Lucid Dreaming

Learning Goal: I’m working on a psychology writing question and need a sample draft to help me learn.

For this week’s assignment, you will need to start several days before the due date. The goal is to become more aware of the fact that you do dream by remembering that you have dreamt and becoming better at recalling dream content; once that is tackled, you can work on becoming lucid in your dreams (knowing you are dreaming while you are dreaming). There are two things you will start doing all at once: The first is to keep a dream journal. A note pad or your phone’s recording device by your bed side will work. As soon as you wake up, jot down what you remember from your dreams, even if only a few key words. Do this for several days. The second task is to ask yourself during your normal waking day “Is this real? Am I dreaming.” The reason being, that you will gain practice at asking yourself these very simple questions. Habit is habit, and you may eventually find that you will spontaneously ask yourself these questions while you are dreaming, which can trigger a lucid dreaming experience. Do this also for several days. These two things combined often trigger lucid dreaming in people after a few days. You may startle yourself awake the first time you lucid dream. That’s ok! Lucid dreaming is a skill, and does take practice. There is some information here that you may find helpful. Not all of this information has been scientifically validated (though some has), but it won’t hurt you to read it and make use of some of the techniques. There is also a lot of junk and untested techniques on the internet if you google how to lucid dream. So beware, use common sense, and have fun with it. For this assignment, you do not need to divulge the content of your dreams. Rather, discuss the PROCESS by which you attempted to lucid dream, and the progress your made throughout that process. Your response should be approximately 400 words.