Thread: Lucid Dreaming Book Club (November-December)

I'm enjoying this book so far. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of the archetype concept. I've read about it before by another Jungian author, but it doesn't really resonate with me. However, keeping an open mind, I'm going to look for signs of archetypes in my upcoming dreams.

I do strongly believe in the animus/anima concept. I work closely with my animus ("the father") every night in dreams. I also have an Old Woman guide, which is another Jungian concept for the higher self.



Also - as an aside, like Occiptalred mentioned in an earlier thread, I really don't think the spoiler tags are necessary when we're discussing non-fiction books.

I am just about over halfway into this book.

It has been a very interesting read so far, though I have a few quibbles in places, they are really rather minor points overall and either way I still want to finish reading the whole thing before pointing out any negatives or positives.

But so-far in, the book has already helped me better understand and think over some of my recent experiences in the context of communication with the unconscious.

I liked his wheel-spoke idea for dream interpretation. I want to try this out for fun. Play around with symbols and see what happens.

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

I'm enjoying this book so far. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of the archetype concept. I've read about it before by another Jungian author, but it doesn't really resonate with me. However, keeping an open mind, I'm going to look for signs of archetypes in my upcoming dreams.

I do strongly believe in the animus/anima concept. I work closely with my animus ("the father") every night in dreams. I also have an Old Woman guide, which is another Jungian concept for the higher self.

Interesting, I personally find the inverse; the archetype concept makes intuitive sense to me but I feel a bit baffled with the anima/animus. Perhaps that's just because I haven't been able to recognize the latter in my own dreams yet... or maybe I'm a little fuzzy on the finer points of the concept. I definitely appreciate that this book encourages customizing by personal meaning, though. The one concept that matches pretty much perfectly for me is the shadow. Even as a kid before I was familiar with Jungian interpretation, I would sometimes encounter a shadow figure that would terrify me. On at least a couple occasions I turned and took its hand and it clarified into a person.

Originally Posted by nautilus

Interesting, I personally find the inverse; the archetype concept makes intuitive sense to me but I feel a bit baffled with the anima/animus. Perhaps that's just because I haven't been able to recognize the latter in my own dreams yet... or maybe I'm a little fuzzy on the finer points of the concept. I definitely appreciate that this book encourages customizing by personal meaning, though. The one concept that matches pretty much perfectly for me is the shadow. Even as a kid before I was familiar with Jungian interpretation, I would sometimes encounter a shadow figure that would terrify me. On at least a couple occasions I turned and took its hand and it clarified into a person.

I half wonder if it's because I started learning about the animus a few years back, that I started to have one in my dreams. Who's to know?

Yes, the shadow is definitely real, too! I have experienced the same thing you describe. Sometimes the shadowy figure turns into a person, who has a message for me. Sometimes it transforms into a friendly animal or myself.

Have you ever had the experience of the shadow figure, once you express acceptance/love for it, merging into your body?

It's funny, I was generally attracted to the four Jungian concepts of Anima/Animus, Shadow, Hero and Self as described in a book I'm particularly fond of; expecting as if they would sort of just appear solidly and be uniquely consistent throughout my exploration of my inner world, I suppose I could call it. I expected for quite a long while that they might be a sort of logical and distinctive element that I could be on the lookout for; in my dreams, in my imagination, in visualisation exercises, etc... But this is not quite my view on them anymore.

Over the last three years or so I have felt much closer to parts of myself that I think I always acknowledged, especially from my childhood, and I think many of my characters or inner personalities are diffused from those basic archetypes, even before I knew of them as nautilus also remarked; sometimes coming closer to those specific archetypal representations but many times not quite as much. I'm coming to think more and more about just how personal and unique these journeys must be for each of us. I still think it's really interesting to share these journeys with each other, especially as individuals who are generally very interested in these things.

With this book, though I am not quite finished with my first read-through of it, I have found that the "Active Imagination" part is of particular interest to me, for one thing making me reprocess a lot about how I have imagined these Jungian archetypes and about how I may have tried too hard to feel like they should be concrete concepts rather than general ideas. In a way, I also realise now that I partly "failed" myself by not putting into practice my own lessons about following my own symbols and allowing my own inner vision/world to simply create itself without as much external influence, at times.

This could almost be a rave for the rant/rave thread; I have allowed this to happen on its own a great deal more over this year that has almost gone by but really, the previous year was the introduction to it, so it has been a long process that I'm very glad for. It has been a bit of a return to the inner world of my childhood too in a way, rediscovering a few things that I simply neglected/forgot or didn't allow myself the mental time for, even for all my interest in these subjects.

There's so much to say. But what I said in my previous comment here still holds very much; this book has been good for all the thinking it's got me to do and has indeed helped me recontextualise a lot of recent inner experiences.

Just wanted to say I've finished reading the book properly through-and-through today. There weren't a lot of pages left since my last post but I hadn't found the time or mood until today.

I feel that some parts of Active Imagination really were already known to me, just not in a formal way. In particular, I used to have conversations with myself quite a lot when I was younger - I think my oldest sibling and my mother have also done this a bit - and some part of Active Imagination feels very familiar to that experience.

At first I disliked a lot of aspects about the way the author writes, for one thing feeling that he repeated himself too much. I honestly believed I would just stop reading the book completely at some points. But I ended up enjoying the full book and have come to think that perhaps that repetitiveness isn't all bad; the book covers a lot of basic stuff at first, so I suppose for someone who has never dipped their feet in the water, that's probably going to be quite helpful and even then, for someone who already understands those concepts, it can be a refresher from the author's own perspective I suppose.

The author was perhaps a bit too Jungian in some regards even for me, but I started to think about what was going on in another thread here and felt that perhaps he was using language in a certain way because it's the way he knows and the way it makes sense for him to explain certain things, so just because I don't feel connected or agreeable to his explanation perhaps doesn't mean that I can't reinterpret it a bit so that it makes more sense to me, based on what I already know. The really positive aspect of this book for me is that I felt the author did try quite hard to demystify a few complex notions.

Finally, I think it's interesting that the author did not mention lucid dreams at all; perhaps he's never had them, I don't know. But in my mind, he could have certainly included the topic in this book, somewhere in-between Dream Work and Active Imagination.

There was a lot to learn with this book and a lot that I can re-link to my existing knowledge; it will definitely be worth re-reading in the future. Hopefully I will be able to find the energy to put some of the ideas to practice, especially in the new year.

I finished my second read through of the book and I feel like I got more out of the active imagination section in particular than I did the first time I read it a couple years ago. One symbol from the dream interpretation section, though, that I didn't catch before was the diamond being a representation of the Self. My DV avatar is actually a drawing I made from a super intense dream I had many years ago where I was fleeing from shadowy creatures in the darkness that could end my existence if they caught me, but a diamond of radiant light appeared protecting me with pure love. The interpretation of the diamond as Self adds another layer of meaning to something that had already left quite an impression on me.


As for active imagination, I'd made a couple half-hearted attempts in the past, but I really gave it some solid effort recently. Initially I had a hard time clearly visualizing things and immersing myself in the scenery as more than an observer. As the author suggested, I found it helpful to focus on the feelings and experience of things more than the visuals themselves. Certain aspects of the imagination session would become really clear and colorful after a while even if the surroundings were vague. As for immersing myself... I ended up miming various actions physically while my eyes were closed lol. It really did help a lot with getting into it, but given my klutzy nature it's a miracle I didn't smack into something.

I did have a lot of intense symbology come up, some new and some from a variety of old dreams. As a matter of fact, it seems to have affected at least a few of my dreams following the sessions, with those same symbols showing up together in dreams as if they're taking off from where I left them during active imagination.

Just wanted to share a little poem excerpt from a character in one of the active imagination sessions (I do not normally write poems):
Look not where your eyes cannot see,
Be not where your body cannot be,
Touch not what your hands cannot grasp,
Think not what your mind cannot understand.

The message is pretty much the opposite of my conscious tendencies. That is, I'm very much "in my head" most the time. I've spent much of my hiatus from focusing on dreaming trying to be more practical and go beyond "Who am I?" to "Who am I in the context of the world around me?" I certainly experienced some personal growth from that, but it was diminishing returns over time. I felt more and more like something was seriously missing, so I decided to reconnect with my inner world. Only to have it essentially tell me that I need to be more grounded and stop trying to intellectualize everything. Go figure. Perhaps I'll want to shift my focus to applying new insights in waking life as the author repeatedly suggested after all... It seems like such a common sense point, but it really can be a challenge.

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

Have you ever had the experience of the shadow figure, once you express acceptance/love for it, merging into your body?

I haven't had that experience with the shadow yet, but that does sound like the natural progression. In the past I've gone from being absolutely terrified and fleeing for my life to hanging out with it like we were buddies

Originally Posted by DarkestDarkness

Finally, I think it's interesting that the author did not mention lucid dreams at all; perhaps he's never had them, I don't know. But in my mind, he could have certainly included the topic in this book, somewhere in-between Dream Work and Active Imagination.

Yes, it also struck me that lucid dreaming was somewhere between the two - it's especially similar to active imagination in that the conscious and subconscious parts of the mind are "meeting" relatively directly, except perhaps it's more like bringing images from the subconscious into conscious awareness while lucid dreaming is bringing consciousness into an existing inner landscape.

But this is actually something I was curious to hear about other LDer's opinions on since the book doesn't address lucid dreaming; how could active imagination be used to supplement lucid dreaming practice? I feel like it has a ton of potential beyond what's already described. For instance, maybe it could be used to practice dream control techniques, creating more vivid visualizations/experiences, or dream incubation in general.

Hey guys, awesome posts about this book. Really love the amount of interaction and thought going into this selection's thread. Just wanted to shout out that we will beginning the next one in about a week.

If there are any new suggestions, please add them to the suggestion thread

So reading this today. I really enjoyed his section on integrating ritual into our lives to honor our dreams. I've heard about this before from Robert Moss. This takes it to a new level, I definitely want to do more of this. There's a sense of love and gratitude given back to the unconscious when we do these sorts of things. That feeling, I think, causes more connection to our dreams, and can only help with recall or lucidity. For example, I had a lucid dream where I cast a teleportation spell, using a piece of chalk to draw a circle on the sidewalk to stand in. The next day, I actually got a piece of chalk and drew the circle, right where it was in my dream. It doesn't do anything, but it made me really happy. Or dreaming about prickly pears, and then buying some at the store. Little things like that.

I also really enjoyed his dream interpretation about the robbery and becoming friends with the robbers. I felt that he really hit the nail with his interpretation. LOVED that, because it helps me to see new ways of looking at dream symbols (for example, how he interprets everything, including his dream setting). And you can see, everything does have some symbolic meaning. Nothing put in our dreams is meaningless (unless perhaps it's day residue). This is great.

Now.. to get back to the book.

Finished this book today. Here are some thoughts on the Active Imagination section.

I don't like how he differentiates and describes active imagination, passive daydreaming, and guided meditation. Either my experiences are just different than his, or he's slightly off on some things.

1. Passive daydreaming he describes as being all unconscious focused and very little ego involvement. This is opposite. Daydreaming is our own mind's creation - yet absolutely influenced by our unconscious. It's the ego's involvement without a response from the unconscious. Mostly because our mind is a little too awake OR because we lack the belief or sensitivity to catch the unconscious intrusions.

2. Guided meditation can absolutely become, or set the stage for, active imagination. I've done this before, in a new age spirituality church. We were all doing a group meditation session with a guided tape. Afterwards we went around and everyone described their experiences. Some people actually projected, which is crazy awesome in my mind! Not me, though. What I experienced were intrusions from the unconscious. So, like, I'm imagining the setting being described, then I'm looking around and suddenly see my daughter next to me. That was not from "me". But she was there with a message for me. So, I don't like his dismissal of guided meditation because in the right setting, it can be a launching pad for inner work.


I love how he talks about active imagination. It is indeed the meeting between ego and unconscious, much like lucid dreaming. It's a real thing. I love doing this. You can absolutely play in your own mind, and the unconscious/subconscious will play with you. It's not all ego. It's not all you. It requires a meditative state of mind, very relaxed, but not alseep.

I also love how he describes hallucinations in a positive sense. I've experienced them, too, only a couple times, but once it was so strong I thought it was real. During my stay at the psyche ward, the first night, after I woke up, I saw the whole bed went from white sheets to suddenly as if a corpse had been laying on it. The areas where my hands and feet were, were the most affected, as if I had stakes through them and they bled onto the sheets. It didn't feel bad, it felt amazingly good. I knew this was not true, but my eyes deceived me. I realized later it symbolized my "death" and now rebirth. It was a true hallucination. I kept that to myself while I was there.

Ok, I tried out his active imagination technique with a dream character last night (I had never thought to do that before). I wanted to know what part of myself he represented. Here's the dream:

I witness a gorilla and a huge raven being torn apart by a man. He walks away after defeating both of them[intelligence being defeated?]. Then, I am in the grocery store, checking out, the cashier says "Harrison.. that's his name. Or Alison. Alison." Everyone is talking about this man who's loose on the streets. I get to my car, and get in. For some reason, I hop in the back seat as I put the groceries away[Backseat = not in control]. Suddenly, the man approaches my car, and I try to lock the doors. I am a second too late, he has his arm in the door now [My efforts to stop this were not strong enough]. I threaten him, telling him if he doesn't get out of here, I'll bite him. He is trying to get in my driver's seat [He wants to take control].


OK. I woke up very afraid, this was a nightmare. I already had a good idea what it might be about. The night before I impulsively bought a bunch of candles - strange book-related scents (old books, libraries, blacksmith forge, lord of the rings themes, etc.). I went to bed very guilty. I knew I should be more responsible with my money, and I usually am. However, I was overtaken with this feeling of obsession over these weird candles, how I was going to burn them while listening to books, and looking at pictures of book nooks and home libraries. Here's the dialogue:

Me: Who are you?

Man: Book publisher.

Me: What do you want?

Man: A library.

Me: How am I supposed to get you that?

Man: You need to sponsor me.

Me: And how do I sponsor you?

Man: You have to pay.

That was all I got before I fell back asleep. I will attempt to continue the discussion later, in a hopes of finding some resolution. Anyways, I just figured I'd share my story with the technique!

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

I don't like how he differentiates and describes active imagination, passive daydreaming, and guided meditation. Either my experiences are just different than his, or he's slightly off on some things.

I suppose this is a small point but it did get me thinking.

Some of what the author said doesn't line up with how I view things, just as some of the things you mention in the same post as the bit I quote from you also don't line up for me, either. I can't imagine that my descriptions of things always line up or make sense to others too.

To be honest, I feel that we can't always manage to line up our subjective experiences to how others might describe the same experiences from their point of view. What's interesting about this to me is that the author was likely content enough with his own experiences and with how he described them and we are probably all fairly content with how we describe our own experiences, I would think. *And at the same time we can relate to aspects about these things, even partially if nothing else.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I wouldn't necessarily accept someone else's description of a "term" as a fact for what that term may mean, as all these complex experiences and everything that goes with them, all the intuitive aspects... To try and condense it all into just one or two words, I personally think it's trying to really stretch a word to its limit and basically welcomes open interpretation of what a term may mean and that can be both positive and negative, depends on the context. In any case, I feel this way about a lot of what I read in some books or from some authors. I just chalk it up to the fact that they view things differently from me and that's not necessarily a negative anyway.

Though, as I said before, for me what he describes as Active Imagination was already familiar to me, it's just that previously I didn't even have a term I could use for it, other than maybe Visualisation and even that term is fairly recent for me.

And I quite liked reading all of your and nautilus' thoughts here on this thread. I will be looking at the next book in the club when I get a chance to do so.

I agree with DarkestDarkness that the term definitions could easily differ from person to person. I'm wondering if the way "active imagination" is defined could vary somewhat based on how easily an individual enters a particular state, too. For instance, MoonageDaydream described active imagination as requiring a meditative state, but for me I can pretty much just sit down and close my eyes and my imagination starts up right away (although the visuals aren't as clear as they might be in a dream). If anything I have to work harder at turning it off again, which is why I found the suggestion of creating a ritual to get in and out of the session really helpful - so that I can cue my mind when I'm finished. I think while people may be able to enter similar states, they likely differ in how easily they can enter particular ones. Kind of like how some people are more receptive to hypnosis than others. So, if we're trying to define active imagination by the balance between level of consciousness and unconsciousness, it can get a little tricky to pin down and measure exactly what that balance is. Especially if we're using how easily one enters the state as part of the definition.

P.S. Did this remind anyone else of playing make believe as a kid?

Originally Posted by nautilus

P.S. Did this remind anyone else of playing make believe as a kid?

It did not for me, but that's an interesting point to raise. For me, "make believe" as a child didn't feel any different from the regular experience of reality so I can't say there were any specific thresholds at which I was "in" that mode or "out" of it... Or it would have been very gradual, if anything. I'll have to think more about this.

On the rest of what you said, since I read the book and have thought about it, I have had a few very casual "active imagination" situations where certain characters more or less come up to me when I'm in the middle of something (I tried to cultivate this idea for a while first); it's not really visually clear but there is some of that less-than-conscious voice more present than usual during those moments. I haven't felt the need for a specific ritual to get in/out of this but I haven't tried allowing it to come at a quiet time quite so much, mostly because I haven't had a chance for it.

On the other hand, I do have an incredibly specific ritual to get into quite a similar but deeper state where I have had the direct un/sub-conscious dialogues but it takes a few factors to be right and I need to have about 2 hours time free and uninterrupted for it.

Originally Posted by nautilus

I agree with DarkestDarkness that the term definitions could easily differ from person to person. I'm wondering if the way "active imagination" is defined could vary somewhat based on how easily an individual enters a particular state, too. For instance, MoonageDaydream described active imagination as requiring a meditative state, but for me I can pretty much just sit down and close my eyes and my imagination starts up right away (although the visuals aren't as clear as they might be in a dream). If anything I have to work harder at turning it off again, which is why I found the suggestion of creating a ritual to get in and out of the session really helpful - so that I can cue my mind when I'm finished. I think while people may be able to enter similar states, they likely differ in how easily they can enter particular ones. Kind of like how some people are more receptive to hypnosis than others. So, if we're trying to define active imagination by the balance between level of consciousness and unconsciousness, it can get a little tricky to pin down and measure exactly what that balance is. Especially if we're using how easily one enters the state as part of the definition.

P.S. Did this remind anyone else of playing make believe as a kid?

For clarification, when you describe your interactions, you are getting messages from the unconscious, or from imagination coming from you? I think it's the former, but I wanted to be sure.

If so, it's really cool that you can hear/see the unconscious in a more active, alert state of mind. I don't get that very often (every now and then I will hear a voice in broad daylight coming from the unconscious, but it's pretty rare). However, in a meditative or half-sleep state, it comes more easily (as voices I can hear).

Hmm, the more we talk about this, the more it gets me thinking.

Originally Posted by DarkestDarkness

I have had a few very casual "active imagination" situations where certain characters more or less come up to me when I'm in the middle of something (I tried to cultivate this idea for a while first); it's not really visually clear but there is some of that less-than-conscious voice more present than usual during those moments.

Interesting. I had something like that happen a day or two after one of my active imagination sessions. It's like I could sense one of the characters from that previous session internally, like it wanted my attention. It was more of a visceral feeling than a thought for me though. I was actually a little worried it might start making me snappy if I ignored it for too long. I ended up doing a brief active imagination session that day with the character and it cleared up the feeling.

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

For clarification, when you describe your interactions, you are getting messages from the unconscious, or from imagination coming from you? I think it's the former, but I wanted to be sure.

If so, it's really cool that you can hear/see the unconscious in a more active, alert state of mind. I don't get that very often (every now and then I will hear a voice in broad daylight coming from the unconscious, but it's pretty rare). However, in a meditative or half-sleep state, it comes more easily (as voices I can hear).

Yes, it's the former. The messages are coming from other characters and not being consciously generated. However, the images and speech-type messages are not super clear from a sense perception standpoint. It feels like a step or two beyond "thoughts in my head". The main tip off that I'm not consciously planning the other characters' responses is that I'm surprised by what I see and hear and the characters' personalities don't really match my day to day self perception. (Even though, technically speaking, they are part of me.) It seems like the sense peceptions do become stronger and clearer as the active imagination session goes on, especially once I allow myself to become immersed and let go of the constant "am I doing this right?" line of thinking in the background.

I've only had full blown audio hallucinations on a couple occassions, where it sounded like I was hearing an external voice and my only indication to the contrary was context. I knew what was happening, but it was certainly a strange feeling to have that audio that I knew only I was hearing super imposed over other waking life sense perceptions. What's more common for me, too, is that experience of having conversations in my head while in the half asleep state - especially on the way out of sleep. It would sound nearly as clear as if there were physical speech by myself and other voices. Sort of like really "loud" thoughts. Then I'd wake up, mostly, realize no one had spoken aloud and think, "What? Wow I could swear I was having a conversation with someone just now..." Sometimes I can stay in that muddy, in-between state for a while and extend the perception for several minutes by sort of blinking in and out of physical awareness. Unfortunately recall on content is generally pretty terrible once I wake fully. Does any of that sound similar to what you experience?


I wonder how much the clarity of sense perceptions influences the sense that "I'm really talking to my subconcious/the unconscious/some specific aspect of myself right now"? I feel like in dreams, it's common to rank the vividness of the dream (sense perception and perhaps emotional intensity) separately from the lucidity (level of conscious awareness). Perhaps it makes sense to do something similar for waking and in between states as well? If so I'd say I can personally reach the balance between consciousness/unconsciousness (lucidity level) during an active imagination session very quickly, but I struggle with the vividness more.

Originally Posted by nautilus

I've only had full blown audio hallucinations on a couple occassions, where it sounded like I was hearing an external voice and my only indication to the contrary was context. I knew what was happening, but it was certainly a strange feeling to have that audio that I knew only I was hearing super imposed over other waking life sense perceptions. What's more common for me, too, is that experience of having conversations in my head while in the half asleep state - especially on the way out of sleep. It would sound nearly as clear as if there were physical speech by myself and other voices. Sort of like really "loud" thoughts. Then I'd wake up, mostly, realize no one had spoken aloud and think, "What? Wow I could swear I was having a conversation with someone just now..." Sometimes I can stay in that muddy, in-between state for a while and extend the perception for several minutes by sort of blinking in and out of physical awareness. Unfortunately recall on content is generally pretty terrible once I wake fully. Does any of that sound similar to what you experience?

Yeah, pretty similar. Although, I do hear a fair bit at night, even accents sometimes. But often, it's more like you described. Like a thought impression. It's like, like listening to music, and hearing the harmony that's not there. You know what I mean?

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

I half wonder if it's because I started learning about the animus a few years back, that I started to have one in my dreams. Who's to know?

Yes, the shadow is definitely real, too! I have experienced the same thing you describe. Sometimes the shadowy figure turns into a person, who has a message for me. Sometimes it transforms into a friendly animal or myself.

Have you ever had the experience of the shadow figure, once you express acceptance/love for it, merging into your body?

Thank you so much for all the references. I also incorporate some Jungian thought into the way I see things. The shadow can definitely be encountered and provides a great opportunity for self-integration via lucid dreaming. It can truly be transformative.

As far as I can tell, the dream world is a visual reification of our thoughts, memories, preoccupations, emotional content, mental abstractions and that which tends to reside in our subconscious minds. Lucid dreaming can give us conscious access to that vast, mental reservoir, potentially leading to self-integration. We can easily identify aspects of our selves, and exploring the mindscape is definitely akin to 'knowing thyself' as they say. We could even meet the concept of a higher self.

I'm still learning in this journey. I've just come across Holecek and his concept of dreams of light. He tells us reality is made of light, and it is how we see it. In dreams, where do the photons come from? Like in the real world, they are massless and intrinsic.

Originally Posted by MoonageDaydream

Yeah, pretty similar. Although, I do hear a fair bit at night, even accents sometimes. But often, it's more like you described. Like a thought impression. It's like, like listening to music, and hearing the harmony that's not there. You know what I mean?

Yes, exactly