My first Lucid Dream in years
I'm 34 now. When I was in my mid-20s, I was meditating a lot, doing a lot of yoga. I did some psychedelics, and I was very interested in the philosophical questions of WHAT IS REALITY.
Most of my lucid dreams back then involved me taking control of the dream. I'd test the physics (by jumping), and I'd run around really fast and jump high and idk. Most of my lucid dreams were ones I took control of. And most of the time, becoming lucid would cause me to wake up.
Over the last few years, I've began to become lucid a few times, but I almost immediately try to take control, and then it wakes me up, so I don't really get to experience a lucid dream.
I've again been meditating and doing yoga consistently for many months now. It's been really good for me. Good for my mental health, good for my quality of sleep, good for my physical wellbeing (I have very little chronic pain now!)
Well. My interest in lucid dreaming had sparked again recently (probably in part because of the book i just read). For a long time I was reluctant to try because my mental health has been poor, my sleep has been poor, and I didn't wanna mess with things (sometimes lucid dreaming would make me wake up so much tired).
But two nights ago, I started talking with myself about lucid dreaming, trying to encourage my mind to do it.
Then last night, while I was reading, I stopped and asked myself "Am I dreaming?" then I looked around the room, kind of took stock of everything, and assessed everything as normal. I will say, there's this trippy sense that maybe this is a dream, from a version of my self in another, "higher" plane. Like life is the dream that my soul dreams.
But no, I was not dreaming.
So then for my meditation before bed, I prepped myself some more. I started with my deep breathing, with my breath-awareness, with my current mantra-of-choice: (inhale) Joy within, (exhale) Joy around. (or did I do "love" last night?)
Then I went into dream-related mantra.
(inhale) I am a dreamer (exhale) Am I dreaming?
and later
(inhale) Am I dreaming? (exhale) Am I awake?
and so-on. I did the breathwork and the mantra for a little bit. Whole meditation was probably 10 mins or less.
But then, during one of my dreams last night, I hear "Am I dreaming?"
And yes, I fucking was. And then I knew I was. My old instinct kicked in, to try to drive the dream. But I talked myself down, settled myself. My intent did affect the dream some, but it was mild, and I didn't let the intent take over.
Mostly, I just "sat" there, inside my dream-self, and just watched the dream happen.
It was nice. I want to do more of this. I want to practice the watching-while-lucid. At some point, I do want to engage and drive the dreams, too. But I need to practice the calm, patient awareness first. And I also just want to watch things happen sometimes.
Sidenote: It's an open question in my mind whether my soul actually has any will. The body and mind function in the world, and are clearly dynamic. I experience intention and choice. Thoughts and actions feel like they are mine, like I am doing them. But I often wonder whether I - the soul, the part that experiences the body and mind - have any influence over my body/mind. It might just be an illusion. I may not be a creator of action, but merely an observer of a body/mind that acts.