon that allowed reason for the scene with Roxas as I did not even mention any other KH member in my letter, but yet that happened. There were also some aspects in Dream No. 659 but I don't see them as significant as 658. So then after that person appears in a dream, the next day I go to my journal and think 'what do I want to do with them next?'. I wrote another letter to Riku on the 24th of May to address what happened in the last dream as well as to encourage him to come to subsequent dreams. I also wrote to my female dream guide on the 25th of May (that I've had since 2016), and a line I think might catch your attention is "In the dream world, he hasn't seemed to come since Saturday (23 May) morning when he tried to talk to me for the first time. Is he pissed off with me because he thinks I was trying to fob him off by repeatedly waking up?". So then, this constituted Riku to come again on the 26th of May if you look at Dream 661 B, and this was like the first time Riku finally took the time to 'know his dreamer'. So then on the day of the 26th of May, I took to write to thank Riku for appearing in that dream. That letter is when I also decided to 'tell him' of the damage my previous 'dream guide attempt' had caused; so that's when I etched Riku's 'academic specialist' identity into him. Between the 27th and 30th of May, this is where I addressed Riku's age and appearance. This is because there was one minor dream, where the dream put facial hair on Riku (gave him a thick ass beard), whereas if you look up images of Riku, he's not supposed to have a beard! So in my task journal, I put boundaries for what the dream can make Riku look like. I said his height can be between x and x. He is to have no facial hair. Appropriate ages that Riku can be under are between 16 and 25. 30th of May is where I started to set specific dream tasks. They were things such as: "Continue in-person engagement with him", "Have him meet another dream guide", "Have him help you in any way you can to help you complete your degree", "Help him try to find Sora". Notice the last task? That task wasn't for him, it was for me. With the kind of character Riku is, I thought I'm more likely to keep him as a good dream guide if I give something back to him, give him a reason to stay rather than being afraid that he may lose interest. 3rd of June, I decided to write to the 'Fairy Godmother' due to inspiration from the KH3Re:Mind scene. In this letter, I stated that I was getting some appearances from Riku, but was still struggling to have any significant moments with him; so I kinda asked if she could hurry him along a little; lo and behold, a dream constituted that very night: Dream No. 665, AND, it was unexpectedly lucid! In the letters, I had been asking Riku to give me an exact number between 16 and 25 for his dream-age. He responded in the last part of No. 665. I could keep going but it will take FOREVER. I think this is enough for you to see where I'm going with this. Perhaps I'll just say a little more. On the 17th of June, I had my tax exam with the realisation that I had to get 35/60 or more to pass the subject. I immediately took a nap after the exam was done and this dream unexpectedly came: Dream No. 670N. Secondly, IRL, I thought I had overcome my lifelong fear of elevators. In-fact, my previous primary dream guide 18-Volt helped big-time with this. I never wrote to Riku that I was scared of elevators, but then how on Earth did Dream No. 681 happen? And that dream took place only a few days before I thought I had to go back to IRL campus classes on Level 3 because I failed a subject. But I ended passing everything and getting my degree. Like I thought I had eliminated that problem with 18-Volt, but subconsciously, Riku's like "nah uh, you've still got that problem".

[Sangfoot]

Wow Karla thank you for that awesome reply! I think you may be on to something here! The thing I like about your system is the way that it sets expectations and focuses intentionality. In previous guides I have read on meeting dream guides everything was happening inside a dream. Which for me introduces a whole host of unknowns. Who knows what is going to happen when I call out in dream "is there anyone to teach me?!" With your method I can harness my waking life expectations and intentions, which are much more consistent and clear, to meet a dream guide that can assist me with specific issues. I am interested in trying this out for myself. Hopefully I will be back in several days to report success, but for anyone who is curious I will try and come back to report my experiences with this method success or failure. I am excited to meet a dream guide that can help me achieve lucidity more frequently and consistently, and help me remember that self-awareness and memory are the keys to lucidity, which will hopefully help with my many other current barriers to the epic adventures I want to be having in my dreams! Lol I need a powerful dream guide because I need a lot of help!

[Sangfoot]

I'm not sure how to link to it but I just posted a dream journal update of a lucid dream I had last night. Success! I wrote out a letter basically how KarlaB18 describes, building strong intention of meeting a dream guide or someone who will go on adventures with me in my dreams. In my last lucid dream quite a while ago, there where two sisters that answered a question for me in my dream. In my latest dream when I called out "Is there anyone who can answer my questions? Is there anyone who will talk with me? They showed up again. This is the first time I have had a recurring character in a lucid dream! I wouldn't say that I wrote my letter specifically to them, or to anyone in particular, but they do fit the "archetype" that I was writing to very nicely. I still don't know much about them, other than that their names are Tarra and Skippy, and that they are friendly, and willing to answer my questions. In the future I am hoping to run into them again and learn more about them, maybe they want to go on an adventure!

[KarlaB18]

Oh yay! Congratulations Sang! I'm actually excited to see where you'll go next and if you do end up 'furthering your relationship' in any way with Tarra and Skippy. What I also find interesting is that you have two simultaneous characters to work with; so you can communicate with them one-on-one or aim for both at the same time. Edit: Now that we know what their names are; you start your letters with 'Dear Tarra and Skippy'. Always call them by those names unless they officially declare something different in a subsequent dream