Fantasy Check

Hello I'm new to this forum. I'm wondering if anyone has ever, not so much, questioned the reality of your surroundings to see if it's really a dream...but questioned the fantasy or illusion of your surroundings when you know you are dreaming?

That may sound backwards to some, but sometimes I have a real hard time believing that all the detailed scenery that I experience during lucid dreaming is "all in my head". I mean, how can my brain "paint" such a picture when I can't do that when I'm awake?

I mean, things are very solid, colorful, I can't always control what's happening, in fact, last night I had a "lucid dream" where I asked myself If I was dreaming, and I answered to myself "No, this is too real". So I went on in my dream convinced it was real.

And then I woke up.

I have had lucid dreams for years, since I was a kid (I'm 35 now). After all my experiences of lucid dreaming, I'm more and more questioning that it's "all in my head". I mean, with so many stories and accounts of people who have OBE's, and all kinds of other strange experiences...could this be some other "plane", "world", "dimension", whatever you want to call it?

One of the last lucid dreams I had, I remembered to hold up my hand and flex my fingers, and it was just as real as if I was awake, and then I told myself, "Can you believe that you are actually lying in your bed with your eyes closed, motionless, with the cat laying next to you?" It was really hard to believe even though I knew it was true...

keith9

Everyone is in amazement at the beauty of lucid dreaming. We hope you learn more about LDing and have fun with it.

I see what you're saying... It is pretty amazing that our brains can "create" these dream worlds, but I guess we have to remember that human memory can be pretty amazing. Simple events that happened decades ago can be can be recalled vividly through triggers such as hypnotic regression.
Recently I had a lucid dream where I was trying to judge the quality of my surroundings. I found that the quality was perhaps sub-par to reality. The overall look of things was similar to an oil painting. If you scrutinize the details, I find that this can cause you to wake up. In connection with memory, this LD took place in my backyard but it was the backyard of my house during the late 80's. I was indeed lucid and did a some flying and other "magic" tricks, but I never really stopped to think that the configuration of things in my backyard was that of over ten years ago until looking back on the dream after waking up.

Yeah I have definitely had experiences like this. They are the best :D

I have been laying in the sand..picked a handful up and watched it slip through my fingers and just thought "my god I cannot BELIEVE this is a dream". They are sometimes hyper-real. Those are the best kind. And when you wake they really sort of leave you questioning what is really real and what isn't. :shock:

It is hard to believe if you look at it objectively. The power of the human mind seems, well, mind-boggling to those of us who haven't studied it intensely.

As for myself, I do hold the belief that when the body is shut down in such a way, the spirit is free to wander, and thus, dreams really are separate planes of existence. They are in a certain category of plane that makes them easily manipulated by lucidity.
Perception is a huge part of it. If the grass felt like cardboard or the snow felt like blankets, you wouldn't believe it half as much, but since it is so vivid, it makes you think.

Dreams feel like reality, that's why it's so easy to accept them as actually happening. Becoming lucid is nothing more that questioning whether or not the things around you make rational sense. Reality Checks (or RCs) are how we know.

The mind is capable of creating so much! Our imaginations are only limited to the sum of our experiences and our personalities (which leads to very few limitations, in fact). As to physical sensations, I had a very interesting LD where at one point there was a duality where I could feel both my sleeping, unmoving body, and my dream body which was walking down a hallway. It was so cool! Sometimes LDs can feel more real than reality, if that makes sense.

(Welcome to DV :D Enjoy your stay!)

Thank you all for your great replies! I am so glad you are all so open and that all views are welcome. I am definitely going to enjoy talking with all of you.

Today I have the day off and was hoping to sleep in, when I sleep in, the LD's come on strong in the last few hours before I wake, especially when I'm sleeping over the 8-9 hour mark.

I slept in a little but not enough this morning. :angry: So I had one small LD, I have a pattern of things I do when I LD, last night I decided to visit with a close family member who is passed away. It didn't last long but I was so glad to see her !!!

Anyone else do this? And what have been your experiences?

keith9

When I was twelve, my grandfather (Mom's father) passed away, from emphysema. When I was younger, my parents and I would always fly back to the States from France right before Christmas time. So I went to the airport in my dream, and I saw my grandfather. I ran to him, and he knelt down and hugged me. I cried for a while. Then we sat down and talked for a long while about things, casual and cosmic. Then at the end, his plane had arrived, so he had to go. I gave him last hugs and kisses, and waved as he went through the gate and disappeared.

When I woke up, I felt a lot better. I still missed him, but I didn't feel so lost.

It is a little different than your experience I think, but similar.