Lucid Dreaming Read online

  Late one morning several years ago, I found myself driving in my sports car down a dream road, delighted by the vibrantly beautiful scenery, and perfectly aware that I was dreaming. After driving a short distance farther, I saw a very attractive hitchhiker on the side of the road just ahead. I hardly need to say that I felt strongly inclined to stop and pick her up. But I said to myself, “I’ve had that dream before. How about something new?” so I passed her by, resolving instead to seek “The Highest.” As soon as I opened myself to guidance, my car took off into the air, flying rapidly upwards, until it fell behind, like the first stage of a rocket, and I continued to fly higher into the clouds. I passed a cross on a steeple top, a star of David, and other religious symbols. As I rose still higher, beyond the clouds, I entered a space that seemed a limitless mystical realm: a vast emptiness that was overflowing with love, an unbounded space that felt somehow like home. My mood had lifted as high as I had flown, and I began to sing with ecstatic inspiration. The quality of my voice was truly amazing—it spanned the entire range from deepest bass to highest soprano. I felt as if I were embracing the entire cosmos in the resonance of my voice.[8]

  This dream gave me a new sense of identity. I felt as if I had discovered another form of being to which my ordinary sense of self stood in relation as a drop of water to the sea. Of course, I have no way of evaluating how close this vision comes to the ultimate nature of reality (if there is any such thing), and I say this in spite of the conviction of certainty that came with the experience.

  ARE WE AWAKE?

  Idries Shah, considered by some to have been the Sufi Teacher of the Age, said that most people make the fundamental mistake of thinking that we are alive when we have “merely fallen asleep in life’s waiting room.”[9] Indeed, it is a traditional doctrine of esoteric psychologies that the ordinary state of consciousness we call “waking” is so far from seeing things as they are in “Objective reality” that it could be more accurately called “sleep” or “dreaming.” Bertrand Russell, after traveling a very different path, arrives at much the same conclusion: “If modern physics is to be believed,” writes the philosopher, “the dreams we call waking perceptions have only a very little more resemblance to objective reality than the fantastic dreams of sleep.”[10]

  But philosophers aside, if you were asked, “Are you awake now?” you would probably reply, “Certainly!” unfortunately, feeling certain that we are awake provides no guarantee that we are in fact awake. When Samuel Johnson kicked a stone as if to say, “We know what’s real,” he was expressing this sense of certainty. Yet Dr. Johnson could have dreamed he kicked a stone and felt the same. The illusory sense of certainty about the completeness and coherence of our lives leads us to what William James described as a “premature closing of our accounts with reality.”[11]

  How do you know that you are awake right now? You may say you remember waking up from your last night’s sleep. But that might merely have been a “false awakening,” and you might have been fooled by dreaming you are not dreaming anymore. Perhaps what we take to be “true awakenings” are really just another degree of partial or false awakenings. A novelist has similarly argued:

  Why, my friend, should these successive degrees not exist? I have often dreamt that I was awakening from a dream, and in a dream I have reflected on the preceding dream: on waking, I was then able to reflect on my two dreams. Owing to its greater clearness, the second one was a sort of waking in relation of the first. And as for this real waking, who is to say that it will not appear to me as a dream one day in its turn in relation to an even clearer view of the sequence of things...? So many things here below remain confused and obscure to us; it is impossible that the true waking state lies here.[12]

  Once more, try to really ask yourself, “Am I awake?”

  You will note how difficult it is to genuinely raise the question. To sincerely ask whether we are really awake requires honest doubt—however slight. And this is no easy matter for most of us. But doubting the indubitable is the business of philosophers. As Nietzsche put it, “...the man of philosophic turn has a foreboding that underneath this reality in which we live and have our being, another and altogether different reality lies concealed, and that therefore it is also an appearance.”[13] Indeed, Schopenhauer considered his own propensity to at times regard people and things alike “as mere phantoms and dream-pictures” as the very criterion of philosophic ability.[14]

  How might we not be fully awake? It may be that we possess a higher sense (let us say, a form of intuition) that ordinarily remains asleep when our lesser, though better known, senses awake. Thus, as was suggested above, the experience we call “awakening” and consider complete may in fact be only a partial awakening. As A.R. Orage has written,

  It may be feared that there is something morbid in the foregoing speculations; and that an effort to see our waking life as merely a special form of sleep must diminish its importance for us and ours for it. But this attitude toward a possible and probable fact is itself morbidly timid. The truth is that just as in nightdreams the first symptom of waking is to suspect that one is dreaming, the first symptom of waking from the waking state—the second awaking of religion—is the suspicion that our present waking state is dreaming likewise. To be aware that we are only partially awake is the first condition of becoming and making ourselves more fully awake.[15]

  Given that mere philosophical reasoning has little power to genuinely raise the suspicion that we are only partially awake, it is fortunate that we can come to this understanding through direct experience. Lucid dreams plainly show us what it is like to think we are awake, and then to discover that we are not. Professor J.H.M. Whiteman’s book The Mystical Life provides an example of the astonishing impact this discovery can bring. Dr. Whiteman believed that his nocturnal mystical experience was stimulated by the meditative state in which he listened to the performance of a celebrated string quartet on the previous evening. The concert so moved him that for a few moments he felt “rapt out of space by the extreme beauty of the music,” experiencing “a new state of contemplation and joy.” If this sounds like a peak experience, his first dream of the following night revealed another range of mountains towering beyond:

  I seemed to move smoothly through a region of space where, presently, a vivid sense of cold flowed in on me and held my attention with a strange interest. I believe that at that moment the dream had become lucid. Then suddenly, ... all that up to now had been wrapped in confusion instantly passed away, and a new space burst forth in vivid presence and utter reality, with perception free and pinpointed as never before; the darkness itself seemed alive. The thought that was then borne in upon me with inescapable conviction was this: “I have never been awake before.”[16]

  While it is unusual for lucid dreamers to experience as deep a sense of topsy-turvy transformation of the familiar to the strange as Whiteman’s “I have never been awake before,” it is not at all unusual for them to feel they have never before been fully awake and present in their dreams.

  The experience of lucid dreaming provides a simple but powerful analogy for understanding degrees of awakening. Solve for X: as ordinary dreaming is to lucid dreaming, so the ordinary waking state is to X. This unknown state X, the “lucid waking state,” may be interpreted in various ways ranging from simple mindfulness or cognizance to enlightenment. Remember that there are degrees of lucidity, ranging from the marginal to complete, as our knowledge of the meaning of being in a dream varies from knowing only that this is not everyday reality to all the implications of the state, however many there may be. Likewise, there will be similar degrees of understanding with regard to being in the dream we call life.

  This capacity to introduce us to the possibility of a fuller awakening may prove to be lucid dreaming’s most profound application. Certainly, it provides the greatest value in helping us become more alive in our lives.

  We all have had the experience of going into a room to do or get something or other and fo
rgetting when we get there what it was we had intended to do. Worse yet, we may not even notice that we have forgotten why we were there, and instead just do something we habitually do in that room. This trivial bit of the psychopathology of everyday life offers a compelling analogy to the amnesia we experience not just in dreams but in our lives as a whole. Just as in dreams where we typically neither remember what we were doing before the dream began (e.g., going to sleep, etc.), nor concern ourselves with the fact that we cannot recall, so in life. We find ourselves alive, here, now, with no recollection of what we came to do, or even who or that we were “before we were.” Who? Whence? To what end? We have no clue.

  Or do we? Just as we are able with appropriate help and preparation to remember ourselves and our intentions in our dreams, so we can remember what we are here to do in our lives. Let me leave you with a clue. T.S. Eliot unveiled half the secret with the words, “In my beginning is my end,” and the other half as well, with the reflection, “In my end is my beginning.”[17]

  Speaking of beginnings and ends, I am reminded of a tale said to contain in the various levels of its interpretation “all wisdom.” Perhaps you have heard it before?

  THE PRECIOUS JEWEL

  In a remote realm of perfection, there was a just monarch who had a wife and a wonderful son and daughter. They all lived together in happiness.

  One day the father called his children before him and said:

  “The time has come, as it does for all. You are to go down, an infinite distance, to another land. You shall seek and find and bring back a precious Jewel.”

  The travelers were conducted in disguise to a strange land, whose inhabitants almost all lived a dark existence. such was the effect of this place that the two lost touch with each other, wandering as if asleep.

  From time to time they saw phantoms, similitudes of their country and of the Jewel, but such was their condition that these things only increased the depth of their reveries, which they now began to take as reality.

  When news of his children’s plight reached the king, he sent word by a trusted servant, a wise man:

  “Remember your mission, awaken from your dream, and remain together.”

  With this message they roused themselves, and with the help of their rescuing guide they dared the monstrous perils which surrounded the Jewel, and by its magic aid returned to their realm of light, to remain in increased happiness for evermore.[18]

  Notes

  ***

  1 In Dreams Awake

  [1] S. LaBerge, Lucid Dreaming (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1985), 1-2.

  [2] T. Tulku, Openness Mind (Berkeley: dharma Press, 1978), 74.

  [3] G.S. Sparrow, Lucid Dreaming: Dawning of the Clear Light (Virginia Beach: A.R.E. Press, 1978), 26-27.

  [4] I. Shah, Seeker After Truth (London: Octagon Press, 1982), 33.

  2 A Psychobiological model of Dreaming

  [1] Dalai Lama, The Joy of Living and Dying in Peace (HarperSanFrancisco, 1997), 169.

  [2] S. LaBerge, Lucid Dreaming (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1985).

  3 Learning Lucid Dreaming

  [1] For information on lucid dreaming training, visit www.lucidity.com.

  [2] Dalai Lama, Sleeping, Dreaming, and Dying: An exploration of Consciousness with the Dalai Lama xIV, ed. F. Varela (Boston: Wisdom, 1997), 107.

  4 The Practical Dreamer: Applications of Lucid Dreaming

  [1] E. Green, A. Green, and D. Walters, “Biofeedback for Mind-Body Self-regulation: healing and Creativity,” Fields Within Fields ... Within Fields (New York: Stulman, 1972), 144.

  [2] S. LaBerge and H. Rheingold, Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming (New York: Ballantine 1990), 223.

  [3] D.T. Jaffe and D.E. Bresler, “The Use of Guided Imagery As an Adjunct to Medical Diagnosis and Treatment,” Journal of Humanistic Psychology 20 (1980): 45-59.

  [4] B.M. Kedrov, “On the Question of Scientific Creativity,” Voprosy Psikologii 3 (1957): 91-113.

  [5] W. Dement, Some Must Watch While Some Must Sleep (San Francisco: W. h. Freeman, 1972), 101.

  [6] S. LaBerge, Lucid Dreaming (Los Angeles: Tarcher, 1985), 1-2.

  [7] W. Dement, Op. Cit., 102.

  [8] S.S. Steiner and S.J. Ellman, “Relation between REM Sleep and Intracranial Self-Stimulation,” Science 177 (1972): 1122-24.

  5 Lucid Dream Work: From Nightmares to Wholeness

  [1] G. Larson, Beyond the Far Side (Kansas City: Andrews, McMeel & Parker 1983).

  [2] E. Rossi, Dreams and the Growth of Personality (new York: Bruner/Mazel 1972/1985).

  [3] Ibid., 142.

  [4] R. Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet (New York: Random House 1984), 91-92.

  [5] F. van Eeden, “A Study of Dreams,” Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research 26 (1913): 439.

  [6] I bid., 461.

  [7] Augustine, Confessions, X, 30.

  [8] P. Tholey, “A Model of Lucidity Training As a Means of Self-Healing and Psychological Growth,” Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain, Eds. J. Gackenbach and S. LaBerge (New York: Plenum 1988), 263-287.

  [9] H. Sanai, The Walled Garden of Truth, Trans. D. Pendlebury, (New York: Dutton 1976), 11

  [10] H. Saint-Denys, Dreams and How to Guide Them (London: Duckworth 1982), 58-59.

  [11] I bid.

  [12] I bid.

  [13] I bid.

  [14] G.S. Sparrow, Lucid Dreaming: Dawning of the Clear Light (Virginia Beach: A.R.E. Press 1976), 33.

  [15] Asklepios the Greek god of health was symbolized by the snake, and indeed, this creature was commonly associated with the god in cult and ritual. Whether or not Asklepios actually ever took the form of a snake (as did another light bearer), the two were strongly associated in ritual and myth.

  [16] P. Tholey, op. cit., 265.

  [17] P. Tholey, op. cit., 272.

  [18] h. Saint-Denys, op. cit.

  [19] Cf., S. Kaplan-Williams, The Jungian Senoi Dreamwork Manual (Berkeley: Journey Press, 1985).

  For more recommendations on various approaches and outcomes in lucid dream encounters with hostile dream figures, see P. Tholey, “A Model of Lucidity Training As a Means of Self-healing and Psychological Growth,” Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain, eds. J. Gackenbach and S. LaBerge (New York: Plenum, 1988), 263-287.

  6 Life as a Dream

  [1] I. Shah, The Sufis (London: Octagon Press, 1964), 141.

  [2] T. Tulku, Openness Mind (Berkeley, California: dharma Press, 1978), 77.

  [3] I bid., 90.

  [4] Ibid., 78.

  [5] Ibid., 86.

  [6]. I. Shah, “Myself,” The Subtleties of the Inimitable Mulla Narsudin (London: Octagon Press, 1983).

  [7] Ibid., 90.

  [8] S. LaBerge, Lucid Dreaming (Los Angeles: Jeremy P. Tarcher, Inc., 1985), 244-245.

  [9] I. Shah, Seeker After Truth (London: Octagon Press, 1982), 33.

  [10] S. LaBerge, “Lucid Dreaming: Directing the Action As It happens,” Psychology Today 15 (1981): 48-57.

  [11] W. James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (New York: Modern Library, 1929), 378-379.

  [12] R. De Becker, The Understanding of Dreams (London: Allen & Unwin, 1965), 406.

  [13] Ibid., 138.

  [14] Ibid.

  [15] A.R. Orage, Psychological Exercises (New York: Samuel Weiser, 1930), 92.

  [16] J.H.M. Whiteman, The Mystical Life (London: Faber & Faber, 1961), 57.

  [17] T.S. Eliot, 1940, “East Coker,” Four Quartets.

  [18] I. Shah, Thinkers of the East (London: Octagon Press, 1971), 123.

  About the Author

  ***

  Stephen Laberge, Ph.D., entered this world in 1947. As an Air Force brat, he saw much of the planet, and developed a keen interest in science as a means of understanding the cosmos. In 1967, he obtained his bachelor’s degree in mathematics after two years at the University of Arizona, and began graduate studies in chemical physics at Stanford University. Following a hiatus spent in quest of the holy Grail, he retur
ned to Stanford and laid the groundwork for his pioneering breakthroughs in lucid-dreaming research, obtaining his Ph.D. in psychophysiology in 1980. Since then, he has been continuing work at Stanford studying lucid dreaming and psychophysiological correlates of states of consciousness. In 1988, acting on his conviction that lucid dreaming offers many benefits to humanity, Dr. LaBerge founded the Lucidity Institute, the mission of which is to advance research on the nature and potentials of consciousness and to apply the results of this research to the enhancement of human health and well-being. Email: [email protected]

  Sounds True was founded in 1985, with a clear vision: to disseminate spiritual wisdom. Located in Boulder, Colorado, Sounds True publishes teaching programs that are designed to educate, uplift, and inspire. We work with many of the leading spiritual teachers, thinkers, healers, and visionary artists of our time.

  To receive a free catalog of tools and teachings for personal and spiritual transformation, please visit www.soundstrue.com, call toll free at 800-333-9185, or write to us at the address below.

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  “Stephen LaBerge has proven scientifically that people can be fully conscious in their dreams while remaining asleep”