The Science of Thought Group Magazine 1

The Science of Thought Group Magazine Six monthly – First Issue – January 2016 © January 2016 – Satsang Ebook Publications, Ghent, Belgium

Lucid Dreaming for Young and Old Foreword Let us start with the following two quotations: Realization that one is dreaming brings a wonderful sense of freedom– freedom to try anything in the extended range of experience. … The nature of lucid dream experience may range up to the mystical, whilst

there seems to be an inherent resistance to anything erotic. (McCreery, 1973: 114) When lucid dreams endure beyond a certain point, at least for me, orgasm is almost inevitable… in fully two-thirds of my lucid dreams, I feel the flow of sexual energy; this arousal culminates in an orgasmic burst on about half of these occasions. (Garfield, 1979: 134-35) What are we concluding from the above two quotations? Certainly nothing regarding the nature of sex or eroticism in the lucid dream state. Rather, they illustrate that the experience of lucid dreaming is subject to individual variation. This should not be surprising, since lucid dreaming, like all forms of conscious experience, is comprised of a flow of subjective events created by brain processes using input from sensory-perceptual modalities, internal algorithms or schemata and, perhaps, poorly understood neuronal activity associated with central nervous system homeostatic maintenance. Variability in individual experience is inherent at all levels: anatomical in the form of limitations imposed by breath and sensory system development, physiological as sleep and REM sleep (Rapid Eye Movement sleep) needs, inborn activation and damping tendencies, and psychological variation caused by recent and long-term experiences, the development of habits of interaction with the environment, and assumptions about the way the world works. The range of subjective experiences reported to occur during dreaming appears wider and more variable than those typical of waking. In this chapter we will focus on the nature of experience in lucid dreams. We begin by showing that lucidity in dreams is not a discrete phenomenon, but that reflective consciousness exists in all dreams and can be measured on a continuum with “lucidity” and “non-lucidity” representing two ends of the spectrum. The remainder of the chapter will explore the substantial individual variation in lucid dreams, illustrated with examples derived from the authors’ experiences. The discussion will focus on two primary themes: the role played by belief systems and learning in shaping lucid dream experiences, and the role played by factors which appear to be independent of the dreamer’s beliefs and learning. The distinction between non-lucid and lucid dreams represents perhaps the broadest level of variation in dream experiences presently recognized. The contemporary notion of a lucid dream is a “dream in which one knows one is dreaming” (Green, 1968). This is in contrast to the non-lucid dream, in which dreamers are not aware of being in the dream state. Some dream theorists treat the lucid/non-lucid distinction in a way we consider too rigid, arguing these are two completely distinct types of phenomena (Hobson, 1988, 1994; Tart, 1984; Tholey, 1988). In our view, the distinction between lucid and non-lucid dreams 2

is not as clear-cut as the definition suggests and fails to do justice to the subtlety of the actual experience. We feel the contemporary distinction has misplaced focus away from what we consider the essential variations in dream cognition underlying dream lucidity. We have recently developed a psychological model that we believe captures the experiential essence of the differences between lucid and non-lucid dreams (DeGracia and LaBerge, 1998). In brief, our model hinges on the relationship of the waking self and the identity of the dreamer, and addresses the question: at what psychological levels do changes in self-awareness in the dream state occur that correspond to the onset of dream lucidity? Or stated somewhat differently, what exactly is dream lucidity? Our basis for answering this question involved a systematic comparison of waking, lucid and non-lucid dreaming within the framework of the Global Workspace (GW) model of consciousness developed by Bernard Baars (1988). Recognizing that dreams in general are an expression of consciousness during sleep, the critical feature of Baars’s GW model we used was his formulation that conscious processes are moulded and framed by unconscious processes. Baars formulates unconscious processes as contexts. Contexts are operationally defined as “a system (or set of systems) that constrains conscious contents without itself being conscious” (Baars, 1988).

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Briefly, How can your Dreams be Controlled? Have you ever fallen in love with a dream character so much that when you wake up you miss them and hope to see them again when you dream? Lucid dreamers are individuals who know they are dreaming while in a dream, but there appears to be an additional advantage of this unique ability. Researchers from the Max Planck1 Institute for Human Development and the Max Planck Institute of Psychiatry found the area in the brain known for being responsible for higher self-reflection (i.e., self-awareness and metacognition) is also higher in lucid dreamers. Certain individuals have an awareness while dreaming which enables them to be cognizant and understand it is only a dream, not real life. Many of these lucid dreamers, if not all of them, can actually control the events in their dreams. For example, most people have experienced the feeling of flying in dreams but they just ‘go with the flow’ and experience the scenic view. They dream they are flying but cannot control where they fly or what they see during their flight. On the other hand, lucid dreamers not only can control where they fly, they can virtually land and change the dream while being cognizant of it only being a dream, not real life. They have what is called “meta-cognition” that allows them to be cognitively aware and understand their own thought processes. The researchers postulate lucid dreamers are more self-reflective and have more self-awareness than individuals who are not lucid dreamers. Their assumption is based on medical tests which show the association within the brain. The anterior prefrontal cortex controls conscious, cognitive processes and is larger in both lucid dreamers and in individuals who performed better on meta-cognitive tests. Techniques to control, or at least influence, our dreams have been shown to work in sleep experiments. We can strategize to dream about a particular subject, solve a problem or end a recurring nightmare. With practice we can also increase our chances of having a lucid dream, the sort of "dream within a dream" that Inception's characters regularly slip into. 1

Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck, April 23, 1858 – October 4, 1947) was a German theoretical physicist who originated quantum theory, which won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918. Planck made many contributions to theoretical physics, but his fame as a physicist rests primarily on his role as an originator of the quantum theory. However, his name is also known on a broader academic basis, through the renaming in 1948 of the German scientific institution, the Kaiser Wilhelm Society. The MPS now includes 83 institutions representing a wide range of scientific directions. Max Planck's quantum theory revolutionized human understanding of atomic and subatomic processes.

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The ability to influence other people's sleep worlds is still crude. But emerging technologies raise the prospect that, at the very least, we'll get an idea of what others are dreaming about in real time. We asked Deirdre Barrett, author of the book The Committee of Sleep: How Artists, Scientists and Athletes Use Dreams for Creative Problem-Solving—and How You Can, Too (Crown, 2001) and assistant clinical professor of psychology at Harvard Medical School, about what dream-control strategies do and don't work—and why.

An edited transcript of the interview as follows We're all familiar with dreams, but what's the scientific definition? The literal definition is a narrative experience that occurs during sleep. A few people will define it as a REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep experience but, actually, the research doesn't support that. Some things that seem to look like dreams occasionally occur in other stages of sleep. Why do most dreams seem to occur in REM (Rapid Eye Movement), and what's happening during that sleep phase that seems to produce dreams? REM is generally the only time during sleep that most of the cortex is pretty much as active as it is when we're awake. During this phase, there are rhythmic bursts of activity in the brain stem. There's one school of thought that this rhythmic firing is the sole cause of dreaming and all the upper cortical activity is 5

a simple response to that. It just doesn't look that way. It looks like the lower brain stem activity wakes the cortex up and then the cortex does a lot of organized, meaningful thinking once it's activated. The thing that is very frustratingly not neat and clean is that every once in awhile when you wake somebody out of a non-REM period, they report something that looks pretty much like the elaborate narrative of a dream. This is especially common in people who have big traumas and shift workers who have their sleep disrupted, so it may be that it happens mainly when something isn't operating completely properly with the regular sleep cycle. During dreams, are certain regions more active than others or does that depend on what you're dreaming about? It's sort of halfway in between the extreme version of either of those. On average, there are several areas that are more active than they would be during the waking state. Those are parts of the visual cortex, parts of the motor cortex and certain motion-sensing areas deeper in the brain. That's probably related to why dreams are so very visual compared to other sensory modes or types of content and also why they have a lot of motion and action in them relative to our waking experience. The parts of the brain stem that fire those bursts of activity are also active. There are other areas that are less active on average during REM sleep. Those are the prefrontal areas, which have to do with the fine points of logical reasoning and also where you might say censorship resides. That's not only for censorship of things that are socially inappropriate, what Freud would have meant by censorship of sexual and aggressive impulses, but also the impulses that say, "that's not the logical way to do things." That seems to be why even though we continue to think about all kinds of problems and issues in our sleep, and sometimes come up with really creative, interesting solutions; their logic is less linear than our waking thought is. Given that there's higher-level thinking going on in our dreams, to what extent can we control them? That we can control our own dreams is quite true and really much more so than people seem to know or realize. The details of how to do it are very different depending on whether you're trying to induce lucid dreams, whether you're trying to dream about particular content or whether you're trying to dream a solution to a particular personal or objective problem. Another really common application has been influencing nightmares, especially recurring post-traumatic nightmares—either to stop them or turn them into some sort of mastery dream. 6

So how can you solve a problem in a dream? Although any kind of problem can make a breakthrough in a dream, the two categories that really crop up a lot are things where the solution benefits from being represented visually, because the dreams are so vivid in their visual-spatial imagery, and when you're stuck because the conventional wisdom is just plain wrong. You may have heard the example of August Kekulé2 and the benzene ring, which represents both these themes. He was thinking that in all nonchemical molecules, the atoms were lined up in some kind of straight line with 90-degree side chains coming off it. Once he knew the atoms in benzene, he was trying to come up with arrangements of them that were straight lines with side chains and it just wasn't working. Then he dreamt of the atoms forming as a snake, eventually reaching around with the snake's tail in its mouth. It seems exactly related to the fact that the prefrontal lobes that control censorship are, on average, much less active during dreams. If you want to problem-solve in a dream, you should first of all think of the problem before bed, and if it lends itself to an image, hold it in your mind and let it be the last thing in your mind before falling asleep. For extra credit assemble something on your bedside table that makes an image of the problem. If it's a personal problem, it might be the person you have the conflict with. If you're an artist, it might be a blank canvas. If you're a scientist, the device you're working on that's half assembled or a mathematical proof you've been writing through versions of. Equally important, don't jump out of bed when you wake up—almost half of dream content is lost if you get distracted. Lie there, don't do anything else. If you don't recall a dream immediately, see if you feel a particular emotion—the whole dream would come flooding back. [In a weeklong study I did with students that followed this protocol] 50 percent dreamed of the problem and a fourth solved them—so that's a pretty good guideline, that half of people would have some effect from doing this for a week.

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Friedrich August Kekulé, later Friedrich August Kekule von Stradonitz (German pronunciation: [ˈfriːdrɪç ˈaʊɡʊst ˈkekuːle fɔn ʃtraˈdoːnɪts]) (7 September 1829 – 13 July 1896) was a German organic chemist. From the 1850s until his death, Kekulé was one of the most prominent chemists in Europe, especially in theoretical chemistry. He was the principal founder of the theory of chemical structure.

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What about if you want to, say, dream of a certain person or about a particular experience—how can you do that? If you're just trying to dream about an issue or you want to dream of a person who's deceased or you haven't seen in a long time, you'd use very similar bedtime incubation suggestions as you would for problem solving: a concise verbal statement of what you want to dream about or a visual image of it to look at. Very often it's a person someone wants to dream of, and just a simple photo is an ideal trigger. If you used to have flying dreams and you haven't had one in a long time and you miss them, find a photo of a human flying. Image-rehearsal therapy has gotten attention as a strategy to overcome nightmares. How does this technique work, and is it effective? Different people mean different things by that. The details are different but the techniques are very similar—they all grow out of the observation that when people are having bad, repetitive post-traumatic nightmares, a certain proportion seem to move on to having some kind of mastery dream spontaneously. The same way the nightmares had been re-traumatizing them, the mastery dream seemed to carry over into helping them feel much safer and more healed in their daytime state. [Therapists or researchers] have the person work out an alternate scenario they want the dream to take, where they might ask them to close their eyes and imagine and generally talk them through a kind of vivid enactment of it. Usually the person incorporates some degree of the rehearsed scenario at bedtime or listens to a tape where the therapist or researcher is recounting the alternate scenario. Barry Krakow3 does this in a group format and gets statistically significant, positive outcomes. He gets a remarkably high number of people who don't report the mastery nightmare and yet their nightmares stop and/or their daytime anxiety gets much better. We can't know whether they had a mastery dream and don't recall it or if something else about that positive, soothing imagery as you're falling asleep—even if it does not carry over into the dream—carries over into decreasing the number of the nightmares or the daytime anxiety, heightened startle response and flashbacks. In the one-on-one clinical studies there seems to 3

Initially trained as an internist and emergency room physician, Dr. Krakow's interest in treatment of sleep disturbances developed after he pursued an interest in medication side effects related to sleep problems. He has since become a sleep researcher, and runs a sleep clinic in Albuquerque, NM specialized in the treatment of sleep problems co-occurring with PTSD and other psychiatric disorders.

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be a much higher rate of actually having the rather dramatic mastery dream. In the case of the successful techniques, what may be happening in the brain that allows these dream-control strategies to work? Only if you're buying this idea that dreams should all be random or are being generated in the lower brain stem is there anything we need to explain about why you'd remember a suggestion you'd made to yourself for dream content or that intensely studying a problem before you fell asleep wouldn't be likely to turn up in your dream. Our ability to request that of ourselves at some point in the future is very analogous to what we might do awake. When it happens in a dream, it's happening in a state that by its nature is more vivid, much more intuitive and an emotional kind of thinking, and much less linear in its logic and much less verbal in orientation. That we're going to respond to this request from this very different biochemical state is what makes it such that sometimes we'll kind of respond but it will be in this vaguely nonsensical kind of way; other times it will be that we have this amazing breakthrough because we're thinking about this problem we've had this false bias about how to solve when we're awake. Can we dream that we're dreaming? Yes. That is the most common definition of a lucid dream—a dream where you know you're dreaming as the dream is occurring. A few writers on lucidity have chosen to make some degree of dream control part of the definition, but most choose to see that as a separate, additional element. Lucid dreams are infrequent—less than 1 percent of dreams in most studies—but they certainly do crop up in any large collection of lots of people's dreams. How can you up your chances of having a lucid dream? By reminding yourself you want to just as you're falling asleep, either as a verbal statement or idea: "Tonight when I dream, I want to realize I'm dreaming." That's the single most important thing, other than simply getting enough sleep. For any sort of dream recall or influencing of dreams, or for lucidity, simply getting enough sleep is one of the most boring pieces of advice, but one of the most important. When you deprive yourself of sleep, you are getting a lower proportion of REM. We go into REM every 90 minutes through the night, but each REM period gets much longer and occupies a larger chunk of that 90-minute cycle each time. So if you're only sleeping the first part of a normal eight hours of sleep, you're getting very little of the REM sleep you could. 9

Beyond that, if you check on whether you're actually awake in a systematic way during the day, you'll eventually find yourself doing this in a dream, and that can make it likelier that you will have lucid dreams. You can do this by identifying something that is consistently or usually different from your sleeping and waking experience. Lots of people find they can't read text in a dream, that if they see text it's almost always garbled or hieroglyphics or doesn't make sense or it's fuzzy. People who can read in a dream will still report that the text is not stable; if they look away and then back, it says something different or there's no longer any writing there. So trying to read something in a dream is a good test for lots of people. Others find that things like light switches and other knobs that are supposed to turn things on and off work normally in their real world and don't do what they expect them to in a dream. If you work out one specific check and then ask yourself, does everything look logical, you'll find yourself doing that in a dream. Some of these techniques are successful in as many as 10 percent of people in the course of a week for a few studies. What are less effective ways of controlling a dream? People who decide that they want to alter their nightmares or solve a problem through lucid dreaming have carved out an infinitely more difficult path—not that it's impossible but there's a lot more hard work and a lot less chance of success that way. When lucidity was getting press in the 1970s, people were thinking it's a great way to end nightmares and have problem-solving dreams. But it turns out that lucidity takes a lot more effort and happens more unreliably than other forms of dream control. The study where I had MGNA and CMG4 students select real-life problems within their ability to solve—with strong motivation, in one week half dreamed about the problem and one fourth dreamed an answer to their problem, and that's much higher than you'd get for lucidity techniques. In transformingnightmare studies, that rate is higher and happens quicker than it does for lucidity. So approaching these goals by almost demanding that the dream do what really you can do much better awake is not the smartest approach.

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MGNA or Meditation Group for the New Age; CMG or Creative Meditation Group, headquarters at Sundial House, Nevill Court, Tunbridge Wells, UK. The two groups are no longer at that address, and in other hands.

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What about controlling someone else's dream—is this possible? Occasionally there are some ways that one might influence someone else's dream content ahead of time via waking suggestions or during sleep via sensory stimuli that are impinging on the dreams. The auditory seem to things work best, such as water or a voice saying something. Very strong stimuli wake us up. You want it to get in some narrow threshold where it gets detected by the brain and processed but it doesn't wake you up, and then there's a shot at it getting incorporated into the dream. In his research on lucid dreams, psycho-physiologist Steve LaBerge5 tested a dream light that sleep subjects wore on their faces that detected REM and flashed a low-level, red light during that phase. He found that it often got incorporated into people's dreams—they saw a pulsing red glow. If you combine that with the suggestion that when you see the flashing red light you know you're dreaming, you can promote lucidity. Magnetic input is being done in the waking state to improve depression and to halt psychomotor seizures. If you can influence mood awake, it would seem you could influence the mood of a dream. We will get more precise about what we know about different brain areas and targeting magnetic signals toward them. Lastly, we can image the brain well enough awake or asleep to know things like: there's an unusual amount of motor activity; or this person is probably doing mathematical calculations right now; or this person is processing incoming language or speaking or writing or is very likely sad or very likely happy. And 5

Stephen LaBerge (born 1947) is a psycho-physiologist and a leader in the scientific study of lucid dreaming. In 1967 he received his Bachelor's Degree in mathematics. He began researching lucid dreaming for his Ph.D. in Psychophysiology at Stanford University, which he received in 1980. He developed techniques to enable himself and other researchers to enter a lucid dream state at will, most notably the MILD technique (mnemonic induction of lucid dreams), which was necessary for many forms of dream experimentation. In 1987, he founded “The Lucidity Institute”, an organization that promotes research into lucid dreaming, as well as running courses for the general public on how to achieve a lucid dream. In the early 1980s, news of LaBerge's research using the technique of signalling to a collaborator monitoring his EEG with agreed-upon eye movements during REM, helped to popularise lucid dreaming in the American media. The first scientifically verified signal from a dreamer's mind to the outside world came several years earlier in 1975, from a study conducted by Keith Hearne at Hull University, England; however, media confusion over which scientist first published their results has caused the widespread but incorrect belief that LaBerge was the first to conduct this research.

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we will probably get better at that. We can already do more things with animals: If you've trained rats in a maze, during REM sleep they look like they're dreaming the maze—they show the same pattern of firing left-right turns. That's done by sinking needle electrodes into their brains, which we obviously don't do to humans. But we may get good enough at imaging non-intrusively from the outside to see a lot more about the content. That's not directly controlling a dream, but it's one of the things that you might want to know if you were trying to control dream content.

What is Lucid Dreaming? Lucid dreaming means dreaming while knowing that you are dreaming. The term was coined by Frederic van Eeden6 who used the word "lucid" in the sense 6

Fredeic Van Eeden was the son of the Frederik Willem van Eeden (botanist) (nl), director of the Royal Tropical Institute in Haarlem. In 1880 he studied English at Leiden University where he pursued a bohemian lifestyle and wrote poetry. Whilst living in the city, he coined the term Lucid dream in the sense of mental clarity, a term that nowadays is a classic term in the Dream literature and study, meaning dreaming while knowing that one is dreaming. In his early writings, he was strongly influenced by Hindu ideas of selfhood, by Boehme's mysticism, and by Fechner's panpsychism. He went on to become a prolific writer, producing many critically acclaimed novels, poetry, plays, and essays. He was widely admired in the Netherlands in his own time for his writings, as well as his status as the first internationally prominent Dutch psychiatrist. Van Eeden's psychiatrist practice included treating his fellow Tachtiger Willem Kloos as a patient starting in 1888. His treatment of Kloos was of limited benefit, as Kloos deteriorated

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of mental clarity. Lucidity usually begins in the midst of a dream when the dreamer realizes that the experience is not occurring in physical reality, but is a dream. Often this realization is triggered by the dreamer noticing some impossible or unlikely occurrence in the dream, such as flying or meeting the deceased. Sometimes people become lucid without noticing any particular clue in the dream; they just suddenly realize they are in a dream. A minority of lucid dreams (according to the research of LaBerge and colleagues, about 10 percent) are the result of returning to REM (Rapid Eye Movement dreaming) sleep directly from an awakening with unbroken reflective consciousness. The basic definition of lucid dreaming requires nothing more than becoming aware that you are dreaming. However, the quality of lucidity can vary greatly. When lucidity is at a high level, you are aware that everything experienced in the dream is occurring in your mind, that there is no real danger, and that you are asleep in bed and will awaken shortly. With low-level lucidity you may be aware to a certain extent that you are dreaming, perhaps enough to fly or alter what you are doing, but not enough to realize that the people are dream representations, or that you can suffer no physical damage, or that you are actually in bed.

Is Lucid Dreaming the same as Dream Control? Lucidity is not synonymous with dream control. It is possible to be lucid and have little control over dream content, and conversely, to have a great deal of control without being explicitly aware that you are dreaming. However, becoming lucid in a dream is likely to increase the extent to which you can deliberately influence the course of events. Once lucid, dreamers usually choose to do something permitted only by the extraordinary freedom of the dream state, such as flying. You always have the choice of how much control you want to exert. For example, you could continue with whatever you were doing when you became lucid, with the added knowledge that you are dreaming. Or you could try to change everything—the dream scene, yourself, other dream characters. It is not always possible to perform "magic" in dreams, like changing one object into another or transforming scenes. A dreamer's ability to succeed at this seems to into alcoholism and increasing symptoms of mental illness. Van Eeden also incorporated his psychiatric insights into his later writings, such as in a deeply psychological novel called "Van de koele meren des doods" (translated in English as "The Deeps of Deliverance"). Published in 1900, the novel intimately traced the struggle of a woman addicted to morphine as she deteriorated physically and mentally.

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depend a lot on the dreamer's confidence. As Henry Ford said, "Believe you can, believe you can't; either way, you're right." On the other hand, it appears there are some constraints on dream control that may be independent of belief.

How are Lucid Dreams related to Out-of-Body Experiences (OBEs)? (See also part two page 123) Dreams and out-of-body experiences are not the same thing, although they share certain similarities. For instance, both are states of consciousness that are different from a wakeful state. Although materialists believe that an out-of-body experience is nothing more than a lucid dream, people that support dualism believe that an out-of-body experience occurs when your immaterial mind leaves your physical body. A dream is simply your mind working while your conscious mind is inactive. In the case of a lucid dream, your mind is conscious that it is dreaming. A lucid dream can resemble an out-of-body experience in the sense that both states have an ethereal (psychic) feel to them that is a result of differing brainwaves from normal consciousness. Despite some things that dreams and out-of-body experiences have in common, supporters of dualism believe that there are more differences than similarities.

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Separation of Mind and Body When somebody has an out-of-body experience, they are usually able to see their physical body. This is because an out-of-body experience involves a clear dichotomy between the physical body and the immaterial mind. Many people report seeing their physical body lying where they fell asleep; most people also see a silver cord that extends from their midsection of their "mind body" to the midsection of their physical body. Out-of-body experiences can typically involve strong sensations of dualism. This is because your body still remains alive and functional despite your consciousness having left it. It is therefore possible to experience sensations from both your "mind body" and your physical body. This is quite a bit different from dreaming: dreaming doesn't involve a separation between the mind and body. Instead, dreams are fully contained within the physical body.

Lack of Control During an out-of-body experience, people are unable to manipulate their environment. People who believe in the paranormal believe that when people have out-of-body experiences, their consciousness is travelling through a copy of the physical universe. If you are having a lucid dream, it is easy and common to manipulate the dream world around you. This is because you are the one creating the world. In the case of an out-of-body experience, you are not the one creating the world, but are merely an explorer in a pre-existing realm.

Realism Dreams commonly have elements that are nonsensical and ridiculous. This is because your mind is constantly inventing the dream world, while filling it with many things, some which have meaning and some of which do not. According to supporters of the paranormal, an out-of-body experience will yield real information about the physical world. To check if you are really having an outof-body experience, verify what you saw when you awake from your experience. If you can verify certain facts in real life, your consciousness was obviously outside of your own body.

Comparison Everybody knows what it's like to have dreams, and lucid dreams are merely dreams in which you know you're dreaming. People who have had an out-ofbody experience say that it feels nothing like a lucid dream. Although this is incredibly subjective, it is still worth noting: the difference between an out-ofbody experience and a lucid dream is obvious to anyone who has had both. Out15

of-body experiences feel like a heightened, fully-awake level of consciousness, while dreams are often cloudy and tough to focus on. People who consciously induce out-of-body experiences believe that out-of-body experiences are characterized by a higher state of consciousness than normal waking life. Dreams, on the other hand, are a duller, less alert state of consciousness. A mysterious and highly controversial phenomenon sometimes occurs in which people experience the compelling sensation that they have somehow "left their bodies." The "out-of-body experience" or "OBE", as this fascinating phenomenon is usually termed, takes a variety of forms. In the most typical, you are lying in bed, apparently awake, when suddenly you experience a range of primarily somatic sensations, often including vibrations, heaviness, and paralysis. Then you experience the vivid sensation of separating from your "physical body" in what feels like a second body, often floating above the bed. It is important to note the distinction between the phenomenal reality of the OBE and the various interpretations of the experience. What is really happening when you feel yourself "leaving your body"? According to one school of thought, what is actually happening is just what it feels like: you are moving in a second body out of and away from your physical body—in physical space. But this "explanation" doesn't hold up very well under examination. After all, the body we ordinarily feel ourselves to be (or if you like, to inhabit) is a phenomenal or mental body rather than a physical body. The space we see around us is not physical space as "common sense" tells us, but as modern psychology makes clear, a phenomenal or mental space. In general, our consciousness is a mental model of the world. OBE enthusiasts promote lucid dreaming as a "stepping stone" to the OBE. Conversely, many lucid dreamers have had the experience of feeling themselves "leave the body" at the onset of a lucid dream. From a laboratory study, we have concluded that OBEs can occur in the same physiological state as lucid dreams. Wake-initiated lucid dreams (WILDs) were three times more likely to be labelled "OBEs" than dream initiated lucid dreams. If you believe yourself to have been awake, then you are more likely to take the experience at face value and believe yourself to have literally left your physical body in some sort of mental or "astral" body floating around in the "real" physical world. If, on the other hand, you think of the experience as a dream, then you are likely to identify the OBE body as a dream body image and the environment of the experience as a dream world. The validity of the latter interpretation is supported by observations and research on these phenomena.

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Why have Lucid Dreams? Upon hearing about lucid dreaming for the first time, people often ask, "Why should I want to have lucid dreams? What are they good for?" If you consider that once you know you are dreaming, you are restricted only by your ability to imagine and conceive, not by laws of physics or society, then the answer to what lucid dreaming is good for is either extremely simple (anything!) or extraordinarily complex (everything!). It is easier to provide a sample of what some people have done with lucid dreaming than to give a definitive answer of its potential uses.

Adventure and Fantasy Often, the first thing that attracts people to lucid dreaming is the potential for wild adventure and fantasy fulfilment. Flying is a favourite lucid dream delight, as is sex. Many people have said that their first lucid dream was the most wonderful experience of their lives. A large part of the extraordinary pleasure of lucid dreaming comes from the exhilarating feeling of utter freedom that accompanies the realization that you are in a dream and there will be no social or physical consequences of your actions. One might think that this is a rather intellectual concept, but an ecstatic "rush" frequently arises with the first realization that one is dreaming. 17

Overcoming Nightmares Unfortunately for many people, instead of providing an outlet for unlimited fantasy and delight, dreams can be dreaded episodes of limitless terror. As is discussed in the books Lucid Dreaming (LaBerge, 1985), Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming (EWLD) (LaBerge and Rheingold, 1990) and Lucid Dreaming: A Concise Guide to Awakening in Your Dreams and in Your Life (LaBerge, 2004), lucid dreaming may well be the basis of the most effective therapy for nightmares. If you know you are dreaming, it is a simple logical step to realizing that nothing in your current experience, however unpleasant, can cause you physical harm. There is no need to run from or fight with dream monsters. In fact, it is often pointless to try, because the horror pursuing you was conceived in your own mind, and as long as you continue to fear it, it can pursue you wherever you dream yourself to be. The only way to really "escape" is to end your fear. (For a discussion of reasons for recurrent nightmares, see "Overcoming Nightmares" from EWLD.) The fear you feel in a nightmare is completely real; it is the danger that is not. Unreasonable fear can be defused by facing up to the source, or going through with the frightening activity, so that you observe that no harm comes to you. In a nightmare, this act of courage can take any form that involves facing the "threat" rather than avoiding it. For example, one young man dreamt of being pursued by a lion. When he had no place left to run, he realized he was dreaming and called to the lion to "come and get him." The challenge turned into a playful wrestling match, and the lion became a sexy woman (NightLight 1.4, 1989, p. 13). Monsters often transform into benign creatures, friends, or empty shells when courageously confronted in lucid dreams. This is an extremely empowering experience. It teaches you in a very visceral manner that you can conquer fear and thereby become stronger.

Rehearsal Lucid dreaming is an extraordinarily vivid form of mental imagery, so realistic that the trick is to realize it is a mental construct. It is no surprise, therefore, that many people use lucid dreaming to rehearse for success in waking life. Examples of such applications include public speaking, difficult confrontations, artistic performance and athletic prowess. Because the activity of the brain during a dreamed activity is the same as during the real event, neuronal patterns of activation required for a skill (like a ski jump or pirouette) can be established in the dream state in preparation for performance in the waking world.

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Creativity and Problem Solving The creative potential of dreams is legendary. The brain is highly active in REM (Rapid Eye Movement dreaming) sleep and unconstrained by sensory input, which together may contribute to the novel combinations of events and objects we experience as dream bizarreness. This same novelty allows thought to take on forms that are rare in waking life, manifesting as enhanced creativity, or defective thinking depending on one's point of view (as Roland Fisher put it, "One man's creativity is another's brain damage."). The claim of enhanced creativity of the dream state is supported by LI research: One study found word associations immediately after awakening from a dream to be 29% more likely to be uncommon compared to word associations later in the day (NightLight, 6.4, 1994). Another study comparing a variety of kinds of experience including daydreams, memories of actual events, and dreams, found that dreams were judged as being significantly more creative than both daydreams and memories (NightLight, 4.1, 1992). In any case, many lucid dreamers report using dreams for problem solving and artistic inspiration; see EWLD for a variety of examples.

Healing The effects of visual imagery on the body are well-established. Just as skill practice in a dream can enhance waking performance, healing dream imagery may improve physical health. Medical patients have often used soothing and positive imagery to alleviate pain, and the dream world offers the most vivid form of imagery. Thus, some people have use lucid dreams in overcoming phobias, working with grief, decreasing social and sexual anxieties, achieving greater self-confidence and by directing the body image in the dream to facilitate physical healing. The applications, which are described in greater detail in EWLD, deserve clinical study as they may be the greatest boon that lucid dreaming has to offer. Other potential healing applications of lucid dreaming include: practice of physical skills by stroke and spinal cord injury patients to encourage recovery of neuromuscular function, enjoyment of sexual satisfaction by people with lower body sensory loss (fully satisfying dream sex requires only mental stimulation!), more rapid recovery from injury or disease through the use of lucid dream imagery, and an increased sense of freedom for anyone who feels limited by disability or circumstance.

Transcendence The experience of being in a lucid dream clearly demonstrates the astonishing fact that the world we see is a construct of our minds. This concept, so elusive when sought in waking life, is the cornerstone of spiritual teachings. It forces us 19

to look beyond everyday experience and ask, "If this is not real, what is?" Lucid dreaming, by so baldly baring a truth that many spend lives seeking, often triggers spiritual questioning in people who try it for far more mundane purposes. Not only does lucid dreaming lead to questioning the nature of reality, but for many it also has been a source of transcendent experience. Exalted and ecstatic states are common in lucid dreams. EWLD (Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming) presents several cases of individuals achieving states of union with the Highest, great peace and a new sense of their roles in life.

Can Lucid Dreams be Dangerous? The overwhelming majority of lucid dreams are positive, rewarding experiences. Moreover, lucidity in unpleasant dreams or nightmares can transform habitual fear into conscious courage. The simple state of lucidity is frequently enough to elevate the mood of a dreamer in a nightmare. In a study of the effect of lucid dreams on mood, college students reported that realizing they were dreaming in a nightmare helped them feel better about 60 percent of the time. Lucidity was seven times more likely to make nightmares better than worse. Probably the only people who should not experiment with lucid dreaming are those who are unable to distinguish between waking reality and constructions of their imagination.

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A parallel concern is that dying in a dream can cause death in reality. If this were true, how would we know? Anyone who died from a dream could not tell us about its content. Many people, after awakening alive, report having died in their dreams with no ill effect. Dreams of death can actually be insightful experiences about life, rebirth, and transcendence. Some people believe that dreams are messages from the unconscious mind and should not be consciously altered. Modern research on dreaming suggests that dreams are not messages, but models of the world. While awake, sensory and perceptual information governs our model. While dreaming, our bodies are paralyzed and our brain builds a world model based on a secondary source; namely, our assumptions, motivations, and expectations. These biases are difficult to identify while awake, so a world based entirely on such biases, the world of dreams, can help us to recognize them. Thus, dreams are not messages, but are more like clues into the inner workings of our minds. The conscious and critical awareness that accompanies lucid dreams allows dreamers to thoughtfully interpret their dreams while they happen. Finally, some people worry that lucid dreams are so exciting and pleasurable that they will become addicted and "sleep their life away." There is a biological obstacle to living in lucid dreams: we have a limited amount of REM sleep. More importantly, lucid dreams can be inspirations for how to act and improve in reality. Your behaviour strongly influences your experience in both worlds. Lucid dreams can be signposts for how you can make your waking reality more exciting and enjoyable.

Can everyone learn to have Lucid Dreams? Lucid dreaming is a skill you can develop, like learning a new language. A few individuals may have an innate talent for achieving lucidity, yet even they can benefit from instruction and practice in making the most of their lucid dreams. Many more people experience lucidity as a rare spontaneous event, but need training to enjoy lucid dreams at will. The best predictor of success with lucid dreaming is the ability to remember dreams. This, too, is a skill you can develop. With specific techniques, you can increase the quantity and quality of your dream recall, which will in turn greatly increase your ability to have lucid dreams.

How do I learn to have Lucid Dreams? The two essentials to learning lucid dreaming are motivation and effort. Although most people report occasional spontaneous lucid dreams, they rarely 21

occur without our intending it. Lucid dream induction techniques help focus intention and prepare a critical mind. They range from millennium-old Tibetan exercises to modern methods developed by dream researchers. Try the following techniques and feel free to use personal variants. Experiment, observe, and persevere—lucid dreaming is easier than you may think.

Dream Recall The most important prerequisite for learning lucid dreaming is excellent dream recall. There are two likely reasons for this. First, when you remember your dreams well, you can become familiar with their features and patterns. This helps you to recognize them as dreams while they are still happening. Second, it is possible that with poor dream recall, you may actually have lucid dreams that you do not remember! The core exercise requires writing down everything you recall about your dreams in a dream journal, no matter how fragmentary your recall. Upon awakening, remain absolutely still while you recall the essential elements of the dream, paying particular attention to the dream signs (see 3.2.3 below). Then record the dream immediately in your journal. If you wait until morning you are likely to forget most, if not all, of the dream. We advise that people build their dream recall to at least one dream recalled per night before proceeding with lucid dream induction techniques.

Reality Testing This is a good technique for beginners. Assign yourself several times a day to perform the following exercise. Also do it anytime you think of it, especially when something odd occurs or when you are reminded of dreams. It helps to choose specific occasions like: when you see your face in the mirror, look at your watch, arrive at work or home, pick up your NovaDreamer, etc. The more frequently and thoroughly you practice this technique, the better it will work.

1. Do a reality test. Carry some text with you or wear a digital watch throughout the day. To do a reality test, read the words or the numbers on the watch. Then, look away and look back, observing the letters or numbers to see if they change. Try to make them change while watching them. Research shows that text in dreams changes 75% of the time it is re-read once and changes 95% it is re-read twice. If the characters do change, or are not normal, or do not make sense, then you are most probably dreaming. Enjoy! If the

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characters are normal, stable, and sensible, then you probably aren't dreaming. Go on to step 2.

2. Imagine that your surroundings are a dream. If you are fairly certain you are awake (you can never be 100% sure!), then say to yourself, "I may not be dreaming now, but if I were, what would it be like?" Visualize as vividly as possible that you are dreaming. Intently imagine that what you are seeing, hearing, smelling, feeling is all a dream. Imagine instabilities in your environment, words changing, scenes transforming, perhaps you are floating off the ground. Create in yourself the feeling that you are in a dream. Holding that feeling, go on to step 3.

3. Visualise yourself enjoying a dream activity. Decide on something you would like to do in your next lucid dream, perhaps flying, talking to particular dream characters, or just exploring the dream world. Continue to imagine that you are dreaming now, and visualize yourself enjoying your chosen activity.

Dream signs By studying your dreams you can become familiar with your own personal dream signs and set your mind to recognize them and become lucid in future dreams. Exercises are necessary for noticing dream signs while you are awake, so that the skill carries over into your dreams. This exercise also applies to lucid dream induction devices, which give sensory cues—special, artificiallyproduced dream signs—while you are dreaming. To succeed at recognizing these cues in dreams, you need to practice looking for them and recognizing them while you are awake.

Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD) The MILD technique employs prospective memory, remembering to do something (notice you're dreaming) in the future. Dr. LaBerge developed this technique for his doctoral dissertation and used it to achieve lucid dreaming at will. The proper time to practice MILD is after awakening from a dream, before returning to sleep.

Setup dream recall Set your mind to awaken from dreams and recall them. When you awaken from a dream, recall it as completely as you can. 23

1. Focus your intent. While returning to sleep, concentrate single-mindedly on your intention to remember to recognize that you're dreaming. Tell yourself: "Next time I'm dreaming, I will remember I'm dreaming," repeatedly, like a mantra. Put real meaning into the words and focus on this idea alone. If you find yourself thinking about anything else, let it go and bring your mind back to your intention. 2. See yourself becoming lucid. As you continue to focus on your intention to remember when you're dreaming, imagine that you are back in the dream from which you just awakened (or another one you have had recently if you didn't remember a dream on awakening). Imagine that this time you recognize that you are dreaming. Look for a dream sign—something in the dream that demonstrates plainly that it is a dream. When you see it say to yourself: "I'm dreaming!" and continue your fantasy. Imagine yourself carrying out your plans for your next lucid dream. For example, if you want to fly in your lucid dream, imagine yourself flying after you come to the point in your fantasy when you become lucid. 3. Repeat until your intention is set. Repeat steps 2 and 3 until either you fall asleep or are sure that your intention is set. If, while falling asleep, you find yourself thinking of anything else, repeat the procedure so that the last thing in your mind before falling asleep is your intention to remember to recognize the next time you are dreaming.

Napping Two observations led LaBerge in the late 1970s to develop morning napping as a method of lucid dream induction. First, he noticed that lucidity seemed to come easier in afternoon naps. The second suggestion same from several lucid dreamers who noted that certain activities during the night appeared to induce lucid dreaming. The diverse qualities of these interruptions: sex, vomiting, and pure meditation, piqued LaBerge's curiosity regarding what feature each might possess conducive to lucidity. The answer proved to be quite simple: wakefulness interjected during sleep increases the likelihood of lucidity. In fact, the nap technique, refined through several NightLight experiments, is an extremely powerful method of stimulating lucid dreams. The technique requires you to awaken one hour earlier than usual, stay awake for 30 to 60 minutes, then go back to sleep. One study showed a 15 to 20 times increased likelihood of 24

lucid dreaming for those practicing the nap technique over no technique. During the wakeful period, read about lucid dreaming, practice reality checks and then do MILD as you are falling asleep.

How quickly can I learn Lucid Dreaming? The speed with which you develop the skill of lucid dreaming depends on many individual factors. How well do you recall dreams? How much time can you give to practicing mental exercises? Do you use a lucid dream induction device? Do you practice diligently? Do you have a well developed critical thinking faculty? And so on. Case histories may provide a more tangible picture of the process of learning lucid dreaming. Dr. LaBerge increased his frequency of lucid dreaming from about one per month to up to four a night (at which point he could have lucid dreams at will) over the course of three years. He was studying lucid dreaming for his doctoral dissertation and therefore needed to learn to have them on demand as quickly as possible. On the other hand, he had to invent techniques for improving lucid dreaming skills. Thus, people starting now, although they may not be as strongly motivated as LaBerge or have the same quantity of time to devote to it, have the advantage of the tested techniques, training programs, and electronic biofeedback aids that have been created in the decades since LaBerge began his studies.

Experiences with learning lucid dreaming are as follows: "I first heard of lucid dreaming in April of 1982, when I took a course from Dr. LaBerge at Stanford University. I had had the experience many years before and was very interested to learn to do it again, as well as to get involved in the 25

research. First, I had to develop my dream recall, because at the time I only remembered two or three dreams per week. In a couple of months I was recalling 3 to 4 or more per night, and in July (about three months after starting) I had my first lucid dream since adolescence. I worked at it on and off for the next four years (not sleeping much as a student) and reached the level of 3 to 4 lucid dreams per week. Along the way, I tested several prototypes of the DreamLight lucid dream induction device and they clearly helped me to become more proficient at realizing when I was dreaming. During the first two years that we were developing the Dream Light, I had lucid dreams on half of the nights I used one of these devices, compared to once a week or less without. In considering how long it took me to get really good at lucid dreaming, note that I did not have the benefit of the thoroughly studied and explained techniques now available either, because the research had not yet been done nor the material written. Therefore, people now should be able to accomplish the same learning in far less time given, of course, sufficient motivation."

What technology is available to assist Lucid Dreaming training? Lucidity Institute (in US) offers electronic devices that help people have lucid dreams. They were developed through laboratory research at Stanford University by LaBerge, Levitan, and others. The basic principle behind these devices is as follows: the primary task confronting someone who wishes to have a lucid dream is to remember that intention while in a dream. One of the best ways to increase a person's chances of having a lucid dream is to give a reminder to the person during REM sleep. In the lab, we found that flashing light cues worked well in that they tended to incorporate into ongoing dreams without causing awakening. You may have noticed that occasional bits of sensory information are filtered into your dreams in disguised form, like a clock radio as supermarket music or a chain saw as the sound of a thunderstorm. This is the same principle used by our lucid dream induction devices: the lights or sounds from the device filter into the user's dreams. In cases of very deep sleepers, we found that it was sometimes necessary to use sound as well as light to get the cues into dreams. The dreamer's task is to notice the flashing lights in the dream and remember that they are cues to become lucid. Because we could not possibly accommodate everyone who wants to come into the sleep lab for a lucid dream induction session and most people would rather sleep at home anyway, we worked for several years to develop a comfortable, portable device that would detect REM sleep and deliver a cue tailored to the individual user's needs. 26

The NovaDreamer The NovaDreamer lucid dream induction device works by giving flashing light or sound cues when the user is dreaming. Users modify the device settings to find a cue with the right intensity and length to enter their dreams without causing awakening. In addition, device users practice mental exercises while awake to enhance their ability to recognize the light cues when they appear in dreams. The NovaDreamer includes a soft, comfortable sleep mask, which contains the flashing lights, a speaker, and an eye movement detection apparatus. The NovaDreamer's electronics are all inside the sleep mask. The NovaDreamer uses REM detection to time the delivery of lucidity cue and provides feedback on the number of cues given. It includes the "Dream Alarm" feature to boost dream recall. Users have a choice of a wide selection of cues and receive feedback on the number of cues they receive during a sleep period. The lucidity cues of the NovaDreamer are intended to enter into ongoing dreams. This can occur in several ways. Cues can be superimposed over the dream scene, like a light flashing in one's face, or they can briefly interrupt the dream scene. The most common (and most difficult to identify) incorporation of cues is into dream stories. Little brother flashing the room lights, flash bulbs, lightning, traffic signals, police car lights: all are real examples of incorporations of NovaDreamer cues. The trickiness of cue appearances underscores the need to thoroughly prepare one's mind to recognize cues via waking practice. The NovaDreamer offers a second method of lucid dream stimulation. This method arose out of the discovery that while sleeping with the NovaDreamer, people frequently dreamed that they awakened wearing the device, and pressed the button on the front of the mask to start the "delay," a feature that disables cues while you are drifting off to sleep. Ordinarily, a button press would cause a beep to tell you that you had successfully pressed it. However, people were reporting that the button was not working in the middle of the night. Actually, they were dreaming that they were awakening and pressing the button, and the button did not work because it was a dream version of the NovaDreamer. Dream versions of devices are notorious for not working normally. Once people were advised that failure of the button in the middle of the night was a sign that they were probably dreaming, they were able to use this "dream sign" reliably to become lucid during "false awakenings" with the NovaDreamer. Research suggests that about half of the lucid dreams stimulated by the devices result from using the button for reality tests.

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How well do Lucid Dream Induction Devices work? Lucidity Institute's lucid dream induction devices are designed to help people achieve lucidity by giving them cues while they are dreaming and also by providing a reliable means of testing one's state of consciousness. They do not make people have lucid dreams any more than exercise machines make people develop strong muscles. In both cases the goal, strength or lucid dreams, results from practice. The machines accelerate the process. Several factors enter into success with one of these devices. One is how accurately the cues are coordinated with the user's REM sleep. The devices' REM detection systems are adjustable to individual variables. Another success factor is how well the cues enter into the dream without awakening the sleeper. A third factor is how prepared the user is for recognizing cues in dreams and becoming lucid. Finally, the user's commitment to performing a reality test on each awakening with the device influences success. All four of these factors are, to some extent, controllable by the device user: adjustment of eye movement sensitivity to catch REM sleep, selecting a cue that enters dreams without causing awakenings, mental preparation to recognize cues in dreams, and resolution to do reality tests. Therefore, it is difficult to obtain a truly accurate measurement of the effectiveness of the devices. Nonetheless, research with various versions of the Dream Light (previous lucid dream induction device that is no longer in production) have shown that it definitely helps people have more frequent lucid dreams. Because expectation makes lucid dreaming more likely, one might wonder whether the Dream Light is any more effective than a placebo. A study published in IASD journal Dreaming proved that it is. In brief, fourteen experienced Dream Light users were exposed to two conditions: light cues or no light cues. Subjects thought they were testing two different light cues and did not know their nightly condition (making motivation and expectations constant). Thus, the study examined how much the Dream Light's light cues specifically contributed to the achievement of lucid dreams. More people had lucid dreams on nights when they received light cues (73% versus 27%). Lucid dream frequency was three times greater on nights with cues (one lucid dream every three nights versus one in eleven nights without cues). An earlier study with a different version of the Dream Light showed a five-fold increase in lucid dreaming frequency when people used the Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreaming (MILD) mental technique in conjunction with the device, compared with using no device and no mental technique. Using the device without mental techniques worked about as well as just using the mental technique; both cases were an improvement over using nothing. 28

In summary, at this stage the lucid dream induction devices can definitely help people to have lucid dreams, or to have more of them. Important factors contributing to success are good dream recall (the Dream Light and NovaDreamer also can be used to boost dream recall with the "Dream Alarm feature"), diligent mental preparation, and careful adjustment of the device to meet individual needs for cueing and REM detection. No device yet exists that will make a person have a lucid dream.

Are there any drugs or nutritional supplements that stimulate Lucid Dreams? A number of substances have been suggested to enhance the likelihood of lucid dreaming, from vitamins to prescription drugs. There are few good scientific studies to test such claims. Lucid dreaming is highly subject to the placebo effect; the belief that something will stimulate a lucid dream is very effective! This is not to say that there are not substances that do, in fact, promote lucid dreaming. We are interested in discovering such and welcome observations from fellow dreamers. At this time, however, we do not endorse any substances for inducing lucid dreams. Many prescription drugs as well as marijuana and alcohol alter the sleep cycle, usually by suppressing REM sleep. This leads to a phenomenon called "REM rebound," in which a person experiences intense, long REM periods after the drug has worn off. This can manifest as nightmares or, possibly, as lucid dreaming, since the brain is highly active. Drugs in the LSD family, including psilocybin and tryptamines actually stimulate REM sleep 29

(in doses small enough to allow sleep), leading to longer REM periods. We do not recommend the use of drugs without proper guidance nor do we urge the breaking of laws.

How can I prevent waking up as soon as I become lucid? Beginning lucid dreamers often have the problem of waking up right after becoming lucid. This obstacle may prevent some people from realizing the value of lucid dreaming. Fortunately there are ways to overcome this problem. The first is to remain calm in the dream. Becoming lucid is exciting, but expressing the excitement can awaken you. It is possible to enjoy the thrill that accompanies the dawning of lucidity without allowing the activation to overwhelm you. Be like a poker player with an ideal hand. Relax and engage with the dream rather than withdrawing into your inner joy of accomplishment. Then, if the dream shows signs of ending, such as a loss of detail, vividness, and apparent reality of the imagery, the technique of "spinning" can often restore the dream. You spin your dream body around like a child trying to get dizzy. LaBerge developed this technique after experimenting with the idea that relaxing completely might help prevent awakening from a dream. When in a lucid dream that was fading, he stopped and dropped backwards to the floor, and had a false awakening in bed! After a few trials he determined that the essential element was the sensation of motion, not relaxation. The best way to create a feeling of movement, especially in the dream scene has vanished, leaving nowhere to move to, is to create angular momentum (or the sensation of it), by spinning around your axis. You are not really doing it, but your brain is well familiar with the experience of spinning and duplicates the experience quite well. In the process, the vestibular and kinaesthetic senses are engaged. Presumably, this sensory engagement with the dream discourages the brain from changing state from dreaming to waking. Note that dream spinning does not usually lead to dizziness. Be aware that the expectation of possible awakening sometimes leads to a "false awakening" in which you dream of waking. The vividness of the spinning sensation may cause you to feel your spinning arm hit the bed. You think, "Oops, I'm awake in bed now." Think now—your physical body wasn't really spinning, it was your dream body—therefore, the arm is a dream arm hitting a dream bed! To avoid being deceived, recite, "The next scene will be a dream," until a scene appears. If you are in doubt about your status, perform a thorough reality test. If awakened, lie still and imagine the sensation of spinning while reminding yourself that the next scene may be a dream. This tactic can result in a return to dreaming with lucidity.

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Variations in Lucid Dream Experiences Having presented a way of looking at the distinction between lucid and nonlucid dreams, we will now turn our attention to outlining the degree of variety that exists in lucid dream experiences. Because lucid dream experiences tend to be remembered nearly as well as waking experiences, and because lucid dreams are cumulative experiences, lucid dream reports can provide highly detailed and descriptive accounts of lucid dream phenomenology. We will draw on such reports below to illustrate the range of variation in lucid dreams. Our survey of lucid dream variations will parallel the general temporal course of lucid dreams, discussing in turn, lucidity initiation, variations in perception, emotion, cognition and action within lucid dreams, and finally, the termination of lucid dreams. A. Variations in Lucid Dream Initiation Since the lucid dream context bridges the waking and dream states, logic suggests that lucid dreams could be initiated either from the non-lucid dream state (a dream-initiated lucid dream, or DILD) or from the waking state (a wakeinitiated lucid dream, or WILD) (LaBerge, 1980). Because transitions directly from the waking state to the REM sleep state are very rare, one would expect WILDs to occur with a lower frequency than DILDs–just what the data shows. 1. Dream-Initiated Lucid Dreams More than 80% of lucid dreams are initiated when a non-lucid dream transforms into a lucid dream (LaBerge, Nagel, Taylor, Dement, & Zarcone, 1981). This process involves the lucid dream context displacing the current non-lucid dream 31

context. The form of this displacement is dependent upon the individual’s specific training in lucidity induction techniques and degree of lucid dreaming experience. For inexperienced lucid dreamers, lucidity is perhaps most likely to arise from a nightmare or anxiety dream. LaBerge (1985) argues that there is an evolutionary-biological basis for anxiety stimulating reflective consciousness. Not all novice lucid dreamers experience anxiety-triggered lucidity; specifically, for example, DLD reports none, while SLB reports his percentage of anxietytriggered lucid dreams recognized in years 1-3 respectively were 36%, 19%, and 5. The decrease in proportion (and frequency) of anxiety-initiated lucid dreams with time was probably due to the psychotherapeutic techniques SLB was practicing (LaBerge, 1985; see also Tholey, 1988) as the following example illustrates: (SLB106) “I was in the middle of a riot in a classroom; a furious mob was raging about, throwing chairs and fighting with each other. A huge repulsive barbarian with a pock-marked face, the Goliath among them, had me locked in an iron grip from which I was futilely trying to free myself. At this point, I recognized that I was dreaming, and remembering what I had learned from handling similar situations previously, I immediately gave up my struggle … and tried to feel loving as I stood face to face with my ogre. At first, I failed utterly, feeling only repulsion and disgust for the ogre. He was simply too ugly to love: thus spoke my visceral reactions. But I tried to ignore the image and seek love within my own heart. Finding it, I looked my ogre in the eyes, trusting my intuition to supply the right things to say. Beautiful words of acceptance flowed out of me, and as they did, he melted into me. As for the riot, it had vanished without a trace; the dream was over and I awoke, feeling wonderfully calm.” Other intense emotions such as embarrassment or delight can also initiate lucidity. Such lucid dreams are typically spontaneous and brief, and lucidity onset is quickly followed by awakening. Survey data suggest that most people have experienced a nominally lucid dream at least once in their lifetime (Snyder and Gackenbach, 1988). A spontaneously experienced lucid dream can serve as a nucleation event for the development of a lucid dream context, if there is follow-through on the part of the individual to cultivate these experiences. A number of methods exist for the individual to intentionally cultivate the onset of lucidity from within non-lucid dreams (LaBerge, 1981, 1985; LaBerge and Rheingold, 1990; Rogo, 1983). The learning of these methods occurs during waking and adds to both the semantic and goal-option components of an individual’s lucid dream context. The essence of methods to initiate lucidity 32

during non-lucid dreams is to condition dreamers to recognize that they are dreaming through some form of state testing (also called “reality testing”). Some approaches to state testing are: 1. Anomaly recognition - Here dreamers condition themselves to use the recognition of bizarre dream events as a cue for lucidity onset. This approach is not limited to observing events in the dream but can be based on selfobservation as well, so that, if they perceive their behaviour as unusual (not typical of waking) this may induce lucidity. (SLB351) “I’m walking through a field that is fantastically animated with extravagant life: Magic Mushrooms (Psilocybe cubensis ) popping up everywhere and growing to gigantic proportions. I realize the fantasy element of this scene: I must be dreaming. I do two all up eye movement signals, but this causes the dream to begin to fade. I try to press the micro-switch, and I seem to have succeeded, but it feels like I’m already awake...” The anomalies that serve as lucidity cues, or “dream signs” (LaBerge & Rheingold, 1989) can be very subtle indeed as the following account from von Moers-Messmer (1938) illustrates: From the top of a rather low and unfamiliar hill, I look out across a wide plain towards the horizon. It crosses my mind that I have no idea what time of year it is. I check the sun's position. It appears almost straight above me with its usual brightness. This is surprising, as it occurs to me that it is now autumn, and the sun was much lower only a short time ago. I think it over: the sun is now perpendicular to the equator, so here it has to appear at an angle of approximately 45 degrees. So if my shadow does not correspond to my own height, I must be dreaming. I examine it: it is about 30 centimetres long. It takes considerable effort for me to believe this almost blindingly bright landscape and all of its features to be only an illusion. [Translation from LaBerge, 1985, pp. 38-39.] 2. Programmed behaviours - Here dreamers condition themselves to perform an act that will tend to produce distinguishable results when performed during either waking or dreaming. For example, attempting to fly in a dream will tend to lead to the experience of flying; if the individual actually “lifts off” then this is a strong indication that the experience is a dream (as in the following example). Another behaviour that can result in lucidity initiation is attempting to read and reread text; if the text changes, then this is used as a lucidity cue. This approach can be simplified to the point of simply looking at one’s hands as a cue for lucidity onset.

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(SLB1032) “At a movie theatre, I am running down a flight of stairs, skipping more and more steps, until I notice that I seem to be able to skip as many as I like! Wait a minute! That makes this a dream. But it doesn’t seem at all like it. So I step into the air to convince myself. It is indeed! As I float upward close to the wall, the scene begins to fade. I decide to test rubbing hands together instead of spinning. I vividly feel the sensation and then also the wall at my back. I keep rubbing for perhaps 15 seconds, and then I feel a closet door, which I open. At first the closet contains only vague images, but they finally become vivid. I am now in a bedroom. L is on the bed, “talking in her sleep.” She says something unintelligible. I ask her to repeat it: She says “Wisdom is being given out …mumble, mumble.” While wondering what she means, the dream fades and I awaken.” 3. Déjà rêvé - Lucidity can sometimes be initiated when lucid dreamers have an apparent or actual recognition that they have had a similar dream before as in the following example: (SLB31) “I am walking with my friend, M, when I recognize that we are in a place I have dreamed of before–‘The Museum of Un-invented Inventions’–and that this therefore, is a dream. I reflect how the real M. would like to have lucid dreams, knowing quite explicitly that this is ‘M’, a dream figure. Nevertheless, I suggest to him that even though he is only a dream character, perhaps he could realize that he is dreaming. Maybe he does, for I wake up.” With increasing experience, DILD techniques become habitual. After a certain degree of experience, the individuals may simply recognize that they are dreaming without any apparent state testing or lucidity onset cue. Frequently dreamers question their state and decide they are awake and not dreaming. A dream in which the dreamer has at one point raised this question without arriving at the correct conclusion is commonly termed “pre-lucid” (Green, 1968). Pre-lucid dreams can be interpreted as a failed attempt by the lucid dream context to gain full access to framing dream consciousness. 2. Wake-Initiated Lucid Dreams It is possible to maintain continuous reflective consciousness while falling asleep and hence to enter a lucid dream directly from the waking state. As with DILDs, this form of lucid dream initiation is a skill that improves with motivation and practice. Its cultivation has been described by Tibetan yogis, and several modern sources (LaBerge 1985; LaBerge and Rheingold 1990; Ouspensky, 1960; Rogo 1983). WILDs are most likely to occur after awakening in the morning or during afternoon naps (LaBerge, 1980). While falling asleep, the subject’s mind is kept focused and lucid through the transition from waking 34

to dreaming. Experiences of visual and auditory hypnagogic imagery are common during this transition. Unusual some aesthetic imagery may also occur; subjects may feel themselves “float” or “sink out of their body”. There may (e.g. SLB561) or may not (e.g. SLB37) be a momentary break in subjects’ consciousness. Then the subjects will find themselves fully in a dream scene and lucid. Once in the dream-state, the lucid dream continues exactly like those initiated directly from the dream state. Some examples from the authors’ personal experiences illustrate the fascination of this transition: (DDG55) “I went back and laid on my bed hoping to project some more. I laid there and hypnagogic images came and went: city scenes, people sitting at a bar, a friend sitting on a stool behind an open door with a beautiful girl standing next to him. I could feel myself sinking deeper and deeper. Finally, I felt myself sink very deep and simultaneously my visual field locked into a stable scene and I felt a strong wind blowing over me. I could hear loud “whooshing” and wind sounds. Next I knew, the “wind” grabbed me and was pulling me along. It seemed to be pulling me forward but what I saw was me passing through fuzzy but identifiable frames of my bedroom.” (DDG48) “I woke from sleep. Had fleeting glimpses of my dream memories, then they were gone. I shut my eyes and could see hypnagogic images. A few scenes formed and faded but I don’t recall what they were. The scene of a street formed vividly in front of my closed eyes. There was a river off to my left, 50100 yards from the road. On the left seemed to be a construction site. There were buildings on my right. I was trying to observe details and I felt my foot step forward! This surprised me! Next thing I knew, I was walking along the street.” (SLB561) “I have just awakened from a dream in the sleep lab and am worrying about how the night is almost over and I still haven’t succeeded in having a lucid dream. Suddenly, I find myself flying hundreds of feet above a field of wildflowers: I realize at once, with great excitement, that this is a dream and carry out the pre-planned protocol, making an eye-movement signal and singing ‘Row, row, row your boat/ Gently down the stream/ Merrily, merrily, merrily/ Life is but a dream!’ Then I make another signal and estimate 10 seconds by counting ‘One thousand-one, ... one thousand-ten’ and signal again. When I finish this sequence, I am overjoyed and do a virtual cartwheel in the air. After a few seconds, the dream begins to fade….” (SLB37) “I was lying awake in bed late in the morning listening to the sound of running water in the adjoining bathroom. Presently, an image of the ocean appeared, dim at first like my usual waking imagery. But its vividness rapidly increased while, at the same time, the sound level of the running water decreased; the intensity of the internal image and external sound seemed to alter 35

inversely (as if one changed a stereo balance control from one channel to the other). In a few seconds, I found myself at the seashore standing between my mother and a girl who seemed somehow familiar. I could no longer hear the sound of the bath water, but only the roar of the dream sea….” Differences in styles of lucid dreaming give rise to individual differences in DILD and WILD frequency. Although quantification of such differences has not been attempted in a large sample of lucid dreamers, to illustrate such stylistic differences, a comparison of lucid dream initiation frequencies of the authors is here presented. DDG has 114 recorded lucid dreams of which 43% were WILDs and 56% were DILDs. In contrast, only 8% of SLB’s dissertation sample of 388 recorded lucid dreams were WILDs, a significantly lower proportion. 3. Ambiguities in Lucidity Induction With increasing experience, some facets of lucid dreaming become habitual, making the classification of dream lucidity more ambiguous. Consider the following example: (DDG74) “My (non-lucid) dream involved me, X and a bunch of other people. We were all roommates in a big house. I was unaware that I was dreaming. There was a party going on or something. We were down in the basement hanging out. However, at some point in the dream I looked at X and told him I’d be back in a little bit because I was going to go up to my room and try to project! I went up to my bedroom in this dream house. Again, at this point I thought everything was normal and had no idea I was dreaming. I laid down on my bed and started concentrating to leave just exactly like I always do on the physical plane….[text omitted of a 1400 word lucid dream report] …I decided I was done for the time being, so I got up out of bed. I was still in the dream house and still unaware that I was dreaming. I went looking for some paper to record my experience. I ended up going back into the basement where everyone was still hanging out. X was there and the others and I told them all about the projection I had just had. Meanwhile, I’m getting very concerned that I can’t find any paper. Then I woke up for real. For a moment I was totally disoriented.” In this example, DDG, in the midst of a non-lucid dream, performs his habitual techniques for achieving a WILD. He then experienced what was, for all practical purposes, a typical lucid dream. Following this, he “awakes” in the exact same non-lucid dream setting and seeks paper to record his lucid dream, which is also a habitual behaviour. Shortly thereafter, DDG truly wakes up in a momentarily disoriented state. 36

How is one to classify such an experience? What we see here is a lucid dream nested perfectly inside of a non-lucid dream. One could argue that DDG merely dreamt that he was lucid dreaming, but this clarifies nothing. The characteristics of the lucid dream (the omitted text) were identical in general features to all of his other lucid dreams. What we believe this particular sequence represents is the cooperation between the global non-lucid dream context and DDG’s lucid dream context. In this particular instance, the global non-lucid dream context provided perfectly for the full expression of the lucid dream context because the subject dreamt all of the requisite details needed for activation of his lucid dream context. After completion of the lucid dream, the lucid dream context returned control of access to the dreamer’s consciousness to the previous nonlucid dream context. This kind of situation could only result because the subject possessed a well-defined lucid dream context that could clearly demarcate itself from the global non-lucid dream context. This is an extreme example of the mixing of non-lucid and lucid dream elements. However, it is not uncharacteristic of the kind of subtleties and ambiguities encountered when attempting to characterize dream consciousness and what does and does not constitute dream lucidity. A related issue is the characterization of intentionality in lucidity induction. It is not always easy to draw a clear distinction between a lucid dream that is “spontaneous” and one that is “deliberately” induced. In fact, the characterization of such factors is critically dependent upon the subject’s degree of experience, and the relative maturity of the lucid dream context. As the lucid dream context matures, and hence, becomes more habitual, the likelihood of unintended lucid dreams increases and the ambiguity of what constitutes dream lucidity also increases. WILDs are typically intentional by nature. However, it is possible, for example, for an experienced lucid dreamer to lie down and nap with the intention to merely rest, and have an unintended WILD. In the case of DILDs, the issue of intention becomes even more ambiguous because the experienced subject may simply come to learn to recognize that he or she is dreaming, with no cause other than sheer familiarity with the state; in such a case, there may be no explicit onset of lucidity (e.g. no reality testing, no statement “I am dreaming”). Alternatively, experienced lucid dreamers may have a non-lucid dream in which they access elements of their lucid dream context incompletely and never achieve full lucidity. These types of considerations are important because they indicate that the subject’s degree of experience can profoundly affect how dream lucidity manifests itself, and clearly indicate that lucidity induction is not homogeneous across subjects. What constitutes dream lucidity may be more subtle and ambiguous to identify for experienced subjects who have programmed aspects of lucidity induction and manifestation to be habitual. 37

B. Perceptual Variations in Lucid Dreams The examples listed above begin to illustrate the diversity of perceptions that can occur in lucid dreams. By “perception” we are referring to the hallucinated sensory modalities characteristic of dream consciousness. Because afferent input from peripheral senses is attenuated during dreaming (LaBerge, 1985), it should be understood that the use of the term “perception” in the following discussion refers to the hallucinated analogues of the sensory modalities. Dreams are, in general, highly perceptual experiences expressing all the dream analogs of waking sensory modalities. Dream perceptions are typically characterized as “bizarre” (Hobson, 1988). Examples of perceptual bizarreness in dreams may include dream characters or environments transforming abruptly (discontinuities), or the perception of physically impossible scenes and events. Perceptual bizarreness occurs in lucid dreams just as it occurs in non-lucid dreams (Gackenbach, 1988). However, bizarreness in perception is often recognized as such by lucid dreamers, and can be described by them in vivid detail, providing us with a clear window into the perceptual qualities of lucid dreams. To understand the perceptual diversity of lucid dreams we need to introduce the notion of perceptual environment. This is the complete hallucinated sensorium of the dreamer including all the sensory modalities: vision, audition, somatosensation, gustation, olfaction and the sub-modalities therein. These hallucinated sensory perceptions combine to form the dreamer’s body image (if present), and the allocentric space perceived by the dreamer. The dreamer can be either immersed within the dream environment or observing it from without. For both authors, our lucid dreams are associated with immersion in the perceptual environment, which seems to hold true in general; reports of lucid dreamers as pure observers are rare (LaBerge, 1985). The vividness and richness of the perceptual environment ranges from the “minimal” in which most or all sensory qualities are absent or greatly attenuated, through the “typical” much like everyday experience, to the “surreal” in which the environment is vibrantly, psychedelically alive with fantastic, extravagant detail. 1. Typical Perceptual Environments A “typical” perceptual environment is experienced as immersion within or observation of a rich sensory environment containing all sensory modalities. Typical perceptual environments are characteristic of both non-lucid and lucid dreams. These environments generally contain the same elements that waking environments do such as landscapes, city streets, trees, buildings, driving in cars, etc., and are readily comprehensible by the dreamer, although bizarreness is frequent. 38

Within lucid dreams, typical perceptual environments display a large variety of perceptual qualities. In some the scene is dimly lit or vaguely delineated; others overwhelm the lucid dreamer with their intense beauty and extravagant detail. Some seem, indeed, “more real than real”. In general, the average lucid dream is more perceptually vivid than the average non-lucid dream. This conclusion is supported by relatively intense brain activation during lucid dreaming which may correlate with increased perceptual vividness (LaBerge, 1981). 2. Surreal Perceptual Environments A surreal perceptual environment is characterized by the presence of at least some sensory modalities displaying rich perceptual content. However, surreal environments have no counterpart in normal waking experience; they are often abstract spaces of colour, shape, and motion within which the dreamer is immersed. These environments are abstract, and typically are not comprehendible by the dreamer. Surreal perceptual environments occur very rarely in non-lucid dreams (Hall and Van de Castle, 1966), although Hunt (1989) has discussed them in the context of activated dreams. A clear distinction should be drawn between surreal environments and bizarreness perceived in typical environments. Some forms of hypnagogic imagery and psychedelic druginduced hallucinations (e.g. described in Mavromatis, 1987, and Aaronson and Osmond, 1970, respectively) resemble surreal perceptual environments, but in lucid dreams, there is a definite sense of somatic immersion in the environment. The following are examples of surreal perceptual environments; the lucid dreamer’s lack of comprehension of his perceptions are apparent: (DDG75) “But I managed to turn around and what I saw was unbelievable and utterly amazing. I don’t even really know how to describe it! When, after great effort, I turned myself around, I was no longer seeing the forest. Instead I was looking onto this unbelievable coloured field and there were three spheres ahead of me and they had something that looked like butterflies dancing in each of them. But they were not butterflies, though they looked a little like them. Whatever they were, there was one each inside of the three spheres and these “butterflies” were spinning and rotating within the sphere and constantly changing colour. The way they changed colour was strange, it was as if colours were welling into them from somewhere I could not see, like a liquid, and flowing around inside of these butterfly creatures. I was both awed and confused; confused that the forest was gone, and confused at what I was looking at, awed because whatever I was looking at was very, very beautiful.” (DDG70) “I got the idea to shut my eyes, spin around rapidly, and pretend that I was shrinking. When I did this and opened my eyes up I was quite surprised to see that I was actually somewhere else! And what I saw when I opened my eyes 39

was amazing. I was in the midst of a spectacular panorama of swirling activity and spiralling colours. The scene was staggering in its complexity. I was floating amongst the images, floating surrounded by these moving colour patterns. I remember that I was amazed, but baffled, and didn’t understand in the least what I was looking at, other than that it was very beautiful and moving around too much to make out any definite structure.” What these surreal perceptions represent is currently unknown. It is intriguing, however, to speculate that lucid dreamers perceiving such imagery may be in fact perceiving the lower level neurological processes that underlie normal conscious sensory perceptions, as has been suggested for LSD-induced hallucinations (Mavromatis, 1983). 3. Minimal Perceptual Environments Minimal perceptual environments are characterized by immersion in an environment containing a minimum of sensory perception. Again, these appear to occur frequently in lucid dreams, but rarely in non-lucid dreams. This is a relatively neglected area in the literature with the exception of Gillespie (1988), who has experimented extensively with deliberately eliminating sensory content from his lucid dreams. It is not uncommon for lucid dreamers to involuntarily “fade” from a lucid dream to the waking state with no break in consciousness (LaBerge, DeGracia, et al., 1998). Prior to and during the fading process, lucid dreamers perceive their sensorium as “unstable”. In general, lucid dreamers learn to perceive their sensorium as more or less stable; this is a perception with no counterpart during waking. When a lucid dream is “stable”, all perceptions of the dream environment appear normal. When a lucid dream is “unstable”, there may be a “blinking on and off” of the visual field, as if one is phasing in and out of blindness. The visual field may also become cartoon-like or pale in colour. Somatic sensations may feel as if they are fading in and out. Although the basis of this fading process is not currently understood, techniques exist to stabilize one’s sensorium in the event that it is perceived to be fading (LaBerge, DeGracia, et al., 1998). The degree to which lucid dreamers experience instability events seems to be quite variable both between and within subjects. We know of no waking counterparts for the perception and sensations associated with fading and stability. These are wholly experienced and learned in the lucid dream state. Even in non-lucid dreams the experience of fading appears confined to the transition to waking. However, in lucid dreams, variations in one’s “stability” can occur at any time during a lucid dream, for a greater or lesser duration.

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Minimal perceptual environments are related to perceptions of fading and stability. Some individual lucid dreamers do not awaken when they experience a complete loss of stability and fade from their lucid dreams. Instead they find themselves in minimal perceptual environments. Minimal perceptual environments are characterized by a loss of the rich sensory modalities typical of dreaming; such experiences may be perceived by the lucid dreamer as being in a “void” or in “darkness”. However, lucidity is preserved; internal speech, affect and cognitive function remain intact within this minimal environment. Some sensory modalities are also preserved; kinaesthetic sensations may be present (so that the subject seems to be “moving”) although some esthetical sensations (sense of body image) typically are absent. There are perceptions of visual depth (e.g. the “darkness” has a sense of depth and size to it), but typically not visual perceptions of colour or form. The “darkness” can sometimes appear to have visual motion; it may “swirl” or “bellow”. Because some lucid dreamers can undergo a loss of stability and appear in a minimal perceptual environment instead of awakening, it is possible for a lucid dream experience to consist of a string of lucid dreams occurring in typical or surreal environments punctuated by minimal environments (a multi-part lucid dream). That is, the lucid dreamer will be in a typical lucid dream, lose stability and fade from the dream into a minimal environment. Techniques similar to those used to prevent lucid dream fading, such as spinning in place or inducing somatic sensations, can also be used to cause a sensorium to re-form around the lucid dreamer, giving rise to the second lucid dream. The second lucid dream environment may or may not be the same as the first. The cycle can then repeat. It is possible for a single lucid dream session to consist of perhaps six or more lucid dreams in typical or surreal environments punctuated by fadings or minimal experiences. The following are accounts of minimal sensory environments from the authors’ records. (DDG16) “Found myself in the void. My mind was wandering in all kinds of thoughts. Then I noticed that I could ‘leave’ my body. I flew off through the void. Everything was dark, kind of sombre, and I didn’t have a body. I had the desire to be somewhere. Soon a large, what appeared to be wooden fort appeared in the mist. It was still quite dark but I could ‘see’ now.” (DDG31b) “Though I was in the void, I was still being pulled along by this mysterious wind force. As I was being pulled along, a very beautiful rainbow coloured sphere came rolling past me and it was very clear and well defined in appearance. I was very surprised because this is the first time I had ever actually seen an object in the void and I began to wonder what was going on. I quickly noticed that I was surrounded by subtle arrays of coloured patterns. It was very 41

subtle because the darkness of the void seemed to be covering over these colour patterns, the patterns seemed to be behind the darkness. The colours and patterns were very intricate and I have no words to describe what I was seeing.” (DDG61) “In my imagination, I imagined flying off, but got pulled back again. This happened twice. Then, I dove off my bed straight downwards. I was moving straight downwards in the void. Far below me in the darkness I saw a square floating. In the square I could see colours, like a scene was inside the square. I stretched to grab this square and my arms stretched far below me like Plastic Man, and I grabbed the floating square. I pulled it up over me like putting on a pair of pants, and was thinking to myself, ‘I’m not gonna let this one go!’ I stepped into this square and was all of a sudden somewhere! I was very surprised. I was in what looked like a high school hallway standing in line with people going into a room.” (SLB56) “...I am looking at the image of an instruction book for a vacuum cleaner or some such appliance, knowing that I am asleep. As I focus on the writing the image stabilizes (and I have a sensation of opening my eyes) and I am able to read some but it is not interesting to me. Then my hands appear and I am looking at this piece of paper in bed. I think I ought to do the eye movements and so I follow my finger up, then down (I am very aware of the muscle strain in my arm and wrist, and feel the need to urinate). Then the dream fades.” It is of interest to note that the lucid dreamer can “fade out” from both typical and surreal environments into minimal environments, and conversely, can “materialize” out of a minimal environment into typical or surreal environments (as DDG61). As (DDG31b) indicates, the dreamer perceived “the darkness of the void seemed to be covering over these colour patterns, the patterns seemed to be behind the darkness”. It is almost as if the lucid dreamer’s sensorium is tuning in and out of stable patterns of perceptions, akin to tuning a radio to a radio station. The following journal entry illustrates clearly how surreal and minimal environments can fuse, and fade into typical environments. This example suggests that clues to understanding sensory consciousness may be found in the phenomenology of lucid dream perceptions: (DDG64) “I seemed to now be floating in the void. However, there were what seemed to be coloured triangles moving around, crossing and spinning over one another making distinctly geometric patterns in front of me. The colours were mainly a yellowish green with red, orange and pink hues and they had the texture of clear and smoky, but smooth glass. ‘This is a weird view of the void,’ I thought to myself. I stared at these patterns wondering what the hell I was looking at. I began to focus harder and harder on these patterns, trying to discern some detail in them. Then, as I was focusing, the most incredible thing happened. I watched these patterns ‘solidify’ and transform into the scene on the 42

dance floor of the club I had just faded from. The spinning triangles were actually the dancing people in the club! I was amazed. I relaxed my focus and the scene faded back to the spinning triangles. I was thinking, ‘Wow! This is amazing!’ I tightened my focus again and the triangles again transformed into the dancers on the dance floor. This time I tightened my focus so much that the entire bar scene faded in around me! I was back in the bar again!” What minimal lucid dream environments correspond to in physiological terms is unknown. It is tempting to speculate that minimal, surreal and typical perceptual environments correspond with lesser to greater degrees of brain activation, respectively, during REM sleep. Minimal environments superficially resemble the “thought-like” character of non-REM subjective experience (Hobson, 1988). However, given the fact that it is more or less easy to re-establish a typical or surreal environment from a minimal environment, the minimal environment may correlate with tonic REM. The time after REM onset may also be an important variable affecting perceptual qualities of lucid dreams. The interrelated phenomena of stability, fading, and minimal perceptual environments during lucid dreams has interesting implications for our understanding of conscious processes. Clearly, in these experiences, higher level cognitive functions of consciousness continue to operate in the relative absence of conscious sensory modalities. We are observing in these phenomena some type of dissociation, or perhaps lack of binding, of the contents of consciousness. Psychophysiological characterization of this phenomena would be of great interest. No previous studies have presented data regarding the frequency with which lucid dreamers as a population or individual lucid dreamers experience the three perceptual environments we have identified here. Published dream reports indicate that typical environments predominate lucid dreamers’ perceptions, although we have encountered cases where this is not true for single individuals, and it seems likely that individuals will have characteristic distributions of environment type. For example, 52%, 96%, and 17% of DDG’s lucid dreams had at least one scene with minimal, normal, and surreal environments, respectively; the figures for SLB are 16%, 92%, and 5%. Although the great majority of both authors’ lucid dreams take place in normal environments, DDG’s were significantly more likely to have minimal and surreal environments as well. The differences in frequency are even more striking if we consider the extreme case of minimal environments, the void, without any content at all; DDG, 32% vs. SLB, 3%.

4. Perceptual Variation in Specific Sensory Modalities Within the context of one of the three varieties of perceptual environment just reviewed, the specific contents of consciousness in different sensory modalities 43

can vary from the normal to the bizarre. Thus, for example, a particular lucid dream may take place in an environment that is almost entirely normal, with the exception of a single element of the sensory array. Or everything may appear perfectly normal if considered individually, but quite anomalous when considered in context. For example, van Eeden (1913) describes experimenting with breaking a claret-glass in a lucid dream: “It broke all right, but a little too late, like an actor who misses his cue. This gave me a very curious impression of being in a fake-world, cleverly imitated, but with small failures.” The factors affecting the variations in lucid dream perceptual bizarreness and their frequency of occurrence have yet to be investigated. Here we will very briefly review some of the variations in perceptual experience and bizarreness in several sensory modalities.

a. Vision Although the visual contents of most lucid dreams seem quite normal, there are some aspects of the visual experience that do not operate in the same way as in waking perception. For example, the Marquis de Saint-Denys observed that he was often unable to alter the level of illumination in his lucid dreams (see LaBerge, 1985), an effect termed the “Light-Switch” phenomenon by Hearne (1987). (SLB1029) “…[in a lucid dream] I remember the light task and look around for a switch. I find a table lamp and flick it’s switch on: it dimly illuminates. I switch it off and it goes off. I try willing it to light, focussing my willpower on the bulb, but no luck. Then I try another lamp, a halogen desk lamp. I turn the on knob and it dimly lights (about as bright as in waking imagination). Twist off and off it goes. Magical will power has no effect, again..” Visual bizarreness in the geometry of the dream environment (allocentric space) is described clearly by lucid dreamers, as the following two examples illustrate: (DDG20) “It didn’t strike me at the time, but what was weird was how the ghoul was positioned in my backyard and the angle I was viewing him from out my window. He was standing at the corner of my room on the outside, with its side facing in my direction and its front facing towards the street and its back facing into the backyard. What I didn’t realize until I woke up and wrote this is that there is no way I could see someone if they were standing in this position physically. After waking, I tried to look out my window from where I was standing in my room in the lucid dream, and you simply can’t see that corner of the house. I had to put my face right up to the window and turn my head to see that position from my window. But in the lucid dream I could see that position perfectly standing back a few feet from the window.” 44

(DDG43) “I looked up at the ceiling and got a nice visual surprise. The hallway seemed to repeat itself upward and curving out of sight, like the effect of two mirrors up against each other, except there were no mirrors.” The visual texture of objects is highly variable in lucid dreams. Scenes can take on appearances ranging from highly realistic to “cartoon-like”. Lucid dreamers frequently report that dream objects appear to be “glowing” as if selfilluminated. The visual texture of whole dream environments can take on drastically different appearances in lucid dreams, usually accompanied by distinctive affect, as the following examples indicate: (DDG76) “Standing on the lawn I saw a white picket fence running up the walk to the front door. Across the street was a lake and beyond the lake an amazing horizon of sun and colours. Everything seemed to have a pinkish red tint to it. The colours were like soft delicate pastels. A warm breeze was blowing. My movements were like slow motion as I walked through the front yard (not the slow motion kind of movement that makes it difficult to move, but a slow motion in the sense of being very dream-like). My thoughts seemed very removed from my situation. The whole thing seemed to be beautifully unreal….” (SLB355) “…I find myself on a street (not at first aware that I’m dreaming). Then after a few seconds I realize that I am dreaming again. I fly up into the warm air towards the sun. But it always seems out of reach. I fly over mountains and then the sea and, as I continue to try for the sun, weird volcanic-organic forms sprout up from the ocean. Gradually this bizarre fractal-coral creature’s transformations dominates the scene and the sun is above my field of vision. I find myself sinking into the water. I no longer seem to be able to fly and feel continuously more constrained by the dream….” As in non-lucid dreams, visual aspects of dream characters, objects and environments in lucid dreams can transform visual appearance. In some cases, the effect of such transformations is similar to the familiar morphing process popular in computer graphics (DDG61), in other cases, the transformation is more abrupt, a discontinuity (DDG18). Often, discontinuities of perceptual environments involve a change in the visual setting of the dream contrary to the dreamer’s expectation (DDG18): (DDG61) “...I was glad to have gotten her attention. But then I noticed as I was staring at her face, that her features kept shifting from that of an old lady to that of a beautiful young woman.” (DDG18) “Through the window I saw that it was raining outside. I desired to experience this astral rain. I tried to pass through the wall to get outside but I 45

couldn’t. The window was open, but there was a screen blocking my way. I tried to open the screen but couldn’t, so I decided to tear the window out. I smashed through it but the hole was too small to crawl through, so I tore away the wall around the window. But the hole was still too small to pass through! So I tore down the whole kitchen wall! Now the hole was big enough to climb through and I jumped through it. But I wasn’t outside! Instead, I was in a strange and unfamiliar hallway. I turned around and the kitchen with the hole in the wall was gone! I was in some kind of hallway that looked like an apartment building.” Lucid dreamers report that reading, and especially re-reading, of text in lucid dreams can present challenges. Here is Oliver Fox’s description: “…reading [in lucid dreams] is a very difficult matter. The print seems clear enough until one tries to read it: then the letters become blurred or run together, or fade away, or change to others” (1962, pg.46). If comprehended initially, the text, upon rereading, can change in either form, lexical structure, semantic structure, or based on rhyme and alliteration (LaBerge, 1996). Here are some examples: (DDG53) “I saw a bulletin board and went and tried to read it. I managed to read, with great difficulty, one line of what looked like a flyer announcing a party. I tried to reread the line so as to memorize it, but it now read something completely different. Familiar with this kind of thing, I gave up trying to read.” (DDG13) “I noticed a sign in front of a building and got the idea to go try to read it... The sign was on some steps leading into a building and I got the sense that it was some kind of official sign. I tried to read it but had a very difficult time. I could not get it into focus that easily. All I could make out were the letters ‘OR’, which for some reason I interpreted to mean Oregon, and, with difficulty I read the statement ‘Cheyan Country’. At that moment I thought to myself ‘This sign is senseless.’ I gave up my attempt to read the sign and walked back down the steps somewhat shaken up.” There are other occasions in which lucid dreamers read dream material that is coherent and even especially meaningful as in the following example: (SLB592) “Exploring around a grand old hotel that for some reason I take to be ‘Freud’s Hotel’. Fully lucid, I find a piece of paper that appears at first to be a prescription, but upon closer inspection now seems the will or legacy of Anna Freud. On the paper I read the words: TO DUST, WE MUST; TO LIGHT, WE MIGHT.”

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Variations in dream reading presumably occur because the brain creates dreamed text without any external source of visual information, resulting in unstable perceptions of dream text. The relative roles of individual differences versus expectation in the variations of dream reading has yet to be determined.

b. Audition Sound may be experienced during WILDs, in the transition from waking to sleep, in the form of cracking, hissing, twinkling, or similar sounds, sometimes reported as “haunted house” sounds. These are auditory forms of hypnagogia. Lucid dreamers have reported hearing songs during lucid dreams, as if a radio was playing, when in fact, there was no other source of the perception of music using other modalities. Subjects experiencing sleep paralysis have reported hearing voices, sometimes of a threatening or terrifying nature, reminiscent of the auditory hallucinations of schizophrenics. Lucid dreamers also frequently experience playing music: (SLB270) “In a ‘high-school dream’ that has become lucid, I walk up to the teacher who is demonstrating something on the piano as if I am an expected guest artist and sit down to play. I think of playing something from a book, but find that my vision is too weak. So I improvise a Fantasy in F#m, starting out prosaically enough, but building up gradually to a terrific climax. The dream fades with the last chord….” There are infrequent reports reminiscent of fluent aphasia by lucid dreamers. (DDG76) “He said something about getting into a fight with his Dad. I asked him where he was from and he said ‘the Land-O-Lakes, from Idaho.’ I asked for his address but he mumbled nonsense. He told me his name but I can’t remember it now.” However, reports containing aphasic qualities are rare, and even in (DDG76) word comprehension was mixed with incomprehension. Generally, auditory conversation with dream characters is marked by lexical, syntactical and pragmatic accuracy (Meier, 1993).

c. Somatosensation There is strong variability in somatosensation during lucid dreams. Variations in somatosensation are prevalent during initiation of WILDs where, during the transition from waking to lucid dreaming, the person may experience any of the following somatic sensations: vibrations, tingles, waves of warmth, a sense of melting, floating, peeling, flipping over, flopping, slipping, and sinking. Once in a lucid dream, there may be variations in perceptions of a body image, ranging 47

from being a disembodied point or freely moving centre of awareness (but still immersed in the perceptual environment), to perceiving in full detail that one is in a body and fully immersed in one of the varieties of perceptual environments. Autoscopy is reported in which the lucid dreamer may see his or her body as if looking at it from the outside. All of these variations in somatosensation have been proposed, at one time or another, as criteria to distinguish out-of-body experiences from lucid dreams (e.g. Gabbard and Twemlow, 1984; Irwin, 1988). There is little justification for this distinction (Levitan and LaBerge, 1991) and it seems most reasonable to simply recognize that there is a wide variability of somatic sensations associated with lucid dreaming. Some of these embodiments can seem very strange indeed as in the following two cases: (SLB308) “I have been telling an improvised version of the story of Fatima the Spinner and the Tent. Through a forgotten transition, my awareness has come to rest within a collection of porcelain plates and china. Queen Fatima is walking through the gallery and I begin to communicate with her by rattling my plates. All the while I am fully aware that I’m dreaming. The courtiers try to stop the rattling, believing an earthquake to be taking place…Then I believe I have awakened during–an earthquake! I find the apparent incorporation of the earthquake in my dream interesting until I actually awaken a few moments later.” (SLB880) “After lying on my back for a long while, still seemingly awake, I suddenly feel as if I’ve turned into a bluish gas: actually a cloud of coarse blue spheres in the general form of my body that floats above the bed…” Tholey7 (1988) describes a very interesting phenomenon in which the lucid dreamer’s “ego” leaves his dream body and “enters into another dreamer figure”. The result can be a more complete degree of interpersonal understanding than usually results from such techniques as dialoguing with 7

Paul Tholey (1937–1998) was a German Gestalt psychologist, and a professor of psychology and sports science. Tholey started the study of oneirology in an attempt to prove that dreams occur in colour. Given the unreliability of dream memories and following the critical realism approach, he used lucid dreaming as an epistemological tool for investigating dreams, in a similar fashion to Stephen LaBerge. He devised the reflection technique for inducing lucid dreams, consisting in continuously suspecting waking life to be a dream, in the hope that such a habit would manifest itself during dreams. Paul Tholey's research included the examination of the cognitive abilities of dreamers, as well as the cognitive abilities of dream figures. In the latter study, nine trained lucid dreamers were directed to set other dream figures arithmetic and verbal tasks during lucid dreaming (Cognitive abilities of dream figures in lucid dreams, 1983). Dream figures who agreed to perform the tasks proved more successful in verbal than in arithmetic tasks.

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dream figures. Tholey reports that it is also possible to “slip into different dream figures, one after the other, during lucid dreaming, and to conduct a dialogue with a dream figure that one has left with the ego consciousness” (p. 284). A particular kinaesthetic sensation is reported by lucid dreamers but not nonlucid dreamers: this is a sensation of being uncontrollably dragged or whisked along by a “force”, sometimes described as a “strong wind”, which carries the lucid dreamer through the dream environment: (DDG31a) “I floated up through the roof to the outside. Suddenly, I lost my ability to fly, and I began to be pulled along by a strong force, that was like a strong wind gust. This force pulled me violently towards the house next door and I shut my eyes in fright, fearing that I was going to smash into the wall. But then, I just passed smoothly through the wall as the wind force continued to pull me along. I had a momentary glimpse of the inside of the house before I was pulled up through the roof of this house.” Hobson and co-workers have suggested a motor-control theory of dreams in which PGO-initiated stimulation of vestibular and motor pathways generates dreamed motion in a random fashion (Hobson, 1988). Such phasic REM events are a potential explanation of the uncontrolled kinaesthesia experienced in lucid dreams described here. However, lucid dreamers, to our knowledge, do not report autonomic sensations associated with vestibular activation in lucid dreams. For example, spinning is quite common for lucid dreamers (used as a technique to stabilize the dream sensorium) but this does not typically produce sensations of vertigo. Thus, it may be that vestibular pathways do not directly affect dream consciousness, and somatic sensations are generated at the level of sensorimotor cortex. Sleep paralysis is commonly reported both by non-lucid and lucid dreamers. Sleep paralysis involves the intrusion of peripheral somatosensory input associated with REM atonia into the dreamer’s consciousness. Closely related to sleep paralysis is the commonly reported feature of the difficulty of moving or talking in dreams, often when the dreamer is subject to a threat. This feature is also reported by lucid dreamers, and again suggests intrusion of peripheral somatosensory afferent information into dream consciousness.

d. Other senses Lucid dreams can contain content in every sensory modality, including temperature, pain, olfaction, and gustation. Most of these modalities are somewhat rare in lucid dreams, just as they are rare in waking life; but all are possible. Here is an example from van Eeden (1913): 49

On Sept. 9, 1904, I dreamt that I stood at a table before a window. On the table were different objects. I was perfectly well aware that I was dreaming and I considered what sorts of experiments I could make. … Then I saw a decanter with claret and tasted it, and noted with perfect clearness of mind: “Well, we can also have voluntary impressions of taste in this dream-world; this has quite the taste of wine.” According to folk-lore, a dream pinch is supposed to be painless. LaBerge and Levitan (1998) tested this idea by asking lucid dreamers to induce several somatosensory experiences (pain, pressure and light touch) through dream actions and then awaken and rate the results on a seven-point scale for intensity, discomfort, and pleasure. The same procedure was also followed in waking and in imagination. The results showed a notable deficiency in the reproducibility of the conscious experience of pain on demand in lucid dreams (mean discomfort 1.5 in dreams vs. 3.9 in waking; p.05). The subjects had much better success at eliciting lucid dream sensations of pressure (means of 2.9 in dreams, 3.7 in waking) and light touch (mean=3.2 in dreams, 3.0 in waking). These findings suggest that, while some sensory experiences are well modelled by the brain in the absence of primary sensory input, pain may be a special case. To experience convincing realistic pain in dreams, the brain may require some peripheral somatosensory input that may be interpreted as pain. Lest this study be misunderstood to suggest that one cannot experience pain in dreams, here is the testimony of one of the subjects to the contrary: (C. S.) However, as soon as I knew I was dreaming, I remembered the experiment... so I stopped and pinched my left forearm with my right hand. At first, I didn’t feel anything but the touch. So, I pinched myself as hard as possible. The pain was so extreme that I yelled out “Oh my God!” … the sensation of pain [was] so severe … that I woke up. On the other hand, the finding that it is easier to experience pleasure than pain in dreams is an intriguing result demanding explanation, and in any case, good news for lucid dreamers.

e. Emotions Emotion in lucid dreams, while generally positive or relatively neutral, can vary over the entire range of human emotions from agony (mitigated by the realization that “it is only a dream”) to the unmitigated ecstasy of sexual or religious bliss. The realization that one is dreaming is frequently accompanied by an unmistakable sense of excitement and delight. For Rapport (1948), the emergence of lucidity “instantly” transformed his dream into “an incommunicably beautiful vision.” Fox (1962), described the onset of his first 50

experience of lucidity: “instantly, the vividness of life increased a hundredfold...never had I felt so absolutely well, so clear brained, so divinely powerful, so inexpressibly free!” Not surprisingly, the emotions felt in lucid dreams often carry over into the waking state as in the following example: (SLB1027) I had somehow gotten myself out on a limb as it were: at the end of a girder high above the street below. I was trying to choose between walking or crawling. Both seemed too risky and I looked around for other alternatives. I observe that behind me is another way I can escape. I climb off the end of the girder onto another ledge and start to work my way through cobwebs in another passageway. I believe I was partially lucid during this because I have a false awakening in which I am telling someone about the preceding dream. I describe letting go of my mental set of going back on the beam the way I came. At the words “letting go” I realize that I’m dreaming again and that the real solution is to trust and let go. As I do so, leaping into the beautiful sunrise sky, I am overwhelmed with feeling and awaken with tears of joy. Emotional arousal, whether associated with the excitement of lucidity onset or for any other reason, presents lucid dreamers with a problem: Experience of strong emotion within a lucid dream may increase sensations of instability and lead to fading from the lucid dream. Thus, prolonging the lucid dream state requires a degree of emotional control. According to Celia Green (1968: 99), “Habitual lucid dreamers almost unanimously stress the importance of emotional detachment in prolonging the experience and retaining a high degree of lucidity.” A second problem of emotional involvement is that the lucid dreamer’s consciousness may be reabsorbed by the dream, and as the lucid dreamer becomes emotionally absorbed, re-identify with the dream role. This amounts to a displacement of the lucid dream context by a non-lucid dream context. This is a problem more often encountered by beginners than experienced lucid dreamers, and through practice and experience, one can learn to maintain lucidity in spite of intense and emotional involvement with the dream.

f. Cognitive Functions Characterizing variations in cognition during lucid dreaming is both subtle and complex. Not only can variations in cognition occur amongst lucid dreamers, cognition can also vary for a single individual from lucid dream to lucid dream, or within the same lucid dream. Because lucid dreaming is a cumulative skill modified by experience and practice, this means there will always be at least some degree of continuous variation underlying the cognition of lucid dreamers, reflecting changes in the psychological development of that individual both with 51

respect to lucid dreaming, and in general. Nonetheless, variations in cognition within lucid dreaming can be due to other factors including the subject’s semantic framework and contextual competition, affecting in particular memory access and thinking. 1. Variations in Memory Access to memories of waking experience can vary, in spite of the lucid dreamer’s intention to access those memories. For example, a lucid dreamer may be unable to recall one’s phone number, or the date, or even one’s name, in a given lucid dream, although such memories may have been accessed in other lucid dreams. On the other hand, sleep laboratory subjects can remember to perform complex tasks during lucid dreams, tasks which had been previously planned and/or rehearsed during waking. Thus, variations in voluntary access to waking memory may be partly due to intrinsic factors, such as the degree of cortical activation in a given lucid dream or the degree of competition from elements outside the lucid dream context, and partly due to prior preparation and priming of memory. Levitan and LaBerge (1993) tested memory for four different tasks in a group of 20 lucid dreamers. The tasks and percent of successful recall were: where one is sleeping (95%), the current date (94%), and arbitrary word learned before bed (100%), and a fact that one could not remember previously while awake despite multiple efforts (19%). 2. Variations in Thinking The thoughts, conceptions, metacognitive reflections and expectations of lucid dreamers are strongly conditioned by the dreamers’ semantic framework. Within a given semantic framework, the quality of lucid dreamers’ thinking tends to be consistent. However, the use of different semantic frameworks results in more or less accurate conceptions of the lucid dream experience. For example, lucid dreamers who conceptualize their lucid dreams as out-of-body experiences (OBEs) may tend to confuse physical and dream objects, and may operate under the assumption that what they perceive in their lucid dreams corresponds to physical reality (LaBerge, 1985). People who conceive of their lucid dreams as astral projections may come to similarly flawed conclusions. Within the astral projection lore, it is commonly taught that characters encountered during astral projections are the souls of the deceased (Leadbeater, 1895, Fox, 1962, Monroe, 1985). Thus, the astral projector may act as if dream characters are “real” and not mental representations. These examples illustrate that what could be mistakenly taken for a flaw in thinking during a lucid dream is not necessarily a defect in thought per se, but a consequence of the lucid dreamer operating in a 52

specific semantic framework. In such cases, it is the semantic framework that is flawed, not the dreamer’s ability to think or reason. Because of the tremendous perceptual diversity of lucid dreams, the variations on this theme are boundless. Considerations of an individual’s semantic framework also apply to near-death experiences (NDEs), which have phenomenological overlap with lucid dreams. NDEs are characterized by autos copy, lucidity, and surreal perceptual environments such as the experiences of perceiving white light, or moving through a tunnel (Greyson, 1993). NDEs are often interpreted in a religious context as proof of life after death (Reader, 1995). Again, the emphasis here is that individuals’ semantic frameworks will affect their interpretation of events and behaviour in lucid dreams and phenomenon-logically similar states. The semantic frameworks used by individuals is not confined to their lucid dream experiences but also has consequences for their waking life. Because lucid dreams are not widely understood in our society, and because of the variety of semantic frameworks available, some peoples’ responses to their lucid dream experiences may alter the course of their waking lives. Furthermore, these individuals can influence the beliefs of others and thereby replicate their semantic framework within the wider culture. The elaboration of these notions involves the study of biographies of individuals who have undergone lucid dreaming but interpreted these as something else. This topic is beyond the scope of this chapter, but the interested reader can find sources illustrating these points (e.g. Lutyens, 1975; Monroe, 1985; Tillett, 1982). On the other hand, lucid dreamers can display alterations in thinking that are not in any obvious way the direct result of operating under a specific semantic framework (Barrett, 1992; Levitan, 1994). These alterations in thinking resemble minor lapses in rationality, unclear thinking, and drawing absurd conclusions. Several factors can account for these belief-independent variations in thinking: (1) the lucid dreamer’s degree of experience is such that the lucid dreamer has not yet learned what is and is not appropriate behavior in a given dreamed circumstance, (2) competition from non-lucid dream contexts provided distractions that absorb the dreamer into a dream narrative, and influence the dreamer’s thought processes toward this narrative, and (3) variations in brain activity during the course of the lucid dream could alter the performance of higher level cognitive tasks such as comprehending situations and formulating responses. There is sometimes no obvious difference between belief-dependent and beliefindependent variations in thinking when viewing isolated dream reports. Ascertaining these requires knowing a lucid dreamer’s semantic framework and taking this into account when judging the quality of the thinking reported during lucid dreams. 53

3. Volition and Action There is more voluntary choice available to lucid dreamers than to non-lucid dreamers. The experienced lucid dreamer seems capable of exercising at least as much free choice while dreaming as waking. However, waking volition is constrained by general knowledge and past experience. Likewise, volition during lucid dreams is constrained by the dreamer’s semantic framework and past lucid dream experience. These factors together define to the lucid dreamer what is and is not possible, and therefore, what voluntary choices are available. The set of these possible choices are contained in the lucid dreamer’s goaloptions context. The actions of lucid dreamers vary from simple to complex. A lucid dreamer’s actions may be reflexive, as when walking in a lucid dream without losing balance. Others are instinctive, such as attempting to avoid threatening situations. Still others are habitual, such as speaking or driving a car or performing other procedural tasks in a dream. Finally, some of the actions are deliberate and based on volitional choice. Volitional actions are initiated by the lucid dreamer for any number of reasons: curiosity, desire, etc. The actions of lucid dreamers are not constrained by the real world either physically or socially. Hence, lucid dreamers routinely fly, pass through walls or perform other actions impossible in the physical world as the following passage indicates: (DDG54) “I stared up at the big window before me and there was nothing on it indicating that I could open it. So then I did a very interesting trick to get out through the window. I stared at the window and “bent” my perspective on the window so that there was now a gap between the window and the wall that was large enough for me to climb through. I hovered up out of the chair, ignoring the nurse, and pulled myself through the opening I had just created. I was wiggling through the hole wondering what the nurse and other people in the room were thinking.” Lucid dreamers can also freely violate social mores, and behave in highly uninhibited fashions. This can provide a form of therapy to lucid dreamers in terms of overcoming anxiety, recognizing habitual patterns of social interaction, and developing self-knowledge, as well as simply providing a form of pleasure and entertainment (LaBerge and Rheingold, 1990). The characterization of the actions of lucid dreamers is subsumed under the notion of “dream control”. A distinction can be drawn between two kinds of dream control (LaBerge, 1985). One type involves magical manipulation of the 54

dream environment or of dream characters other than the dream actor. The manipulation of the window in (DDG54) is an example of magical manipulation of the dream environment. The other kind of control open to lucid dreamers is self-control, exercised over one’s own actions and reactions to events occurring in the lucid dream. Contrary to some descriptions of lucid dreaming, lucid dreamers typically do not have complete volitional control over their lucid dreams. The most important factor in this regard is that lucid dreamers do not necessarily have control over the perceptual environment in which they find themselves. Like non-lucid dreams, lucid dreamers often find themselves in novel and completely unfamiliar environments which they had no intentional control over creating. This is particularly true of surreal lucid dream environments; here lucid dreamers often cannot even comprehend what they are experiencing (as in DDG75 and DDG70 above). Likewise, lucid dreamers do not intentionally desire to appear in minimal sensory environments, and often have no control over this happening. Thus, lucid dreaming is less like a fantasy experience and more like an exploratory experience. There are also limits to the actions of lucid dreamers, particularly with respect to magical manipulations. For example, the attempt to fly during any given lucid dream may be met with varying degrees of success. The lucid dreamer may fly readily, merely hover, or not be able to fly at all. Likewise, a lucid dreamer may not always be able to pass through walls (as illustrated in DDG61). Thus, because the lucid dreamer may have performed such acts in previous lucid dreams, the inability to perform such an act will often be met with confusion. This variability in performance of actions from lucid dream to lucid dream appears to be belief-independent because, for example, a lucid dreamer may remember that he has flown before, and will expect to fly, but then cannot fly in the current lucid dream. It is reasonable to hypothesize that variations in performance of actions during lucid dreams reflects underlying variations in REM brain activity. There are also situations where the dream environment itself imposes actions on the lucid dreamer completely outside the dreamer’s intentions or expectations. We have presented examples of this in preceding sections: the need to maintain stability is perhaps the most general non-volitional action with which lucid dreamers are faced. Here, lucid dreamers must control their emotions, and often take steps to stabilize themselves (through spinning or other techniques) in order to prolong their lucid dreams. The kinaesthesia experienced as being carried by a strong wind (DDG55 and DDG31a,b above) also occurs outside the will and intention of the lucid dreamer. Often, perceptual discontinuities, such as

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illustrated in (DDG61) will occur in spite of the lucid dreamer’s intention and are often met with surprise by the lucid dreamer. To suggest that the lucid dreamer “unconsciously” desires or wills experiences that are outside the dreamer’s conscious intentions does not offer a credible explanation of these forms of lucid dream variability. It would appear that events and actions occurring in lucid dreams are a combination of: (1) those intentionally generated by the lucid dreamer, limited by the dreamer’s experience and knowledge and (2) those generated by the dream environment outside of the conscious knowledge and intention of the lucid dreamer. With respect to unintended actions generated by the dream environment, these events and actions must in some way be related to the occurrence of physiological phenomena in the sleeping brain. This is clearly the case with sleep paralysis in which peripheral atonia intrudes into the dreamer’s consciousness unintentionally. A second example, the sensation of being uncontrollably whisked along by a “wind force” may be a subjective correlate of localized miniature seizure activity in somatosensory cortex, which itself may be grounded in the random brainstem neurotransmission so actively advocated by Hobson and his followers as a basis for dream generation. Another example highly suggestive of the involvement of neurophysiological processes is when a lucid dreamer “fades” from a lucid dream: there is a relatively stereotyped loss of conscious sensory modalities (LaBerge, DeGracia, et al 1998). These fade in the order of vision followed by somatosensation and audition. This suggests a pattern of cortical deactivation from occipital cortex followed by a medial to lateral and caudal to rostral deactivation in the temporal and parietal cortices, respectively. Together, these examples indicate that unconscious brain physiology can intrude into the consciousness of lucid dreamers, forcing unintended actions on the lucid dreamer. There are Tibetan traditions of lucid dreaming dating from the Ninth Century which claim that a person can achieve complete control of the dream environment (LaBerge, 1985); similar claims are commonplace in Western occult lore (e.g. Leadbeater, 1895). However, no one in the modern era has demonstrated this capability. It is perhaps reasonable, given the evidence at our disposal, to recognize that actions and events occurring in lucid dreams are due to a complex combination of psychological and neurological factors. This, of course, does not preclude testing the limits of possibility in lucid dreams. Indeed, teasing apart the relative roles of neurology and psychology in lucid dream experiences could provide significant insight into the workings of the mind and brain and further our understanding of the relationship between subjective experience and neurological events.

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4. Termination of Lucid Dreams Sooner or later, all things end, and lucid dreams are no exception. There are two general possibilities for terminating lucid dreams: lucidity is lost while the dream continues, or the lucid dream ends with an awakening. The first mode we have discussed above and involves displacement of the lucid dream context by a non-lucid dream context. Novice lucid dreamers are particularly susceptible to loss of lucidity and may need to explicitly remind themselves that they are dreaming (LaBerge & Rheingold, 1989). With experience, some lucid dreamers learn to maintain lucidity without any special effort (e.g., SLB; The percentage of lucid dreams in which lucidity was lost in years 1-3 respectively were 18%, 1%, and 0.4% for SLB, and 17%, 21%, and 40% for DDG, a significantly different pattern). For more experienced lucid dreamers, lucid dreams are more likely to terminate by awakening than by loss of lucidity. Termination by awakening typically involves the “fading out” sensations discussed above. Ordinarily there is a high degree of continuity of consciousness during this transition. In contrast, there is usually a moment of confusion when dreamers wake from a non-lucid dream, as they make the transition from the non-lucid dreamer to the waking self. There are two other possible ways in which lucid dreams can come to an end. In one case, the lucid dreamer enters non-REM sleep and ceases dreaming. Typically, if awakened at this point, the dreamer would recall nothing. In the other case, lucidity is lost, and REM sleep continues, with the person dreaming that he or she has awakened. These dreams are usually called “false awakenings” (Green, 1968) and are very commonly reported concomitants of lucid dreams. Sometimes, false awakenings occur repeatedly with the lucid dreamer seeming to awake again and again only to discover each time that he or she is still dreaming. In some cases, lucid dreamers have reported enduring literally dozens of false awakenings before they finally wake up “for real”. False awakenings tend to increase in frequency with experience in lucid dreaming. For example, here are the percentage of lucid dreams with false awakenings in years 1-3 respectively were 9%, 13%, and 24% for DDG, and 16%, 31%, and 39% for SLB. The reason for the increase frequency of false awakenings is probably that more experience with lucid dreams leads to the greater expectation that as a lucid dream is about to end that one is about to wake up. Thus the expectation of awakening leads to the dream content of the false awakening. Increased familiarity leads to increased likelihood of recognizing that one is dreaming during a false awakening. The percentage of false awakenings recognized in years 1-3 respectively were 4%, 8%, and 20% for DDG, and 0%, 3%, and 26% for SLB. 57

Conclusions Dream experience is innately complex and the waking personality can choose to explore this complexity with a greater or lesser degree of involvement. When there is more involvement of the waking self with one’s dream life, one’s dreams partake more of lucidity. When lucid dreams are explored, significant variation is discovered, and individual factors underlie a great deal of this variation. Much of the phenomenology we have described above is not understood in either psychological or neurological terms, but it offers intriguing glimpses into the processes underlying conscious experience, and the relationship between subjective experience and neurological processes. A deeper understanding of the variety of lucid dream perceptual environments may shed light on sensory representations in waking. An understanding of the effects of semantic structures on lucid dream experience underscores the role of belief in subjective perception and behaviour. Finally, study of the unintentional aspects of lucid dream action may bring us closer to understanding the generation of dreams, and the relationship between subjective experience and neurological events. We hope this chapter will inspire more comprehensive research on the phenomenology of lucid dreaming experience.

Rapid Eye Movements 'change scenes' during dreams For the first time, scientists have recorded from individual brain cells during the dreaming phase of sleep. After each rapid eye movement (REM) they recorded bursts of activity that match what happens when we are awake and we see - or imagine - a new image. They suggest that these well-known flickering movements accompany a "change of scene" in our dreams. The recordings were made from patients with electrodes implanted in their brains to monitor seizures. "It's a unique opportunity to look at what's happening inside the human brain," Dr Yuval Nir8, from Tel Aviv University in Israel, told the BBC. "We're very thankful to the epilepsy patients who volunteered to take part." Dr Nir worked with colleagues from France and the US on the study, which is published in the journal Nature Communications.

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Dr. Nir YUVAL NIR, D.V.M., M.S. graduated with a doctorate in veterinary medicine from the University of Parma, Italy in 1985. He then pursued further education at Kansas State University, where he obtained an advanced Master of Science degree in veterinary surgery and medicine in 1988. Herpetology and exotic animal care have been part of his life since childhood and he has a valuable hands on experience in the field.

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Over the course of four years they worked with nineteen different patients, recording from electrodes in several different brain areas but largely within the medial temporal lobe. This is not a part of the brain directly involved in vision, Dr Nir said. "The activity of these neurons doesn't reflect image processing. It's more about signalling to the brain about a certain concept. "You can close your eyes and imagine Queen Elizabeth, and these neurons will fire. This activity implies a refresh of the mental imagery and the associations." When the patients were awake and shown a picture, especially one associated with a memory, the researchers saw a particular pattern of activity. "About a 0.3 seconds after the picture appears, these neurons burst - they become vigorously active," Dr Nir explained. "This also happens when people just close their eyes and imagine these pictures, or these concepts." Intriguingly, he and his colleagues spotted a "very, very similar pattern" during sleep. In particular, these bursts arrived just after eye movements during REM sleep. This is the phase of sleep in which we dream, and it is characterised by these occasional, very quick eye movements. It has long been thought that these movements might reflect the visual component of dreams, but there has been no clear evidence for this - until now, Dr Nir said. "We are intimately familiar with the activity of these neurons. We know they are active every time you look at an image, or when you imagine that image. And now we see them active in a similar way when you move your eyes in REM sleep, so it becomes very probable that the eye movements represent some type of reset, or 'moving onto the next dream frame'. "It's almost like when I was growing up and we had slide projectors. You move to the next dream slide, if you like."

Switching not scanning This could help to explain why unborn babies and blind people also move their eyes during REM sleep, he added. 59

"Even people who are congenitally blind... can still dream about their aunt coming to visit from Florida: her voice, the emotions and all the associations that go with that. "And when the dream changes from meeting this aunt to, say, taking your dog for a stroll in the park, then the brain activity changes and this happens in sync with eye movements." Other sleep researchers welcomed the findings. Prof Jim Horne 9, who established the Sleep Research Centre at Loughborough University, said the study fits with our improving understanding of REM sleep. He also emphasised that flickering of a dreamer's eyes, which only happens in brief spurts, does not mean they are surveying a scene. "The eye movements are not actually scanning your dream - they're reorienting your visual thoughts," Prof Horne told BBC News. "This study endorses other findings that REM sleep has many similarities to wakefulness. "I see REM sleep as rather like the screensaver on your computer; all you need is the touch of a button and your computer leaps to life. It's very close to wakefulness. Non-REM sleep is more like when you switch your computer off, and waking up requires a process of rebooting." Prof William Wisden, a neuroscientist at Imperial College London, was also convinced by the similarity of brain activity between awake and REM states - but he said there are bigger questions still to answer. "The most fascinating question of all is why do we have to have REM sleep? Why does our brain have all this circuitry to do that? "This paper doesn't answer that, but it does emphasise how similar being awake and in REM sleep are, for particular circuits in the brain."

Trying Lucid Dreaming - Three Simple Methods (Choosing what is best for you) Dream lucidity is awareness that you are dreaming. This awareness can range from a faint recognition of the fact to a momentous broadening of perspective. 9

Sleep Neuroscientist − BSc, MSc, PhD, DSc, FSB, FBPsS, CPsych, CBiol

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Lucid dreams usually occur while a person is in the middle of a normal dream and suddenly realizes that they are dreaming. This is called a dream-initiated lucid dream. A wake-initiated lucid dream occurs when you go from a normal waking state directly into a dream state, with no apparent lapse in consciousness. In either case, the dreams tend to be more bizarre and emotional than regular dreams. Most importantly, you will have at least some ability to control your "dream self" and the surrounding dream.

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I. Dream Awareness Techniques 1. Keep a Shadow book or Journal Keep it close by your bed at night, and write down your dream immediately after waking, or the emotions and sensations you experience right when you wake up. This will train you to remember more of your dreams, which is important for lucid dreaming. Plus, there's not much point in controlling your dreams if you forget the experience before the morning.

2. Alternatively, keep a recording device by your bed. You might remember more of your dream if you stay still for a few minutes concentrating on the memory, before you start writing.

3. Use often reality checks Every few hours during the day, ask yourself "Am I dreaming?" and perform one of the following reality checks. With enough practice, you'll start following the habit in your dreams as well, cluing you in to the fact that you're dreaming.  Read a page of text or the time on a clock, look away, then look back again. In dreams, the text or time will be blurry or nonsensical, or will be different each time you look.  Pinch your nose, close your mouth, and test whether you can still breathe.  Simply look at your hands and feet. These are often distorted in dreams when you inspect them closely.

4. Use reality checks frequently Every few hours during the day, ask yourself "Am I dreaming?" and perform one of the following reality checks. With enough practice, you'll start following the habit in your dreams as well, cluing you in to the fact that you're dreaming.  Read a page of text or the time on a clock, look away, then look back again. In dreams, the text or time will be blurry or nonsensical, or will be different each time you look.  Pinch your nose, close your mouth, and test whether you can still breathe. Simply look at your hands and feet. These are often distorted in dreams when you inspect them closely. 62

5. Learn to recognise your personal dream signs Read through your journal regularly and look for recurring "dream signs." These are recurring situations or events that you may notice in your dreams. Become familiar with these, and you may recognize them while you dream, and therefore notice that you're dreaming.  You probably know some of these already. Common dream events include losing your teeth, being chased by something large, or going into public without clothes on.

6. Drift back to sleep when awakened from a dream. When you wake up and remember your dream, write it down in your dream journal, then close your eyes and focus on the dream. Imagine that you were in the dream, noticed a dream sign or reality check, and realized it was a dream. Hold on to this thought as you drift back to sleep, and you may enter a lucid dream.  Note that most lucid dreams occur while the person is fully asleep, usually because he notices a bizarre event and realizes he's in a dream. This is just an alternate trigger that starts off about 25% of lucid dreams.

7. Consider purchasing a light alarm Go online and purchase a light-based, instead of a sound-based alarm, or even a specialized "DreamLight" designed to induce lucid dreaming. Set it for 4.5, 6, or 7 hours after you fall asleep, or set it to go off every hour if possible. While sound, touch, or other stimuli during REM (Rapid Eye Movement) sleep can also make a dreamer aware of the fact he's dreaming, one study shows that light cues are most effective.  You don't want to actually wake yourself up (unless you try the Wake Back to Bed method below). Keep the light alarm more than arm's reach away from your bed, and/or cover it with a sheet to dim the light.

II. Using the Wake Back to Bed Method 1. Know when lucid dreams most commonly happen 63

Lucid dreams, and vivid dreams in general, almost always occur during REM sleep, the deep sleep phase characterized by Rapid Eye Movement. The first REM phase typically occurs ninety minutes after you first fall asleep, with additional phases roughly every ninety minutes afterward. The goal of this method is to wake up during a REM phase, then fall back asleep and continue the dream aware that you are dreaming. You won't be able to time your phases exactly unless you visit a sleep lab or have a very dedicated night owl watching your eyelids all night. More realistically, just keep repeating the method below until you catch yourself in REM phase.

2. Encourage your body to get more REM sleep There are many ways to increase the amount of REM sleep you get, as described in the linked article. One of the most effective, and the one that causes REM sleep to appear at regular times, is to stick to a daily sleep schedule, and to sleep long enough that you wake up well-rested.  This can be difficult to balance with the step below, which interrupts your sleep in the middle of the night. If you have trouble falling back asleep, try a different method instead, or limit your attempts to once or twice a week.

3. Wake up in the middle of the night Set one alarm to go off either 4.5, 6, or 7 hours after the time you fall asleep. You're more likely to be in REM sleep during these times, although it's difficult to predict in advance. The six or seven hour times are the most likely to work, because later REM phases last longer, and are more likely to contain vivid or lucid dreams.

4. Stay awake for a while Write down your dream if you were having one, make yourself a snack, or just get up and walk around for a while. Your goal is to get your conscious mind active and alert, while your body is still full of sleep hormones. One study shows that staying awake for somewhere between 30 and 60 minutes gives the highest chance of a lucid dream.

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5. Concentrate on the dream and fall asleep again Close your eyes and fall asleep again. If you remember the dream you were having, recall it and fall back asleep, imagining yourself continuing the dream. Even if this takes quite a while to happen, you've got a decent chance at a lucid dream.

6. Try other concentration techniques If your mind wanders while trying to "catch" the dream, or if you don't remember the dream at all, instead try focusing on the movement of your fingers. Use a pattern of small movements, such as "index finger up, middle finger down, middle finger up, index finger down." Repeat this rhythmic movement until you fall asleep.

III. Using Supplementary Techniques 1. Meditate Before going to sleep, meditate in a quiet, dark room. Taking a meditation training course may give better results, but to start out, just pay attention to your breathing, or imagine ascending or descending stairs. The goal is to stop thinking and enter a quiet, comfortable state, and from there slip into a lucid dream.  Keep in mind that "Wake Induced" lucid dreams are rarer and more difficult than dreams that become lucid after you're already asleep.  There are many meditation guide videos online specifically designed to help you lucid dream.

1. Prolong a lucid dream as it starts to fade One common experience among first-time lucid dreamers is waking up due to the excitement of having a lucid dream! Usually, you'll get some warning before hand as the dream feels "unstable" or you begin to notice sensations from the real world. These techniques can help you keep the lucid dream going:  Spin your dream body around or fall backwards. Some people report that this helps, although the reason is unknown. 65

 In the dream, rub your hands together. This can distract you from the sensations of your actual body.  Continue doing whatever you were doing before the dream became unstable, asserting that you are still in the dream. This is much less effective than the techniques above.

2. Listen to binaural beats If you send a different sound frequency to each ear, your brain will interpret the two sound waves' overlapping pattern as an audio beat even though no beat is included in the sound. This definitely changes the brain's electrical activity, but so far scientists are unsure whether this can actually stimulate lucid dreaming. [13] There are many websites out there with collections of binaural beats, so it's easy to try it out if you can sleep with ear buds in. Most would-be lucid dreamers use beats that mimic Theta brain waves, which occur in REM sleep, but some swear by Gamma or Alpha beats instead, or a progression through several types.  Binaural beats can come with soothing background music, or just the beat itself.

3. Play video games Gamers report a much higher rate of lucid dreaming than the general population. While more studies need to be done, it's possible even a couple hours a week could increase your chances of a lucid dream. The type of game played does not appear to make a difference.

4. Consider taking galantamine Galantamine, a drug synthesized from the snowdrop plant, may be the most effective drug for inducing lucid dreaming. Take 4 to 8 mg in the middle of the night for best results; taking it before bed can worsen sleep quality and cause unpleasant dreams. Due to this possibility and the unpleasant side effects listed below, galantamine is only recommended as an occasional supplement.  Talk to a doctor first if you have any medical issues. Galantamine can worsen existing conditions such as asthma or heart problems.  This drug also increases the chance of sleep paralysis, a harmless but often terrifying experience of being awake for several minutes without being able to move your muscles.

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5. Consider the occasional vitamin B supplement. Vitamin B5 or Vitamin B6 supplements can increase dream vividness, bizarreness, and emotional intensity, which can lead to lucid dreaming. However, you may need to take a dose of 100 mg for this effect to be noticeable. This dose is much higher than recommended for daily intake, and if you take it regularly over a long period of time, it can lead to peripheral nerve damage. Use this only for a special lucid dreaming occasion, and at your own risk.  Check with your doctor first if you are taking any medications, or if you have a disorder involving bleeding, the stomach, the intestines, or the heart.  This drug sometimes causes people to wake up in the night, so it may be counterproductive if you're a light sleeper.

Important Lucid dreaming is a skill that must be learned, and even people who lucid dream regularly may only do so once or twice a month. Be patient and continue using these techniques, and the chance and frequency of lucid dreaming will gradually increase. If you sometimes get "false awakenings" while dreaming, get in the habit of performing a reality check (such as trying to read a book) as soon as you wake up. Otherwise, a false awakening can turn a lucid dream into an ordinary one. When you do lucid dream, consider waking up intentionally after a few minutes. This increases your chance of remembering the dream. Do not drink any fluids for one hour prior to sleeping. The last thing you want is to wake up from successfully lucid dreaming just because you had to use the bathroom. If you find the dream is not going how you want it to, "close your eyes" for a bit in the dream, then open them forcefully. Repeat until you wake up. If you think you are losing control, shout out what you want to happen next very loudly until you regain control or it happens.

Attention Lucid dreaming can cause sleep paralysis, in which you remain conscious and aware of your surroundings during the transition from sleep to wakefulness, but 67

are not able to move your muscles. This is harmless, but often terrifying, especially as it can be accompanied by hallucinations of a strange presence in the room. Some muscles are often less affected than others, so concentrate on wiggling your toes or swallowing and stay calm until the hallucinations stop. If you get very excited during your lucid dream, you might wake up suddenly. To attempt to return, shut your eyes and focus on your dream. If you are caught partway through waking up, but still "in" your dream self, spin around or rub your hands.

Galantamine: The Lucid Dreaming Pill (for info only) Galantamine improves the function of nerve cells in the brain. It works by preventing the breakdown of a chemical called acetylcholine (ah see til KO leen). People with dementia usually have lower levels of this chemical, which is important for the processes of memory, thinking, and reasoning. Galantamine is used to treat mild to moderate dementia caused by Alzheimer's disease. Galantamine may also be used for purposes not listed in this medication guide. Before taking galantamine, tell your doctor if you have urination problems, heart disease, a heart rhythm disorder, stomach ulcers or bleeding, a seizure disorder, kidney disease, liver disease, or asthma. Stop using galantamine and call your doctor at once if you have chest pain, slow heart rate, blood in your stools, coughing up blood, decreased urination, weakness, confusion, extreme thirst, or hot, dry skin. There are many other drugs that can interact with galantamine. Tell your doctor about all medications you use. This includes prescription, over-the-counter, vitamin, and herbal products. Do not start a new medication without telling your doctor. If you need surgery, tell the surgeon ahead of time that you are using galantamine. You may need to stop using the medicine for a short time. If you have stopped taking galantamine for any reason, talk with your doctor before you start taking it again. You may need to restart the medication at a lower dose. This medication may impair your thinking or reactions. Be careful if you drive or do anything that requires you to be alert. 68

You should not use galantamine if you are allergic to it. To make sure you can safely take galantamine, tell your doctor if you have any of these other conditions:       

urination problems; heart disease or a heart rhythm disorder; a history of stomach ulcer or bleeding; seizures or epilepsy; kidney disease; liver disease; or a history of asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

FDA pregnancy category B. Galantamine is not expected to harm an unborn baby. Tell your doctor if you are pregnant or plan to become pregnant during treatment. It is not known whether galantamine passes into breast milk or if it could harm a nursing baby. Do not use this medication without telling your doctor if you are breast-feeding a baby. Get emergency medical help if you have any of these signs of an allergic reaction: hives; difficulty breathing; swelling of your face, lips, tongue, or throat. Stop using galantamine and call your doctor at once if you have a serious side effect such as:         

chest pain, slow heart rate; feeling like you might pass out; blood in your urine or stool; coughing up blood or vomit that looks like coffee grounds; painful or difficult urination; urinating less than usual or not at all; weakness, confusion, decreased sweating, extreme thirst, hot dry skin; or nausea, upper stomach pain, itching, loss of appetite, dark urine, clay coloured stools, jaundice (yellowing of the skin or eyes).

Less serious side effects may include:  feeling tired, dizzy, or drowsy;  headache, blurred vision, runny nose; 69

   

depression, sleep problems (insomnia); nausea, vomiting, stomach pain, loss of appetite; weight loss; or unusual or unpleasant taste in your mouth.

This is not a complete list of side effects and others may occur.

Severe warning without doctor’s advise (medical advise essential) This medication may impair your thinking or reactions. Be careful if you drive or do anything that requires you to be alert. Tell your doctor about all other medicines you use, especially:          



donepezil (Aricept); erythromycin (E.E.S., EryPed, Ery-Tab, Erythrocin, Pediazole); ketoconazole (Nizoral); paroxetine (Paxil); rivastigmine (Exelon); atropine (Atreza, Sal-Tropine), belladonna (Donnatal, and others), benztropine (Cogentin), dimenhydrinate (Dramamine), methscopolamine (Pamine), or scopolamine (Transderm Scop); bladder or urinary medicines such as darifenacin (Enablex), flavoxate (Urispas), oxybutynin (Ditropan, Oxytrol), tolterodine (Detrol), or solifenacin (Vesicare); bronchodilators such as ipratropium (Atrovent) or tiotropium (Spiriva); irritable bowel medicines such as dicyclomine (Bentyl), hyoscyamine (Hyomax), or propantheline (Pro-Banthine); NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs) such as ibuprofen (Advil, Motrin), naproxen (Aleve, Naprosyn, Naprelan, Treximet), celecoxib (Celebrex), diclofenac (Arthrotec, Cambia, Cataflam, Voltaren, Flector Patch, Pennsaid, Solareze), indomethacin (Indocin), meloxicam (Mobic), and others; Or ulcer medications such as glycopyrrolate (Robinul) or mepenzolate (Cantil).

This list is not complete and there are many other drugs that can interact with galantamine. Tell your doctor about all medications you use. This includes prescription, over-the-counter, vitamin, and herbal products. Do not start a new medication without telling your doctor. Keep a list of all your medicines and show it to any healthcare provider who treats you.

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Finally the dosage only by the doctor’s recommendation Take exactly as prescribed by your doctor. Do not take in larger or smaller amounts or for longer than recommended. Follow the directions on your prescription label. Your doctor may occasionally change your dose to make sure you get the best results. The galantamine extended-release capsule is usually taken once per day in the morning. Follow your doctor's instructions. The galantamine short-acting tablet or the oral solution (liquid) are usually given two times per day, with meals. Follow your doctor's instructions. The extended-release capsule works best if you take it with food. Do not crush, chew, break, or open an extended-release capsule. Swallow it whole. Breaking or opening the pill may cause too much of the drug to be released at one time. Measure the liquid using only the special dose-measuring device provided. Empty the medicine into 3 to 4 ounces of any non-alcoholic beverage. Stir this mixture and drink all of it right away. Rinse the dose-measuring device with water after each use. The liquid form of this medication comes with patient instructions for safe and effective use. Follow these directions carefully. Ask your doctor or pharmacist if you have any questions. Take galantamine with a full glass of water. Drink 6 to 8 full glasses of water each day to keep from getting dehydrated while taking this medication. If you need surgery, tell the surgeon ahead of time that you are using galantamine. You may need to stop using the medicine for a short time. If you have stopped taking galantamine for any reason, talk with your doctor before you start taking it again. You may need to restart the medication at a lower dose.

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Store at room temperature away from moisture and heat. Do not allow the liquid medicine to freeze. Overdose symptoms may include severe nausea, vomiting, stomach cramps, muscle weakness or spasm, watery eyes, drooling, increased urination or bowel movements, sweating, slow heart rate, feeling light-headed or fainting, and seizure (convulsions). Take the missed dose as soon as you remember. Skip the missed dose if it is almost time for your next scheduled dose. Do not take extra medicine to make up the missed dose.

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LaBerge, S. & Levitan, L. (November, 1998). Does the subjective experience of pain require neuronal activity below the level of the brain? A study of pain in lucid dreams. Paper presented at the 17th annual meeting of the American Pain Association, San Diego, California. LaBerge, S., Nagel, L., Dement, W., & Zarcone, V. (1981). Lucid dreaming verified by volitional communication during REM sleep. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 52, 727-732. LaBerge, S. 1985. Lucid Dreaming. New York: Ballantine Books. LaBerge, S. 1988. The psychophysiology of lucid dreaming. In J. Gackenbach & S. LaBerge (Eds.), Conscious mind, sleeping brain: Perspectives on lucid dreaming (pp. 135-153). New York: Plenum. LaBerge, S. 1990. Lucid dreaming: Psychophysiological studies of consciousness during REM sleep. In R.R. Bootsen, J.F. Kihlstrom, & D.L. Schacter (Eds.), Sleep and Cognition. Washington, D.C.: American Psychological Association Press (pp. 109-126). LaBerge, S. 1993. Physiological studies of lucid dreaming. In J. Antrobus & M. Bertini (Eds.) The neuropsychology of dreaming sleep (pp. 289-303). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. LaBerge, S. 1994. The stuff of dreams. Anthropology of Consciousness, 5, 2830. LaBerge, S. 1996. “To sleep, perchance to read” Nightlight 3(2): 17-21. LaBerge, S. 1998. Dreaming and consciousness. In S. Hameroff, A. Kaszniak, & A. Scott (Eds.), Toward a science of consciousness II (pp. 495-504). Boston: MIT Press. LaBerge, S., DeGracia, DJ., & Zimbardo, P. 1998. “Prolonging lucid dreams”. In preparation. LaBerge, S., Nagel, L., Dement, W., & Zarcone, V. (1981). Lucid dreaming verified by volitional communication during REM sleep. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 52, 727-732. LaBerge, S. and Rheingold, H. 1990. Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. New York: Ballantine Books. Leadbeater, C.W. 1895 (12th reprint, 1984). The Astral Plane. Madras: Vasanta Press. 74

Levitan, L. 1994. “A fool’s guide to lucid dreaming”. Nightlight 6(2):1-5. Online: http://www.lucidity.com/NL62.FoolsGuide.html Lutyens, M. 1975. Krishnamurti: The Years Of Awakening. London: John Murray. Mavromatis, A. 1987. Hypnogogia. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. McCreery, C. 1973. Psychical Phenomena and the Physical World. London: Hamish Hamilton. Meier, B. 1993. “Speech and thinking in dreams”. In C. Cavallero and D. Foulkes (eds.) Dreaming As Cognition. New York: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 5876. Moers-Messmer, H. von, 1938. Traüme mit der gleichzeitigen Erkenntnis des Traumzustandes [Dreams with simultaneous cognizance of the dream state], Archiv für Psychologie, 102: 291-318. Moffitt, A., Hoffmann, R., Mullington, J., Purcell, S., Pigeau, R., and Wells, R. 1988. “Dream psychology: operating in the dark”. In J. Gackenbach and S. LaBerge (eds.), Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain,. New York: Plenum, 429-439. Monroe, R. 1985. Far Journeys. New York: Doubleday. Ouspensky, P. 1960. A New Model of the Universe. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Rapport, N. 1948. “Pleasant dreams!” Psychiatric Quarterly 22: 309-17. Reader, A.L. 1995. “The internal mystery plays: the role and physiology of the visual system in contemplative practices.” Alternative Therapies 1(4): 54-63. Rogo, D.S. 1986. Leaving The Body. New York: Prentice Hall. Salzarulo, P. and Cipolli, C. 1974. “Spontaneously recalled verbal material and its linguistic organization in relation to different stages of sleep”. Biological Psychology 2: 47-57. Snyder, T. and Gackenbach, J. 1988. “Individual differences associated with lucid dreaming”. In J. Gackenbach and S. LaBerge (eds.), Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain. New York: Plenum, 221-259. Tart, C. 1984. “Terminology in lucid dream research” Lucidity Letter, 3: 4-6. 75

Tholey, P. 1988. “A model for lucidity training as a means of self-healing and psychological growth”. In J. Gackenbach and S. LaBerge (eds.), Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain. New York: Plenum, 263-287. Tillet, G. 1982. The Elder Brother A Biography Of Charles Webster Leadbeater. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. van Eeden, F. 1913. A study of dreams. Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 26: 431-461.

What Is Telepathy? Research Work and Study by Philippe L. De Coster, B.Th., D.D.

The Power of Thought Thought power, or the Power of Thought is the key to creating your reality, an interplay and an extended sentiency developed, that closely interlinks with each other. Everything you perceive in the physical world has its origin in the invisible, inner world of your brain were thoughts and beliefs are developed. To become the master of your destiny, you must learn to control the nature of your 76

dominant, habitual thoughts. By doing so, you will be able to attract into your life that which you intend to have and experience as you come to know the Truth that your thoughts create your reality. Every effect you see in your outside or physical world around has a specific cause which has its origin in your inner or mental world, your brain. This is the essence of thought power. Put another way, the conditions and circumstances of your life are as a result of your collective thoughts and beliefs. Circumstances do not make a man, they reveal him. Every aspect of your life, from the state of your finances to the state of your health and your relationships, is accurately revealing your thoughts and your beliefs. We have to be aware of our thoughts, they are powerful.     

Watch your thoughts, they become words. Watch your words, they become actions. Watch your actions, they become habits. Watch your habits, they become your character. Watch your character, it becomes your destiny.

Through words of power one can command the energies to reverse themselves and even return to their originating centre. To this end we have three things to do: 

That which we utter with conviction crystallises the built thoughtform, like architects and bridge builders reducing the desired form to a mathematical formula.  Pronouncing affirmative words which will give the form vitality and so carry it forth on the physical plane.  Uttering the phrase which detaches the thought-form from the mind to be as such drained towards other energies. This is telepathy. We are in an age, that men recognise that noise acts as a deterrent to telepathic intercourse. Putting it this way, we may state that through the complexity of much speech-making and book-writing, ideas are now enabled to take form and so run through their cycle of activity. But this method is as unsatisfactory in the field of knowledge as is the ancient tallow dip in the field of inspiration, or if you prefer illumination. Electric light has superseded it, and some day even from today the true telepathic communication and vision is, will take the place of speech and of writings. In this concept of telepathic work we have the worker (you and me) in thought-matter building our though-forms and “confining the lives” which express and respond to his or her ideas within a “ring-pass-not”. The latter persists for as long as his or she mind attention and hence his inner77

self energy is directed on it. In this way we pronounce the words which will enable the thought-form(s) to do its work, fulfil the mission for which it has been constructed, and carry out the purpose for which it has been created. Telepathy and the allied powers will only be understood when the nature of force, of emanations and radiations, and of energy currents, is better grasped. This is rapidly coming about as science penetrates more deeply into the arcana of energies and begins to work—as does the occultist—in the world of forces. So, telepathy is direct transference of thought from one person (sender or agent) to another (receiver or percipient) without using the usual sensory channels of communication, hence a form of extrasensory perception (ESP). While the existence of telepathy has not yet been generally proved, some parapsychological research studies have produced favourable results using such techniques as card guessing with a special deck of five sets of five cards. The agent may simply think of a random order of the five card symbols while the percipient tries to think of the order on which the agent is concentrating. Telepathy proponents point generally to controversially scientific concepts such as psychology and quantum mechanics, as areas of research that are considered to be deeply based in the scientific method, but have equally problematic and unexplainable links to the exclusively physical description of reality. Here, I would suggest two wonderful books, written by Michelle Belanger: The Psychic Energy Codex (Wakening you Subtle Senses); and The Psychic Vampire Codex (A Manual of Magick and Energy Work). Two books on psychic development, nothing to be afraid of. To be ordered at Amazon. About telepathy, you can also check various dictionaries or Wikipedia for telepathy. But then, if it really worked, you’d just find someone who knows about it and copy from their mind. An older term still found in the literature is “thought transference”, mostly of “thought impressions”.

Developing Quick Thinking The human mind is capable of lightning quick thinking, but primarily when in a relaxed, positive frame of mind. Do you remember the last emotional outburst or argument that you had? Did you get too flustered for a proper comeback? Did you say to yourself later on, "I wish I had said (such and such)?" When you allow the emotional side of your brain to gain control, the conscious thinking side of your brain is suspended. Quick response is easily achieved when you curb the impulse to flare up emotionally. For starters, exercise discipline over yourself and be silent when emotionally confronted. This will give you a chance to see how another person blows off steam without getting embroiled in the process yourself. 78

It will also give you practice in achieving more conscious control over your life. Policemen, bar maids and customer relations officers all practice being 'cool' headed thinkers, because it is their job to handle emotional retorts in a calmer way. Lack of emotional control brings about inefficiency, non-productivity and little progress. Like with other things, practice is the key to improvement. As an exercise, work with a partner that you barely know. Agree ahead of time that this exercise is only a game, and that the object of the exercise is NOT to get antagonistic with each other over it. Now let your partner act as target, and you start bombarding him with emotionally directed remarks, one at a time. Your partner's job is to keep as cool and as calm as possible, and retort back to you a response as quickly as he can. A split second of clear thinking is all that is necessary, and soon you'll get the knack of it. Afterwards, reverse the roles. If done in a workshop or group, it might help to listen to other pairs performing the exercise. Often you'll find a response directed in the form of a calm question will take an emotional person off guard, because to consciously formulate an answer, the thinking side of the brain is needed. With practice, you'll no longer need to fumble for your words. Quick responses will become second nature to you. One way to get the words to flow quickly when you're upset is to simply read aloud a page out of a book as fast as you can. This is also a good method to use in pulling yourself out of a depressive, hateful or lonely mood (but not for chronic conditions). The conscious effort is so intense to keep the rapid speed going that your emotional doldrums simply pass away as your awareness is shifted to a cortical task. Time yourself for speed and read the same page again, but go faster this time. To think fast in emergency situations is often a matter of life and death in some cases. How would you handle yourself in a fire, a bad car accident, a robbery or on a passenger liner sinking at sea? Campers have died of cold exposure with packs containing food and cooking stoves. Car occupants have frozen to death in their cars with a half a tank of gas left. People have drowned in 4 feet of water. Panic is a killer. Determined, quick thinking is a life saver. Injured outdoorsmen have dragged their smashed bodies for miles and survived. Women have given birth to children in the wilderness all alone. People have performed amputations or crude surgery on themselves and saved their own lives. As an exercise, visualize yourself in emergency situations where you correctly choose a creative alternative for survival. For instance, after falling through the ice on a frozen river, you breathe from the shallow air pockets trapped underneath the ice. 79

You bail out of an airplane and your primary and secondary chutes don't open, so you cut a slit in your pack and pull the chute out. While in an elevator, the cable snaps and you grab a hold of the ceiling fan to break your eventual fall to the ground. By creating visualizations where you are an active participant, you build self- confidence and establish prepared scenarios in your mind to give you a better ability, to handle yourself later. Even when totally different emergencies pop up, your readiness for them will produce better responses.

All on Telepathy Telepathy [ < Greek têle (far away) + patheia (perception or feeling; < to be affected by). Popularized by Frederic W. H. Myers.] Causing someone to think or feel something by use of one’s mind; communication using means beyond the standard physical senses. One who has such abilities is a ‘telepath’ (which is technically different from ‘psychic’, who calls on and communicates with spirits rather than the minds of the living). The abilities themselves are described as ‘telepathic’. Telepathy is the direct transference of thought and/or feelings from one person to another person without using the normal five physical senses of sight, hearing, touch, taste and smell. But telepathy should really be as natural to us as breathing, and the power has never really gone away. We all have the ability to communicate entirely by the power of our minds, and with the right guidance and training this ability can be ‘re-learnt’. It is not that difficult to develop telepathy. Telepathy really is not as difficult to ‘re-learn’ as you might imagine – the main stumbling block is lack of belief that it is possible. However with the latest advances in quantum physics more and more studies are showing and explaining the very real science behind telepathy. Studies show that for someone to use their telepathic powers, their mind needs to be functioning in the mid to low delta frequency ranges. These are the frequencies that occur when your mind is a asleep but it is possible for the mind to reach these frequencies and for you to still be conscious.

Are You Thinking What I’m Thinking?... Telepathy is about communicating from mind-to-mind, getting someone to feel or think or ‘hear’ something from far away, without the use of sounds or symbols or anything else but bare thought. There are several types of telepathic activity : 80

1. Telepathic impression (planting a message, image, or word into someone else’s mind), 2. Mind reading (copying or sensing, but not interfering with, what’s going on in someone else’s mind), 3. Mental communication (a wireless phone of the mind, but without the bills), 4. Mind control (actually commanding or compelling the thoughts, and thus the actions, of another person through telepathy). Mind control is a separate subject for altogether. Could it be that telepathy works well when our relation to each other is based on trust, cooperation, and love rather than by the knowledge of how to read minds or the power of directly planting thoughts? And what happens to symbolism, visual art, literature, and the art of speech or broadcast, once the mind can go straight to what the artist is conveying? The truth is, there’s no credible evidence that a mind can be made to take action by way of projecting thoughts into someone. Even the most fully telepathyfriendly of studies show at most the ability to cause in someone a sense of unease or nervousness. Most studies show that telepathy can’t put into anyone’s mind an impression that acts as a command or suggestion, nor any specific communication that can be understood. Nor is there any credible evidence for mind reading, or copying from a mind. Today, paranormal researchers generally reject material-world explanations such as ‘brain-wave’ reception (since there is no such a thing). If you believe that there’s a realm transcending the material, measurable world, then science does not fully resolve the question. And it takes more than mere science to understand what it would really mean if some form or level of telepathy really exists. Or, to explain what it tells us about ourselves if we think it exists when it doesn’t, or the other way around.

Telepathic Powers When people are asked what one super power they would most want to have, mind reading comes a close second to flying. Some popular authors call it a fun psychic skill that’s naturally available to just about everyone but it’s being inhibited by our lack of belief in it. It’s such an interesting idea that it’s easy to wish it were true. But if someone is actually reading minds, what would they be doing with it? Are they reducing poverty, limiting the actions of the insane, blocking terrorists and spies, unmasking lies for the public, or even just sending ‘I love you’ to each other? Judging from the way the world goes, apparently not. And maybe that’s for the better, since just as with normal skills, telepathic abilities would provide us with a new way to really foul things up. Many insane or perverted people think they’re telepathic – could you picture the insanity they 81

could cause in other people if they really were? There would even be the chilling possibility of developing real telepathic “thought police” who would investigate you by reading your thoughts. Sci-Fi and horror, rolled into one. Many just-plain-folks report having some sort of telepathic abilities. There are some things in life that are hard to explain outside of telepathy: think, for instance, of how our mothers seem to be able to make us feel guilty no matter how far away we might be. The reported telepathic abilities usually come in the form of mental communication with one particular person only. That’s often the psychological effect of being emotionally close to someone for awhile. Being emotionally close could provide a possible kind of telepathy, in the sense that such closeness could possibly bring about moments of someone else being included in the edges of a person’s consciousness. (In this case, consciousness means the ‘community’ of all that is you. There could perhaps be an ‘overlap’ with someone else.) Some people report that they experience a mental contact that feels like a form of harassment, causing them to be in terror. If there’s anything giving you terror, from telepathy or anything else, don’t try to pray it away or block it out, it won’t work. Seek professional counselling to help you deal with the fear. Some Christian writers have taken an interest in telepathy, but most of those are fringy sorts who hold some New Age ideas. Perhaps the most notable example of one who dug into telepathy-like things was literacy leader and prayer specialist Frank Charles Laubach10, who believed a praying person could act as a funnel between God and someone else. (He thought many people deliberately block God out of their minds. So, the prayer would serve as God’s way around the blockade.) One nearly-irresistible drawback is to think into someone in order to get a kick out of watching what seems to be that person’s physical reactions. It seems like an innocent game, but it would be manipulation of other people, and thus even the desire to do so would be profoundly un-Christian.

Telepathy in History Very few anecdotal accounts of telepathy have been noted in many ancient cultures since historical records have been kept. 10

Frank Charles Laubach (September 2, 1884 – June 11, 1970), from Benton, PA was a Congregational Christian missionary educated at Union Theological Seminary and Columbia University, and a mystic known as "The Apostle to the Illiterates." In 1915 (see Laubach, Thirty Years With the Silent Billion), while working among Muslims at a remote location in the Philippines, he developed the "Each One Teach One" literacy program. It has been used to teach about 60 million people to read in their own language. He was deeply concerned about poverty, injustice and illiteracy, and considered them barriers to peace in the world.

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In the Bible, some prophets appear to have the ability to see into the future (precognition, time travel, grid travel). This seems to be a common claim from ancient and primitive people. But the sending and receiving of messages from individual to individual by mind alone is never mentioned at all. As with all psi phenomena, there is wide disagreement and controversy within the sciences, even within parapsychology, as to the existence of telepathy. Western scientific investigation of telepathy is generally recognized as having begun with the initial program or research of the Society for Psychical Research. The apex of their early investigations was the report published in 1886 as the two-volume work Phantasms of the Living. It was with this work that the term “telepathy” was introduced, replacing the earlier term “thought transference”. Although much of the initial investigations consisted largely of gathering anecdotal accounts with follow-up investigations, they also conducted experiments with some of those who claimed telepathic abilities. However, their experimental protocols were not very strict by today’s standards. In 1917, psychologist John E. Coover from Stanford University conducted a series of telepathy tests involving transmitting/guessing playing cards. His participants were able to guess the identity of cards with overall odds against chance of 160 to 1; however, Coover did not consider the results to be significant enough to report this as a positive result. Perhaps the most well-known telepathy experiments were those of J. B. Rhine and his associates at Duke University, beginning in the 1927 using the distinctive ESP Cards of Karl Zener. These involved more rigorous and systematic experimental protocols than those from the 19th century, used what were assumed to be ‘average’ participants rather than those who claimed exceptional ability, and used new developments in the field of statistics to evaluate results. Results of these and other experiments were published by Rhine in his popular book Extra Sensory Perception, which popularized the term “ESP”. Another influential book about telepathy in its day was Mental Radio, published in 1930 by the Pulitzer prize-winning author Upton Sinclair (with foreword by Albert Einstein). In it Sinclair describes the apparent ability of his wife at times to reproduce sketches made by himself and others, even when separated by several miles, in apparently informal experiments that are reminiscent of some of those to be used by remote viewing researchers in later times. They note in their book that the results could also be explained by more general clairvoyance, and they did some experiments whose results suggested that in fact no sender was necessary, and some drawings could be reproduced pre-cognitively. 83

By the 1960s, many parapsychologists had become dissatisfied with the forcedchoice experiments of J. B. Rhine, partly because of boredom on the part of test participants after many repetitions of monotonous card-guessing and refusing the suggestion by magicians of adding cards that were totally blank, partly because of the observed “decline effect” where the accuracy of card guessing would decrease over time for a given participant, which some parapsychologists attributed to this boredom. Some parapsychologists turned to free response experimental formats where the target was not limited to a small finite predetermined set of responses (e.g., Zener cards), but rather could be any sort of picture, drawing, photograph, movie clip, piece of music etc. As a result of surveys of spontaneous psi experiences which reported that more than half of these occurred in the dreaming state, researchers Montaque Ullman and Stanley Krippner at the Maimonides Medical Centre in Brooklyn, New York, undertook a series of experiments to test for telepathy in the dream state. A “receiver” participant in a soundproof, electronically shielded room would be monitored while sleeping for EEG patterns and rapid eye movements (REMs) indicating dream state. A “sender” in another room would then attempt to send an image, randomly selected from a pool of images, to the receiver by focusing on the image during the detected dream states. Near the end of each REM period, the receiver would be awakened and asked to describe their dream during that period. The data gathered suggested that sometimes the sent image was incorporated in some way into the content of the receiver’s dreams. While the dream telepathy experiments results were interesting, to run such experiments required many resources (time, effort, personnel). Other researchers looked for more streamlined alternatives, such as the so-called ganzfeld experiments. To date there has not yet been any satisfactory experimental protocol designed to distinguish telepathy from other forms of ESP such as clairvoyance.There have been rare claims of shared of visual hallucinations in folie a deux Ð shared psychotic disorder. These are beyond the scope of science at this time. The phenomena cannot be produced or reproduced on demand.

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Quantum Mechanics11 In seeking a “scientific explanation,” some telepathy proponents have claimed there to be connections between scientific quantum theory as a basis for telepathy. Such modern concepts of telepathy have attempted to draw both legitimacy and scientific curiosity, by making both general and specific analogies between the “unaccepted unknowns” of religion and parapsychology, and the 11

Quantum mechanics ("QM") is the part of physics that tells us how the things that make up atoms work. QM also tells us how electromagnetic waves like light work. QM is a mathematical framework (rules written in math) for much of modern physics and chemistry. Quantum mechanics helps us make sense of the smallest things in nature like protons, neutrons and electrons. Complex mathematics is used to study subatomic particles and electromagnetic waves because they act in very strange ways. Quantum mechanics is important to physics and chemistry. Quantum is a Latin word that means 'how much'. So a quantum of energy is a specific amount of energy. Light sources such as candles or lasers shoot out (or "emit") light in bits called photons. Photons are like packets. Each one has a certain little bit of energy.

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“accepted unknowns” in the quantum sciences, where the classical and understood concepts of physics (time and space) don’t generally apply. The clear example is in quantum mechanics and its inherently theoretical cousin, string theory. Both have radically changed modern concepts regarding the nature of time, space, energy, and matter, and the relationships between each. In general the concept is that the mind (human or otherwise) is simply evolved physical scaffold for an entity of electrical and quantum impulses. This system, in turn is claimed to have been developed abilities to influencing and receiving “quantum fluctuations” from other minds. In essence, proponents claim that telepathy is not “extrasensory”, rather that the brain is the telepathic organ, its connections to other brains are not physical, but psychic, and the very definition of the psychic medium is the localized inertial frame of reference which is affected by the mind. This new and “scientifically-grounded” concept of telepathy provides the context for further speculations. However, physicists and ehaviou state that quantum mechanics does not show classical effects until objects are at subnanometre scales, and since the physical components of the mind are all much larger, these quantum effects are considered negligible. Proponents counter that the scientific statements carry two flawed assumptions, namely that the experience of telepathy need be a classical effect, and that the mind is sensitive to only classical effects. Some physicists, such as Nick Herbert, have pondered whether or not quantum mechanics’ “non-locality” (or “spooky action at a distance”) principle would permit instantaneous communication such as telepathy. Experiments have been conducted (by scientists such as Gao Shen at the Institute of Quantum Physics in Beijing, China) to study whether or not quantum entanglements (connections allowing instantaneous information exchange) demonstrated at the level of electrons can also be verified between human minds. Such experiments usually include monitoring for synchronous EEG patterns between two hypothetically “entangled” minds.

Technologically-assisted telepathy Some, for example the science-fiction writer Spider Robinson in the book Deathkiller, have envisioned neurological research leading to technologicallyassisted telepathy, also called telepathy. As of 2004, scientists have demonstrated that brain imaging can be successfully used to recognise distinct thought patterns, and tell, for example, whether experimental monkeys thought about juice or water, and whether a human participant thought about a rotating cube or moving his paralyzed arm. Both implanted electrodes recording 86

neurons’ activity and outside electrodes recording electromagnetic activity of the brain can be used. Telepathic communication between humans and animals Some people believe that it is possible for humans and animals to communicate through telepathy. In the past, this type of interspecies communication was thought to be a normal part of life, such as in Native American culture. For more information on this subject, see books by Rupert Sheldrake (Dogs who know when their owners are coming home), and professional animal communicators Penelope Smith and Marta Williams. Delusions of telepathy – Schizophrenia can produce delusions that the sufferer is in telepathic communication with others; such delusions include thought broadcasting and thought extraction.

Telepathy in Dreams There is a long tradition of anecdotal evidence for foreseeing the future in dreams and by various devices such as observing the flight of birds or examining the entrails of sacrificial animals. Precognition has been tested with subjects required to predict the future order of cards in a deck about to be shuffled or to foretell results of dice throws, but the statistical support for it has generally been less convincing than that from experiments in telepathy and clairvoyance. Telepathy is instinctual. Primitive species used it as a survival mechanism. It involves mind to mind contact – communication – of one mind with another by means beyond the normal or ordinary – beyond the frequencies of the five physical senses – sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell. No all psychics are telepathic or can read minds. Telepathic abilities are about connecting frequency. It is like turning on a radio and finding the right station. You just have to know how to ‘tune in’ and the frequency of the program. For a few people this skill comes easy – but on the norm – telepathy is never developed though many people try. Different meditation techniques and learning to focus the mind are the key. The more you practice the better you get. Once you open the door to telepathy – it should work like a light switch. You can turn it off – tune off – or turn it on by focusing your thoughts. Rarely does one find that they are bombarded by the thoughts of others all the time. It would drive you crazy. 87

Human DNA is not activated in a way that makes us natural telepaths – in most cases. We are in the third dimension – the physical realms –to experience emotions. Telepathy would make it more complicated than it already is. Of course no one would be able to lie anymore – so perhaps humanity could live in peace – but that is not why we come into the physical. We experience here as if in a Matrix – the Holodeck – a Virtual Reality game – for the drama, the emotions – the thrills and chills – until one day we pause the game and say, “I am tired of this. I can think ‘out of the box’ and want those skills returned. Give me back my powers.” It is then we go in seek of the tools which are innately ours. Dreams bring telepathic messages as we time ravel or grid travel in our dreams where al exists. These are called precognitive dreams. If they are about the ‘world’ rather than our personal lives, they are called ‘collective dreams’. Deceased souls sometimes bring messages through dreamtime. Communication is by thought form using symbols. In dreams you are moving faster than the speed of light. This is similar to meditation, time travel and remote viewing. You meet up with spirits and share adventures and information. In dreamtime you move faster and higher. As your consciousness returns to the physical body the lower your get to your body – the more it slows down ...slower...and slower... until you enter your consciousness mind and wake up in the sluggish place – we call 3D. It is here that the concept of linear-time exists. You can best understand this by remembering that in your dreams – you move from event to event but time is not marked. There is no time beyond 3D as frequency of light – and that is all we are – is moving too fast. Remember – the lower and slower the frequency – the less likely to achieve telepathy or other abilities that work in faster light. 3D appears to be as dull as it gets. Lovers definitely are more in tuned telepathically as being in love at that level is a very high frequency. This is not just about sex – though it is an aspect of it. Sexual activity is often telepathic in that one is responding to the needs of their partner on a higher level of expression. Telepathy between members of the same family – or close friends is common as they learn to adjust to each other’s frequencies. There always seem to be one member of every family – usually a woman – who has psychic or telepathic abilities. Mother’s sense when children are in trouble. When you are in panic mode – the adrenaline flows and the telepathy kicks in to those would tune in to help you.

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I woman could receive messages from her unborn child, often through dreams, but also telepathically. People often sense the death of a family member. These make the most dramatic stories – heightened tension, nick-of-time rescues. However, keep in mind that telepathic situations may be happening all the time, but we lack the awareness to recognize them. In times of crisis we sent out our message and those who are in tune will pick it up. Twins are often telepathic with each other creating these abilities when they are infants. They generally are in the same frequency at the same time and learn to communicate with words. Very often it is just about a single thought – hunger. Telepathy between twins or family members can remain for a life time. I have friends who play telepathy games with their children wherein one member will think of something and the second person has to guess what he is thinking about. As a rule, the rate of success for this type of telepathy is often higher than with those outside of the family. Family members who are learning challenged, often rely on ‘higher senses’ to connect with those around them. When you are talking about ‘psychic sensitives’ – they train themselves – or are naturally gifted to send and receive messages. This innate gift is based on their DNA opening at an early age.

In short how to develop telepathy Telepathy is one of the most beautiful Psychic Powers. It is known as mind to mind communication, (Tele means- distance and pathy means- feelings) which is feelings exchanging between two minds and in an advanced stage this can be done between multiple minds. When we learn new things it takes some time for us to learn effectively but if we compare this time with others then we can find different results for different persons..i.e., some people learn much faster and others much slower. This happens due to lack of:-belief in psychic powers existence, concentration power, self believe, patience and persistence. So before developing any kind of psychic power this one should develop those above abilities...then powers can be developed much more faster. It is a guide in which one can learn Telepathy and Mind Reading. 1. Find someone (a receiver) to whom you will send the telepathic message, make sure that you are close to the receiver and not just picking a random person. 2. Find a place where nobody will be able to disturb you. Now calm your mind relax. 89

3. Whatever you have written in your psychic diary read it with feelings and try to visualize that you are actually telling it to your receiver. 4. Fill your message with right feelings. 5. Now with closed or opened eyes visualize your receiver. You can only visualize his face 1–2 feet (0.3–0.6 m) away from you. 6. See a mental video in which your message in form of your ehaviour colour entering in his mind or brain. A telepathic message reaches maximum speed faster than light. Your intuition will tell you that it reached. 7. Ask your receiver about your message and tell him the time of his message receiving. If he responds positively about his receiving then you have successfully send your message. Remember: Ask him in such a way that he can never understand about your telepathy act. Or else he can think you as freak and make you negative. The power is yours not his it is you who is increasing or tapping into the unused power. 8. Daily practice and you will be able to do this much more effectively and easily. Once you master this ability, you will see how useful it is it needs network no boundary it can pass though almost anything.

Telepathic Development at length – Several Methods First Method All creatures are telepathic: animals, trees, other plants, even insects! Developing this gift has been one of the deeper joys of my life. It is amazingly heart-warming to know from personal encounters that all living forms are intelligent and possess interesting and unique personalities! The higher a being’s spiritual vibration, the easier it is to communicate with them this way. A very beneficial use of telepathic communication is the opportunity to be heard and understood by people who are defensive or insensitive when you talk with them out loud. You know your telepathic communication has worked when they bring up an idea as their own suggestion that you had shared with them telepathically! You can use this gift with spouses, children, and pets to help them understand what is needed or wanted from them and to listen to what it is they are trying to tell you that you might miss in ordinary communication. This level of understanding makes everyone’s lives more comfortable and pleasurable. You could also try it with parents, siblings, friends, behaviours or bosses! I once used this technique with a very grumpy and unreasonable immigration officer who had held me and my car at the border for over an hour. He 90

immediately gave me back my keys and told me to leave! Just like that! You can use the exercise below and with practice get very good results. Notice it suggests you work from your heart. This is better than your head or your third eye. You will be able to send and receive more effectively from there. A) When connecting telepathically with someone, your emotions will be amplified directly toward the person’s unconscious self. If you have conflict within yourself or the other person, try to get grounded and resolve as many emotions as you can before you connect or your emotions could cause them to react to you in counterproductive ways. Look honestly at what it is within you that contributes to any conflict. By accepting and offering forgiveness to yourself for that, you will be able to make room in your heart for understanding and forgiving the other person as well. When you are ready as you can be within yourself you can approach the communication with a more open and loving heart. B) Breathe into your body and give yourself a big inner hug, all the way down to your toes; the best kind of hug you have every received, like you’d give someone you truly, unconditionally love. This helps you to ground into your body. Then allow your consciousness to travel to the middle of your chest and centre on your heart chakra. Follow your heart chakra deep into your body, back toward your spine until you find the still, clear place where you feel open and true. Imagine you have eyes within that place and that you are looking out at the world from your spiritual heart. Formulate in your heart the message you want to send. Listen to your energy and words as though you were receiving them yourself and make sure they communicate the message you want the person to receive and respond to. Let it be gentle but firm and clear and make room in your heart for the other person to respond in their own way. Staying centred deep within your heart and looking out with the eyes of your heart, see the other person and focus on a place about one foot above their head, asking from your heart, to connect to their higher self which you will find in that area. Speak from within your heart to their higher self. You will know your communication is working when you sense your message connecting to them and entering their field. Wait for a sense of acceptance from them, like they have received it.

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In your heart, you will likely get a sense of whether or not they agree with you or are able to respond positively to your message. If you don’t get that, you can try again another time and see if they are becoming more open or not. You may get a clear message back, or just a sense of the message having been received, or you may not be sure. Watch for changes in the person’s attitudes or behaviour that indicate they have been listening to your messages. If you don’t see that within a week, you can try again. Telepathy doesn’t insure the person will ever agree with you, but often, when your message is true and appropriate to the situation, you will see tremendous shifts that reveal your message has been received and acted upon. When you are done, centre again within your heart. Telepathy makes an energetic connection into the other person’s soul. Now it is time to get out of their energy field and return to your own. Breathing into your heart, ask your inner wisdom which resides within your heart to release the other person back to their own self and call yourself by name back to yourself. Then ask your inner wisdom to rebalance your energy for whatever you need to do next.

Second Method Here’s an easy way to develop telepathy, find out just how telepathic you are, and improve your abilities. What is a definition of telepathy? It’s mind-to-mind communication by thought. Telepathy is a basic skill possessed by all humans and animals, whether they know it or not. Why? Because we are spirits, not bodies. We existed in the spirit world as spirits, usually before we went into a body somewhere between conception and birth. How do spirits communicate with each other? Why, by telepathy of course! Telepathy is not “reading a person’s mind” as most people’s mind are full of a lot of junk. Telepathy is communicating with another person by thought. However, many people’s telepathic ability have atrophied for a number of reasons, including lack of use and being told that telepathy isn’t real. This exercise will show you that telepathy is real, and improve your abilities. A key to telepathy is to “Be present”. That is, be “here” and be “now”. Still your mind. Do not think of any other place. Do not think of the past or the future. This is the hardest part of telepathy. The more you meditate, the better you will get at this. 92

Sit down with another person. Have seven different coloured pencils between you. Choose one person to “send” and the other to “receive”. The person who sends chooses a colour in their mind. They then ‘send’ this colour to the mind of the other person. Once they have started to do that, they say “start”. The person who is receiving then looks into the other person’s mind to see what they are sending. They say one colour, for example “blue”. The sender then says one of two things. If they were sending blue, they say “yes”, and then choose another (or the same colour) and says “start” and send again. If they were not sending blue they say “no” (nothing else) and the receiver keeps working to get the colour. Do this for five to ten minutes. Then switch sides. Then take a break. This can be very exhausting. Only do a little at a time until you are used to it. Most people tend to be better at either sending or receiving. That is, they are either a sender telepath, or a projectional telepath. If you do this with children particularly, you may be surprised how quickly they come to the right answer. And if you do it with animals, you may get some surprises. After you have mastered this exercise, you can progress to harder and harder exercises, such as 1) Do it with other people (telepathy is easier to do with people you are close to and that you practice with) 2) Do it with more colours, then numbers, then objects in the room, then any word, then sentences 3) Do it with a door between you 4) Do it over the phone Success!

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Later, whenever you get a thought, and someone acts on that thought, for example, you think of a person and they ring you, the trick is to discover, who had the thought first? Did you think of it and send it? Or did you think of it and they picked it up? Or the other way around? Warning: If you do this with children, they will find it easier to know what you are thinking. You had better have a clean and pure mind because they may discover and blurt out what you are thinking. However, if we are to evolve as a species, this is something that has to be handled (by improving our thoughts and actions) and accepted (by not getting embarrassed). You can also practice telepathy with animals. Animals and children are very telepathic. I have been told by different people that many circus horses and dolphins are trained by telepathy.

How to use telepathy with people not hearing you! In my thirties, I was looking for a soul mate, improving my ‘shopping list’ for the young man in my life, and working on myself, especially my subconscious thoughts and habits. I knew that I wanted to meet the man (three years younger than myself) not just for personal satisfaction and to have someone to share my life with, but also as my “mission buddy”. One person supported by a friend or a spouse can do much, much more for the world than a person on their own can do – it’s an energy thing. I don’t know if this is true or not, but I was told that “If one positive is against many negatives, the negatives will win. But if two positives are against many negatives, the positives will win.” This rang true for me after years’ experience. I figured that since I was telepathic, my soul mate would also be telepathic. I once had a kind of vision when I invited a man in my car, driving across the South Park nearby a public toilet in Ghent (Belgium). I saw the acquaintance of mine leaving the public toilet, I stopped my car to pick him up. And, while he entered my car, we were stopped by two policemen in civil. On the strength of this happening, we both had to report to the Police Office a few days later, we were not sanctioned, but we were told to find a girl to marry (years 1960’s). At the time I was studying “extra muros” (extension studies) at the Unity School of Christianity, Lee’s Summit, Missouri, USA, and already managed telepathy too. Worrying myself about the situation as I was still living with my father, I still think I telepathically influenced the policemen. But, in fact no offense was committed at the public convenience, I just opened the door of my car for the man. Also true, I did not know what the man had done before we really met.

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Telepathic Sleep (Subjective) Communication “The best time to communicate mind-to-mind with another is when they’re in their alpha levels. This is when they are day dreaming, meditating and when they are asleep. In Telepathic Sleep Communication, you program your mind as you go to sleep at night to wake you up when your brain neurons are resonating with their brain neurons. All you really need to do is visualize the person or group you want to contact and your automatic right-brain network will do the rest.

How do you do it To contact an individual: As you go to sleep at night, keep repeating to yourself: “I will wake up when I am in mental contact with (whoever) and I will remember why I have woken up”…. To program yourself to wake up to talk to a group of people, say: “I will wake up when I am in mental contact with the greatest number of my group and I will remember why I have woken up….” 2. Repeat this a dozen or more times until you fall asleep. 3. When you do awaken it is fairly important to arrange things so that you don’t fade away and drift off to sleep while in the middle of your alpha transmission. The best way to organize this is to get out of bed and freshen up by splashing cold water over your face … visiting the bathroom etc. 4. When you climb back into bed … make sure you are not too comfortable. Prop yourself up in a slightly uncomfortable position and leave a light on. 5. At this point it will help considerably if you have had alpha training, but if you haven’t, don’t worry 6. Relax your mind and let yourself drift down into that dreamy state, while all the time telling yourself this: “I will not go to sleep until after I have finished communicating with (whoever).” Keep repeating this over and over. When you feel yourself totally relaxed start “talking” with the person (or group) in a positive, friendly way. 95

DO NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES PROJECT CRITICISM! If you do, the circuit will be broken. Mentally see yourself talking to the other person and explaining the problem to them. See them nodding their head in agreement. Visualize clearly a happy and positive outcome to the meeting. Thank them for listening to you and visualize the meeting closed. Let yourself drift off to sleep. If you tend to keep thinking about them as you’re going to sleep control your thoughts very carefully. Any negative mental projection may get through and undo the good work you’ve just done. The best way is to drift off while seeing all concerned celebrating a happy outcome. Now as soon as possible, contact that person in real life and run your problem past them. You will probably be pleasantly surprised to find that you receive a very cordial reception and things go well for both of you. Best results seem to be obtained by “talking” to the same person more than once, say 3-4 times a week for 2 weeks. Don’t ‘bore’ them by overdoing it. Use it for a few days and then give it a rest. Here are some examples of real-life situations where you can use the magic of this communication process to everyone’s advantage: You have a wayward child who is getting in with the wrong crowd and is rapidly heading off the rails. You communicate with them and explain why it would be to their advantage to “straighten up”. See them agreeing and visualize their attitude improving. But whatever you do, don’t preach at them. Somebody owes you or your business money. Communicate and explain how much better they would feel if they paid. See them nodding in agreement and writing out a check. Debt collectors who use subjective communication in the manner report quite spectacular results in some cases. Suppose you have to give a public speech. Visualize yourself standing on a stage in front of a microphone with your audience listening intently and giving you wild applause at the end. Subjectively communicate an outline of the speech to your “imaginary” audience and see yourself getting a standing ovation. Maybe your marriage is breaking down and you would like to correct this situation. You can use subjective communication to convey to your partner the strong emotional feelings of love and affection that you both shared at the beginning. Visualize both of you holding hands and gazing fondly into each other’s eyes. Visualize total happiness and contentment. 96

Perhaps you aren’t married and would like to find a suitable partner. “Advertise” for someone, e.g. “I will waken when I am in mental contact with the man/woman who fits my list, and I will remember why I have woken”. Picture the general appearance of the person you are looking for but keep the description vague. Project your own general appearance and requirements. Visualize you holding hands with them, looking into their eyes, kissing them etc. In general, see yourself blissfully happy while in the presence of this person. Psychokinetic synchronicity will arrange the meeting place – you don’t need to worry about this. Do not do this process for more than 8 times or for more than about 2 weeks. One man met exactly the right lady for him. He was somewhat stunned as usual with the success of subjective communication as in this case he specified some fairly tight requirements. He met her by “talking” to her 6-8 times over 2 weeks. She turned up 6 weeks after he first started talking to her. As a service to the planet, you might even like to adopt an influential person (politician, businessman, military leader etc.) who can help to make the world a better place, and give them some positive suggestions. There is one important thing to remember here. The left brain is the analytical one which handles all the nitty-gritty but the right brain only deals with “over-all concepts”. When doing Subjective Communication do not transmit facts and figures. That is left-brain stuff. If you do, you will may break the neural connection. Merely project win / win concepts. You must treat the receiver as your equal. Offer mutually beneficial suggestions which you clearly visualise the receiving party agreeing with. The only actual downside of subjective communication is that if you do a lot it can be draining waking up night after night. It basically means that you have to go to bed early so that when you wake up you have had enough sleep to be able to concentrate on the message without dozing off. If you are using subjective communication, it is strongly recommended that you keep the knowledge to yourself. If you tell people what you are doing it is highly likely that they will feel as if they have been manipulated. Some people may perceive this as controlling others, but you control others all day long anyway with your thoughts. The fact that you are broadcasting subjectively all the time has a constant effect on others. It is just that in this case you are controlling and directing your subjective broadcasts.” Again, this is not the same as controlling someone. People on this crazy planet we live on are continually being controlled by such things as TV, advertisements, music, hypnosis, mind control, drugs, past painful events in their subconscious mind and demons, as well as general thoughts flying around. 97

This is an attempt to give them a communication that will help them to break free of programming which is causing pain to themselves and others.

Group Telepathy The new science of group telepathic communication, of which herd or mass telepathy (so well known) is the lowest known expression. This instinctual telepathy which is shown by a flight of birds, acting as a unit, or that animal telepathy which serves to govern so mysteriously the movements of herds of animals, and the rapid transmission of information among the savage races and non-intelligent peoples—these are all instances of that lower externalisation of an inner psychic reality. An intermediate stage of this instinctual activity, based largely on brain reactions, can be seen in modern mass psychology and public opinion. It is, as you know, predominantly emotional, unintelligent, psychic and fluidic in its expression. This is changing rapidly and shifting into the realm of what is called “intelligent public opinion,” but this is, as yet, slow. It involves the activity of brain/mind, which I happily call “the Third Eye” (or Ajna Centre) We have, therefore: 1. Instinctual telepathy. 2. Mental telepathy. 3. Intuitional telepathy. 98

In any consideration of this theme, it is obvious that there are three major factors which must be considered: 1. The initiating agent. I use this word with deliberate intent, as the power to work telepathically, both as initiating agent and as recipient, is closely connected with initiation, and is one of the indications that a man is ready for that process. 2. The recipient of that which is conveyed to him on the “wings of thought.” 3. The medium through which it is intended to convey the transfer of thought, of idea, of wish, of imprint, and therefore of some form of knowledge. When strong emotions are telepathically transmitted to people, consciously they often go unnoticed. Subconsciously though, these telepathic energies ARE received by recipients on a subtle level, as evidenced by measurable blood volume changes in their hands. Experiments reveal that these same physiological changes (registered on instrumentation) occur regardless of the distance between the sender and the receiver. When two or more people concentrate in unison, the effect is magnified geo- metrically (not 1 + 1 ..., but 1 x 10 ...). Mob psychology or group hysteria is a good illustration in panic situations what can be easily “felt” by all who are present. People at a sporting event, rock concert, (the Tomorrowland) or other public demonstration easily get caught up in the “electricity” or “atmosphere” of the gathering. Perform exercises with a group of senders and one receiver; then a group of receivers and one sender. Show a group of senders a horrible scene of death to transmit to a receiver in another room, then have them transmit a beautiful picture of birth. Experiment and choose other emotion-evoking scenes, but practice. My father used to say when as a boy and at school: “Bene, bene respondare.”

Improving your magnetic awareness The author already deal with the subject in another EBook: https://www.scribd.com/doc/50978196/Vampiric-Personal-Magnetism Researchers have found that bees and pigeons have iron oxide particles (magnetite) in parts of their body that assist in their magnetic-field orientation to home. Attaching small magnets to pigeons on cloudy days disrupted their steering mechanism, but on sunny days they were able to counter the magnet's effects with celestial navigation. Even humans have displayed a magnetic sensing ability enabling them to tune into the earth's magnetic field. Electricity 99

and magnetism are co-related, so where we can use an electroencephalogram (EEG) to reflect electrical brain wave output, we can also use a magnetoencephalogram (MEG) to distinguish the brain's magnetic waves. The weak magnetic field in the human head is represented by lines of force that go from the left hemisphere of the brain around the head and back into the right hemisphere. The massive Olmec stone heads of ancient Mexico show signs of once being decorated with magnetite stones, presumably representative of their creators' knowledge of human reactions to magnetic fields. Between 1976 and 1978, studies at Manchester University in England revealed that blindfolded students had an uncanny sensing 'instinct' for home. In fact, the homing accuracy was greater the farther the students were taken from home (tested up to 48 miles distance). On the other hand, when bar magnets were placed in helmets on their heads, disorientation resulted; whereas control groups with brass bars instead of magnets in their helmets maintained their homing instinct successfully. As an exercise, and as a good demonstration of your body's reaction to the earth's magnetic field, simply stretch out your arms on each side of your body and slowly rotate your body 360° while noting the sensation in your fingers and palms. Since your hands are of opposite polarity (right hand is positive & left hand is negative), the line of connection can be sensed between one hand and the other as you rotate through the north/south axis and even quite strongly between the east/west directions as well. Identify words, images and feelings to describe each direction so that the next time you face that direction you can recognize what it feels like again. After discerning what the sensations feel like in the different directions, it becomes obvious that the human body standing vertically can act like a magnetic compass as it reacts to the earth's magnetic field. To further improve your magnetic abilities, work with another person who has a bar magnet with a strength of at least 2,000 gauss. Blindfold yourself and have your partner use the N pole and bring it close to your head in different locations, keeping the magnet moving in small circles to improve perception. You then indicate what part of your head the magnet is located. Use the S pole next in the same way. You will soon find that with practice, each side of the head will have a discernibly different feeling between using the 2 poles. If the N pole is placed at the right ear for instance, a kinesiological test of an indicator muscle will show weak (review "Exercise -- Improve Your Physical Strength in 7 Days"). This effect does not occur if the S pole of the magnet is tested at the same point. The opposite is true with the other ear. Since there appears to be magnetite in human blood, try hyperventilating for a few minutes to raise the pH level. The magnetite in the blood will rotate its resonance and your sensitivity to magnetism will often increase with this method. With practice, your north-south orientation abilities will improve markedly from here. Once you acknowledge and understand your sensing abilities, your overall sensitivity to magnetic fields will always be with you as an additional skill. To illustrate how your body's energy field reacts to pain, have a friend lie on his 100

back on the floor. Now suspend an ordinary magnetic compass a few inches above the solar plexus region of his body. If the person is given pain, as in a severe pinch, the compass needle will deflect considerably. Give your friend a guided visualization where he imagines himself suddenly falling off a ladder and hitting a pavement, and a similar reaction on the compass will be registered if his imagery is vivid enough. He may even tell you that he felt a twinge in his solar plexus as well, when he visualized the action.

Electromagnetic Field Awareness Have you ever entered a room just after someone had an angry bout with someone else, and detected the angry energy in the air? Have you ever been near someone seriously unstable and picked up on it even when his or her back was toward you? Even areas of certain cities simply radiate a bad energy around them that is perceivable to some people. You have various energy fields surrounding your body that are directly tied into the beating of your heart. These energies course through you, interacting with body chemistry, and are distributed throughout your body via the 7 subtle energy centres called chakras. By regulating the distance in extending your energy fields, your sensitivity to them and your control over them can be heightened. Sit or lie down in a comfortable, relaxed position and take a few deep, abdominal breaths. Do "Exercise -- Cleansing Breath For Better Health" to charge up your body. Then completely relax yourself and tune into the energy radiating from your body (see the “life energy” measuring device in the back of the book). Imagine it pulsating in a wave-like action and sense the feeling of it emanating from your body. Now imagine that you are expanding this energy field to about 3 feet from your body. Put your conscious awareness into it and let it flow outward. Gradually expand it some more until it reaches 9 feet from your body. Visualize how this would look and continue to expand it even further to about 15 feet from your body. To assist the process, create an excited, positive, emotional attitude while doing it. Now slowly pull the energy field back to your body in a progressive way, but this time draw it in even closer than it normally would be. To contract the field, create a glum, negative, emotional attitude. Next, relax the energy field contraction and let it go back to its normal size. After practice with this exercise, your awareness of your energy fields will improve as well as your sensitivity to other fields around you. 101

By projecting a stream of energy, a Chinese qigong master can kill, stun or knock someone down from a distance of up to 10 feet away. When masters use their fingertips or hands to relieve pain or heal someone, their energy is temporarily drained afterwards. ("And Jesus said, somebody hath touched me: for I perceive that virtue is gone out of me." Luke 8:46) The Soviet Nina Kulagina could focus her energy to perform psychokinetic demonstrations -even to the point of stopping the heart of a frog. There is also fatigue and an energy drain experienced by people after performing psychokinetic feats. Just as your physical body is controlled by your mind, so too is the electromagnetic energy field surrounding your body directed by the power of your thoughts. Thought precedes your bodily actions -- whether they are gross or subtle. An old magician's "mind-reading" trick is to have you think about and concentrate on one of your hands. The magician then subtly holds both of your hands and lightly places one of his fingers on your pulse. Magicians have long known that your blood volume increases markedly in the hand that you are thinking of. Your pulse will first slow down (it seems to skip a beat), and then with a sudden surge, it will throb with more force. Consequently, a distinct difference is discernible by touching the pulses of both wrists, and the "mind reading" trick of determining which hand you are thinking about is achieved. Obviously, what applies to the hands also applies to other areas of the body, and what applies to blood flow also applies to other bodily capacities. Light and radio waves are other forms of electromagnetic energy. Various colours in the light spectrum cause distinct reactions in people (see "Exercise – Colour Significance"). People exposed to directional radar beams (a form of radio wave) report a 'hearing' sensation described as a buzzing sound in the temporal lobe of the brain. When exposed to radar guns, people test weak kinesio-logically for up to 100 yards away (see "Exercise -- Improve Your Physical Strength in 7 Days"), so obviously the body is reacting to radar (a form of microwave) on some subtle level. If an emotional message was directed through the radar gun by the person transmitting, could the receiver discern it with enough training? Could radar guns be modified to pulse at frequencies that scramble, disrupt and confuse all those caught in their beams? Perhaps radar guns could be further modified to immobilize or stun a charging bull in full stride, or a running felon for that matter? Could pulsed, focused beams from simple radar guns be keyed to a desired frequency for a desired effect?

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Besides electromagnetic energy, many people accumulate 10,000 to 20,000 volts of static electricity while walking across a deep pile carpet on a dry day. Electrostatic instruments can measure this energy via the cloud of ions (charged particles) surrounding the human body. Some people are "allergic" to electrostatic fields and react very strongly to them. On the other hand, Pauline Shaw of Manchester, England accumulates so much static electricity in her body that she blows out electrical appliances with just a touch. This electrostatic energy may also be partially responsible for establishing the initial stages of psychokinesis (see "Exercise -- Psychokinesis") in some people. Psychokinetic Nina Kulagina for instance could easily light up fluorescent lights with her static discharge.

Sending Energy to Someone in Absence (Healing in Absence) When you pray (if you do) or think strongly for someone to receive good health, you are sending energy to that person. Now there are many variables as to how a person processes available energy, but however the person is processing his available energy, you have increased the available energy to him or her with your kindly prayers. The longer and clearer your prayer for that person, the more energy is provided. Good health and high energy go hand in hand. People with high energy are healthier than people with low energy, so increasing one’s energy level increases one’s health . As an exercise in sending energy to someone, work with a partner situated in another room or in the same room with you but with his back toward you. Both of you sit in a relaxed, comfortable position, and do some deep, abdominal breathing. Both of you close your eyes and maintain a receptive or at least neutral, nonsceptical state of mind for the exercise. Now visualize your partner's body and choose one area to send healing energies into. Focus & emotionally feel the pulsating energy permeating and soothing only that selected area, perhaps like a funnel of energy. Visualize your hands stroking and healing that area. When your partner feels a sensation of warmth, or a tickling or anything else, ask him to indicate what area it is in. If it's not the area you're visualizing, say nothing and keep sending energy to him until he gets the correct area, or you both get tired. Pushing too hard loses the rapport. A relaxed concentration is best. Receptivity to your energy is also important. If the person is closed or blocked, receiving your energy will be difficult. As an exercise variation to the above, let several people send energy to the same pre-designated bodily area of a subject , and follow the same procedure. You might also use a psychotronic diagram or a crystal to amplify your results. As an exercise to create a favourable effect on a person from a distance, sympathetically achieve a connected state or feeling to that person and see them 103

in a healthy state, not in their ill state. Bathe them with thoughts, prayer or feelings of love, joy, compassion, happiness and confidence. Imagine a white bubble or funnel of such feelings and envelop them with it. Visualize holding them and caressing them to your bosom. Affirm to them mentally that their body is healing. If a bad habit is their problem, see them radiantly without it and perfectly content; and know that it will be so. Once you achieve sufficient amplitude and focus to your thought projections, helping someone at a distance will become easier, but be sure the person is open and expectantly receptive to the idea of your help, and not disbelieving or sceptically blocked to the process. Depending upon many factors (the way they breathe, the emotions they express, the way they think about themselves, etc.), each person processes available energy differently. By feeling compassionate love or great empathy, you can relinquish your personal ego and become part of something that is more than just yourself, and then you can truly help many people.

Developing a Photographic Memory Without memory, there is no learning; but to have only a good memory of data without utilizing the information is hardly worthwhile. Daniel De Blander was born in Heusden (near Gent) in 1936. His powers of memory were noticed at 5 or 6 years of age and they became fully acute at the age of 16. From that age on, he forgot nothing for the rest of his life! He learned nothing by reading, but only by hearing, for his eyesight was poor. He could give the cube root of numbers up to the millions almost instantly, and solve any other calculating problem given to him as well. He could give you the day of the week on any calendar date of the past. He knew 200 hymns and could sing 150 tunes. He remembered what he ate during each meal for over fifty years. When asked how he did it, he replied, "I just know it." Aside from a few demonstrations, Andrée Marie Cambier was born in 1917 and revealed a remarkable calculating ability at an early age. As soon as she could read, she devoured every book she could find. Soon she became obsessed with her father's twenty volume set of encyclopedias and eventually committed them to memory. Andrée Marie Cambier together with her brother as well went on to become teachers of mathematics, chemistry, writer on probabilities, psychologist, metaphysician and he a discoverer of fundamental truths of electrodynamics too. She and her brother lived in Ronse (Renaix), but studied in Tournai (French part of Belgium). Although these two individuals seemed to have had certain channels in their minds naturally open, others can nevertheless open up these same super memory channels through training. Both mental mathematics and mental chess require an inner visual acuity of extreme detail, but often in a "moving " or flexible fashion. A photographic 104

memory is the observational recall often referred to as eidetic imagery in children (37% have the ability at an early age). The ability is rare in adults, and involves seeing an inner picture that lasts for varying intervals with each individual. Some yogis develop a 'super memory' after doing daily exercises in raja yoga (mental yoga) for about a year. Through exercises in visualization, concentration, breathing and altering your state of consciousness -- control of the memory triggering mechanism is achieved and a 'photographic' memory is developed. If we remember something under hypnosis that we didn't remember out of hypnosis, then there must be either something impeding the associative retrieval process in our conscious state or the retrieval cues are more efficiently organized during hypnosis or both. During hypnosis, there is a quieting of the busy conscious mind, and a searching of the subconscious storehouse for the needed information. This exercise can help you to recall material you have 'forgotten' by stimulating associative patterns in your subconscious storehouse. Before beginning this exercise, you should have mastered and practiced for one full week "Exercise -Concentration and Eidetic Imaging." Lie down and assume a relaxed, comfortable position. Take some deep, abdominal breaths, close your eyes and visualize a large blackboard in your mind's eye. Against the blackboard, imagine a white 12" X 12" square centred about one foot away from you. Hold this image steady and don't allow it to slide around in your mind. Now mentally put a small black circle about 2 inches in diameter in the centre of the white square against the black background. Now vaporize the entire image to allow a void in your mind. Observe the images that appear. When this exercise is prefaced with a desire to recall a lost item, certain facts or old information, there is a freer flow of associations from the subconscious to the conscious mind. With lots of practice, your mental blackboard will always be able to bring up the information that you require in an almost 'photographic' way. Even though photographic implies visual, Mozart had the faculty of perfect pitch, where music is heard and indelibly imprinted in the brain after only one hearing of it. Others have the faculty of performing a kinaesthetic action only once (as in a gymnastic or martial arts movement), and completely remembering it afterwards.

Self-Induced Trance We already dealt with the subject in Self-hypnosis. There are many ways to suspend the analytical side of your brain to produce an altered state of awareness. "Brainwashing" occurs with an overload of words or arguments or demands for concentration -- thus exhausting the analytical side of your brain. Deprivation of food or sleep or sensory stimuli can suspend your analytical brain. Jogging, marching, dancing, swimming, rhythm, narcotics, 105

cadence, music, chanting, flashing lights and the monotone of a hypnotist's voice can shift your awareness into a trance-like state. Rally leaders, mobs, drill sergeants, politicians, preachers, hard sell salesmen, con artists and tough teachers shut down your evaluating left brain by loud, strong or persuasive language and hit the emotional right side of the brain by displaying authority, forcefulness or by creating a state of peer acceptance in you. This exercise should be done with a partner to guide you at first, but later it can be achieved on your own. Assume a comfortable position and relax all the muscles of your body from your feet to your head. Breathe rhythmically and deeply during this process. With your eyes closed and rolled upwards, imagine that you have a gigantic blackboard in front of you. Now visualize writing your name on the blackboard with a piece of chalk. Then write the word "trance" underneath it. Now again write your name and the word "trance" underneath it. Continue doing this over and over repeatedly until you start to feel like you are going into a trance. Now inwardly write your name again, but this time write the word "deeper" underneath it. Write your name and the word "deeper" over and over again. For visual minded individuals, this internal writing process is an excellent way to create a deep, self-induced trance. When you feel you are just about as deep as you can go, wait for a moment and experience a limitless, restful peace about you. Now take your chalk and write some positive affirmations on your mental blackboard to create a desired change in your life. For example, to curb the smoking habit, say to yourself, "My body no longer needs poisonous smoke in my lungs" or "My body is healthier as a non-smoker." Picture yourself to be strong, confident and at ease with yourself. Visualize how glad that you'll feel as a non-smoker. Imagine yourself in a situation where previously you would have had a cigarette in your fingers or your mouth and now you are content without one. With practice, the whole visualization process can take less than 2 minutes. Much of the belief that smoking is difficult to give up comes from all the attention and publicity given to it that it is so difficult. You can practice this exercise to bring about any needed change in your life. When you want to come out of the trance state, simply suggest to yourself that you will progressively wake up as you count backwards from 10 to 1. When you reach 1, you will feel fully awake, fully refreshed and with a good happy feeling about yourself.

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Using Quartz Crystal in Meditation This subject has always interested me, the more that I have a collection of Quartz Crystals, Amethysts, and other precious stones, they are found in an album of mine on Facebook. Quartz crystals have been used for centuries in all parts of the world for healing purposes as well as for strengthening overall mental and spiritual abilities. In several of my writings and EBooks you learned that many vibrations are picked up by inanimate objects. Crystals not only pick up and store vibrations, but they focus, direct, shield, transform, balance and amplify your own vibrational energy as well. Choose your quartz crystal by the way it 'feels' to you. If a chipped and ugly one feels right, then that's the crystal for you. To start off, use a clear, singleterminated quartz crystal (it has only one point). Since your crystal picks up vibrations easily, it is necessary to initially cleanse it. You can pack your crystal in salt (preferably sea salt) or soak it in salt water for 7 days (1 tsp. sea salt to 1 qt. of pure water). 107

You can put the crystal in running water (like a stream) or bury it in the earth for 7 days. The vibrations of painful emotions and health problems can be imparted to your crystal, so short cleansings are periodically necessary. For short cleansings, a 3-day period of any of the above procedures is sufficient. If your crystal is handled by someone, clear it with a salt solution soaking for 10-30 minutes. After cleansing, place your crystal in the direct dawn sunlight for 2 to 3 hours to charge and activate it with the life energy of the sun. If your crystal is small enough, carry it with you wherever you go. Instead of being your 'pet rock,' this can be your 'pet crystal,' but don't let others handle and imprint on it their thought vibrations. You can sleep with it, meditate with it, talk to it or say your prayers with it. The more it is exposed to you, the more attuned to your vibration it becomes. It quickly becomes your friend and your teacher. To some degree, it will even protect you from the negative effects of artificial environments and shield you from negative forces. Since 50 - 75% of all of your scattered thought impressions during the day are derived from ELF (extremely low frequency) waves generated from other entities, a crystal properly tuned to your vibration will help keep your mind clearer of this 'mental noise.' Some people have had their crystal crack when a negative hit was sent in their direction. It can also mirror back negativity in this respect. In one experiment, a researcher discovered that a handful of small, doubleterminated quartz "diamonds" from either Lake County, CA or Herkimer County, NY has the potential of splitting shot glasses in half when the crystals are placed inside them and allowed to sit for a few hours or days. The peculiar configuration of a heavy bottomed shot glass appears to be the only type of glass where this cracking phenomenon works. It is undetermined what kind of energy accumulates and is imparted to the glass to make it split into two pieces? Just as quartz computer chips store information, your quartz crystal can store and focus your intentional or emotional energy. Crystals augment and magnify your intention, so you should only use them when in a clear, positive state of mind. As an exercise with your crystal, do "Exercise -- Imagine and Mind Walk Your Goals" and "Exercise -- Imaging To Bring Luck And Happiness" while visualizing the results you want to achieve flowing through your crystal. You'll find that your visualizations become more powerful and effective when using your crystal, especially those concerning healing (review "Exercise -- Improving Your Visualization Skills"). If you send healing prayers through your crystal while holding it over an afflicted area, they will be greatly magnified. Since crystals amplify emotional intentions with more distinctness, do the telepathy exercises while holding your crystal. Your ELF thought waves can be augmented and sent through your crystal and then received through someone else's crystal and decoded with their 108

thoughts (like the crystal in a radio set assists in transmitting sound across space). For example, danger can be transmitted quite easily. Use your crystal for storage of reminders or information that you may want to retrieve later, or for that matter that you want to have someone else to retrieve, but make sure that you connect up such information with some emotional intention for better clarity. If you go to sleep holding or putting your crystal under your pillow, solutions to problems on your mind will greet you when you awaken. Double-terminated crystals are especially good for dream solutions, because the energy comes and goes in both directions to connect your conscious with your subconscious. If you do your concentration and meditation exercises with your crystal, the result will be greatly enhanced. If you hold your crystal between clasped hands over your solar plexus, you can feel the energy drawing into your body. Experiment on your own, and enhance your mental abilities by carrying a quartz crystal.

Crystal Communion and Workings Crystals, as for me Quartz Crystals and Amethysts are tools for intensifying whatever you are seeking to do, if it is in line with the Cosmic Plan. They are used for working with the higher aspects of yourself and the universe as taught by the Psychologist Carl Gustav Jung about consciousness and the collective consciousness and its archetypes. Crystals have a particular lattice formation that holds the energy in a specific pattern. When you program your crystal it can hold the programming and be made to do a specific task for you and your patients or clients. The Atlantean civilization used crystals to run the society via the energy they created. We have not quite figured all that out today; however, we do use them for radio signals, and digital devices. Balance energy with crystals by working with chakras or energy centres. Crystals balance chakras by stimulating chi (energy) throughout the body-mind. When working with crystals, cleanse and charge the stones properly for maximum effectiveness. Select crystals to match the vibrational balance you want to create. Medical uses of crystals are strictly folklore and should not be considered legitimate medical care. Beside the two more used crystals mentioned above, each person has certain crystals that they are attuned to and can work easily with. When you buy a crystal hold it in your left hand and attune to it. Now in your altered state try to become a part of it. Let your inner knowledge relate to the crystal. If you can connect to its energy either with a verbal 109

connection or a warmth and vibration in your hand it is responding to your connection. If you don't get a connection, that particular crystal is not for you. One day long ago, I entered a stone and gems shop in Ghent my own town, walking about from one end to another, and returning looking to the available products, I hit always the same stone on the floor though there was enough room to walk along it. I thought, “That’s funny, I must buy it.” I bought is, and it is still on my terrace at the arrear of my penthouse. One is attracted to a particular stone or stones and vice versa. They need care, as they are like dogs and cats, even birds in the house. With this short introduction, I did not say everything but I promise you a manuscript in English. I like to end this introduction with the following meditation technique with a quartz crystal, remembering that every psychic development starts with meditation, and not rituals as many magicians suggest. Like the various religions, rituals on certain days, months and high peaks during the years belong to the past and have served their purpose. This is the opinion of various occultists today.

Programming and Charging your Crystal Charging So now you have a crystal that feels almost like an extension of you. When you hold it in your left hand, you are receiving from it and attuning to it. Now you switch it to your right hand and put your energies into it. Cup your left hand under your right as you hold the crystal in your right hand. At first you may be unable to accomplish a full change immediately, but after working with it for a while, you will do it instantly. Charging is an act of the will aspect of the Source. Will the crystal to become psychically charged with positive Energies for the purposes of healing as an example. Hold the crystal in your right hand with your left hand cupped under it and focus your attention on your crystal. With the following statement you can charge the crystal. Do this in a state of meditation by visualizing the white light energies of harmlessness, sending them into the crystal with the will-to-good. Have some positive ideas for charging your crystal for healing purposes coming from your own consciousness. Love is a bird. When we encage it, we call it 110

human love. When we allow love to fly in the all-pervading Consciousness, we call it Love Supreme. To see a face of love is to feel a heart of peace. To triumph over our earthly sorrows, what we need is the power of our own loving intentions. Now your crystal is charged and will remain charged for about three weeks. Unless you use it for healing work, then it will need to be recharged after each healing session. As you become more proficient in their use, you can charge your crystals so they will hold a charge longer. After changing your crystal you might experience a sense of immersion in the crystal, seeing the structure, the inner parts of it. You are beginning to exchange consciousness with the crystal.

Programming Use the same steps above and add the specific task you would like your crystal to assist you with such as third eye activation, DNA activation, specific block removal for particular chakras.

Storing the Quartz Crystals you are working with. These are the Quartz Crystals I am constantly working with, as well as the one I keep in my hand (see pictures). They are washed on a regular bases by putting them in a bucket of water, preferably salted for a night, and put under sunlight, or a lamp (in winter) for a while (a few hours). Having programmed your crystal you keep it for your work and you alone will touch the energies allowing it to stay in encoded with your programming. If you use let other touch the crystal in your work, then redistribute your energies into it after they have used it. Keep it in a closed space when you are not handling it. These Quartz Crystals have been washed (purified) and are now exposed under sunlight. This I do on my back terrace! It can be very hot there with the slightest sunshine, but cool at night.

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Out of Body Experiences (Part Two)

Many phenomenon have surrounded the out of body experience. Most of them have been developed from ancient beliefs taught long ago. Some of these beliefs are still taught in Hindu religions. These beliefs teach that a person's individual conscience can depart from the body during sleep or trance and journey to 112

remote places or astral realms. Many ancient religions taught that we are all spiritual entities, or souls that have been sent here in this body for a divine purpose. It is believed that when we die, we are separated from the physical body but continue to remain in the afterlife (?) or until we become transformed in to a new incarnation. Many Hindu religions believe and taught about out of body experiences. Hindu teaching is that of three bodies, subtle, casual and physical. It is believed that the casual body influences and forms what is to come in the next incarnation. Most teachings state that the subtle body may leave the physical body during the lifespan and then comeback after visiting the physical world. Some Egyptian teachings say that the soul may be able to levitate beyond the physical body in the ka, or subtle body. These occurrences seem to be described as first travelling through a tunnel. Some have heard the wind rushing in their ears and felt a strange vibrating sensation. A select few say they can induce an out of body experience at will. A great interest in teachings comes from the Christian religion which believes that inducing, or taking part in an out of body experience is a sin. Scripture in the Bible refers to out of body experiences as being a part of the occult, or witchcraft. Although the scriptures many be true, many who claim the religion of Christianity have had an OBE. Even though some can induce the experience, with others it comes unexpectedly, and without warning. Some experience the feeling of being scared. They recognize that they feel outside of their body and are not comfortable. In most cases when fear is induced it immediately returns you to your normal physical state. Some have had multiple out of body experiences and claim that they have learned to relax and accept the experience. When they do they describe the experience as being very intense. Some say that it feels as if their whole body is on fire and vibrating. It is said that once you get used to this experience, and see that you come out of it unharmed, you will open yourself up to the OBE and be able to increase your experience.

Out of Body Reported Experience - Interview I remember my first out of body experience occurring at the age of 20. I found myself incarcerated with another inmate who had a forty year sentence for murder. The inmate was practicing the Sikh religion. This religion involves quite a bit of meditation. While I wasn't interested in the religious aspect of his practices, I wanted to learn more about the meditation involved. 

I would usually meditate before sleep, and would end up falling asleep for the night during the meditative state. I used a type of elevator meditation.

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I found this to be the most relaxing and it always helped me to sleep more sound. One night while in the middle of the meditation my body suddenly began to vibrate uncontrollably. It felt as if my brain was going to explode. I could hear the wind rushing through my ears, and I stared down at my body. I tried to move my arms, but they would not move. I used all the effort I had to get my lift my arm but it was impossible. The vibration became more intense, and I tried to scream for help, but nothing would come out. As I looked over toward the cell window I could see black figures shaped like humans walking around outside of the cell. They had no faces, and were no more than a black non-transparent void in space. I did not know if they were dangerous or not. A couple of them stopped and seemed to peer through the cell door at me. They had no eyes or features, just blackness. I tried to scream to wake up the bunkmate below me but I couldn't. I felt myself hovering above my body, and I could look down at my torso and legs. I attempted to move again, focusing my entire mind on getting a leg or arm to react, nothing. I was very scared because the vibration taking place in my head seemed dangerous; it felt as if I could explode. It didn't hurt, but was so intense it brought on the feeling of fear.

After the incident I tried repeatedly to go back to that place, I became intrigued with what had happened to me. In 10 years time I have revisited the out of body experience roughly once a year. I have found that if you relax during the experience and not become frightened you can lengthen and intensify the experience to achieve a much higher level of intensity. If you ever find yourself in an out of body experience remember to not become frightened, embrace and accept it, because you may never experience it again. Steve G. Jones is a board certified Clinical Hypnotherapist. He is a member of the National Guild of Hypnotists, American Board of Hypnotherapy, president of the American Alliance of Hypnotists, on the board of directors of the Los Angeles chapter of the American Lung Association, and director of the California state registered Steve G. Jones School of Hypnotherapy. Here are some methods that I use to induce Out of Body Experiences from within a Lucid Dream as well as a little bit of discourse on about the nature of "viewing and experiencing" these types of experiences: astral projection - out of body experiences - lucid dreaming. Regardless of the terminology there are ways to induce these states and experience them for yourself. Several of the methods outlined below focus on deliberately increasing the level of heightened awareness, maintaining peak experience and taking advantage of the direct 114

correlation between these heightened states and your thoughts, expectations, perception, and your EXPERIENCE.

Method One: While in a dream I will become lucid and examine my dreamscape to stabilize within it. I read in William Buhlman's "Adventures Beyond the Body" that if you're lucid dreaming and your vision isn't too clear or if your dreamscapes aren't stable you can simply will it or intend it to become more clear and stable by saying forcefully and confidently, "INCREASE CLARITY NOW!", I used this effective technique and expanded it a bit further to use verbal commands to create just about anything. The most notable and important command I found was "INCREASE LUCIDITY NOW!!!" or "INCREASE LEVELS OF LUCIDITY NOW!!". While in an LD I will say "INCREASE CLARITY NOW!!!" and this usually brings crisp resolution and increased awareness and focus. After I stabilize again and become comfortable, I will then intend verbally, "INCREASE LEVELS OF LUCIDITY NOW!". This brings even more intensity. The colours of the background may take on hyper-sensitive tones, possibly a wavering background, it's intense!!! It is essential to reground and become stabilized in the LD before you intend to INCREASE LUCIDITY or else what often occurs is that the increased lucidity will be too much for you to handle and you will either lose you visuals or just wake up immediately. Likewise after you have heightened your lucidity you must then re-stabilize until you are comfortable at this higher level before increasing it more. I will repeat this process of increasing levels of lucidity and then re-stabilizing (usually three times is good enough for me) until I get to a point where I am SO lucid that I can just intend or verbally command or even just think "FIND THE PHYSICAL BODY BUT DON'T GET TRAPPED INTO IT. PREPARE FOR AN OUT OF BODY EXPERIENCE!!!" After practicing this for a while, I don't have to say the whole thing anymore, but it helped in the beginning. Now, I can just get to a sufficiently heightened level of lucidity and then just verbally say "IT'S TIME FOR AN O.B.E.!!" If successful at this point, I'll be more conscious of my actual body which before hand I'm not at all. Before I'm more in tune with my dream body if any body at all, whereas now I'm conscious of my physical yet still in an altered state of mind. It's like the interim phase between a series of lucid dreams where there are no visuals, you're conscious you're dreaming and of your body lying in bed but you just wait it out in the black void until some visuals start to form into a new dreamscape which you enter into the next lucid dream cycle. 115

Well I am digressing, it seems almost like a slight bilocation of awareness, being aware you're observing this from somewhere/place beyond ties of the body and yet you're also slightly conscious of feeling your body but in a strange loose energetic way. So if I can get to this point, I will wind up being in a state of bilocation and my physical body will be in the vibrational state. There will be a flowing mild current of electric-like ripples through my body. It doesn't hurt but sometimes the vibrations can get very intense and seem "hard to take" even spooky or scary at first. (It gets easier each time until eventually it is pleasurable :) But If I can just resist the urge to fight the vibes or analyse them, INSTEAD of thinking so much and analysing what's happening, I will just let go of all of myself into the moment. Because I know that if I am in the vibrational stage I am that much closer to lifting "out" of my physical body. I will now *know* that I AM going to have an OBE and I just vaguely know and intend to have one. The vibrations will increase and become full-blown waves which are rippling through me accompanied by a humming buzz-like "Mmnmnmn" sound. It's almost like all of my body is being contracted to one point which is slowly flowing up and then down my physical body. At this point, once the vibrations are full-blown I now will intend to leave the body. I will just rock my awareness back and forth or sometimes just the thought and intent is enough, but eventually I'll just be catapulted somehow from the body, sometimes a lift-out, sometimes I can just stand up and get "out" of bed and body It's definitely an OBE not a lucid dream, I'll be hovering in my exact room for a while then I go to explore my apartment, yet within a few minutes I will see things I know couldn't be happening: people I don't know in my living room, being able to move things, etc.... I take this as a sign that dream imagery is superimposing itself on the astral realm. When this happens I have two options I can re-induce an OBE which will zap me right back into my body which will again be in a full blown vibrational state and I can go through the process again OR I can just go with the flow of the semi-OBE/LD. The amount of lucidity and consciousness are still at extremely elevated levels so I usually wind up just "running with " and maximizing the lucid dream and seeing where it takes me or using this state to follow through with whatever goal I have planned. I have tried to re-induce an OBE when the visuals indicate that I am now in a lucid dream, and I have had success with this, but the same thing usually will happen. After I'm "out" for a while the OBE will become a highly lucid dream...which ain't that bad :) So I usually am happy to be in the LD and explore it to see what it has to offer. 116

I find that I can exit the body successfully but can only maintain "true" visuals of my real actual apartment for a few minutes before the OBE starts to merge with an LD-state. Although I may be setting far too strict of guidelines for an OBE, since I have heard from many accomplished OBErs who often travel in realms which are NOT "real" in the sense that they are NOT an exact replica of our "real" waking world, but I would love to be able to prolong the OBE awareness in this "real" environ. I did once manage to float through my door and into my roommates room and I saw them sleeping in their bed. They started to awaken and I was SO conscious that I really thought I WAS in their room and became scared that I had been sleepwalking and they would wake up and find me in their room. It was that REAL or rather I was perceiving the incident as THAT REAL!!! They did wake up and I hovered into the corner of the ceiling. They noticed me and that was when I realized this must be a lucid dream because there is no logical way to explain how I could be hovering on the ceiling and them "seeing" me unless we were in a dream...or whatever altered state you want to label it as :) But the story continues, I saw what they were wearing and noticed that his girlfriend was wearing a yellow felt sweater that I'd never seen her wear before so I thought how strange that I wouldn't picture her in something I knew she might wear. There was no way I could have seen her wearing this sweater that night because I was sound asleep before they had come home and she had NEVER worn it before. What was STRANGE was that the next day she had on the exact yellow sweater that I had seen in my LD or was it an OBE...or is the LEVEL OF AWARENESS that matters!!!! Feel free to play the Twilight Zone theme right now, do-dee-doo dee-do-dee, hehe Anyway, I hope this INCREASE LUCIDITY command/technique can be used to help others "out", and improved on or modified to fit your needs. Keep in touch with results or additions. And if anyone has advice on how to prolong the OBE without slipping into a lucid dream please share anything that you think might help.....Or any other successful methods which may seem related. I believe if you find a method which works well for you then you should stick with it because everyone seems to have techniques and methods which are tailored toward their individual characteristics. Try everything but continue to use what works. That way you can pragmatically develop a process which works for YOU. I'll always try new methods but usually have more success incorporating the new techniques with ones that have worked in the past or new methods which are similar to the ones that have already been working for me. 117

Why reinvent the wheel when you can just upgrade it?? Maybe it's the subconscious responding and becoming used to certain techniques which allows certain methods to work better??

Method Two Also, I have been doing a lot of experimenting with heightened lucidity. I find that if you are firmly grounded and stabilized in your lucidity while in a dream....meaning you feel *really* comfortable with being able to maintain your lucidity.....then what you do is this: Verbally intend to increase the levels of lucidity. I will say "INCREASE LEVELS OF LUCIDITY NOW!!!" This should create some surprising effects in your dreamscape as well as in your state of awareness. It brings on heightened levels of lucidity which are basically higher levels of consciousness. After you do this, re-stabilize in the dreamscape until you once again are comfortable being lucid at this "heightened" level. Once you have a stable dreamscape and are grounded in your newly increased lucidity, then you can verbally intend it again. "INCREASE LEVELS OF LUCIDITY NOW!!". Follow this process of stabilizing, increasing lucidity, restabilising, and then increasing lucidity again. Once you get comfortable using this method you will get to a point where you are soooooooo highly lucid that it is indistinguishable from the state of awareness one has while having an OBE. I find that once I hit a certain level the whole nature of the dream changes and becomes indescribably intense. Sometimes I'll be in a lucid dream but I'll also have bilocation so I will have simultaneous awareness that my physical body is in a full-blown vibrations state. Normally it is rare to have full-blown vibrations while in an LD yet common for OBEs so this is how I know that this method really works. So what I'm wondering or rather what I'm learning is that it may be possible to have OBEs directly from an LD without going through the vibrational and "liftout" phases. If you can reach the same level of intensity in an LD that you can in an OBE just after "lift-out" then why is there the need to place OBEs as superior to LDs. I believe they are merely points on one endless spectrum of consciousness. OBEs are a notch more intense than LDs but that is basing it on the levels of intensity of an average LD. I would bet that heightened LDs can reach levels of OBEs and beyond. Why would I bet this? Because I've had both and there is no subjective difference in the levels of heightened awareness between the two. There is a difference between normal LDs and OBEs but once you heighten the levels of lucidity in your LDs they become indistinguishable. It's just a matter of being able to "handle" heightened levels of lucidity which can only be learned by 118

practicing but isn't it the best kind of homework you could ever do??? Keep it up and it gets easier and easier.

Method Three Exploring this led me to the realization that the difference between LDs and OBEs is a subjective. What is the one differentiating factor??? To me the one difference between them is how you view and experience them at the time. So I have been working on another technique lately based on this realization. Once I become lucid and have stabilized my lucidity in the dreamscape, normally I would think "WOW!!! I AM DREAMING!! I AM IN A LUCID DREAM!!" but when I'm having an OBE I find that I am thinking "WOW!!! I AM OUT OF BODY!!!! I'M HAVING AN OBE!!!" So based on this subjective difference I decided to modify my thinking while in an LD, once I become lucid and have stabilized my lucidity in the dreamscape, I will think "I AM REALLY OUT OF MY BODY!!! I'M HAVING AN OBE!!!" instead of thinking "WOW!!! I'M DREAMING AND HAVING A LUCID DREAM!!". The results are incredible and lead me to believe that your experience is definitely what YOU make it, by how you view it at the time!!! I find that in an altered state your thoughts are the driving principle of the experience. Thinking you are out of body leads to a whole different kind of experience. Your thoughts, beliefs, and your INTENT are what creates and maintains your experience when you are dealing with less dense energy-fields. I have found this technique is much like hitting a warp-speed button which rearranges and manifests an experience which will fit into your definition of what it is to be "out of body". It has shown me that there may be too much emphasis on classifying and categorizing this as LD and that as OBE. YES, there are differences between the average LD and the average OBE but what if someone's LDs are more intense than someone else's OBEs. And also, the biggest difference between LDs and OBEs that I have found is the way the experience is perceived at the time, so why not use that as the focus. Change your experience by the way YOU choose to "perceive" it, and not surprisingly, the whole experience will change accordingly. There's no way to TOTALLY define and quantify this stuff with our linear thinking. You just need to EXPERIENCE it!!!!!! Try all these techniques and see what works best for you and see what parts can help you "out". I believe there is always room for revising and upgrading until the day that I can lie back in bed meditate and consistently induce an OBE. Now that will be the day!!!!

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It's good to have goalzzz :) and for all the kids out there, Do try this at home. I Hope these ideas can literally help you "out". Remember if you never stop trying, you are guaranteed to succeed!!!!

A Valuable Lucid Dream Method First, I want to say that I have been using the following method, and it has been showing some AMAZING results. I usually have quite a lot of lucid dreams (one to three lucid dreams per week, sometimes more, sometime less, but usually one to three). Using this method outlined below, I had twenty-five lucid dreams in one week. Yes, you did read that correctly, twenty-five lucid dreams in one week!!! That was a while ago, but the ongoing results are still very promising. Although I have not had anywhere near twenty-five LDs in one week again, I have been having much more than I usually would. More importantly, by using this method I have around a fifty percent chance of successfully inducing a lucid dream whenever I make the time to use it. So needless to say, I am still awestruck with the dramatic increase and attribute it to this technique that I am going to pass along to anyone and everyone who will listen. Shedding light on the magnitude of increase that we are talking about here should help others realize HOW EFFECTIVE it really is, so be sure to try it out! Here it is:

The WAKE - BACK TO BED method 1) Go to bed for 6 hours or so 2) then Wake up 3) Stay awake for an hour or so (...or at least until you are "awake" and not sleepy-headed or foggy-minded, Get out of bed and do something You HAVE TO get out of bed!!! preferably read something about LDs (books, newsgroups, etc...) 4) THEN go back to bed using whatever technique you normally use 120

i.e. MILD technique, affirmations, trance induction, visualization, grounding your awareness, or whatever :) THEN it is lucid dream zzz, my friend zzz The timing can be adjusted to suit your purpose but it is advisable to get a considerable of sleep (six hours is perfect) and then stay up until you are no longer groggy minded and sleepy-headed. Once awake, sometimes twenty minutes of being awake will be enough for me, I will then go back to bed with amazing results. One key thing I have learned is to set the pattern by establishing a routine of doing this regularly. I have been doing it off and on with great results, but when I buckled down and made it a priority. The first week I did it on three mornings and I was fifty-percent successful at inducing a lucid dream. I had about five LDs the first week, above average. The second week again I did it three mornings and had even better results with more LDs and a slightly higher lucidity ratio (about ten LDs for the second week, well above average. The third week was like lucid dreaming magic. It just seemed to kick in and it was LD records for me. Again, I did it about three mornings and had LDs totalling twenty-five or more for that week! How great is it to lose count of your LDs during a one week period?!??! So I think the KEY is to be consistent and get the routine engrained and absorbed into your subconscious. With time it seems to be getting easier and easier, and as a bonus effect of all this induced lucidity, you can expect to have extra spontaneous LDs during the night. It is like an added bonus plan. On this past Saturday, I had a spontaneous LD during my first REM cycle and managed to ride it out for a long looooooooong time. I think the total number of LDs in the series was nearly ten. One LD after another with small intervals in between them in which I was still conscious but did not have any visuals so I would just wait it out in "Limbo-Land" until new visuals would appear and the whole cycle would begin again. Total time of maintained lucidity was at least an hour, possibly an hour and a half. It was by far the longest LD I have ever had and I have had many long ones of forty-five minutes or more with seven or eight re-entries, but this one takes the prize! which is why I am relaying this to everyone I possibly can :) Feel free to forward it to anyone you know who may be interested. 121

I think it is the easiest approach and continues to show the best results. I have been trying them ALL for many years. This one works like magic, literally. The only thing you have to do is arrange your sleeping pattern so that you can use this Wake/Back to Bed Method. Whatever you have to do, just DO IT! Trust me on this one........ It's the BEST thing I've stumbled across yet........

A most suggested Out of Body Method:

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Out of Body Experiences After having studied many methods of Out of Body Experiences or Astral Projection, I have found that the following is the easiest to do. The following technique to learn only takes one week normally, and superior to all other techniques, because it does not require intense visualisation. One of the chief barriers people learning to project themselves is fear. Many are afraid that they may die, or be harmed in some way as a result of their projection. Nothing could be farther from the truth. The Canterbury Institute, renowned for its occult studies, executed an experiment in projection involving over 2,000 people. None of them were hurt in any way by this, and now, three years later, none have complained of any newly arising problems.

Step one: Relax the body. The ability to relax is the first prerequisite, perhaps even the first step itself to having an OBE. (out of body experience) This includes both physical and mental relaxation. Most of the teachers in this skill, do not suggest a method of attaining this relaxation, although “Progressive Muscle relaxation”, coupled with deep breathing exercises (inhale 1, exhale 2, inhale 3.... until 50 or 100) are known to work well.)

Step two: Enter the state bordering sleep. This is known as the hypnagogic state. Once again, There is no specific method recommended doing this. One way is to hold your forearm up, while keeping your upper arm on the bed, or ground. As you start to fall asleep, your arm will fall, and you will awaken again. With practice, you can learn to control the Hypnologic state without using your arm. Another method is to concentrate on an object. When other images start to enter your thoughts, you have entered the Hypnologic state. Passively watch these images. This will also help you maintain this state of near-sleep. This is called “condition”.

Step three: Deepen this state. Begin to clear your mind. observe your field of vision through your closed eyes. Do nothing more for a while. Simply look through your closed eyelids at the blackness in front of you. After a while, you may notice light patterns. These are simply neural discharges. They have no specific effect. Ignore them. When they cease, one has entered in an even deeper state of 123

relaxation which may be called Condition “C” a state of such relaxation that you lose all awareness of the body and sensory stimulation. You are almost in a void in which your only source of stimulation will be your own thoughts. The ideal state for leaving your body is Condition “D”. This is Condition “C” when it is voluntarily induced from a rested and refreshed condition and is not the effect of normal fatigue. To achieve Condition “D”, it is suggested that you practice entering it in the morning or after a short nap.

Step Four: Enter a state of Vibration. This is the most important part of the technique, and also the vaguest. Many projectors have noted these vibrations at the onset of projection. They can be experienced as a mild tingling, or as is electricity is being shot through the body. Their cause is a mystery. It may actually be the astral body trying to leave the physical one. For entering into the vibrational state, he offers the following directions: 1. Remove all jewellery or other items that might be touching your skin. 2. Darken the room so that no light can be seen through your eyelids, but do not shut out all light. 3. Lie down with your body along a north-south axis, with your head pointed toward magnetic north. 4. Loosen all clothing, but keep covered so that you are slightly warmer than might normally be comfortable. 5. Be sure you are in a location where, and at a time when, there will be absolutely no noise to disturb you. 6. Enter a state of relaxation 7. Give yourself the mental suggestion that you will remember all that occurs during the upcoming session that will be beneficial to your well-being. Repeat this five times. 8. Proceed to breathe through your half-open mouth. 9. As you breathe, concentrate on the void in front of you. 10.Select a point a foot away from your forehead, and then change your point of mental reference to six feet. 11.Turn the point ninety degrees upward by drawing an imaginary line parallel to your body axis up and above your head. Focus there and reach out for the vibrations at that point and bring them back into your body Even if you don't know what these vibrations are, you will know when you have achieved contact with them. 124

Step five: Learn to control the vibrational state. Practice controlling them by mentally pushing them into your head, down to your toes, making them surge throughout your entire body, and producing vibrational waves from head to foot. To produce this wave effect, concentrate of the vibrations and mentally push a wave out of your head and guide it down your body. Practice this until you can induce these waves on command. Once you have control of the vibrational state, you are ready to leave the body.

Step six: Begin with a partial separation. The key here is thought control. Keep your mind firmly focused on the idea of leaving the body. Do not let it wander. Stray thought might cause you to lose control of the state. Now, having entered the vibrational state, begin exploring the OBE by releasing a hand or a foot of the "second body". It is suggested that you extend a limb until it comes in contact with a familiar object, such as a wall near your bed. Then push it through the object. Return the limb by placing it back into coincidence with the physical one, decrease the vibrational rate, and then terminate the experiment. Lie quietly until you have fully returned to normal. This exercise will prepare you for full separation.

Step seven: Disassociate yourself from the body. Two methods are suggested for this. One method is to lift out of the body. To do this, think about getting lighter and lighter after entering this vibrational state. Think about how nice it would be to float upward. Keep this thought in mind at all costs and let no extraneous thoughts interrupt it. An OBE will occur naturally at this point. Another method is the "Rotation method" or "roll-out" technique. When you have achieved the vibrational state, try to roll over as if you were turning over in bed. /do not attempt to roll over physically. Try to twist your body from the top and virtually roll over into your second body right out of your physical self. At this point, you will be out of the body but next to it. Think of floating upward, and you should find yourself floating above the body. It is suggested you begin with the lift-out method, but some say that both are equally efficacious.

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About the Moderator of this Magazine Philippe L. De Coster, B.Th., D.D. joined Sundial House, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, UK team in 1971: Michael Eastcott and Nancy Magor. He represented together with Tilla Grenier (Brussels) the two French sections of the Meditation Group for the New Age, and Creative Meditation Group, also called the French Section. When Tilla Grenier died the two groups moved to Ghent, and was assisted by François Geldof for the distribution of the booklets of both groups. In 1970 De Coster was awarded with a certificate of Unity School of Christianity, Lee’s Summit, Missouri for his knowledge, the course being of a metaphysical character covering the fundamental principles of the teachings of Unity and their applications in redeeming the mind and healing the body. As the studies were “extra muros” (extension programme) it lasted almost ten years.

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Sundial House, Nevill Court, Tunbridge Wells, Kent, UK

Michal Eastcott also a prominent writer

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Dr. Roberto Assagioli, M.D, founder of Psychosynthesis and the meditation groups.

Michal Eastcott and Nancy Magor in their early years

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Tilla Grenier (right, black or blue dress) from Brussels (Belgium) General meeting at Sundial House. She was my predecessor in the work of the French Section of the Groups MGNA and GMC.

Dr. Roberto Assagioli, M.D at the centre, and left Jan van der Linden, in charge at that time of the two Dutch Meditation Group. Later he was for a number of years directed of the School for Esoteric Studies, New York, USA where I was also a student for a few years in the 1970s.

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At Sundial House, Wesak Festival probably, in front Michal Eastcott

At one of the Festivals at Sundial House

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At Sundial House

Dr. Roberto Assagioli, M.D. at Sundial House in conversation

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Several additional diploma’s, certificates and awards followed until 1984

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Contents Foreword Briefly, how can your dreams be controlled? An edited transcript of the interview as follows So how can you solve a problem in a dream? Can we dream that we’re dreaming? How can you up your chances of having a lucid dream? What are less effective ways of controlling a dream? What about controlling someone else’s dream – is this possible? What is Lucid Dreaming? Is Lucid Dreaming the same as Dream Control? How are Lucid Dreams related to Out-of-Body Experiences? Separation of Mind and Body; Lack of Control; Realism; Comparison Why have Lucid Dreams? Adventure and Fantasy Overcoming nightmares; Rehearsal Creativity and Problem Solving; Healing; Transcendence Can Lucid Dreams be dangerous? Can everyone learn to have Lucid Dreams? How can I learn to have Lucid Dreams? Dream recall; Reality testing 1.Do a reality test 2.Imagine that your surroundings are a dream 3.Visualise yourself enjoying a dream activity Dream signs Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD) Setup dream recall 1.Focus your intent 2.See yourself becoming lucid 3.Repeat until your intention is set Napping How quickly can I learn Lucid Dreaming? Experiences with learning lucid dreaming are as follows: What technology is available to assist lucid dreaming training? The NovaDreamer How well do lucid dream induction devices work? Are there any drugs or nutritional supplements that stimulate lucid dreams? How can I prevent waking up as soon as I become lucid? 136

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Variations in lucid dream experiences A.Variations in lucid dream initiation 1.Dream-initiated lucid dreams 1.Anomaly recognition 2.Programmed behaviours 3.Déjà Rêvé 2.Wake-initiated lucid dreams 3.Ambiguities in lucidity induction B.Perceptual variations in lucid dreams 1.Typical perceptual environments 2.Surreal perceptual environments 3.Minimal perceptual environments 4.Perceptual variation in specific sensory modalities a.Vision b.Audition; c.Somatosensation d.Other senses e.Emotions f.Cognitive functions 1.Variations in memory; 2.Variations in thinking 3.Volition and action 4.Termination of lucid dreams Conclusions Rapid Eye Movements ‘change scenes’ during dreams Switching not scanning Trying lucid dreaming – three simple methods I.Dream awareness techniques 1.Keep a shadow book or journal 2.Alternatively, keep a recording device by your bed 3.Use often reality checks 4.Use reality checks frequently 5.Learn to recognise your personal dream signs 6.Drift back to sleep when awakened from a dream 7.Consider purchasing a light alarm II.Using the wake back to bed method 1.Know when lucid dreams most commonly happen 2.Encourage your body to get more REM sleep 3.Wake up in the middle of the night 4.Stay awake for a while 5.Concentrate on the dream and fall asleep again 6.Try other concentration techniques III.Using supplementary techniques 1.Meditate 1. Prolong a lucid dream as it starts to fade 137

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2. Listen to binaural beats; 3. Play video games: 4. Consider taking galantamine 5.Consider the occasional vitamin B supplement Important; Attention medically Galantamine: The Lucid Dreaming Pill (for info only) Finally the dosage only by the doctor’s recommendation Bibliography and Sources What is telepathy; The Power of Thought Developing quick thinking All on telepathy Are you thinking what I’m thinking? … Telepathic powers Telepathy in history Quantum Mechanics Technologically-assisted telepathy Telepathy in dreams Telepathic Development at length – several methods First method Second method How to use telepathy with people not hearing you? Telepathic sleep (subjective) communication Group telepathy Improving your magnetic awareness Electromagnetic field awareness Sending energy to someone in absence (healing in absence) Developing a photographic memory Self-induced trance Using quartz crystal in meditation Crystal communion and workings Programming and charging your crystal; Charging Programming; Storing the quartz crystal you are working with Out of body experiences (part two) Out of body reported experience - Interview Method One Method Two Method Three A valuable lucid dream method A most suggested out of body method (in seven steps) Out of body experiences About the moderator of this magazine and eBooks Contents Website (blog) run by the Moderator Philippe L. De Coster, B.Th., D.D.: 138

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Today’s Dynamic Psychology and Psychosynthesis http://sinisterpathwaytriangleorder.skynetblogs.be/archive/2015/05/09/today-sdynamic-psychology-and-psychosynthesis-8434958.html

Humanism Today – A World without Religion http://sinisterpathwaytriangleorder.skynetblogs.be/archive/2015/06/17/humanis m-today-a-world-without-religion-8457635.html http://sinisterpathwaytriangleorder.skynetblogs.be/archive/2015/08/16/humanis m-today-a-world-without-religion-8485451.html

On Scribd - Collections Practical Occultism for the New Age (27 books) https://www.scribd.com/collections/2605747/Practical-Occultism-for-the-NewAge

Opposite Philosophy Collection (legends, myths, stories, philosophy, psychology) https://www.scribd.com/collections/2605767/Opposite-Philosophy © January 2016 – Satsang EBooks Publications, Ghent, Belgium (Noncommercial – sales forbidden)

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