Thread: Am i alone?

Your dreams are a reflection of your subjective view of objective life. Your dreams are boring because you think waking life is boring. Find ways to make your waking life less boring and your dreams should follow suit.

Hey there,

I'd advise you to try and write down your dreams all the same, even if you don't find them that interesting. Chances are, as your dream recall gets better, you might recall more interesting dreams as well. Additionally, even if the dream itself seems mundane, it might help to look for interesting aspects or elements in them. Although dreams about elements in waking life are very common, these elements are seldomly identical. There' might to be quite interesting little gems hidden within the seemingly mundane dream.

Reading books and stories might certainly help as well. Find things you can really immerse yourself in. For instance, I can be watching a good movie or play a good pc game and all but forget the world around me, really immersing myself into whatever story I'm currently watching/playing. When dreaming, elements from these things often turn up as well. Also, dont forget intent. Simply intending to have more creative dreams might just make it happen too.

Just some thoughts,

-Redrivertears-

Friend, I've been practicing lucid dreaming for six years now, and I've had barely more than twenty. XD Right now my goal is to just focus on getting them at the weekends (I have trouble napping, but if I can just nap then I'm guaranteed lucidity). I'd be thrilled if I could have as many LDs as you do. (And I'm not "getting on to you," or anything. Just offering a different perspective. ^^)

As for your dream recall . . . well, what Dolphin said sounds like good advice, but I cant personally confirm whether or not it will help. You're otherwise just going to have to do what you don't like, because what you don't like will help you. Even just making a quick, basic list of the things that happened will help. For example:

- Dreamed that we were floating among stars
* Orion was Chinese
* had blue and pink stars
* we passed the Milky Way Store and Dakota said he needed to buy a drink there
* the drink was dark blue and I got the impression that it would be sour

And so on, and so forth. It doesn't even have to be that detailed.

Also, there's a heavy chance that, because your dream recall isn't that great, there's a good chance that you've had many more lucid dreams and you just can't remember them. Just something to consider.

As redrivertears advised, I would definitely seek out media that include the things you'd like to dream about. Want spy dreams? Spy movies. Want dragon dreams? Fantasy novels. And so on. Daydreaming won't hurt, so tell yourself stories. Make things up.

I still dream about living in my hometown with my family, even though I moved away years ago. Even when you get to the point where you are having wild adventures in your dreams, you'll still have boring ones at least some of the time.

Thankyou all for your feedback...some very good responses and it seems very true that maybe reading or watching the type of things i want to happen in my dreams....in my spare time apart from taking my dogs out and cleaning my house i mainly play xbox alot and watch typical comedy stuff on t.v......i want fantasy type dreams where im finding new planets and meeting different biengs etc but yeah tha ks so much to all of you =)

I do not think you're really taking in what it means to be in a dream while in the dream if that makes sence. I do not believe you need to watch fantasy movies or whatever to make your lucid dreams interesting. What you describe just sounds to me like you don't actually know you're dreaming, or at least do not really know what being in a lucid dream entails. Are you meaning to tell me you've never took it uppon yourself to make something interesting happen? You never tried to conjure something? You never tried to fly?

For instance, I have been practicing my ability to make things appear at will in my dreams recently, and each time I do it it is amazing, no matter what setting I'm in. I attain lucidity and focus and then I just have fun. As simple as that. Maybe you should try to set goals for yourself like "I'm going to fly," or "I'm going to fight an army of dragons." Of course, you need practice to do these things, depending on what you want to do.

A big part of beggining to really enjoy lucids for me was how much I could recal from awake life inside my dreams. This allowed me to set goals. I started really simple like "ok, tonight, when I lucid, I'll look at my hands and I'll take in the detail," or "I'm going to focus on something and try to make the dream really really clear." And that was my entire goal for that dream. When I did that I was done. Then I moved to something a little more complex, like what I'm working now: "today, when I lucid, I'm going to make a person appear." For me it's almost like building a library of super powers. Last lucid I had I did what I wanted to do and more. It was a very important dream for me in many ways, and one of the things I realized with that dream is that my recal of awake life inside my dream was actually getting better, and eventually I remembered that story of telling a dream character they were dreaming, and I did it!

[creep]
Here's an idea: try making a pretty woman appear. I'm sure that wont be boring at all if you succeed.
[/creep]

None of this happened in fantastic environments, mind you. I don't think I've ever dreamed of a dragon in my life, but hell if I'm not going to be able to just make a ton appear at will. I don't think I've had a non mindblowing lucid so far. Granted that might just be because I'm new to this and experience something new every single lucid, but still, while I see myself getting used to the feeling and getting proficient at controlling them, I don't see them becoming boring ever.

I guess what I'm trying to say is: I disagree with the posts above stating that you need to watch fantasy movies or whatever to make your lucid dreams what you want. I actually think it is a great opportunity for you to really get good at manipulating your dreams if they are not what you want right from the get go. And I do realize that those people were talking about dreams in general, but I really want to focus on the lucids.

Basically, my incoherent post comes down to this:
Dolphin says:

Your dreams are boring because you think waking life is boring.

I say if you're actually lucid dreaming, practice breaking from this. Really really think about what it means to be in a lucid dream. Do something fantastical. "Regular" dreaming might be somewhat like awake life in the way that you don't know your own state within the world, but lucid dream is much more and much different than that.

Of course, there's also the chance you just immediately forget you're lucid, which is not unheard of.

And about the dream journaling, I completely agree with the people that say that you should still write down your boring dreams for two reasons:
1. You'll remember more dreams. Simple. When the cool dreams happen you'll remember them fully.
2. I think there's a pretty good chance of you getting more used to the feeling of a dream if you document your dreams. For instance, over the course of some dreams, you might find some elements that are always or often present. Maybe there are always owls in your dream, or maybe everyone has green eyes, things like that. You can then use this to get more lucids if you make a goal to notice these things.
3. If you write your boring dreams it will give you the oportunity to really think about what happened and what you want to do different next time. You can think "was I really lucid?" Or maybe "why didn't I do more with this situation?" Or "wouldn't it be cool if..." And with these you can begin setting yourself some goals, and really begin to improve your lucids.

I hope this helped.

Originally Posted by RaveCrazedDave

I guess what I'm trying to say is: I disagree with the posts above stating that you need to watch fantasy movies or whatever to make your lucid dreams what you want. [emphasis added]

Not my intention. The idea behind reading/watching more exciting media is that it's likely to induce more interesting dreams in general. Personally, I find a lot of my dream-plots more interesting than simply fulfilling lucid goals, but every dreamer has their own approach.

If you want exciting dream plots, media and daydreaming are the way to go. If you'd like to dream about a specific thing, you'll want to remember your dream goals in a lucid and exert dream control to make it happen. Or you can combine the two approaches—that's probably the most effective route.

Originally Posted by RaveCrazedDave

Here's an idea: try making a pretty woman appear. I'm sure that wont be boring at all if you succeed.

Eh, dream sex is nice, but I don't find it particularly interesting to remember or write about.

Your mileage may vary, Clidu, so really think about what you'd define as an interesting dream. It sounded like you were more interested in adventure and dream plots, which is what most of us focused on in our answers. Taking in more adventure/fantasy media is definitely part of it, IMO, but so's daydreaming about how you might fit into the plots (or create new ones). You can also set a dream goal to, say, teleport to a specific fictional location and join in one of the plots you were reading about. You definitely don't need to pick one approach or the other.

Well change them when you become lucid then . Make it your new goal "to make my dreams filled with action" for LD.