Thread: how long does lucid dreaming exists ?

I was wondering when people were started talking about lucid dreaming.

Is it just the last 50 years or so or has it always existed ?

People have studied it and written about it for thousands of years. Frederik van Eeden in 1913 was the first one to actually call them 'lucid dreams'. Up until the 1900s really study of lucid dreaming was mostly done by individuals, recording their own dreams and writing about them privately and publicly. It was in the past 100 years or so that lucid dreaming really began to be studied 'scientifically', with people actually collecting data on subjects and analyzing it and also with the advent of devices which can measure sleep. Around 1982 is the first time that they used eye-signals during dreams for lucid dreamers to communicate back to reality- so as far as 'existing', this was the best evidence that it's a legitimate concept. People have been doing it and studying it long before that, though.

Lucid dreaming is a natural skill, so it must have been around long before any written documentation was created...

thanks for the info

I suspect at least 12,000 years, maybe more. I cannot prove it, but I suspect that many of the higher primates probably also have the capacity to lucid dream. In theory any animal that posesses the concept of self COULD lucid dream, this includes Elephants.

Originally Posted by Seeker

I suspect at least 12,000 years, maybe more. I cannot prove it, but I suspect that many of the higher primates probably also have the capacity to lucid dream. In theory any animal that posesses the concept of self COULD lucid dream, this includes Elephants.

possibly but that means sparadic/random lucid dreams. Possibly "organized" lucid dreaming began with dream yoga several thousand years ago.