Talking to others about Lucid Dreaming

[Night Wolf]

So I started a small part-time job today and found myself thinking all day about lucid dreaming (as you do). I was talking to this other guy I was working with, just banter really. All the time I found myself wanting to blurt out "So, do you know what lucid dreaming is?", or something to that affect. I never did, because of one question that kept running through my head. The question was this: If I start "preaching"about lucid dreaming, does that make me any better than someone "preaching" about their religion? I can't see much difference to be honest. The way I see it, I have found something that I want everyone to be able to enjoy, and that I want to tell everyone about (LDing). By telling someone about it I believe that I would be doing them a favour, because let's face it, LDing rocks. It's the same as someone wanting to share their religion, for example lets say a Christian wanting to "save" a non-Christian from eternal damnation. They see they are doing someone a great favour, and don't see that they are actually selling something. I would like to hear people's comments about this, and I'm sorry if this post is in the wrong place, but I fear the Religion section, and I want a wider selection of responses. Feel free to move this guys!

[evolo]

To each his own.

[Sortilegio]

Originally posted by Night Wolf but I fear the Religion section lol, I thought the same when I joined the forum . Well an idealist job is to always be what their ideal is, if your ideal is to lucid dream, you shouldn't be afraid of sharing it with others. Now, trying to convince someone of something will be more up to the persons moral issues, and the acceptance of the others to yours ideals and willingness to join you, in the end, I think you could talk about it without trying to teach the other unless they want to and express it that way without you proposing it. Its a question of how you afront the issue

[StickFigure]

I say go 4 it. Everyones facinated by their dreams and if they could, they'd talk about'em all day long too. Everyone I've "preached" to has taken a real deep interest in it and I've told just about everyone I've ever chatted with. People love talking about their dreams because they're so damn unexplainable. I have YET to find someone that doesnt like talking about dreams.

[tryured]

Yea when I first started getting into lucid dreaming my friends couldn't shut me up from talking about it, but in the last 6 months I have calmed down. They are aware that it can be done, if they want to investigate further into it, that is something that is up to them to decide.

[Neruo]

Just Tell everyone you want about lucid dreaming, but unlike religious people, keep it subjective. Don't say:'You realy REALY have to try, otherwise you will mis out on a lot and you will die of cancer." Just say that You enjoy it. But allso like tell that you have to be motivated and such to be doing it.

[AlternateReality]

Religion: Salvation from eternal damnation. LDing: Happier mornings. well you tell me. doesn't seem much different than telling somebody that a product or service works really well. "You should try Dish Network, it has a buncha movie channels and you can pause live tv." "You should try LDing, it has a buncha movies you can reenact and you can pause life." lol

[Enigma13]

I personally don't see much relationship. I've already told some of my friends about it, but they just called me a freak. Their loss. To be honest if someone had told me about LDing (rather than me finding out) I probably wouldn't have tried it. This is just due to my loner nature.

[Citrusponge]

There's no more need for 'preaching' about lucid dreaming than there is for 'preaching' about videogames or chocolate icecream. Feel free to mention it to anyone, discuss it like any other topic. If they're not interested then don't make an annoyance of yourself by incessently banging on about it.

[PhowaBoy]

The Buddhist tradition I study recommends that you don't really talk about Buddhism with anyone unless they ask, or they're people that won't be offended or put off by what you're saying. Even then, you then have to come up with conversation that you feel is suitable, and won't freak them out too much. Might be a good approach for talking about LD'ing too.

[Night Wolf]

Originally posted by Neruo Just Tell everyone you want about lucid dreaming, but unlike religious people, keep it subjective. Don't say:'You realy REALY have to try, otherwise you will mis out on a lot and you will die of cancer.\" LOL, you said it. I was thinking some more about it today, and what I came up with is that lucid dreaming is actually a skill that is left usually untapped in most people, not like religion which is based on one's own views. Now this obviously deosn't mean that gives you the right to go round sticking it in people's faces, but to casually mention that such a skill is possible and has been proven to exist doesn't seem too bad. Although, as some of you said, some people would rather find out about by themselves, and don't like the idea of someone telling them a lot of 'nonsensical' jibberish. The only problem is that it's hard not to get excited when you talk about it! I would love to be able to give my friends and such the experince of LDing, but it's hard to get them interested. It's as if they've heard of it before, but don't realise how awesome it can be!

[bamf]

Yes, I agree with how it can feel weird to try and share this with other people. From experience, people think I'm crazy just for talking about this. I don't want to sound like I'm preaching, and I know that that is what it may seem like to a person indifferent to LDing. When I suggest reading the website, people see how "long" it is, and just dismiss it as some new-age trend, almost like it's a bad thing, like a cult or something of the sort. BUT, if we don't tell people of some of the aspects of LDing, they will never learn, unless they "stumble" upon it, like I did, with Mozilla Stumbleupon... Wow. A suggestion is to not make it seem as if you are preaching, just letting someone know about something cool, like a friend would tell another friend about something else "cool".

[wombing]

i've thrown it out there to many people i know. i suppose you just have to limit yourself to people who you think might be interested. every person i have mentioned it to has shown some interest, and a few even want to borrow "exploring the world of lucid dreaming" from me. but then, i definitely haven't mentioned it to my old man, who's about as close-minded as a person can get. meh, his loss... i usually just say "hey, you ever heard of lucid dreaming?", and then, when they say no , something like "oh. well, basically, its the ability to become aware while dreaming-like, as aware as you are right now, talking to me- and maintain that awareness. its like being able to create your own universe every time you dream, once you get the hang of it...i've been experimenting, and i've had six of them so far, including one where i flew off into the sky like superman" i mean, shit. how could anybody NOT find that interesting?

[danbarber]

I felt kind of weird when I told my friends about it, most of them ignored it, one of them accused me of practicing magic! . I quickly told him that it was all about psychology not magic.

[Ex Nine]

I've done all manners of preaching and, although it does interest some people, it does cause them to have an LD. I say let them find out on their own.