Can you alter your subconciouse (emotional drives/motivations) with lucid dreaming?

[intuitionlink2]

I asked a similar question here before but i don't think i gave enough detail. I want anyone who can or has a experience it to provide me a guide on how to alter my subconscious drives/ motivations vi lucid dreaming. I basically took a gap year and wanted to spend the year building muscle and achieving goals e.g. getting a drivers license. but that was last year and i failed to do any of what i set out to. I have mild depression so that may have contributed to my downfall and me wasting over 12 crucial months that could have done me wonders and possibly changed my life for the better had i utilized it or mastered the subconscious manipulation i aim for. i want to for example. 1. instead of having an urge/motivation/ emotional drive to do things such as watch tv, sleep in, eat junk food or day dream too much to alter these drives to doing things that are more productive for me. So instead of having this powerful urge (obviously rooted in my subconscious because consciously i don't want to do these things but can't really fight the urge) i would have a powerful urge to lift weights or do ab exercises (which i intentionally chose to make my subconsciousness to make me do). But is this possible? have i put all my eggs into one basket? or if you have successful achieved this or have an idea or suggestion how to achieve this successfully i would really appreciate it thx.

[Blackhammer]

I'm in a very similar situation to yours except I'm starting my gap year now. From what I've read online and heard from people it is certainly possible, there are even therapists out there that use hypnosis + suggestions to "reprogram" your mind. However if you have developed a depression already, it might be very hard to accomplish such task, as it requires a certain strength of will to achieve. I'm talking from experience, as I battled mild/moderate depression for the last 2-3 years (fortunately I managed to recover from it almost 100 % ). You sound like you're not that much depressed so you might try. I'd advice daily meditation with affirmations (eg. "I WANT TO EXERCISE BECAUSE IT'S FUN" "I AM FULL OF ENERGY AND WILL"). Doing this within a LD might be a bit too complicated for a begginer. Good luck with your depression mate

[EmptyBucket]

I think you need to fight that urge and make a plan for yourself and stay committed to it, no matter what. 1. Figure out the root cause of your depression and start working towards resolving it 2. Figure out your goals and what you will do every day to achieve it and write it down Don't wait for some magical motivation, be disciplined and do what you need to do every day no matter what. For example, I do a intensive short workout before I go to bed every night, even if its super late and I'm tired. Same with dream journal, I make myself write no matter what. Exercise discipline, it's a very important muscle. Sorry this wasn't related directly with your question, but it seems this advice could help. Good luck

[TiredPhil]

To get out of a bout of depression, I have come to the conclusion that I put myself there in the first place. Just calling myself a coward is enough to get me back on track, and face my problem head on. There is only me to blame for being depressed, and that person is me. If I wallow in self pity for long enough, I come to this realisation. I just need a kick in the pants, and I am right as rain again. People choose to be happy, or sad. The circumstances do not matter. It only took me 48 years to realise this. Not sure if this works for everyone, but it works every time for me.

[Bobblehat]

I would recommend learning CBT techniques rather than looking for a magic wand that reprograms your personality.

[realdealmagic]

As the others have said, I would just go ahead and use willpower, setting a decent routine and following my goals without accepting excuses from myself. If you get yourself "in the zone" while doing something, it's generally easier. Have a google around for productivity tips and you'll find a lot of helpful things to help you achieve what you want to. You have to realise that things won't fall into your lap, and you won't just do things without thought and without effort. There's always a little push needed to start on the hard work, but once you do, it all gets easier. Good luck

[TheSilverWolf]

I have to agree with RealDealMagic here, he has hit on something that I can exemplify. For years, since I was a young teen, I've enjoyed writing. I've wanted to become an author, DREAMED of actually writing a novel. Yet, I never put any time into it. Oh I'd write, as a hobby. I'd spend a little time every now and then, writing PARTS of novels that I'd then put aside, and never, ever finish. Why? Because I'd do other things. I'd play my PS2, or I'd watch TV, or pretty much anything else that I thought was fun, EXCEPT put serious time and effort into writing my novel. Well, one day, in part thanks to my mother, I found the motivation to put that time into writing. And you know what? The more time I actually spent writing my novel, the more I *wanted* too. It was hard to make myself do it at first, as there were a million other things I could think to do, but I forced myself to sit down, concentrate on my book and write. Before long, I was spending half the day writing my novel, instead of the mandatory few hours I assigned to myself. Eventually, I finished Novel 1 and then Novel 2, and now I need to put in the time to try and get an literary agent's attention Willpower is what it comes down to. Forcing yourself to stick with what you are doing long enough for it to become enjoyable. I presume there's a part of you that likes to work out? Well, the more you do it, the more that side of you will come out, and you won't have to force yourself so much. That, or it'll just end up habit after awhile. Either way, the longer you stick with what you are doing, the easier it will be to stick with it in the future. ~SilverWolf~

[user5659]

I would recommend not to use your dreams as a solution. The problem is not in your subconscious, but in you. Do not try to improve life in one day or month, start doing it one by one, remove some of the junk food every week. If you will try to leave all your bad habits in one day you will most probably fail. Pick a target or a goal and simply follow it. You can add up Dreams/Lucid Dreams to your list, only because it is fun and cool. And you will be doing something nice at night instead of doing nothing.

[JoannaB]

I have found that lucid dream practice can profoundly change one's self, but it may be more the waking life parts of lucid dream practice preparation than while dreaming. What do I mean by that? Lucid dreaming requires increasing one's awareness and especially one's self awareness. A lot of lucid dreaming preparation is about becoming more aware of what makes one tick, the causes and effects, questioning how one does what one does, questioning what one questions, analyzing oneself and one's circumstances. One can learn a lot about oneself in the process of preparing for lucid dreaming. When I was about nineteen years old, I learned about lucid dreaming for the first time and started practicing it. During that year I changed from being a conservative to being a liberal, from being closed minded to open minded, from knowing right and wrong and nothing in between to a shades of grey type of morality with many nuances. Within a year I became in many ways a very different person. And I think the fact that I was practicing lucid dreaming had a lot to do with it. Lucid dreaming practice helped me understand myself better, discover things about myself that I wanted to change, and empowered me to change into the person I wanted to become.

[user5659]

I have found that lucid dream practice can profoundly change one's self, but it may be more the waking life parts of lucid dream practice preparation than while dreaming. What do I mean by that? Lucid dreaming requires increasing one's awareness and especially one's self awareness. A lot of lucid dreaming preparation is about becoming more aware of what makes one tick, the causes and effects, questioning how one does what one does, questioning what one questions, analyzing oneself and one's circumstances. One can learn a lot about oneself in the process of preparing for lucid dreaming. When I was about nineteen years old, I learned about lucid dreaming for the first time and started practicing it. During that year I changed from being a conservative to being a liberal, from being closed minded to open minded, from knowing right and wrong and nothing in between to a shades of grey type of morality with many nuances. Within a year I became in many ways a very different person. And I think the fact that I was practicing lucid dreaming had a lot to do with it. Lucid dreaming practice helped me understand myself better, discover things about myself that I wanted to change, and empowered me to change into the person I wanted to become. I think it also depends on person, the reason why you started lucid dreaming might be that you already was more open minded then others. Couple of my friends tried lucid dreaming and it got them nowhere. I can see that there is a tendency that people who have strong power of will can control lucid dreams very well and control their life's the same way, they are predisposed to change their life's easier then others. I can clearly see that you are one of those who have strong power of will. Sorry for my English, it was a very complicated thought and it was hard for me to express my self correctly

[JoannaB]

I think it also depends on person, the reason why you started lucid dreaming might be that you already was more open minded then others. Couple of my friends tried lucid dreaming and it got them nowhere. I can see that there is a tendency that people who have strong power of will can control lucid dreams very well and control their life's the same way, they are predisposed to change their life's easier then others. I can clearly see that you are one of those who have strong power of will. Sorry for my English, it was a very complicated thought and it was hard for me to express my self correctly You could be right of course, it is a bit of a chicken and egg issue: what came first, the lucid dreaming, or the strong will power? I think that I was not as strong willed prior to that year though as I became after. I really think that lucid dreaming has the potential to allow people to change the programming of their own personality, and I think anyone can do it. It is not easy, but a skill with the potential to change our personality maybe should not be easy. Some people give up before they get that, or they use lucid dreaming for other purposes other than changing oneself, but I really do believe that anyone can do this if they try hard enough and change their expectations in the right way. I believe everyone can be empowered to have such strong will.

[user5659]

You could be right of course, it is a bit of a chicken and egg issue: what came first, the lucid dreaming, or the strong will power? I think that I was not as strong willed prior to that year though as I became after. I really think that lucid dreaming has the potential to allow people to change the programming of their own personality, and I think anyone can do it. It is not easy, but a skill with the potential to change our personality maybe should not be easy. Some people give up before they get that, or they use lucid dreaming for other purposes other than changing oneself, but I really do believe that anyone can do this if they try hard enough and change their expectations in the right way. I believe everyone can be empowered to have such strong will. Once i thought the same, but i think not everyone. Some part of us we are getting from birth, it stays with us all our life. I believe i have a strong will, but some of my friends are failing in whatever they decide to change in their self, and it is sad to watch them. I know they are trying, but no success.

[JoannaB]

All I can say that in both lucid dreaming and in the rest of life expectations matter: intuitionlink2, if you want to succeed, you need to expect to succeed.

[intuitionlink2]

thanks for all the answers to my question i feel you've given very interesting points that i need to think about

[distorted]

This is an interesting concept; I have not tried anything of this sort, as in to intentionally change my waking life via LD, but I would think there would be a few ways to try this out. A) Practicing the things in your dreams that you would like to do in your waking consciousness, so that they become "habit". Our waking memories vs. our dreaming memories have little difference in the way they are perceived. B) What I think would be most affective would be to find the answers to the reasons why you behave the way you do in waking life via your subconscious. I'm unsure as to if you could really "hardwire" your subconscious into behaving a certain way, but you could question your subconscious as to why it behaves as it does, so you can consciously counteract your subconscious in your waking reality. IE, identifying your dream characters as facets of yourself, and asking them why you are depressed and why you feel certain ways. These characters stem from YOUR mind, yet seem to have their own consciousness, so they may be able to shed light on the things going on in your mind that you're unaware of. Good luck.

[TheSilverWolf]

Given that you can train a skill via an LD, such as fencing or playing basketball. So, I suppose lucid dreaming could be used to alter your subconcious as well.