“I dreamed I was a butterfly, flitting around in the sky; then I awoke. Now I wonder: Am I a man who dreamt of being a butterfly, or am I a butterfly dreaming that I am a man ?”
This quote from the Zhuangzi, an ancient Chinese Taoist text, reminds us, amongst other things, that dreams and the waking state both feel ‘real’ while they’re being experienced.
When you are awake your perception of what you are experiencing, your reality, exists in the electrical circuitry of your brain. When you are dreaming the same thing is true. Dreams don’t just feel real, they are real. So imagine if you could control your dreams. Be the director rather than just an actor in them. Well, maybe you can.
Lucid Dreaming
Lucid dreaming—the experience of being aware that you're dreaming while still in the dream—has fascinated humans for millennia. It's a strange phenomenon that blends consciousness with the unconscious world, giving us the potential to dream with intention and clarity. But what exactly is it, and why has it captured the attention of philosophers, psychologists, and spiritual seekers for over 2,000 years ?
A Brief History of Lucid Dreaming
The earliest recorded references to lucid dreaming date back to ancient times. In 350 BCE, the Greek philosopher Aristotle mentioned in ‘On Dreams’ that sometimes when dreaming, “a person is aware of the state in which he is dreaming.” In Eastern traditions, particularly in Tibetan Buddhism, dream yoga has long been practiced as a spiritual discipline aimed at cultivating awareness within dreams.
In the 8th century, Islamic philosopher Ibn Sirin also wrote extensively on dream interpretation, touching on themes of awareness and control. Yet it wasn’t until the 20th century that the term “lucid dreaming” was coined by Dutch psychiatrist Frederik van Eeden, who documented his own experiences in a 1913 paper.
What Science Says About It
Modern science began seriously studying lucid dreaming in the late 20th century. One of the breakthrough moments came in the 1970s and 80s when researchers at Stanford University, including Stephen LaBerge, developed methods to study lucid dreaming in sleep labs. Lucid dreamers were trained to move their eyes in a specific pattern during REM sleep, creating signals that could be measured in real-time while they were dreaming.
Studies have since shown that during lucid dreams, the prefrontal cortex—the area of the brain associated with decision-making and self-awareness—becomes more active. This may explain the heightened consciousness and control that characterizes lucid dreams.
Can We Learn to Lucid Dream ?
Yes, with practice. I’m not an expert and there are many books and online guides if you want more information, but briefy, techniques include:
Reality checks: Frequently questioning whether you're awake or dreaming throughout the day.
Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD): Repeating affirmations before sleep to reinforce the intention to realize you're dreaming.
Wake-Back-to-Bed (WBTB): Waking up after 4–6 hours of sleep, staying awake briefly, then going back to sleep with the aim of entering a lucid state.
Dream journaling: Writing down dreams upon waking to improve dream recall and increase self-awareness.
With consistent practice, some people can have multiple lucid dreams per week, while others may only succeed sporadically.
Benefits and Risks
It is claimed that lucid dreaming offers a range of psychological and emotional benefits. It can be used therapeutically to treat nightmares and PTSD by allowing individuals to confront and change recurring distressing dreams. Artists, writers, and creatives often use lucid dreaming for inspiration, while others simply enjoy the ability to fly, explore, or experience impossible feats in vivid, personal worlds.
Just think, if you could dream intentionally you could do whatever your mind is able to imagine, unhindered by either the laws of man or physics. You could experience all of your fantasies and really live your dreams if you were able to achieve a sufficient degree of control.
There are risks, however. Some people experience sleep fragmentation or insomnia from overly intense efforts to induce lucid dreams. There's also the potential for derealization, a feeling that waking life is less real or important, which can be disorienting or troubling, especially for those prone to dissociative symptoms.
Can We Share Dreams ?
The idea of shared lucid dreaming, where two or more people consciously meet within the same dream, remains highly speculative and unsupported by scientific evidence but has fascinated fiction writers. While anecdotal stories abound, there’s no confirmed mechanism by which minds can ‘link’ during sleep (it’s not like they’re on the same wi-fi network). That said, the dream state is still one of the most mysterious aspects of human consciousness, and further research might yield surprising insights.
The Dream Temptation
Dreams feel very real while you're in them. If you can add to that the ability to shape and control them, it’d be no surprise if some people wondered: Why wake up ? If a dream can be made more beautiful, exciting, or fulfilling than waking life, what would be the incentive to return to ‘grim reality’ ?
Like virtual reality or addiction to digital spaces, lucid dreaming can offer a form of escapism. While rare, some individuals do report preferring their dream life, which naturally raises concerns about dependency on the dream state.
Haruki Murakami, in ‘Sputnik Sweetheart’, wrote “The answer is dreams. Dreaming on and on. Entering the world of dreams and never coming out. Living in dreams for the rest of time.” I can see how, for some people at some times, that could seem very alluring.
And who knows: maybe in the future, when A.I. manages the world and domestic robots tend to our every need, the rich will spend their lives floating weightlessly in sleep tanks, nourished by machines and endlessly dreaming. Maybe we all will.
But for right now, if you do decide to give lucid dreaming a try, I’ll let you be in my dream if I can be in yours. Deal ?
Wolf Hour
Great post here. I try to nap when I can, and I occasionally have such intense dreams that I feel I'm aware of that I wake up groggy!
Man