Benefits of LD

Hi!
Ive been reading that you can use lucid dreaming as a tool for problem solving, self-healing, and personal growth? How does that work? What else is it good for?

You can get inspiration for your work, overcome fears, visit cool places or explore your own mind. There are no limits to what you can do in a lucid dream. You can create your own world and do whatever you would like. :D

I have an entire list of fun things to do, things I could never do in waking life, that I will use to have the kind of fun I won't experience otherwise(could lead to a feeling of absolution, like there's nothing I didn't get to do). I have an entire list of self development/personal things to do(could lead to another good feeling, the weight off my shoulders), etc.

Lucid dreaming can be extremely valuable to any person. At first there are often binges, sex, flying, etc. But after an LD'er will often accomplish more than they were able to with just regular sleep. I hope that clears it up at all for you.

Lucid dreaming benefits start with lucid dream related practices benefits. In order to become good at lucid dreams, it helps to improve one's self awareness, memory, get a more regular sleep schedule, reduce stress, and in general work on self improvements in lifestyle, which are beneficial for themselves in addition to improving chances of lucid dream success. Furthermore lucid dreaming helps one build self confidence and determination: an I can do it attitude.

Then once one has successful lucid dreams, they generally make one feel good and happy. They feel empowering. Lucid dreaming helps promote goal setting and creativity.

Lucid dreaming is one of the most effective remedies for nightmares, especially recurring nightmares.

One can use lucid dreaming to find out more about oneself, to overcome fears by facing them and diffusing them. One can also use lucid dreams to practice skills, such as public speaking for example.

I also strongly believe that one of the uses of lucid dreaming can be to thoroughly change one's own personality for the better. Some of that was already alluded to before: overcoming fears, improving self confidence, etc. In addition, lucid dreaming helps one become more open minded, and lucid dream practice encourages one to become self aware and question one's reality, and as part of that one may become aware of issues about oneself and of new solutions to these issues.

My goal for lucid dreaming is to overcome my periodic depression with the help of lucid dream practice. This is not going to be easy but I believe that lucid dream practice is ideal for overcoming depression by encouraging meta self awareness - a major problem with depression is that when I am depressed I am not self aware enough of all the negative emotions that are building up. Once I become aware, I can do stuff to combat it. So any practice that encourages self awareness is crucial for me.

Pretty much anything you can imagine, really.
You can live out your wildest fantasies in stunning realism, you can find your deepest identity and receive answers to personal problems from your subconscious mind, you can confront your phobias and practice situations that make you anxious in waking life, and there are even speculations that you can use the placebo effect in lucid dreams for physical healing.

There is also a fantastic story of a woman who managed to get rid of anxiety by firmly telling herself in her dreams that she will be free from anxiety for a week, and she kept doing that every week and noticed that this did indeed make her feel competely free from anxiety and pleased with life.
I find this story extremely fascinating, and I believe in it since Robert Waggoner himself has spoken about it several times.

Aside from everything everyone already said here, which is beyond question more than enough argument for pursuing lucidity, here are a few more long-term, if occasionally over-the-top, potentials and benefits of a dedicated pursuit of lucid dreaming, in no particular order:

* LD'ing is something to do with with the one third of your life that you are currently sacrificing to generally forgotten, oblivious, sleep... aka adding 33% of waking life to your life.

* As has already been mentioned somewhat, LD'ing is an excellent tool for personal growth. As your skills advance and your experience progresses, you will find out more about your self than you ever would have imagined you could know: You can examine and challenge the measures of your fears, your hopes, your love, your memory, and above all your imagination in ways that are simply not possible in waking life. Ultimately, you will necessarily develop a sense of self-awareness that will empower you in waking life.

* There is an excellent chance that humanity is approaching a rare moment in history that's been called a "singularity," where "big things" like technology, genetics, biology/medicine, physics, and philosophy reach simultaneous and complementary apexes that will change the human condition forever. Call it the next step in human evolution, though this time the step will not be genetic but one of mind and spirit. And when it comes, the mental discipline and self-awareness required for advanced lucid dreaming will be very helpful for anyone wishing to surf the crest of the wave caused by that singularity -- indeed, even if not so advanced, a soul fortified with successful consistent LD'ing -- or one just open to its existence -- has a much better chance of surviving the wash of that wave at all, should it come.

* LD'ing is the foundation (or side-effect, depending on your point of view) of the yogas of dream and sleep. Dream yoga is just cool, because it helps you to practically comprehend the non-dual nature of dreaming, which reveals the real potential of what you can do in the universes of your dreams. Sleep yoga is the real kicker, though, because mastering it means that you have learned to hold onto your self-awareness in any state of being you might encounter -- including death. So, if all the mythology is correct and we do have an afterlife/ascension/reincarnation/what-have-you waiting for you after death, LD'ing (through sleep yoga) might give you a leg up in navigating that next step.

* Because of the metaphorical nature of dreaming, conscious immersion in dreams through LD'ing offers an opportunity to learn to communicate via means that transcend language, which can be quite handy as the world gets smaller and language becomes an impediment to exchanging information efficiently.

* Aside from hyper-advanced meditation, LD'ing may be the only effective tool for consciously "communicating" with your unconscious mind, and perhaps your soul. Imagine the ability to freely swim the oceans of your memory, to tap without resistance or confusion the supercomputer-level power of your mind, and perhaps to communicate viscerally with the non-cognitive bits of your brain, perhaps to control, heal, or enhance the mechanical bits of your physical body.

* Then there's transcendence. If there are higher states of being, advanced LD'ing may be an excellent tool for reaching them, and remembering where you were when you get back.

I could probably do this all day. Suffice it to say that the potentials inherent in a discipline that serves to unite the deepest workings of your body, mind and spirit under the umbrella of your waking consciousness are pretty much without limit, and as your skills improve you will not help but be able to tap those potentials.

Excellent post sageous, well done.

I'd like to expand on the point on meditation in lucid dreams. I actually found that in my practice of vipassana meditation (IE awareness and thought meditation to put it simply) I learned that creating constructs to talk to in a dream can be an extremely quick method to meditate. It might not be such a shocking discovery but it was quite eye opening to me.

About a year ago I created a character ,"shino", who I dubbed my dreamguide. I could discuss anything with her, and pondering about complex ideas became much easier to do with her around. I went through a long stage where I thought that she was just a personality that I liked to hang around with, despite knowing that I had fully created her.

As I started meditating I saw that she was much more than just a character to me. I started to observe the prerequisites for her existence. They were roughly

• Create shino with a full conscious effort.
• Let her talk and live without any conscious input of mine.
• Don't put words in her mouth.
• Listen to what she is saying.

What I had unconsciously done all that time was create a perfect human to converse with. Everything about the situation is perfect. When I ask a question, she replies but since I'm only semi-conscious of her, she will tell me something riddled with unconscious thoughts and ideas. She is basically telling me what I truly think. But the best part is that I expected her to be a smart and wise individual, meaning that whatever she said, I truly did appreciate it and ponder it.

To put it simply, I believed that what she was saying had some value to it. So whenever she told me to re-evaluate my idea, I really did. In contrast to if I had seen the idea myself I would have probably dismissed any flaws and accepted it as right.

As you can imagine a tool like this is highly precious to meditation, it's pretty much a quick method to be in a situation where you can think clearly and pull away from beliefs that you are always right. The funny thing is now that I know, I can't use shino in the same way anymore, but the knowledge I have gained from this experience has pushed me to a new level of meditation where I don't require shino :D

Lucid dreaming allowed me to live through one of the most mind boggling experiences of my life and has pushed me forward into a hopefully even more fantastical terrain. It truly is a wonderful tool.

Thanks guys! Helped alot!

I have noticed that lucid dreaming can be very comforting and sometimes a good cure for anxiety.
For example, a few weeks ago I was really nervous for a math exam at my university and was afraid that I might fail it (I passed it, by the way), but then I took some time to think of lucid dreaming and felt really comforted by my possibilities to have fun in lucid dreams, and after thinking about this for a moment my anxiety was suddenly completely gone, and my attitude to the exam was more like "hey, I'll do my best, but it's not a big deal if I fail this time, I can do it again in a couple months - so there is no need to worry" - and this made me feel wonderfully relaxed, and all my fears were gone.

My personal experiences about the benefits of lucid dreaming:

I had pretty bad food allergies where I couldn't eat any raw vegetables, fruit, or anything containing raw eggs. I would throw up and get hives in my mouth within a couple minutes after eating them. I lived with it for about 10 years before I went to an allergist (M.D.). He did histamine tests for all kinds of raw foods and he confirmed that I did have a strong histamine reaction to almost all raw fruits and vegetables that he tested. He told me that there was no cure, that I would have to live with it for the rest of my life, and that I would have to carry around an epipen everywhere that I go. I didn't like that so I went to an acupuncturist where they taught me about energy flow in my body. I was pretty skeptical but it helped me to notice that every time I eat something I'm allergic to there is a split second reaction in my body that says this is poison. I can feel it in my chest. I started meditating while I ate raw fruits and vegetables on stopping that inner reaction that made my body think it was poison. I used the same skills I had learned in lucid dreaming to control the dream world, to control my body's reactions to these foods and now I can eat them. I am no longer allergic to them and I am so glad that I have developed these skills in lucid dreaming or I would still be struggling with those horrible allergies.

Very inspiring story, anotherdreamer! This shows that with a strong intent and the right technique we can influence things much more than we previously thought! :)