Thread: This question has been on my mind for quite some time....

Lol, of course your in control, the very fact that you know your dreaming makes you counscious, and you are in a lucid state, so you can't dream about lucid dreaming, because if you dreamed about it you would be dreaming about realizing your awake, then becoming awake, I hope you understand that big lump of stuff I just wrote lol

Edit: man I am a HORRIBLE speller lol

What if we are just dreaming ABOUT controling a dream?[/b]

I've heard questions like this a couple of times..
Firstly, I've tested the fact that I can decide the night before what I want to do. In fact thats what a lot of us do anyway

Now.. whether we are controlling the dream IN the dream, or BEFORE the dream.. it really doesnt matter much ... but it seems impossible to pre-arrange the dream beforehand, since our subconscious has such a large part in it (and is at play when asleep).

What about believing we controlled a dream AFTER we already wake up?
Simple answer - no, we aren't. There have been tests done on subjects.
Remember that in REM sleep, your eyes are still able to be controlled.
So what they did was test that they can respond to light by moving their eyes in pre-agreed ways.

And they did. (lucid of course)
My conclusion - we are controlling our dreams, inside our dreams...

My conclusion - we are controlling our dreams, inside our dreams...[/b]

Well yea when you strip it down to your subconscious, but we don't know were doing it until we become lucid, I'm confused are you still saying that if we dream about being lucid that we would go lucid?

No - I'm just saying that what we understand as lucid dreams - and what we experience - is the dinkum thing most of the time.
No funny things like 'Oh, I fooled myself to THINK I was lucid and in control, but wasn't really - it was all just a trick'

I don't see the problem. If I want to fly, and i'm flying , i'm happy. So even if I dream that my dream is being controlled, but in that dream I did everything I wanted to, I'm satisfied

But still, you could be wright. Why is life so mysterious

Originally posted by Light
I don't see the problem. If I want to fly, and i'm flying , i'm happy. So even if I dream that my dream is being controlled, but in that dream I did everything I wanted to, I'm satisfied *

Lol that's a good way to look at it.

There's been a few topics like this in the past, but like Placebo said there's been tests to disprove the theory.

If you use your common sense any way you look at it, it would still be lucid dreaming. Lucid is when you are conciously manipulating your dream. You would still be doing that even if your mind is making you think that you are in control. If you get what you want in the end, that means you are still in control.

I've had similar thoughts about lucid dreaming but in a slightly differently way. Many current studies are showing that memory is horrendously unreliable. In fact it is quite common for our brains to stitch pieces of memories together, resulting in new memories.

Throughout our lives, the brain never records direct information that we recieve from our surroundings. There is just too much information to process and our brains would be overloaded. To compensate, our brain filters information by comparing it to past experiences. This is how we are capable of understanding, learning and making important connections between ideas and concepts. It allows for creativity.

Anyways, my point is what if we only remember being in control of our dreams, but when the dream was happening we weren't actually in control?

Even more interestingly, some research shows that the thought and reasoning parts of our brain do not become active until the instant after we commit an action. This raises the question; are we ever really in control? Or is our life just a constant process of rationalizing actions that we had no choice to make in the first place?

Either way, whether we are actually in control or not, lucid dreaming is still the most fun you can have for free.

I just think your looking a little too deep in to the dream aspect! Just chill out and take it for what it is ok man! WERD!

Interesting thoughts bradybaker... but if we only constructed the memory of being in control, then how would you explain the interactive lucid dream experiment (as I call it)
That implies real time decision making (or near real time at least)

I do agree though, that SOME of the dreams may be constructed upon waking, to link up the odd threads of the dreams we have.
But the main bits seem for real....