Natural Lucidity Research

I am currently researching for why people possibly become natural at lucid dreaming.

By natural, I mean that the person does not have to directly attempt a technique to have frequent lucids.

Whether you are a 'natural' or not, I'd appreciate any thoughts on why you think you may have become lucid specifically (without direct use of a technique).

I won't share my thoughts yet, as I don't wish to affect the opinions of anyone who decides to post.

Also, I am curious about length of lucidity. It would be appreciated if anyone who has, or has had, a supposed 'longer' lucidity duration in any dream/s would give information in any length of reply.

Lucidity is all about awareness, maybe their mind is far more aware than a normal persons mind, giving them the intelligent ability to know their dream realm apart from the real realm.

:)

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Originally Posted by Jdeadevil

Lucidity is all about awareness, maybe their mind is far more aware than a normal persons mind, giving them the intelligent ability to know their dream realm apart from the real realm.

:)

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Mmm, I definately think that awareness has something to do with it.
Though I'm thinking very much along the lines of a lesser gap between dream and real realm that might be a large contributing factor also.

Sounds like the Astral Realm. :P

. . .

KAPWNED

Anyway... I have to say that I call myself a natural LDer because 90% of my dreams are at least semi Lucid without me having to actually activily realise this.

However, I find that this varies depending on my mental state; the more depressed I am the higher my chance of vivid LDs.

There is a chance that this could be due to the fact that I have little control over my real life and therefore it's showing inversely in my dreams, (for example trying to drive in dreams - when you can't in real life - is usually a represantative of you trying to control your own life.)

Confidence is probably i big factor.

*a big factor


(cant edit last post..>_>)

I have a certain lack of interest in daily life, and apathy (I believe) plays a large part towards natural lucid dreaming.

Over my life, I have not specifically ever tried to lucid dream - it has just happened.
A few turning points in my life, have led my mind to a slight catatonic state - a belief that waking life is just as real as dream.
Meaning that, life is a dream.

Regardless of this theory, as this thread is not for that purpose - I noticed over contemplation that my lucid dreams (98% of my dreams are lucid) increased dramatically in vividity, length, and frequency.

My natural lucid ability existed before this, though I was certainly was no master. Now that I percieve life as such, lucid dreams have become as if life with lucidity.

I know that this thinking is perhaps not thought to be beneficial, though. As the awake part of life accounts for 2/3, and dream just 1/3.

Still, this leads curiosity as I find through this lifestyle, I am not alone in my dreams becoming enhanced.

yeah this applies to me
please see my thread in the newbie section
its been happening myself all my life
and my mother too
and i dont like it happening it scares me

Natural lucid dreaming. I don't know. Perhaps some of it had to do with terrifying nightmares that I had. More had to do with the fact I could nearly always see my sleeping self from my closed eyes, while dreaming.

Alright, here's why I think I'm a natural:

First of all, the frequency of my of my LDs can be attributed to being naturally conscious during SP. Since it seems to be rare for people to be conscious during SP unintentionally, I would say that there is probably a neurological difference between me and most people, a difference that I have in common with others who experience SP without intending it. Think of it as being similar to whatever makes sleep-walkers prone to sleep-walking, or other's prone to night terrors.

My lifestyle also must have a lot to do with it: I mostly experience unintentional SP when I have wonky sleep schedules and, for example, don't sleep one day, but sleep for 12 hours the next.

But beyond that, there also must be something different about the way I think because I did experience occasional LDs long before I experienced SP, although it might not have been frequently enough to fit the definition of "natural" in the first post. It was also very easy for me to realize that the SP was an altered state of consciousness (something that other people apparently struggle with). After my first experience I never mistook SP for reality again and always knew it for what it was even though I didn't have a name for it for many years. I also had to be brave enough to "sit" through the terrifying SP long enough to lucid dream.


Well those are the factors that I feel pretty sure of. Beyond that it's speculation about personality type, mental disorders, and heredity.

I would say it is largely affected by the level of imagination that one posesses. A more active imagination will diverge from what is accepted as possible in the real world during a dream more quickly and to a greater degree; making it easier to recognize that what is happening is 'not normal'.

I have thought about this, and something interesting continues to come up.

Many naturals I know, don't "realize" they are dreaming. They just are lucid.

Maybe this is a trick of the mind, but it seems quite prominent.

I have only just found out today that what I have had since teenager is called lucid dreaming and that I am a natural.

When I think about it and analyse it this is how and why I think I am a natural. First of all I am a very light sleeper. I often hear sounds in my sleep and I would wake up with the slightest change in my sleep environment. If its too hot, too cold, too much light through the door gap or noisy, I will wake up so it seems there is a defect in my brain on the part that switches my conciousness off during sleep. If someone talks to me while I sleep I often remember what they say the next morning.

Secondly I have always tried to remember my dreams. I talked about my dreams a lot ever since I was a child. I would tell anyone ( mum, dad, friends ) about my dreams. Whenever I wake up and can recall that I have had a dream I would try to remember as many details as possible and trying to make sense of it. Actually this was how I found out I have lucid dreams. I was talking to my friends today about changing my dreams and they told me they couldnt do it, and I had always thought everyones dreams are like that ! So I started to remember my dreams very well. When I first started to have the same dream again, I remembered thinking to myself " Hey, this is a dream, I have dreamt this before" but at that stage I didnt know I could control the dreams.

Later, after having the same dream repeatedly over a few days I got bored of it and thought to myself " I already know how this is going to end, I better stop dreaming " and to my surprise I did. Still, I didnt realise it stopped because I wanted it to. I only realised that I could actually control the dream until I dreamt something unpleasant.

This time I dreamt that my baby brother was in a car accident where the car crashed and he died. I was very very upset and didnt want him to die. When the people were going to take his body away I tried to stop them, telling them that he was not dead , that he was alive because " he was alive before he was dead " ( ! ). When I woke up I was very upset about it. In our culture having such a bad dream can be a premonition so I didnt want to have such a vivid dream where my brother would die. I made up my mind that I would go back to the dream and change it. I didnt know why I thought that would be possible but I knew from past experience that I could have the same dream again and again. I went to bed deliberately thinking about that particular dream and wanting to change it. I cant remember how long it took but I eventually had the same dream again. The first time I tried to change the event it didnt work. I approached the car and tried to take my brother out before it crashed but I failed. The rest of the dream went on as previous. All the details were the same except this time I wouldnt argue with the people anymore. The second time I went back into the dream I managed to get my brother out , the rest of the dream again proceeded as previous but this time my brother didnt die.

Therefore for me, being a light sleeper, having a habit of remembering all of my dreams and talking about them and analysing them helped me to recognise the fact that I was dreaming when the same dream repeated itself. The rest was due to the fact that I wanted to change the dream badly enough to conciously try.

Since then I just enjoy my lucid dreams. Its fun ! Its like directing a movie with yourself being the main character. :)

I hope that helps.

It seems to make sense that light sleeping would predispose one to lucid dreaming, since most dreams occur during light sleep and waking in the night could lead to unintended WBTB and DEILD.

I've also see depression and "apathy" mentioned. Not only can these mental states lead to getting more sleep than the average person (leading to more light sleep and REM) but from my experience if these feelings are prolonged they do tend to blur dream and reality in one's mind. One's own thoughts and feelings become more important while the unfavorable outside world is avoided.

Having the need to change one's dreams seems to be a common factor that I've seen, not only here, but all over the forum. People with frequent nightmares or bad dreams need to have control, and out of necessity they find it.

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Originally Posted by Xaqaria

I would say it is largely affected by the level of imagination that one posesses. A more active imagination will diverge from what is accepted as possible in the real world during a dream more quickly and to a greater degree; making it easier to recognize that what is happening is 'not normal'.

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I don't agree with this. I notice no correlation between realizing a dream is a dream and how weird things are in the dream. I seem to be just as likely to be lucid in a dream that could easily be confused with reality as I am in a dream where impossible things are occurring. What about everyone else?

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Originally Posted by ClouD

I have thought about this, and something interesting continues to come up.

Many naturals I know, don't "realize" they are dreaming. They just are lucid.

Maybe this is a trick of the mind, but it seems quite prominent.

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This is what happens with most of my lucids too. Anyone else?

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Originally Posted by AlexLou

This is what happens with most of my lucids too. Anyone else?

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Yep, but sadly I'm not a natural. :lol:

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Originally Posted by Jdeadevil

Yep, but sadly I'm not a natural. :lol:

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Good to know. It may have nothing to do with being a natural.

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Originally Posted by AlexLou

I don't agree with this. I notice no correlation between realizing a dream is a dream and how weird things are in the dream. I seem to be just as likely to be lucid in a dream that could easily be confused with reality as I am in a dream where impossible things are occurring. What about everyone else?

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It's the same with me.

As I said in another thread, I think being natural at lucid dreaming as to do with the state of mind and awareness.

For example:
Now I was at home, played a video game, ate, watched tv, all in auto pilot.
Then I went to take out the thrash, on my way I became aware: "I was in X, now I'm in the middle of Y, doing Z and after that I'm going to H". Of course I didn't think exactly all that, but I became aware of what was happening and rather than acting automatically I started acting on a basis of constant thinking and awareness.

That's exactly what brings me to lucidity 99% of the time in dreams, when I stop to think and become aware, I don't even have to observe something stupid or not logical, it just hits me "I'm dreaming".

The more aware one is in waking life, the more aware he'll be in dreams and chances of lucidity will highly increase.

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Originally Posted by Scatterbrain

It's the same with me.

As I said in another thread, I think being natural at lucid dreaming as to do with the state of mind and awareness.

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I said the same thing. :D

This must mean it's true....

I actually have done both. Sometimes I would realise something is not " normal " like " Hey, this is a dream, I have dreamt this before". Other time I would suddenly know its a dream, like a thought just appears in my head.

All the times I've become lucid without trying to have been times when I went to sleep again after having been up for a couple of hours..

i am a natural and have been since i can remember.i never knew what it was or that it even had a name until a couple of months ago when i saw something in my school newspaper about knowing when you are asleep and dreaming so i googled it and came here.i am frequented by nightmares and regular lucid dreams almost every night and sometimes as many as four or five a night. i sleep around thirteen to fifteen hours on weekends...i am a sleep junkie.:oops:..er...i just think about what i want to dream about or if i even want to be in control of my dreams that night.sometimes i will randomly become lucid in the middle of the night and i have the most control in the morning.:yawnorama:

I decided to not read much of what others had posted.

I'm a natural, meaning I've had LDs for as long as I can remember. Most of my dreams are lucid (around 65%). I have pretty good recall (about 6 per night). I don't have to do anything to get lucid, but if I want to increase my LDs it is rediculously easy. Generally I just know I'm dreaming without having do do any kind of RC or look for DS.

I'm not positive why I'm a "natural." I'll try to give a full accounting of my suspitions. I think it is a combination of things:

I had bad nightmares as a child. After a while I got to the point that nightmares themselves were a DS (even though I had no idea what that meant) and I'd automatically become lucid in every nightmare.

I'm very introspective. I spend a lot of time thinking about how I think, what I think, and why I think that way. I pay close attention to my emotional reactions, my thoughts. Plus I'm just naturally curiose about things most people never bother to wonder about.

I think of and treat the waking world as if it were possibly a dream. As a child I was shy and akward and thus spent a lot of time alone. One of my favoite activities was to see how my internal thought effected the outside world. I'd repeat mantras so myself and observe the effects. I discovered (but was never able to verbalize) that my thoughts and emotions had real, reliable effects on the waking world. I often wondered if maybe I was in a coma somewhere having a dream. Or I would wonder if maybe god was asleep and I was a part of the vast, devine dream.

I "hallucinate" in waking life, and thus spend a lot of time trying to decide what "real" and what is not. I like to think that my supposed hallucinations are just bleed over from a different layer of reality that have little to no power in this layer. Thus, to blend in with society and not look like a freak I have to determine what is from this layer and what is from others. Then I do my best to ignore the bleed over and only react to this layer, at least in public. So I naturally spend a lot of time questioning the continuity of time, places, and the logic of things. I imagine this helps me be more aware of the illogical things, skips in time, and disjointed locations in dreams.

I consider reality to be much more complex, layered, and weird than most poeple. I mentioned this already. I think having an open mind helps me be more lucid.

I'm not convinced the dream world is just a creation of my mind in off mode. I've encountered some weird stuff that has lead me to believe it is possible that sometimes when I dream I go to a place that has reality independent of my mind.

So there is my odd two-cents (to use a phrase I don't get) on why I (as an individual) am a natural LDer.

Off topic:

Goddamn, seek, you just explained my world view(cept for the fact that I don't hallucinate.)
The different layers or plains of the world are things I really believe in. Also: time doesn't exist. The 4th dimension is possibly time. In this dimension all that was, is, and will be are one. So seeing events before they happen should be possible(I've got a friend who sometimes dream things that happen.)

I should go check out the philosophy thread.



Oh yeah, and my first LD was before I knew what it was. I broke out of a sleep paralysis. You should add that to your list.

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Originally Posted by ClouD

I have thought about this, and something interesting continues to come up.

Many naturals I know, don't "realize" they are dreaming. They just are lucid.

Maybe this is a trick of the mind, but it seems quite prominent.

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Yeah, this true for me. I generally don't go "Ah-ha! I'm totally dreaming!!!" I just know it is a dream from the moment it begins.

However, I've also had dreams where I became lucid because I realized it or noticed something.

Someone else mentioned apathy, depression, and sleeping a lot. I often sleep 10+ hours a night, and around 15 on the weekends. I don't have a "sleep schedule." I stay up all night, sleep when I want, etc... When I have a problem with dissassociation (not feeling like anything is real, of consequence, and generally not giving a f***) I do have more LDs, but not vivid, interesting ones, as my dissasociation bleeds into dreaming life, too. Just a whole long, dull bout of not feeling much, wanting much, or doing much. Gah...

A friend of mine who is a natural actually has sleep-problems in some way.. her dreams are so intense that she has to go on medicine.

I have been having lucids since I can remember. I have always had vivid dreams everynight since I was little. I was and still am a deep thinker. I have always been creative and imaginative. I think if you have a big imagination then it comes naturally.

A lot of my natural lucids come from when I'm in danger. My body is desperate for help and I become aware. Or I realize the repetitive chasing has to be a dream. Running in and out of a house being chased for what seemed like about 3hrs kinda made me open my dream eyes and think.. I'm dreaming. :] lol

I used to get more lucids when younger than I do now. And they lasted longer.

so yeah

I think A LOT.. over analysing about everything. I look at everything with a question. All deep life and after death stuff.

I used to get nightmares when I was little. Repetative ones. Falling down holes and being chased. I still get chased a lot.

I am creative .. my room is covered in trippy Indian wall hangings, Alex Grey prints, painted canvasses, feathers & my window is coated in fur. lol :D love it
I'm very open minded.

I used to take acid and shrooms.. seeing what your brain is capable of fully when conscious helps open your eyes to what your mind can do.

Hard to explain .. I thought everyone had lucid dreams and what not.

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Originally Posted by seeker28

I'm very introspective. I spend a lot of time thinking about how I think, what I think, and why I think that way. I pay close attention to my emotional reactions, my thoughts. Plus I'm just naturally curiose about things most people never bother to wonder about.

I think of and treat the waking world as if it were possibly a dream. As a child I was shy and akward and thus spent a lot of time alone. One of my favoite activities was to see how my internal thought effected the outside world. I'd repeat mantras so myself and observe the effects. I discovered (but was never able to verbalize) that my thoughts and emotions had real, reliable effects on the waking world. I often wondered if maybe I was in a coma somewhere having a dream. Or I would wonder if maybe god was asleep and I was a part of the vast, devine dream.

I "hallucinate" in waking life, and thus spend a lot of time trying to decide what "real" and what is not. I like to think that my supposed hallucinations are just bleed over from a different layer of reality that have little to no power in this layer. Thus, to blend in with society and not look like a freak I have to determine what is from this layer and what is from others. Then I do my best to ignore the bleed over and only react to this layer, at least in public. So I naturally spend a lot of time questioning the continuity of time, places, and the logic of things. I imagine this helps me be more aware of the illogical things, skips in time, and disjointed locations in dreams.

I consider reality to be much more complex, layered, and weird than most poeple. I mentioned this already. I think having an open mind helps me be more lucid.

I'm not convinced the dream world is just a creation of my mind in off mode. I've encountered some weird stuff that has lead me to believe it is possible that sometimes when I dream I go to a place that has reality independent of my mind.

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I find it very interesting that we share the outlook of life as dream, however mildly or extremely we may differ in belief.

I'm curious as to if you have many lucid dreams, and the quality etc. of them.

As for hallucinations, I don't want to label you nor myself (nor anyone else for that), though I share similar experience with this. I find myself ignoring everything a lot of the time [not just what I see visually], and meditatatively watching 'my' actions.

That you are a natural and seem to have had very similar experiences to myself, is intruiging. I was wondering if anyone shared a close set of circumstances to my own, and whether those circumstances affected lucidity.

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Originally Posted by Lunica

A lot of my natural lucids come from when I'm in danger. My body is desperate for help and I become aware. Or I realize the repetitive chasing has to be a dream. Running in and out of a house being chased for what seemed like about 3hrs kinda made me open my dream eyes and think.. I'm dreaming. :] lol

I used to get more lucids when younger than I do now. And they lasted longer.

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This brings to mind another curiosity. I was wondering if anyone had 'very long' lucids.

As in, lucidity perhaps for more than a meager 10-40 minutes.

I've been quiet about expressing my length of lucidity in dreams, as a few people find it questionable as to how much truth it holds.

If anyone has had lucidity for any longer period of time, it'd be greatly appreciated if they could post here to any length about it.

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Originally Posted by ClouD

This brings to mind another curiosity. I was wondering if anyone had 'very long' lucids.

As in, lucidity perhaps for more than a meager 10-40 minutes.

I've been quiet about expressing my length of lucidity in dreams, as a few people find it questionable as to how much truth it holds.

If anyone has had lucidity for any longer period of time, it'd be greatly appreciated if they could post here to any length about it.

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My first/ish lucid where I gave myself a big flying lesson. I remember it cleary. It lasted for about 40mins-1hr it was very clear too. Haven't had one line that since.

Well, I don't normally time my dreams, but I have noticed some lasting 40 min to an hour and I feel confident that I had one last at least 2 and a half hours. Just happened to look at the clock before and after that day. I've most likely had many more long ones.

It is hard to know how long a dream lasts in "waking world time" because of time dialation in dreams, so unless, like AlexLou you happened to look at the clock shortly before the dream began and shortly after it ended how would you know??

That said, I have looked at a clock before and after many of my lucid dream and it is fairly normal for many of mine to last well over an hour. I wonder if this is because i routinely dream during non-REM sleep?? The longest LD I've ever noticed (and was able to closely time by looking at a clock) was just over 3 hours 15 minutes. Most of my LDs seem to last between 10 min and 45 min waking time.

However, if you are talking about dream time (which is notoriously different from waking time) I've had LDs that seem to last for days. In elementary school I had a dream (lucid) that seemed to last more than a month. When I woke up I was so surprised I hadn't slept for weeks. That is the longest seeming dream I remember.

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Originally Posted by ClouD

I'm curious as to if you have many lucid dreams, and the quality etc. of them.

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I have a lot of lucid dreams, when compared to the average DVer. I've been keeping a DJ for 153 days and in that time I've recorded 588 LDs. That is an average of just over 3.8 LDs per night. In that time I've gone a few days without remembering any LDs, but have not yet had a "dry spell."

As to the quality, I'm not quite sure what you mean. They are vivid with all 5 senses generally stronger than waking life. Often contemplate the symbology of this or that. Sometimes I'm "semi-lucid," meaning I have varing degrees of illogical thinking and behavior, accept illogical things in the dream, etc. Generally I don't try to change much in the dream, even when I am supremly aware it is all taking place in my mind and thus I could exert god-like control. But I do love to fly. Often I only realize I spent the whole dream floating to place to place rather than walking in retrospect.

I think the reason I don't man-handle the dream scape, DCs, etc is because I have a respect for dreams. If they do have a reality independent of me I don't want to go around mindlessly trashing the place. Plus I have SO MANY LDs I mostly try to just go along with the dream because I want to be sure my mind has enough chance to work out whatever internal maintenance and problems it needs to. Plus, after a while, grand adventure gets a bit dull.