Thread: Why Lucid Dreaming

Good question. The only thing that i can see is it's either a evolutionary dead-end. Or it will have some effect on people's mind, whether it be negative or positive.

I think one of the reasons we are able to lucid dream, is to reduce fear of phobias, etc. since we know it's a dream, and not reality.
I read somewhere that it is possible to reduce or even get rid of phobias by lucid dreaming.

Originally posted by Seeker
We lucid dream for a reason, why?

I think the question we should ask is why NOT lucid dream.

Lucid dream to grow spiritually, to know that alot more is possible than what we think on terms of everyday lives. Maybe lucid dreaming evolves us into a more accepting person, with a broader sense of the way things are. In absolute 'tiny' ways, could it save a person from suicide, or from being anti-social?

Originally posted by Seeker
If you are a believer in evolution, you know that all changes in an organism are an attempt to adapt or to impove the condition of that organism in it's current environment.

With all respect, Seeker, that's a rather mystical view of evolution. Organisms change because of copying errors in DNA and environmental mutagens like cosmic radiation. Changes that help an organism survive long enough to reproduce and/or lead to increased reproduction proliferate, changes that have no impact on reproduction hang around or not according to chance, and changes that decrease reproductivity (even if they're otherwise beneficial to survival) die out quickly.

There's no guiding intelligence making "an attempt to adapt." Also, not all existing traits represent "adaptations"--features that don't affect reproduction get passed on along with those that do. Turning evolution into a competing Creation story or a philosophy of life only makes it easier for traditionalists to refuse to adapt to the new information. This situation is dangerous when such people come into power and start making far-reaching decisions based on bad data.

That said, the topic of what use we can make of LDs as a species is a good one

I agree with others that they help us get some kinks out of our personalities by helping us explore our minds, and they open up possibilities of control and empowerment for individuals. I think taking responsibility for the content of our dreams can lead to a greater sense of responsibility for the content of our lives.

Is lucid dreaming hereditary?

I think that as the human race gets older, we acquire more brainpower. Why, some say that thousands of years ago, the concept of 'consciouness' didn't even exist! These days, we have philosophers galore, we explore consciousness deeper and deeper and keep coming up with new ideas. We also gain more abilities, ie Lucid Dreaming. To me, lucid dreaming is a skill (which I haven't quite mastered yet ;D).

Anyway, it's a good question to ask what it is that attracts us to dreaming. For me, I was simply so amazed that I'd never heard of it before that I had to try it myself to see if it was real.

Originally posted by LewisM
Is lucid dreaming hereditary?

I don't think you could think of it as truly hereditary. Probably more like alcoholism, you have a genetic propensity to lucid dream.

Everyone can do it, but it does seem easier for some. Some of you have met my cousin, she signed on here a few weeks ago. She is a natural and most of the time is lucid.

I on the other hand have just a few a week. My son has lucid dreams, but my wife and daughter have never had them.

So, other than working out the kinks in personality, what other survival benefits does lucid dreaming present? The major factor driving evolution is in a genetic trait helping the organism survive until the point at which it can reproduce.

Maybe lucid dreaming can keep you sane until you reproduce? Maybe it helps round out your personality and technique so that you can attract a mate?

I don't know, I still believe it's a glitch in the ming.

ok, ill post my thoughts.

Lucid dreaming is a side effect of a defense mechanism.

When we have nightmares, we become lucid in our dreams. This makes it easier for us not to become scared and we can exit the dream from this state if we wish.

Lucid dreaming is just this defense mechanism but, for lack of a better term, exploited.

Make sense?

i think this is the most down-to-earth view.

I agree with damascus, its one of the most logical answers.

You're describing one way of becoming lucid (via nightmares), but that doesn't explain the state of lucidity. For me, I started meditating and got in the habit of noticing how I was constructing reality while I was awake, and lucidity came when I did the same thing while dreaming.

I think that the possibility of lucidity is inherent in dreaming for a creature with any kind of self-reflective consciousness. Many shamanic cultures have practiced lucid dreaming as medicine, psychology, decision-making, and divination. Walking the dream-world (often seen as an aspect of the spirit-world or the afterlife) is one of the basic tools and qualifications of the shaman. Throughout history, wise cultures have turned to those who have increased their awareness of the workings of consciousness, whether waking or dreaming, for advice in all areas of life. If you dismiss dream lucidity as "a defense mechanism," you might as well chuck waking consciousness along with it.

I don't think that lucid dreaming is really the result of evolution, but a mix of consciousness and random gene mutations. Dreaming could certainly hold an evolutionary advantage, but the ability to lucid dream seems like more of an after-effect. If a relativley few people had the ability in the past, it wasn't really a trait of the human population in general, and therefor probably not a major piece of evolution when the general surivival of humans was at any great risk. Now, I could be wrong, and perhaps most people just didn't know they could dream. However, I still think it's mostly a side effect of dreaming and being conscious while awake.

Pretty much, I think lucid dreaming is just a lucky combination of different evolved traits. Certainly, in the modern lifestyle, it has all sorts of uses, and so could eventually become a trait that is passed on. What with enough stress being present to kill young, it provides a great way to unwind, as well as get a little more time to think, practice skills, and so on.

Well, I got some different thoughts on this.
To get at this question, you really have to start with why do we dream at all?
The rhythm of human life and consciousness is shaped by environmental factors. Solar and lunar cycles are very important elements. Sleep apparently developed as a down-time process to revitalize the brain and body, during the darkness of night. The brain was busy thinking about events of the previous day, identifying dangers, potential food sources, observations made about relationships between various things, etc. This all developed before we even had language. These thoughts were sort of pure, uncolored by language. They were experiential playbacks of waking events, sorting things out with a high level of functioning.
Before our dreams developed to what we all now experience, kind of story oriented, with frequent symbols and themes that relate to our complex social lives, maybe lucid dreaming was actually the norm. Dreaming originally may have been a far more conscious process, with intention.
In other words, don't necessarily think of Lucid Dreaming as evolving from normal dreaming, maybe it's the other way around. LDs could be a kind of throwback.

My Two Sense

Maybe people lucid dream becuase they feel trapped inside and want to have freedom. i mean lucid dreaming is pretty much pure freedom. but i don't think very many materialistic people have lucid dreams. just a theory....

Originally posted by Taosaur
Walking the dream-world (often seen as an aspect of the spirit-world or the afterlife) is one of the basic tools and qualifications of the shaman. Throughout history, wise cultures have turned to those who have increased their awareness of the workings of consciousness, whether waking or dreaming, for advice in all areas of life.

I agree with you here. I have purchased all of Carlos Castaneda's books and have begun re-reading them. I read most of them 20 years ago, but am amazed at how much more I am getting from them now. Lucid dreaming is tied in very tightly with many Shamanic beliefs and practices.

One thing on my to do list now is to learn how to 'see' in a lucid dream.

Im getting the feeling that by "see" you mean there is really a whole new thing behind that in LD's Seeker?

In 'Tales of Power', Don Juan attempted to get Carlos to 'see' which is a totally different way to percieve reality. When seeing someone, you do not see the person, byt instead see a luminous egg shaped ball composed of millions of brightly glowing filaments that enter through the navel and converge just between your shoulder blades at the assemblage point.

I've been aware of my assemblage point for some months now and am ready to try seeing.

In the book, Don Juan made him smoke a mixture of herbs including mushrooms in order to help him see. I am hoping to shortcut that method by attempting it in a lucid dream.

My problem with most mystical explainations and descriptions of techniques and phenomena, etc., is that they seem so arbitrary.
ie., "a luminous egg shaped ball composed of millions of brightly glowing filaments that enter through the navel and converge just between your shoulder blades at the assemblage point." I mean, huh?
I imagine if I smoke some herbs and mushrooms I could "see" plenty. I would be certain though, that it was a product of the brain and mind.

Forgive me, I'm rather an agnostic and cynical little snot sometimes. Hahahaha!

I, for the most part, agree with Taosaur.
Evolution acts most directly upon things that confer an advantage to survival. Dreaming has obvious advantages in its relations to memory, learning and, perhaps less directly, the sense of well-being when you wake up from a dream (be it escaping nightmares or the warm glow of a fantastic adventure).

Consciousness also confers survival advantages; the ability to solve problems, act as individuals, think, invent, etc.
I believe that Lucid Dreaming exists as a result of these two abilities mixing, not by some divine intent or as a specificly selected trait (one that undergoes evolutionary pressure).

Although, please do not read meaning too far into that statement. By no means does the fact that something has happened by chance devalue its potential or wonder.

The reason I cannot agree that Lucid Dreaming has evolved expressly on its own merit is that I cannot see any significant survival advantages. Some may argue that the practice of skills and abilities through LDing is a good example, but I remain skeptical about these claims. Further still have not seen proof that the equivalent capability cannot be developed normally (which would, if it existed, show that LDing had potential selective pressure).


Also, consider the population which has access to LDing... There are those naturals (which the rest of us both love and eternally envy ~:) , the shamans/sorcerors who have used it the world over (although, i do get the impression that most mystics were not the primary breeders of the tribes, but i could be too western in my thinking), and finally but not least, those of us who actively seek to develop the talent. All in all, the numbers are not very great.

A principle of selection relates to probability. A trait will increase in proportion as it is selected for. If the proportion is small to begin with, it will increase slowly unless the selection is extreme. So for LDing to have evolved specifically: if say 1% of the population could use it to any extent that had a survival effect, then most of the other 99% would have to die, and continue to die over generations, while the Lucid Children continued to breed and prosper.


Thank you for this topic Seeker *nods* I too have been dipping into Casteneda lately, for the first time. I am stuck on the concept of what don Juan described as not doing, but thus far the readings have been very exciting.

Taosaur said a lot of what I had to say, no quoting needed here.

I doubt lucid dreaming was specifically created/engineered for a purpose... I don't think that there's any real physical part of truly being capable to lucid dream. Dreaming, on the other hand, is quite different. I won't get into any of that (because the basic reasons are obvious and I really do not know).

Lucid dreaming is a skill of the mind, no? Similar to yoga, meditation, etc... Dreaming is a capability of the body, no?

Perhaps we've hit the verge of human evolution where the future generations will all have lucid dreams from birth... Next-gen shit, lol. Like a higher-class dreaming, more benefitial to us.

Meh, I'm so rambling.

This post is done.

Originally posted by Artie J
I imagine if I smoke some herbs and mushrooms I could \"see\" plenty. I would be certain though, that it was a product of the brain and mind.

Heheh... Maybe so, but hit a salvia breakthru and then think about what you said and say that it wasn't real to you.

It's quite the perplexing little b*tch: "It was real. It made so much sense. No, I know I only saw what I saw because I smoked salvia; it was all just a hallucination. *Thinks* The fear... Was no hallucination..."

What is it with me and rambling.

Originally posted by Artie J
Forgive me, I'm rather an agnostic and cynical little snot sometimes. Hahahaha!

That's OK, I wish everyone would question instead of just blindly following.....

This might not make me popular but I don’t think there’s anything special about lucid dreaming. It’s just a skill and people who are ‘naturals’ are really just people who through there development as children learnt that lucid dreaming was possible others of us who didn’t had to be taught it. I don’t think lucid dreaming is enlightening, however used as a skill I think that it can lead to personal development.

So why lucid dream, because its fun! Some people think its not okay to do something because its fun but I’m not one of them :-) If you look deep enough you can justify almost anything to be productive but it being fun is enough for me.

Im sorry if any of you belive im missing the 'point' of LDing or I have offended anyone :-(

I haven't read Castenada, Seeker, though I come across references to him all the time. I'll have to pick it up.

I agree with Turkeh that LDs aren't necessarily a big deal. They can be used as a means for all sorts of things, but they aren't really a path unto themselves. I mostly use them to have fun (of course I have fun mainly by learning, and so I sometimes end up making good use of LDs in spite of myself). I do think having LDs indicates some baseline ability to observe your mind at work and recognize the nature of a situation. Like a drug trip or mystical experience, however, it's easy to write it off as "just in my mind," contain the experience, and fail to see how it relates to daily activity. Just about any activity can become a spiritual practice leading you deeper into what's real, but conversely, just about any spiritual practice can turn into a masturbatory escape from reality.