Lucid dreaming without trying..?? And bizarre dreams within bizarre dreams?

Apparently I have lucid dreams and this is not something that I try to do, I didn't even know what it was until I started Googling some things about my own sleep patterns.

I have suffered from horrible nightmares for about 7 years now and at a certain point I was able to know when I was dreaming, it doesn't always happen, but it has happened frequently and makes my nightmares less frightening. It happens sometimes in really good dreams, too, and I don't want to wake up because I know it is just a dream. There have been some instances where I question myself whether or not I'm dreaming and ask several characters in my dream if I am in fact dreaming. I was wondering if anyone else was a lucid dreamer without trying to be. :?

Also, I sometimes have dreams within dreams, 4 or 5 layers deep, but when I wake up from one of the dreams within a dream, I don't "wake up" to what appears to be my real life, it is always still very abstract. From what I've read about dreams within dreams, usually you wake up in the 2nd dream and it resembles your real life. Just wondering if anyone else has experienced this, too.

Natural lucid dreaming is something people loathe for. I myself have to try to lucid dream, but it seems to come quite naturally to me (however I always have to be aware of inducing it to achieve one).

I have also had a dream within dreams. My first lucid dream came to me in a 2 layer dream. I've also had nightmares 2 layers deep; I was dreaming that I wasn't able to stay awake and I would fall asleep, and then I would have a nightmare. The nightmare would wake me up out of the 2nd layer, and put me into the 1st, where I would fall asleep again against my will, only to have another nightmare. This happened 4 or 5 times before I actually woke up.

I have never had a dream anywhere near 4 or 5 layers deep. How long does it feel like you're dreaming for when that happens?

A lot of the times I feel like I dream all night and they are always very vivid. If not awoken by an alarm I could sleep and dream all day.The last time I had a dream that was 4-5 layers deep was a couple of months ago and it was a very strange experience. It seemed like the dream was never ending and I felt very weird when I woke up. I have had dreams like the cycle that you described more often than dreams made up of 4-5 layers. Are yours usually nightmares like you described? Do you feel pain and does the emotion you feel carry over when you awaken? Do you ever go back to sleep knowing that you are going back into the same dream?

I actually went and saw a sleep doctor b/c I have chronic fatigue and I thought it was b/c I was dreaming so much, but they don't really have a good diagnosis for me. They are treating me as a narcoleptic, but I don't have the key narcoleptic symptom which is falling into REM immediately. Apparently, according to my sleep study, I dream when I'm not in REM, my doctors refer to it as hallucinating which makes me almost feel a little crazy.

Nah you're not crazy; we are all hallucinating in our dreams anyways.

When my layered dreams happen, it does feel like forever. Now that I think about it, I've gone 3 layers deep, with the 3rd layer being lucid. This dream lasted for what seemed a lot longer than my normal lucid dreams. I first dreamt that I fell asleep behind the wheel of a car, then I dreamt that I was drunk in a college dorm and went to sleep, and then I woke up in my 3rd layer lucid. However, I did not return through all layers to awake, I went from 3rd layer to awake.

Whenever I have layered dreams, they are rarely nightmares. However I would say that was the most significant one I've ever had because I would scream out for help inbetween each nightmare, and I knew that each of those dreams I was entering was going to be another nightmare, but when I actually got into the 2nd layer nightmare, I would forget I was dreaming (until I returned back to the first layer).

The emotion and fear definitely carried over to my waking life. How could it not, it was so unbelievably real. The feelings do not last long though, I resume to a safe, secure feeling state quite quickly.

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I have never had a dream anywhere near 4 or 5 layers deep. How long does it feel like you're dreaming for when that happens?

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Guys, you know that stuff in Inception about deeper "levels" of dreaming lasting longer is made-up right? However many times you fall asleep in a dream and go into another dream, time dilation never comes into play.

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Originally Posted by J.D.

Guys, you know that stuff in Inception about deeper "levels" of dreaming lasting longer is made-up right? However many times you fall asleep in a dream and go into another dream, time dilation never comes into play.

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Hm, I don't think anyone was comparing my experience to Inception, my dream experiences are actually quite different. When I dream 4-5 levels deep I do not re-enter the different levels during awakening, I wake up to another dream until I finally wake up in real life, hence why I said it feels never ending. Now the amount of time that I spend dreaming vs. not dreaming definitely feels longer, but I know having had a sleep study that the amount of time that you think you spend dreaming isn't always accurate. I also know that when I dream in that many levels I don't wake up feeling restored, but rather more tired, so whether or not I am actually in REM is a good question. Several recent studies have shown that REM isn't necessarily as restorative as scientists once thought, though, so who knows.

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Originally Posted by txdreamer

Hm, I don't think anyone was comparing my experience to Inception, my dream experiences are actually quite different. When I dream 4-5 levels deep I do not re-enter the different levels during awakening, I wake up to another dream until I finally wake up in real life, hence why I said it feels never ending.

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They sound like false awakenings, but dreams can't actually be layered over top of one another. I've experienced three false awakenings in a row myself; those types of dreams aren't uncommon as many other people on Dreamviews have had them.

As for your question about lucid dreams, there are many people who are naturals at it. Maybe you're just very aware, or you're still fairly conscious when you're sleeping. I envy you because of that!

Puffin, pardon my lack of knowledge but I see that in your signature you have 16 wake induced lucid dreams. Is that when you feel yourself falling asleep and immediately know that you are dreaming? Would that be the same thing as waking up after a dream and knowing that if you just shut your eyes again you will fall right back into the dream and can make it pick up right where you left off?

And what kind of dream is it when you begin to fall asleep and you have the auditory features of a dream and you know that you are beginning to dream but have no control either in your dream or to wake yourself up? Is that lucid dreaming?

Are you able to wake yourself up in your lucid dreams? Is that "dream exit" induced?

The abbreviation for wake induced lucid dream is WILD. WILDing is when you trick your body into thinking you're asleep by staying still and very relaxed for a certain period of time. The person then enters sleep paralysis which is often accompanied by hallucinations, and from there they consciously fade directly into the dream, aware of the whole process and once in the dream, lucid.

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And what kind of dream is it when you begin to fall asleep and you have the auditory features of a dream and you know that you are beginning to dream but have no control either in your dream or to wake yourself up? Is that lucid dreaming?

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I believe that's a WILD.

Dream exit induced lucid dreams (DEILD) are when you just wake up from a dream, and you continue to stay still and relaxed, tricking your body into sending your mind back into a dream. This is similiar to WILD but there's only a minute or less of waiting time. When doing that technique, it helps to imagine the dream scene you just came out of.

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Would that be the same thing as waking up after a dream and knowing that if you just shut your eyes again you will fall right back into the dream and can make it pick up right where you left off?

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That's a DEILD, but should keep your eyes closed the whole time, not opening them at all.

Hope that cleared things up. You can see Dreamviews' tutorial for WILDing here and DEILDing here.

About the layers, well, it's a mindfuck. It is HELLISHLY confusing. I went as deep as 9 layers once. Waking up from each of them was not a pleasant experience, but I had four lucids along the way. 'twas some two years ago..
Puffin, you explained it pretty splendidly. There is only one thing I would like to add. You CAN force yourself to wake up from your dreams. I am pretty handy with it.

Same as you, I didn't know about lucid dreams until I searched on Google:"I control my dreams." From there I learned it was hard to accomplish this, while for me, it's naturally and never knew I had been doing this more than three times a week if not, every day. Then I stumbled upon all these posts and learned the thing about layers. I don't know what layer I've found myself in, I know I'm dreaming, I can say what I want, I can think what I want to think, I can go where I want to, do what I want to. In my lucid dreams I have flown at least 2 different times and still remember the feeling and the amazing experience. Sometimes I open my eyes without falling into another layer and go back to my dream like nothing happened. The thing is—they're a always good dreams, nightmares are so rare but in those cases I can wake up when I feel it's getting too much. When I wake up from those nightmares, my breathing is quick and my heart is beating rapidly. I'm young, no older than 16. I read a lot about moving from layer 4-5 to layer 3, but then realizing it's just another dream, while you thought you had already woken up.But I have control of going from my all-control to being awake and aware. What layer would you consider I've been? I searched them up, but it's a little hard to understand, and since all of you have experienced lucid dreaming I decided to share my experience.

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