Thread: How long did your longest lucid dream last?

Originally Posted by Sageous

Longest LD?

Well, it depends how I measure. My longest uninterrupted LD was about 2 hours -- they really can't be much longer, because even that length of time represents some serious REM stretching.

However, I have managed to "chain" REM periods with DEILD many times. When you do that, you can jump from one REM period to the next without losing the schemata of your current dream. The longest I've made that last was well over four hours.

For what it's worth, it may be easier to judge the length of an LD than you might think. Remember that your waking consciousness is there with you in the dream, so on waking you do not need to rely only on dream recall to measure your time in the dream (which is always sketchy at best), but on actual short-term memory, which is much more reliable. You might be off by a few minutes, but since you were actually there, judging the time is about the same as jusdging the time of any other waking-life event. Another thing I do is keep an eye on my clock: since many LD's are in late stages of sleep with limited NREM interruptions, noting when you started nodding off and when you woke up can give you a rough idea of dream time (this of course would only work for WILD/DEILD, where you are lucid, potentially, for the duration of REM).

Awesome reply, thanks so much! I know that REM cycles are very short, and that thats the real life duration of dreams - but I've heard people claim that they have spent days in a lucid dream, like a Narnia effect. They manage to fool time that time passes slower in their dream or something along those lines. Is there anything to that or is that a lie? If you can truly control everything when lucid, why not time flow?

Originally Posted by RavenOfShadow

Awesome reply, thanks so much! I know that REM cycles are very short, and that thats the real life duration of dreams - but I've heard people claim that they have spent days in a lucid dream, like a Narnia effect. They manage to fool time that time passes slower in their dream or something along those lines. Is there anything to that or is that a lie? If you can truly control everything when lucid, why not time flow?

I personally have never "dilated" time beyond the brief stretches and compressions that accompany waking-life moods like excitement or boredom. I've also consistently found problems with claimants' accounts of their extreme time-dilation successes. And yet, I have a real problem with the very existence of time, so I guess I'm still on the fence with this.

Besides, no matter how long an LD "seems" to last, aren't we talking here about how long it actually lasts, in the real world?

Originally Posted by Sageous

I personally have never "dilated" time beyond the brief stretches and compressions that accompany waking-life moods like excitement or boredom. I've also consistently found problems with claimants' accounts of their extreme time-dilation successes. And yet, I have a real problem with the very existence of time, so I guess I'm still on the fence with this.

Besides, no matter how long an LD "seems" to last, aren't we talking here about how long it actually lasts, in the real world?

No I mean how long it seems! So your answer was perfect I dont care how long it actually is in real life, what matters is how much you can get done and be a part of your dream world.

^^ Oh!

Well, I'm glad part of my addled mind was paying attention...

In that case, determining dream length, or perhaps depth, by how much you get done seems an excellent idea ... especially because such a criterion does away with pesky time measurements altogether. Very cool.