Lucid Dreams
I met a person in Singapore (let us call her Lakshmi because she doesn’t want her identity revealed) who had a very interesting experience with lucid dreaming. For those that are wondering, in a lucid dream, the dreamer is aware that he/she is dreaming! In many cases, the dreamer may be able to exert some degree of control over the dream characters, narrative, and environment. Thus, the dreamer is not just a participant of the dream but also, to an extent, the controller and decider of the destinies of everyone and everything in the dream. In short, the dreamer is almost the God of the dream!
 |
| A lucid dream can allow you to control and also shape your dreams because you 'know' that you are sleeping! (Artwork by Johnson Tsang) |
I was very keen to know more about her experiences because I felt that lucid dreaming is such a spiritual phenomenon. Vedanta says that life itself is a dream - just that one isn’t aware of it. “What better analogy to find in ‘real life’ about awakening and awareness than lucid dreaming?” I thought.
There were many interesting insights that I got from her but the most striking one was about visiting Prasanthi Nilayam and seeing Bhagawan Sri Sathya Sai Baba, who we lovingly call Swami.
Dream or a nightmare?
Lucid dreaming is something that one can train oneself to do and there are lots of resources on the internet on how to become a lucid dreamer. Lakshmi however, discovered that she had a natural ability to lucid-dream. (Statistics show that about 10-12% of the population has this ability naturally.) The discovery came late in life in an interesting manner.
Lakshmi would dream that she was lying on her bed with her head in the opposite direction of which she had actually slept. She would be paralyzed and stuck. And she would know that it was a dream!
“All that I have to do”, she would tell herself in her dream, “is wake up. Then this paralysis will be gone.”
A normal dreamer can only wonder at how such an experience feels. But for Lakshmi, it was very frustrating. Though she knew that the solution to her paralysis was waking up, she did not know how to wake up!
She discussed her strange plight with her family and close friends. She also received a very interesting solution.
“Lakshmi, you are getting frustrated because you don’t know how to ‘wake up’ though you are aware that you are in a dream. Don’t try to wake up. Just exploit your awareness...”
“What do you mean by that?” asked Lakshmi, a bit confused.
“Well, you know that it is a dream. Thus, you can easily convince yourself that you can walk in it. Spend time walking till you are able to wake up!”
