(Repost from something I put on r/LucidDreaming a few mins ago)
I'm a relatively experienced lucid dreamer (roughly 25+ LDs) and I'll periodically bring up lucid dreaming to people I know don't practice it. I found, however, that most people just shrug off what I said or ask why they would want to put all that effort to control their dreams in the first place. Then it hit me, most people don't understand just how different normal dreams and lucid dreams are.
I think this partly because of the LD community has claimed lucid dreams are "dreams you can control". Which not only isn't even technically correct (Dream control and lucidity are not the same thing. They are correlated but you can have one without the other) but it also glosses over the two most interesting aspects of lucid dreaming.
1: Perspective
For most people normal dreams are fuzzy memories of ridiculous occurrences strung about in a non-linear fashion. Usually they never feel like they're actually IN a dream; instead it seems more like they're watching a dream "movie" from a distance. At times it doesn't even feel like they've experienced a dream at all but only remember it after waking up (like it was placed into their heads seconds before opening their eyes).
However, once you attain lucidity the way dreams operate fundamentally changes. You won't just remember your lucid dreams. You'll experience them in real time. You'll be there; in the moment. You won't remember having a dream in which you flew, you'll be flying in your dreams.
This shift from a past perspective to a present perspective completely alters the dynamics of dreaming and in my opinion is the most important factor that makes lucid dreaming worthwhile.
2: The Five(+) Senses:
The vast majority of people will agree that they can "see" in their dreams. A smaller majority will agree they can "hear" in their dreams (though the dream-to-dream occurrence is rarer than sight). You'll find that almost no one reports experiencing any of their other senses while dreaming besides these two. This leads most people to believe that sight and sound are the only senses that are present while dreaming.
This belief is not true and though I do not have an explanation for why our other senses are seemingly absent in most of our normal dreams I can tell you that it is possible to experience every single one of the major senses in your lucid dreams. I have personally experienced sight, sound, touch, taste, smell, temperature, weight/mass (both of myself and objects I was carrying), and bodily orientation in my dreams. As have many others.
I felt the smooth surface of a leather chair I sat in, the cold wind across my skin as I flew at incalculable speeds, heat emminating from a burning campfire, and the weight of my body as I climbed a wall. I have heard beautiful music coming from a nearby auditorium and eaten pasta. I have both seen and felt goosebumps form on my IMAGINARY dream body.
Yet when I tell people this they are reluctant to believe. My own brother (who was attempting to lucid dream at the time) thought I was exaggerating. There was simply no way that I could have been telling the whole truth. No way could a dream be this detailed or this exciting.
Then a few weeks later he told me about his first lucid dream. He said that he was in a field playing football with Ray Lewis when he suddenly became lucid. He said that immediately he looked up in an attempt to fly and blasted upwards into the sky like a rocket. As he did so, he could feel the wind push across his face. This amazed him to no end and he admitted that I really wasn't exaggerating about all my stories.
Once I discovered that all my senses were present in lucids (to varying degrees) it transformed lucid dreaming from a fun pass-time into what was essentially the ultimate virtual reality simulator. When I lucid dream I become god of a world that is at times more detailed and more beautiful than the world we are in now. A world I can experience to such an astounding degree that is is almost a reality unto itself. Yet in that one, anything is possible.
These are the two most important reasons why I lucid dream and I hope this will convince some of you to give it a try or continue in your lucid dreaming practice if the case may be.
