New Lucid Dreaming Trigger

by phil on Friday Aug 29, 2003 6:50 PM
lucid dreaming

I'm experimenting with Lucid Dreaming. Lucid dreams are dreams in which you become aware that you're dreaming. In that state you can control your environment and retain a memory of the dream that carries on into the waking life. A prerequisite of becoming an oneironaut (as lucid dream travelers are wont to call themselves) is establishing consistent dream recall. Being able to remember your dreams assists you in becoming aware that you're dreaming.

I'm also experimenting with different ways of dream story-telling and elaborating on curious dream happenings.

Below is a strange happening in today's first morning nap.

I'm holding in my hand a piece of paper with numbers from 9 through 12. These represent the various hours in which I have class. There is one entry per line, such as 9 - Biology, 10 - Physics, etc. However, there are two number 11's and next to the second 11 is a 12 scribbled out. This makes sense, though, since we have rotating schedules each day. So this indicates my 11 o'clock switches between the two classes.

The curious part is the scribbled-out 12. Somehow my dream knew that I would be hastily jotting down my schedule and would put the wrong number for my rotating class. However, I never went through this process in my dream. I just opened up the paper and there it was, my mistake reflected.

I felt weird because I was seeing evidence of something I did, yet had no recollection of having done so. It was simultaneously familiar and surprising. My thoughts were both, "Oh, how funny, I do that all the time" and "But how odd, I don't remember writing down this schedule." The "I" in "I do this all the time" was like I was referring to myself in the 3rd person, such as "Phil does this all the time." It was almost like I had inserted myself into the timeline of a Doppelganger Phil from a parallel universe.

This strange discordance, should it occur again, can maybe remind me that I'm dreaming. This can now serve as a trigger to assist my entrance into lucidity.