Trying to classify flying experiences

I was discussing this with another LDer a few days ago. I said to him that I had experienced a new kind of flying in my last LD: swimming in the air. The we started classifying our flying experiences, and found out that they could be classified in four types. This is based on our shared experiences:

1) Normal type: You feel yourself floating or flying in the air, and you have to control your direction and speed. It's hard to get it right.
2) Supersonic type: You fly straight, at an extremely high speed (usually going through walls), but you can't feel anything or do much.
3) Swimming type: You feel the air as a dense liquid, and you fly using swimming movements. You fly slower, but with better control. Sometimes you feel air currents. I think this one is more enjoyable than the normal one.
4) Artificial type: You don't fly by yourself, but using an object or DC. It could be a string attached to a cloud, a bird, etc.

Do you know another type?

ONE time, and ONLY ONCE, I had to flap my arms VERY VERY fast like a bird, and I couldn't go too high up :P

I experienced Superman style recently, which is sort of supersonic type you mentioned. Except I kept bumping into buildings instead of flying through anything. It didn't hurt, though. And I wasn't lucid, if you don't mind.

In some dreams, I had wings like an eagle, but those weren't lucid either.

I do the floating thing in most of my dreams. Less so in lucid ones, though.

I'm not sure if this would technically be considered flying, but what about prolonged jumping. With me it gives pretty high control, varying speeds, and quite a nice rush.

One of my fondest memories of a dream is floating gently through the air down a staircase.

What would pretending that a magnet is pulling you go under?

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Originally Posted by Pastro

What would pretending that a magnet is pulling you go under?

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Interesting. :) Was it easy to control the "magnet"?

Anyway, it seems artificial, even if your magnet was just theoretical. In order to fly, my friend pretended that he was being held by an invisible string. Sometimes you can't fly out of nowhere, so you need a vaguely realistic way to fly.

The flying that I had in my first LD last night was exactly like the superman game for xbox 360. It was fast but not too fast and I remember wondering why people found it so hard to fly.

I've never flew in my dreams before.

I love to fly in my dreams *non-cliché*.

I usually jump and stay suspended in the air. It's curious, but I hadn't flied horizontally yet o_o

I actually had my first LD last night!!! and I flew.

I had to run and jump to gain momentum. I felt like the energy came from my arms, like they were my jets. At first I had trouble staying balanced and flew out of control, but soon got the hang of it. I seemed to lose energy after a while and had to go back to the ground to run, jump and gain more momentum.

So jet-arm style, could be considered a new one :)

I've done a bit of all of them...I've flown flapping a pool tube in front of me, flapping my arms, running and jumping, just lifting off and jumping into the air. Mostly now I do have control of my flying...not really an issue. Good list though. After you get it, you really can fly any way you like.

I remember a few times I had to run to fly. I've flown all the other ways you've mentioned, but running was the oddest.

The most natural 'flying' I've done that's not the normal type is when I was bouncing from place to place to stay up in the sky and get places. It was rather fun.

Might I suggest you add in transformation flights where you turn into something else to fly? Or do you consider that artificial too?

where is the type of flying then you fly where you want - height, speed, places.. the time of flying..?

Yeah, your forgetting the best form of controlled flying!
Flying by levitation. Using telekineses on yourself to move through the air.

Among the different methods of flying I have experienced lately, the most fun one was one that felt like being on a roller coast, as I could fly almost straight down to the ground, and then right before reaching the ground would start flying up and go almost straight up.

After that I tried flying on my side which was not all that exciting, after which I tried flying on my back, which proved to be a mistake, as something caught me, which caused me to lapse into a short dream that I was superman and had just been captured by Lex Luther, before coming lucid again. That was the last time I tried flying upside down.

A week later I had a lucid in which I felt like I was being taken somewhere by a tornado as I was turning slow somersaults all along the way and could see the various landscapes below occasionally when turned upright, with the the rest of the time just seeing the sky going around. I'd have to call that one uncontrolled flying, although I got to where I wanted to go.

I think the reason for so many flying dreams lately is that I practice flying in my imagination every night when dropping off to sleep.

After floating all around my house in my imagination I then feel myself on the freeway flying to work, and then I fly to the gym, and then finally fly back home.

No matter how you do it, flying is great!:)

I fly in my dreams quite often. It is my perfered mode of travel. Normally I fly with either a swimming motion, or "superman" style. During one lucid dream in which I had a high level of control I decided to fly in an entierly new way. I crossed my legs, placed my hands palm-up on my knees (meditation posture) and simply floated up into the air in whatever direction I desired.

I'm a one-trick pony when it comes to LD flying. I fly Tinkerbell style, but without the wings - in a mostly upright position, and usually at moderate speeds.

I've flown "supersonic" in my first LDs. In one I attached a huge yellow balloon around my neck and I flew over mountains and lakes. I've also done the swimming kind, but I did not consciously decide to "swim". It just seemed the most natural way of flying at that particular time. Air wasn't liquid or anything, but I did have more control of where I was going, and it was slower than the rocketspeed type. Still faster than hovering around with a yellow balloon though.

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Originally Posted by Caradon

Yeah, your forgetting the best form of controlled flying!
Flying by levitation. Using telekineses on yourself to move through the air.

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Isn't that very similar to normal? At least in my normal flights, I always feel like pulled by a psychic force.

I guess hand flapping (or, to put it more broadly, body movement (with wings, feet, etc), could be a new type depending on the feeling. How does it feel to fly that way? Do you get better or worse control than normal/superman style?

The classification is becoming increasingly difficult, since the artificial type is too broad and doesn't consider the differences in feeling (flying with wings must feel very different to flying on a balloon).

iadr: I can relate to you about the practice. I even practice flying in class! :)

have you ever seen miyazaki "spirited away"?

there'se a point two children fly like an inch from the earth, but very fast
that's another way to fly i did often

plus, ranma-like jumping,

and also having wings may count (though is not my kind at all)

When i fly, with or without the object, i always have some sort of force vector. whether it be my arm, like in superman style, or an object, such as a toy jet or a bird, it has to be pointed in both the forward and upward direction. There is some sort of aerodynamics i dont understand at all that have to be used too.

The other day my flying was similar to a bird.. But a large bird... I flapped quite slowly and rose from the ground about 10 feet.

In the LD I had last night, I tried that "flying through a wall"-thing. Flying through was easy, but then, there was only black on the other side and the dream faded away. :(

Hmmm... I'm not sure if my flight can be classified into types. I have been flying in dreams since I was eight, probably longer. I am verg good at flying so mine is much more controlled with speed and movement.

I get what you mean about swimming though. In non-lucid dreams my flight is quite like that as I take on the role of a first time flyer in most dreams, or someone who has only done so a few times before. 'Swimming' is kind of what that feels like but instead of swimming it feels more like unreceptive control. Ha! In my last dream I even used my duvet to help glide. No idea why I had it 'cause I had been at school. That time I'd even flapped my arms! That was an odd dream... It ended up with me killing Darth Vader with the Death Star's cannon in gun form.

hey thanks for this. :D

theres sumthing between normal and Supersonic. it's not extremely fast-- ur surroundings aren't a blur. but it's faster than Normal. i can feel the air rushing aroudn me and hitting my face. but i can't go through buildings and i can stop when i want. it's like the speed of a car. Normal flying for me is the pace of walking or a little faster, and Supersonic makes me think of a jet or superman.

I hover, and move slowly forward at about walking pace, but I think I could speed it up if I felt the need. Like a very slow jetpack, but without the jetpack, so 1) I guess.