Thread: What stops people from lucid dreaming?

Lack of lucid dream experience might be one reason. Another could be the loss of motivation to keep trying, and that definitely sucks - many people have been here. Or they may be jumping from technique to technique without giving it a trial of at least several weeks? Or maybe they're just not even trying, despite what they post on the forum: that they're trying their hardest.

It's a pretty loaded question, actually! There are probably more reasons for it but I can't think of any more.

I bet a lot of people do have lucid dreams regularly, but they don't remember them. If they don't remember them there is no way to know if they were lucid or not.

Lucid dreaming generally requires one to make some connections in order to become lucid. When you're dreaming and experience something that's impossible in real life, it's sign that it's a dream! The problem is, people often have trouble identifying what is and isn't possible because they're often so overcome with emotion that they forget to the take time to think logically. If they say, see what looks like a trainer and a lion in the park, they tend to be overcome with emotions like fear, surprise and interest rather than skepticism.



It can be difficult for some to overcome these instincts, especially if their self-awareness is low in general.

Originally Posted by dolphin

Lucid dreaming generally requires one to make some connections in order to become lucid. When you're dreaming and experience something that's impossible in real life, it's sign that it's a dream! The problem is, people often have trouble identifying what is and isn't possible because they're often so overcome with emotion that they forget to the take time to think logically. If they say, see a lion in the park, they tend to be overcome with emotions like fear, surprise and interest rather than skepticism.



It can be difficult for some to change these instincts, especially if their self-awareness is low in general.

Thats what i thought also. Because it wouldnt been enough to lucid dream just knowing about it because its still hard grasp and believe if you are so used to idea that idea that you already know what there is what there isnt. Because i triggerd myself to experience lucid dreams, obe.... just by realizing fully how everything is possible. Once you realize this questions come.

Lucid dreaming is like anything else -- it's a skill. Some people are more naturally inclined to it, for whatever reason. Just like sports or music or whatever else. You can take a group of people with zero experience, teach them the basics, and a few of them will have this amazing innate talent. On the other hand, a few of them may have to work insanely hard just to keep up with the average person. It takes a lot of motivation and passion to do that. But of course many people who don't have a lot of natural talent get discouraged easily in the beginning. Unfortunately, adults are really bad about this. Children are great to start in these activities because they will keep trying and trying, without noticing how much they suck in the beginning. Adults can clearly see how sucky their results are because they go and compare themselves to the best, so they feel embarrassed or stupid for not being very good at something right away. It's just really important to think of it that way. If you are an adult and you pick up drawing, painting, music, etc. for the first time, you're probably not going to be very good at it for a while. You just have to keep trying and practicing.

But yeah, I've seen it many many times, where people try a few techniques for LDing, but it doesn't work right away, so they give up. It's really a shame. I just try to keep encouraging people to keep trying because it's so rewarding once you get the hang of things.

As Sageous says, one feature of the dream state is impaired access to memory -- if you don't remember that lions don't normally appear in parks, no amount of logic can produce lucidity out of the situation. This makes sense to me -- I behave entirely logically in dream situations, yet I don't remember that the situations never occur in waking life.

To add to Naiya's excellent points: one of my recent realizations is that lucidity is the result of many factors all coming together at the same time: self-awareness, access to memory, brain chemistry / state of wakefulness, being well rested, good dream recall, intention and expectation. Wow that's quite alot to manage, it's amazing that anybody can get lucid at all! For some, they seem to come together easier, for others, it takes dedication and effort. Another point is how easily one falls asleep, and how deeply one sleeps.

Lucidity occurs between the fully awake and fully asleep states -- if some people naturally tend to sleep at this in between, "just right" level for lucid dreaming most of the night, that can be another explanation.

I have a nagging feeling that my reason for not becoming lucid every night is lack of motivation. Not that I don't desire lucid dreams - much the contrary; I spend a lot of time during the day contemplating and planning lucid dreams.

But when I sleep, any residual motivation to have a lucid dream seems to vanish. It is as if I simply could not be bothered to become aware enough to conclude that it is a dream. Even if the dream signs are falling over one another (my dreams nearly always contain graphic scenes of spectacular magic, and ubiquitous holiday travel on buses, ferries and airplanes - even though I very rarely undertake such travels in physical reality).

Yesterday I dreamt of taking a collercoaster ride through a museum, going from room to room at terrific speed, passing through an ancient library with impossibly large books clearly from the 18th century (it said so on their backs), and eventually stopping in a cafeteria for greenish cakes that could be squeezed and subsequently bounced back, as if made of rubber). None of that made me even remotely conscious enough to call the dream.

Sensei talks about intent and dreaming motivation energies as finite resources, which we of course know they are -- but many don't follow up and conclude that energies need to be balanced throughout the day so that one does not go whole hog on day work and leave no energy remaining for the night. I am guilty of this 1000 times over. This by the way is a great explanation for the "relaxation effect" -- you have enough energy left at night time to remember to get lucid! It also explains the competition success and exhaustion effect: you're borrowing energy from the future for all those competition lucids, but once the competition is over you collapse in exhaustion for a few weeks (also guilty).

And again (), it's the coming together of all the factors *while dreaming* at night that results in lucidity. No intent energy left, no lucidity.