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A little while ago I had a long conversation with one of my friends about lucid dreaming. She has what I termed “Transcendent Lucidity,” or complete awareness in every dream, as well as high levels of control. Enough lucidity to essentially life your life in dreams, and abandon waking reality. Upon my discussion with her however, I noticed a completely different point of view then the one I held and still somewhat hold. She thought it was selfish and sad to live your life in dreams. I argued that there’s nothing selfish nor sad about it, you can still live your normal life, as a normal person, or that even if you didn’t really function in daily life, who cares? It’s an intermission in between a lifetime of unlimited potential and another lifetime of the same.
How would being able to be completely lucid every night for as long as you want change the way you lived your life? Here’s a few that came up in that conversation:
Positives:
-It would give you anything you wanted every night
-it lasts as long as you want
-You wouldn’t have to worry about the normal waking life.
-You wouldn’t want expensive luxuries nearly as much, because you already have everything every night.
Negatives:
-Daily life becomes a drag after having achieved everything you ever wanted.
-You would be dysfunctional in waking life, as it would just be an interruption to dreams.
-It may feel like however long, but in reality it’s just like normal memory when you wake up. (The only thing is, there’s nobody to remind you of it, so it fades away until something does, or unless you write it down. I doubt anybody is going to write a lifetime down in a day)
Questions to ponder and discuss:
When you’re spending more conscious time in your dreams then your waking conscious, which one is your reality?
Is it selfish to spend your life dreaming?
Could you somehow spend that time in the dream with another person from waking reality? (effectively achieving a lifetime with another person)
(This sharing would allow you to discuss what happened with another person, improving your recall)
What’s your opinion on Transcendent Lucidity? I’d like to have a discussion with my readers on this topic, as more points of view will bring new avenues of thought and discussion. Leave a comment and let me know what you think!
-Hatter
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Hatter, The concept of "Transcendent Lucidity" really intrigues me, as you’ve described it. As you might remember, I am decent with maintaing the Lucid State indefinitely. I’m just now getting into controlling the dreams more and more. I’ll be honest with you, the notion of spending an entire lifetime in a dream world never crossed my mind, at least not at a conscious level. I’d be interested in having your friend email me so I can find out how she does the "Transcendent" aspect of Lucidity. I want to model that ability.
I think I may be in ballpark range of "Transcendent Lucidity". I’m lucid about 50% of the time, and usually have very good control. Though sometimes I’m just way off base and completely fooled into thinking my dream is real :-P.Which one is the "real" reality? Beats me. I think it’s the same reality, just different experiences.I don’t think it’s selfish to spend your life dreaming. It may be evidence of a psychological disorder though… perhaps one would dream their whole life if they can’t deal with the "real" world, and use it to escape. This would be as unhealthy as any other type of addiction used to escape reality.~Sean
Fascinating. I keep writing up a long comment and deleting it as I find my thoughts changing as I write this!!! I find it odd that someone with such a degree of constant lucidity would find it selfish and sad to live a life in her dreams. Did she not actively pursue having this state of mind? Is she wasting this ability, and the experiences it could bring her?In terms of Transcendent Lucidity, I think I could live a seperate life in my dreams that would only invigorate my goals and desires in my waking life. I am always enthralled and energized when I have lucid dreams. They fascinate me and I wake up with fresh eyes to the world. To experience this every night, all the time, with all my dreams - this would probably put that energy into over drive.
Personally I use my dreams to learn more about myself & my motivations, not to play "Second Life."I’ve sometimes asked myself the question about "which is more real," however. I mean, who’s to say that THIS isn’t the "dream," ultimately?As far as lucid dreaming all the time goes, however, I find it can be very tiring. When one is partially conscious during the sleep cycle, they’re clearly not getting the restful night’s sleep they need. Although I’m lucid almost every night these days, I find I need to take some nights "off," just to rest up.
<i>Daily life becomes a drag after having achieved everything you ever wanted.</i>I think this could be a benefit rather than a negative (at least for some people). The dreamworld provides limitless experiences, but the waking world provides the opportunity for lasting change. A person could live an entire life every night through lucid dreams and still find value in waking life (<i>e.g.</i>, to enact social justice or to share knowledge with others).
interesting thought! personally, i’ve found that this level of "transcendant lucidity " is unsustainable if waking life is ignored or treated as "meatspace" to borrow a term from second lifers (nice metaphor Lana!). i also have problems with the idea that lucidity equates directly with dream control. but in any case i bet ya’ll would like this article by lucid dreaming phenomenologist Ed Kellogg b/c he makes similiar associations: http://www.improverse.com/ed-articles/kellogg/ is being in control what makes lucid dreaming special? i submit that control is only associated with higher dream consciousness; control is not transcendence. i’ve had so many beautiful and delicate lucid experiences when i was not "in control." in fact, not being in control - while remaining self aware - can be an even greater challenge.
Hey Bill,
The thing is that my friend has done extremely long dreams, but she doesn’t want to do a lifetime. She’s worried that waking life will be boring and meaningless after such an experience. As far as I know, she doesn’t try and control her time of experience, but she most certainly could if she tried.
Hey Sean,
I agree with the escapism idea, it would be like any other method for doing so, except much more powerful. Have you ever tried to hyper-extend your dream reality like Bill has?
Hey Ben,
She didn’t work for this ability, she’s always been a lucid dreamer. That is a good point about being invigorated, I experience that as well. I can’t imagine what having the motivation of a lifetime every time I wake up would feel like. It’s funny, she’s told me sometimes she goes to sleep in her dreams just to give her mind a rest. So that might be construed as a waste of potential from our side of things. But I suppose if you always are lucid, resting one night isn’t such a big loss.
Hey Lana,
Like I was just saying, my friend has done the same. I wonder why this occurs though, becuase I remember reading about studies showing the benefits of sleep between people who were lucid and those who were not were virtually identical. It’s not supposed to interfere with sleep. Then again, hearing it from more people who are lucid more often then I, perhaps there’s something science can’t measure in the mind. I guess a mental fatigue is a very reasonable thing if you never get a chance to "switch off." As far as the "Second Life" idea, who’s to say that you couldn’t spend a lifetime learning about yourself? And ultimately, I’m not sure which could be the dream either. I believe this quote by Chuang Tzu covers the idea:
“I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly dreaming I am a man”
Hey Ryan,
I don’t have time to read over that article just yet, but I think a post might be in order about it later, it looks very intriguing. That is an interesting idea about control. But I would have to ask then what is transcendence, if not awareness and control? I’ve had a few experiences of only being aware, and they were of a different quality then my other lucid dreams. Perhaps I should strive for those as well as controlled lucid dreams.
-Hatter
i can only speak for myself, but i experience transcendence (or moments of bliss/esctasy/union) as a <i>release</i> from control, a kind of willing sacrifice. this requires trust to an unprecedented degree and i have to say that those moments of lucidity are the highest moments i’ve ever had in a dream. in my dreamworld, control can beat down my fear of the unknown quite easily, but transcendence requires something more…. not a vanquishing of fear but a movement past it. it can be really transformative.
Hi Hatter, Great article! Those are some very thought-provoking questions. I have to wonder if being lucid in every dream would be tiring, as Lana mentioned. I do think it would be a bit selfish to devote so much focus to your dreaming life that you neglect your waking life. Dreams offer profound inspiration that can be carried over to waking life, so it would be a shame to not devote equal attention to waking life and apply what you’ve learned in your dreams. Another problem with devoting more time to dream life than waking life is the isolation and the potential artificiality of your experiences. In waking life, you can interact with others and form relationships. Actions taken in dreams don’t offer that opportunity, so if you focus all your attention on your dream life you would neglect the opportunity to form those relationships. It would be like living all alone in a self-created Matrix. Would you be willing to sacrifice real relationships and real interaction for artificial versions manufactured by your mind? (This is an age-old philosophical question — what is reality, what is considered real, what isn’t real, etc. – and it prompts many more questions than answers.) If dream sharing could be achieved and multiple people could interact within a single dream, would the dream be more real in that scenario than in the current scenario in which a single individual creates events and relationships within his/her own dream? I’d have to agree with Ryan with regard to transcendence differing from having control over the dream. Some of my most powerful dreams (in terms of their impact on my understanding and awareness) have been dreams in which I was lucid but made no attempt to control any aspect of the dream. Sometimes the dreaming mind offers up more when you sit back and let it take the reins. ~ Kris
Hatter; Good quote. I’m not suggesting one couldn’t spend a lifetime learning about one’s self–that’s my goal, actually. What I was referring to with the "Second Life" comment is that I prefer to let dream imagery do what it will, rather than using control to give myself a nice car, a nice house, good friends, etc., which would just further mask any personal issues I may need to address, rather than bringing them out of the shadows. ("Second Life" is an online virtual reality game; http://secondlife.com/ ) In my case lucidity definitely has an effect, as I’m partly conscious during dream sleep. Sleep is supposed to be a time of unconsciousness, not a time to engage the brain in "waking" tasks like remembering, reviewing, etc.
Hey Ryan,
That is a good point. Moving past something completely
is much more of a transcendence then controlling that thing. I will
definitely experiment with giving control back to the dream.
Hey Kris,
The point about interpersonal relations being something which dreams lack
keeps coming up. I think it’s a valid point, but I wonder would living
a separate life shared with some of your best friends still be as
selfish as one not? I’d have to say sharing the dream with other people
would make it a little more realistic, mostly in that you can’t control
the other people and they have their own agenda.
Hey Lana,
That is a good point about using material posessions to cover up what may
be personal issues. I have to wonder though, wouldn’t the dream simply
find some other way of manifesting the personal issue? I suppose that
if lucidity is tiring on a person, that in order to live your life in a
dream you’d have to take a night off now and then. That also brings up
the question whether living a hyper extended dream tires you out more
than a normal length dream.
-Hatter
Hatter; If one spends all of their REM states controlling their dreams, then the subconscious is being overruled by the conscious mind & can’t express itself (&/or deep seated issues,) through a normal route. Yes, it might come out some other way–someone might suddenly snap & go on a killing rampage, for example. Considering the importance of normal brain function, I tend to let my dreaming mind do what it will. I don’t try to extend REM periods (but it would make sense that that would be even more tiring, yes,) & I use my lucidity only to focus on remembering.
Hey Lana,
I meant the dream might manifest it in some way. Assuming you aren’t controlling everything strictly, there’s still room for a lot to be shown to you. If I’m understanding you correctly, you prefer to be a normal person (in that you don’t exercise your control) in a dream. That would be very interesting, I think it’d have a value to it’s own, not being in control. I came upon that point with my friend. She says when she’s dreaming and knows it so completely it takes some of the life out of it, things aren’t as interesting. If you let your dreaming mind do what it wanted, it would keep things interesting.
Very interesting Lana. Your viewpoint is a great new avenue for me to think about and explore.
(Assuming I understand you. If I’m wrong, make sure to correct me)
-Hatter
Hatter; Yes, I think we understand each other, finally.