What exactly is a dream /about/ being lucid?

And how is it different from a normal lucid dream? Is it the same as an uncontrolled lucid, or what?

I'm seeing these threads again lately, and I thought it had died down. All I've seen anyone say is that a lucid dream is when you actually are lucid, and a dream about being lucid is when you are dreaming that you are lucid. Is this just the people talking who think that normal dreams are somehow when you are completely unconscious, and lucid dreams are when you become conscious without waking up? Or is it that if you have a thought that you are lucid or don't hear a thought but know anyway? Because I don't partition my thoughts that way. I asked this the last time "dreaming about being lucid" was the hot topic, but never got a straight answer.

What's the deal? How can you dream that you are lucid without actually being lucid?

The only difference(for me) between dreaming of being lucid and actually being lucid is that in a lucid, I will feel that I have some level of control and I'm participating in all actions that I take during the dream.

In a dream of lucidity, it's strange..like my consciousness has become passive, and I'm watching myself do everything. Does that make sense? It's a strange feeling for me, and hard to explain..

So, you consider it a dream about being lucid if you, that is, the thinking you, knows you are lucid, but just watches while your dream body wanders about through the dream?

Sometimes I know that I'm lucid. Other times it will be those dreams where something's happening and eventually the "screen" will zoom out and you realize you're watching a television or something.

Though other times I am aware that I'm dreaming. It's just that I(thinking me) can't get the functioning me to realize it.

I also had once or twice this 'false-lucid dream'. It is actually a very, very strange thing and also difficult to dessribe. Imagine you are dreaming, and in this dream you are dreaming, too. A dream within a dream. And in this 'dream within a dream' you realise that it is a dream, but only with relation to the dream reality, not to the 'real' reality. You believe that reality is the dream world.
Well, I've got a notion that I perfectly understand the nature of this 'false-lucid' phenomenon, but can't find the right words... You are lucid, but only in the 'dream-like' sense and so you also act in a dream-like way... OK, I suppose you don't get what I mean...

Maybe look at it like this. You are dreaming. You become lucid. You have some fun with LD. Finally, you wake up. And then you just wake up, once again ... Maybe I should say... die...? And after death, you're still alive, only you realise that all your life was a dream. So all your lucid dreams in life were only 'false-lucids'.
I think that the reason for this 'false-lucid' thing is the nature of human awareness. Very complex... And probably awareness is infinite and unlimited, in a way, it can't comprehend itself, surpass itself...
Hope my answer will make easier for you to understand what is a 'false-lucid' dream. Cheers

EDIT: Yet another analogy that came to my mind to explain this. Imagine that you have a dream that you are... for example... a priest. Doesn't really matter. Anyway, you would do some stupid and irrational things as a priest in a dream, because your reality is also irrational and deprived of logic. If you were a priest in reality, you would surely act in a different way. Now only replace priest with being lucid.

IMO a dream about being lucid is a dream where your dream self proclaims "Oh, it's just a dream, so __________" but you don't actually understand or comprehend what it means that it is just a dream- that you are dreaming, that nothing around you is real, that everything is potentially controllable, and that there are no consequences to your actions because you are in a dream. It's just a random statement of lucidity without you actually being lucid in a dream. A DC could shout it at you to the same effect, or actually probably with more effect because if a DC says it to you there's always the chance that you might reality check.

In fact, if the phrase "Oh it's just a dream, so we can dance with the trashcans" could have 'dream' replaced with 'burrito' and make no difference whatsoever in the purpose of the sentence or to the dream, then it's certainly not a lucid dream.

But as soon as you understand that you are dreaming, that you are asleep and that you are in a dream inside your head, and that nothing around you is real, to me that is lucidity. A lot of people also don't consider it a lucid dream for some reason if they have shoddy dream control. Sorry guys, you just have shoddy dream control. As long as you truly understand that you're dreaming, it's a lucid dream.

Lots of people get this, especially when they're new and getting close to actual success. Possibly an influx of newbies, but yea DV goes through it's useless phases. I'm just glad people aren't talking about sex, DGs, etc. anymore. DV is just like the media. Damn fads :(

I agree with everything Shift has said. I just wanted to add that I find that there is a difference between "myself" in a dream and "my persona." By "persona" I refer to the character I am portraying in my dream, not myself but that's where my point of view currently is. I've had a dream where my persona knew she was in a dream, but I was not consciously aware that I was dreaming. That was the difference for me.

If you are consciously aware that you are in a dream, it's a full-fledged lucid dream. Different people categorize lucidity differently, but for my opinion, see my published works.... (ie. check the other threads related to the topic which I've posted in.)

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Originally Posted by Shift

Lots of people get this, especially when they're new and getting close to actual success. Possibly an influx of newbies, but yea DV goes through it's useless phases. I'm just glad people aren't talking about sex, DGs, etc. anymore. DV is just like the media. Damn fads :(

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Ha! No joke. At least it's better than the rash of "Staff is evil and must die" threads we've had in the past.

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Originally Posted by Amethyst Star

I've had a dream where my persona knew she was in a dream, but I was not consciously aware that I was dreaming. That was the difference for me.

Ha! No joke. At least it's better than the rash of "Staff is evil and must die" threads we've had in the past.

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Exactly. It's like watching a movie character go "Oh, I'm dreaming so this should work..." and you don't realize that it really is just something you're watching on a movie, and the implications, because you're so caught up in the story that you forget it's just on a screen. Even when I have personal awareness, just like I do now, I sometimes proclaim to know I'm dreaming without actually realizing or understanding that I'm dreaming.

And YEA! Well, at least that stuff usually keeps itself off topic.

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Ha! No joke. At least it's better than the rash of "Staff is evil and must die" threads we've had in the past.

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Agreed. By the way, don't you think that staff is evil and must die?

Your eplanations of this false-lucid are great, much better than mine, actually.

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Your eplanations of this false-lucid are great, much better than mine, actually.

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He's right! congratulations! you win a banana...
...
...
but ok, that explanation was perfectly done...so know, I'm sure that I had at least like 8 False Lucid Dreams...they are so confusing!

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Originally Posted by Nick89

Agreed. By the way, don't you think that staff is evil and must die?

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Considering I've been a DG, Moderator, and Administrator, not particularly :D

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Originally Posted by Shift

Exactly. It's like watching a movie character go "Oh, I'm dreaming so this should work..." and you don't realize that it really is just something you're watching on a movie, and the implications, because you're so caught up in the story that you forget it's just on a screen. Even when I have personal awareness, just like I do now, I sometimes proclaim to know I'm dreaming without actually realizing or understanding that I'm dreaming.

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Okay, that makes sense. Those are what I call uncontrolled lucids (is there any difference between these and what other people call uncontrolled lucids, or are they the same thing?)

@Amethyst: Your explanation does really make a lot of sense, I'm usually seoprate from my dream self in uncontrolled/false lucids (sometimes controled lucids, and in a lot of nonlucids where I wasn;t myself).

You know, ever since I've come to Dream Views, I've been trying to wrap my head around this whole "dreaming of being lucid" thing that everyone keeps talking about. I've been pretty swayed toward the idea that there's really no such thing, and people are just confusing 0-to-low dream control over their own body and actions with not being lucid "enough" to count it as being lucid. The reason I've been thinking this, I gather, is because I don't have very many dreams or dream moments where I'm not in control of myself. I do have them, but they're definitely in the minority. Even in my non-lucids, I usually feel like I'm there and am making my own decisions (most of the time), so the idea of "knowing - and acting as if you know - you're dreaming, without being lucid" seemed kind of foreign to me.

Although, I just realized that I have had a couple of dreams where the dream me would be saying something, or doing something, and would be like (for example): "Such and such doesn't matter, because this is only a dream." It would be said without my preliminary, conscious awareness that this actually was a dream, so I actually do understand where some of you are coming from. The only thing is, every time this happens (and I mean every time), I become fully lucid, right then and there, like I'm being instantly dropped into, well, a movie - to use the analogy that Shift used. It's instantaneous - like a light switching on.

But I can't say I've ever had a dream play out, after my dream self implies that it knows this to be a dream, without actually becoming lucid (as best as I can remember). Looking back on this, though, I actually see how 'dreaming of being lucid' is possible.

Bit of a revelation, on my part. Heh.

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Originally Posted by Nick89

Imagine you are dreaming, and in this dream you are dreaming, too. A dream within a dream. And in this 'dream within a dream' you realise that it is a dream, but only with relation to the dream reality, not to the 'real' reality. You believe that reality is the dream world.

Yet another analogy that came to my mind to explain this. Imagine that you have a dream that you are... for example... a priest. Doesn't really matter. Anyway, you would do some stupid and irrational things as a priest in a dream, because your reality is also irrational and deprived of logic. If you were a priest in reality, you would surely act in a different way. Now only replace priest with being lucid.

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This is exactly it! I've only ever had one dream of being lucid (although I've talked about lucid dreaming during NDs and I've also got into a bed during a dream and WILDed).

It is really hard to explain, but I'll try to describe the situation and my thoughts. I will put my thoughts in quotation marks and italics:

In my dream about being lucid I was standing in a nightclub on the dance floor. I did not know that the nightclub was a dream. In other words, I was not lucid, I was accepting the nightclub as reality. I was the only person on the dance floor. Classical music suddenly started playing and immediately I began dancing. I noticed my body was lighter than it should be making me very floaty. I thought "Ah, it feels like I'm in a lucid dream. In fact, I think I am temporarily really in one because my brain wants to practise for next time I really am in a lucid dream". A woman was watching me and I said to her "Look, my brain is simulating a lucid dream, see how beautifully I can dance when it's only a dream". Then I saw someone I had not seen for a long time and continued with my normal, nonlucid dream. I simply stopped dancing and went over to talk to her.

:)

I think it's similar to insomniacs. Most insomniacs who claim they don't sleep a wink, when observed under laboratory conditions, were found to actually sleep soundly for most of the night, even though they would argue vehemently that they hadn't. At least until they were shown video of themselves sleeping. The conclusion they drew from this? They were dreaming that they were tossing and turning in bed!

Personally, I judge the quality of my lucids by how wrapped up in the dream plot I am. As long as I have a detachment from the dream story, I know it's not important because it's not real, then that's a quality lucid.

On the other hand, if I'm lucid, but still worried that zombies are taking over the world, then that's a crap lucid. Or if I actually care about what DCs think, or feel I have to stop some villain for reasons other than fun or practicing control.

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Originally Posted by The Cusp

Personally, I judge the quality of my lucids by how wrapped up in the dream plot I am. As long as I have a detachment from the dream story, I know it's not important because it's not real, then that's a quality lucid.

On the other hand, if I'm lucid, but still worried that zombies are taking over the world, then that's a crap lucid. Or if I actually care about what DCs think, or feel I have to stop some villain for reasons other than fun or practicing control.

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Even better said :goodjob2:

That very question has had me pondering for a very long time. Then, a few days ago, for the very first time, I may have experienced it to a limited extent. Somehow I was in a dream, KNEW that I could hover for some reason yet did not go "Ah HA, I'm in a lucid dream" as I normally do. It was very strange and perhaps I was indeed dreaming that I was in a dream. That raises a question,

"What happens when in a lucid dream you lie down, go to sleep and .. dream?"

and then, in THAT dream you lie down, go to sleep and dream? Infinite recursion loop?

How about looking at it this way:

Lucid dreaming isn't thinking "this is a lucid dream" (although that is one possible element of a lucid dream - it is not the defining characteristic)

it is KNOWING that this is a lucid dream.

It's a subtle difference but vital.

I think people are more prone to these non-lucid dreams about "what it's like to be lucid" when they define thier lucid dreams by what is possible in a lucid dream. And NOT by thier clear state of conscious awareness within a dream. A lucid dream isnt WHAT YOU CAN DO, but a clear headed knowing.

Being able to fly around may be a possibility in a lucid dream, but dreaming you are flying and thinking "well i can only fly in lucid dreams"... in some groggy, habitual thought pattern... isn't a very lucid lucid dream.

I would say what people are experiencing is low level, or pre-lucid dreams.
Dreams where your mind is coming to the right conclusions, to some extent, but is not clear headed enough to grasp the full meaning of the conclusion.

Next time you're drunk, try and remember what it's like to be sober.
It's the same kind of thing as a low-lucid or pre-lucid dream. You're judging things by a criteria and clouded mind that make it impossible to comprehend the true meaning of these things, because if you did, you'd BE SOBER (or lucid).

The THEME of your dream can be anything.
But the definition between lucid dreaming and dreaming can be only one
thing: Lucid, aware thinking.

Don't mistake the fruit for the tree.

here is my example of a dream about being lucid

all of my examples start out as I am falling asleep. It's like a very passive WILD. my thoughts are random, distant, incoherent as I fall asleep, just like the HI's that I watch so passively, morphing every moment. I'm not even trying to WILD.

the HI's begin to reflect my own thoughts, forming what I am daydreaming about. But I don't even realize it

something catches my attention, and my thoughts change
"wouldn't it be cool if I was dreaming?"

and then I start to think about all sorts of things I like to do in lucid dreams. so I'm daydreaming about lucidity. But as I daydream about lucidity. . . I start to perform the very actions I'm daydreaming about. but it all goes over my head

I'll even fly from point A to point B thinking "I wish I was dreaming right now so I could fly". But I don't see my action of flying, as flying in a dream. It was just a visualization of flying.

Before I could still feel the heaviness of my sleeping body. The HI itself is fuzzy, theres no sound, and no sense of 'space' or depth. It's flat feeling. No real sense of movement. But the more I daydream and interact with my HI, the more solid it becomes until it becomes a full dream environment. It's when it becomes a real dream that I finally become lucid

but my passive wilds are really unstable, so I usually wake up moments later

i have the same doubt as you before , i just had my first LD and i say lucid dreaming is when your dream is freewill being controlled at that moment! ok So basically to me , its just like the real world NOW but just in another different dimension. All past memories can affect my lucid dreaming.