Lucid Dreaming

Thanks to @DevilSurvivor012 for this subject.

I've already posted essays on dreams and what they mean. However, there is one aspect of dreams that is mostly a paranormal aspect. Or, maybe it isn't.

Frederick van Eeden, a psychiatrist and author, coined the term Lucid Dreaming. He wrote an article on this subject in 1913, called 'A Study of Dreams'. This means that this idea has been around for quite some time; however, there are references to the phenomena in ancient writings, including those by Aristotle and in manuscripts by both Buddhist and Hindu writers.

In a nutshell, lucid dreaming is a dream in which you are aware that you are dreaming. Most people are not aware that they are dreaming. Their dreams are so real they think they're actually awake.

There is a site devoted to lucid dreaming. It's called The Lucidity Institute and it's at lucidity.com. They go into this subject in detail.

Basically, when you are lucid dreaming, you may have some degree of control over what's happening. Some experts call this 'false awakening'. There have been many studies to determine what's going on. Most of these studies show that lucid dreaming occurs during the REM (rapid eye movement) phase of sleep. That's when most dreaming occurs.

One of the most festinating aspects of lucid dreaming is awareness of self. This indicates that a person in a lucid dream would act as if they were awake but still realize that they are dreaming.

The other idea is awareness of the meaning of the dream. That's a definite shocker. Most people have no idea what their dreams mean.

Some other crazy aspects of this type of dreaming involve the fact that the dreamer has complete memory of what happened and the fact that the laws of physics may not apply to what happens. They can literally do anything, such as fly or have super powers.

To me, this idea is similar to the Star Trek idea of the Holodeck, a place where one could go to live out a scenario of ones own making. Everything about the experience seems real but is not, and the Holodeck participant realizes that it's illusionary.

It's difficult to say what the psychological effects of this type of dreaming are, but in a horror situation it could be traumatic.

So, like Aerosmith's song says: Dream until the dream comes true.

Thanks for reading.