Lucid dream experiences

At the time Don DeGracia recommended this translation and commentary on the Patanjuli yoga sutras. I have a copy and have read through it several times. I highly recommend it.

https://www.amazon.com/Science-Yoga-Yoga...7ZZNF7WFAX

I occasionally have lucid dreams, but it's quite a long time since I've had one, and I don't think I have them as often as I used to.

Does anyone know whether the incidence of lucid dreams decreases with age?

If you carry a belief that they would, they will. If you do not carry this belief, then they may decelerate/stop for a very simple reason.

You don't need them (as much) anymore.

[Pollux]

I have had quite a lot of Lucid dreams, and posted some of them on the Skeptiko forum. I'll see if I can find them and paste them into this thread.

I had a semi-lucid dreams a week or so ago, that was quite unsettling in some ways. As you know dreams are rarely logical, rational, consistent,  in any way sort, shape, or form. This semi-lucid dream I had I remember that I wasn't aware it was a dream, but I remember that I tried to rationalize my thinking in it, and thought to myself; this cant be real, it shouldn't work like this etc. But I didn't "break through the wall" and realize I was dreaming, but I stayed in this semi-rational-thinking and questioning-mode.

Anyway; I was in a giant two-stories building that can be described as a gigantic mall. It was filled with lots of people, but it wasn't any regular mall with shops and restaurants etc. It was more like a  flea-shop market, with workshops, and all kinds of "displaced" activities. It could be a sort of refugee-camp in one of the more open halls there, then it were some ordinary computer-support companies, in one "shop", while the next "shop" was a blacksmith shoeing horses, the next had reading classes for children (some sort of school), the next was a feldsher
 sawing bones of wounded soldiers, the next "booth"/shop was a clinic where they did CAT-scans and cutting edge brain surgery. One "shop" they sold horses, and it looked like a shitty stable form the middle-ages, and in the "shop" next to it they sold Lamborghini's. It was all these kinds of inconsistencies that sure would have jolted one out of the irrationality of it - and become "aware" and have a lucid dream. But, that didn't happen for me.

Anyhow, the creepy thing of this dream was that I had walking along in this insanely large/wide "mall" for hours, but hadn't seen any windows. The whole place was cramped with people (like a mall right before Christmas) and I was getting fed up with it, and wanted to get out. So I started to asking people were the Exit was. The first I asked ignored me totally, some just gave me the thousand-yard stare
 like they didn't know WTF I was talking about; `an exit??, get out??´ . I got a bit irritated and thought I might get in to one of the "newer" shops, so I went in to a computer shop and asked for the exit of this "mall". They looked a bit apprehensive, but said that you might find it over there, and pointed across some walkways down to he first floor some 200 metres away, but they couldn't be sure, they said. "-Why do you wanna leave?", they asked me. I just looked at them like they were insane, but didn't get into a debate about it.

I went down and tried to plough myself through this mess of people, were some people had set up camp right in the open passageways, put up a tent and was cooking dinner on an open fire while literally hundreds of people was trying to make their way through the crowd to fuck knows where (everyone seemed to aimlessly walking "somewhere" but never getting "there"). I walked pass a garage-shop where some mechanics where working on an old Ford, the next "shop" there were a platoon of Roman solders practising swordsmanship with each other, and the next "shop" some old Indian women were braiding young women's hair outside their teepees. All this is fuckin insane for a rational mind, but since I wasn't "lucid" it was just registered like; "somewhat weird", in my mind. And my mind was set on another goal; `getting the fuck out of there´.

So when I was in the vicinity of where I was told to go I couldn't see any exits , just more "shops" and a wall of people going nowhere. So I got up on a box there and yelled out; "-Can anyone tell me where the exit is?"
People near to me stopped and looked at me like I was a leaper, and continued their aimless walk. I thought; fuck it, now I'm really gonna get hold of someone who can tell me how to get out of here. So I saw a "shop" that was a support-shop for mobile phones, and I went up to the clerk behind the counter and told him; ´you really need to show me they way out of here. He said; "-Maybe you are interested in buying a phone. There is really nothing to see out there anyway."´
"- Gaaah, say what???, tell me how to get out of here or you are going to eat that phone"
He just looked at me and smiled, and now I was beginning to feel trapped.

I got out and run into a women, and asked here; "how did you get in here?" "I dont know" she said; but I heard that there was an exit across the open walking-area, behind a heap of boxes". So I went over there, and saw a really narrow alleyway. And by narrow I mean; walking-sideways-narrow. I tried to squeeze throw, but after a few metres I knew that I would get stuck if I continued. So I went back.

Now I felt like there was "something/someone" that wanted me trapped here, and I ran in to a few shops looking for their backdoor in the end of their shops, to no avail. I asked people; `how did you get here?´ Most of them seemed  confused when I asked them; "- Get here?? I dont know...I haven't been anywhere else.."

By now I was panicking, and I went up a floor in this immense building and thought; fuck it, I'm going thought the roof an no fucker better stop me. So in the middle of the walkway, I saw a painters-ladder, and got it to a clear area and went up it, and punch my way through the soft under-roof, and got up there. And while I was crawling along this cramped area between the soft-roof and the actual roof, I found a ductway, and when I had crawled a few meters in I saw sunlight at the end of it..but just then the ductway started to compress around me, and as I panicked and knew I was gonna get squashed here, I awoke.

If this dream wasn't an depiction/portrayal purgatory I dont know what...

I "felt" that "compression" of being squashed, over my chest, for the better part of that morning.



EDIT: Come to think of it, it was like my own "mall/hell-version" of The Last In Line

There is a direct relationship between the lucidity of a dream and its relevance to what reality that dream experience is to best address. If the dream /appears/ to be manipulated by your physical mind - it is not - then you can expect that the messages being received are intended for the most part for your expereince in physical reality. A feedback loop of sorts.

If the dream is of the astral-journey scheme, then the lucidity is being imposed by your Higher Self (Mind) so that the experience can be more directly enjoyed by the Higher Mind.

This of course excepting certain things like a more compliant set of rules of physics,and a few other things like there being a broader set of colors in this world, and thing like those magnificent grains of sand. : )

I am interested in the broader range of colours. Obviously you can't describe them, but normal things were presumably coloured normally, so were these extra colours reserved for things like pictures or coloured clothes?

How many extra colours did you see, and did they seem to mix with ordinary colours?

David

I am interested in the broader range of colours. Obviously you can't describe them, but normal things were presumably coloured normally, so were these extra colours reserved for things like pictures or coloured clothes?

How many extra colours did you see, and did they seem to mix with ordinary colours?

David

Most of the scenes seemed pretty typical for colors but occasionally I would find a color that was particularity interesting/unique. The grains of sand were interesting because of the range of colors and that each seemed to shine a little. Like they were individually iridescent. It is not a super fine grained sand. Rather more course. And each grain of sand is like a little jewel.

A particular color of blue and one of a pink/red is most memorable.

Most of the scenes seemed pretty typical for colors but occasionally I would find a color that was particularity interesting/unique. The grains of sand were interesting because of the range of colors and that each seemed to shine a little. Like they were individually iridescent. It is not a super fine grained sand. Rather more course. And each grain of sand is like a little jewel.

A particular color of blue and one of a pink/red is most memorable.

I asked because some people report that in OOB/NDE's they see more colours - implying (I think) that they experience more primary colours. The number of colours we see, is of course limited by the three types of colour receptor in the eye, but presumably this limitation need not apply outside the body.

David

I asked because some people report that in OOB/NDE's they see more colours - implying (I think) that they experience more primary colours. The number of colours we see, is of course limited by the three types of colour receptor in the eye, but presumably this limitation need not apply outside the body.

David

I have always assumed that the odd shades I occasionally see are because of the elimination of the RGB aspect of physical sight.

I asked because some people report that in OOB/NDE's they see more colours - implying (I think) that they experience more primary colours. The number of colours we see, is of course limited by the three types of colour receptor in the eye, but presumably this limitation need not apply outside the body.

David

The brain also produces these additional colours during LSD trips and hypnogogic visual displays so if the OOBE/NDE is something produced by the brain rather than a literal event, this is easily explained.  (I'm not saying it is just a hallucination BTW, just being hypothetical.)

The brain also produces these additional colours during LSD trips and hypnogogic visual displays so if the OOBE/NDE is something produced by the brain rather than a literal event, this is easily explained.  (I'm not saying it is just a hallucination BTW, just being hypothetical.)

Actually it isn't clear if those visual effects are created in the brain or in the mind. 

There is some pretty good evidence that says regular visual data is processed before it reaches the physical brain. Which suggests that perhaps "mental" visual imagery does not originate in the brain but passes through it, perhaps on the way to some type of cognition. So it is possible that it is not so easily explained.

When I get a chance I was going to start a thread on the subject.