I wonder if there are people here who practice concentration in lucid dreams. I find it easier there, the usual problems and obstacles don't spring up. But there is a new obstacle: forgetting. Lucid dreams don't last long enough to be counted as a full-fledged practice. Eventually you start doing inane things, forgetting what you were doing before.

What's responsible for how long they are?

Experience with lucid dreaming, strength of mindfulness, concentration abilities, the cycling of the phases of sleep, and being or not being in the A&P or Early Mastery of Equanimity. Those are some options that come to mind. I suppose being under the influence of anything psychoactive, like a sleeping pill, could also play a part.

Dreams usually occur in REM or slow-wave sleep, so if you move into another sleep stage while meditating, you'll generally stop dreaming. Plus, slow-wave sleep is unlikely to be at all suitable for meditation or even for lucidity at all, because dreams in that stage of sleep tend to be very mundane and vague. The best chance of arousing sufficient energy, mindfulness, and concentration is during REM sleep, which may only last for 5-20 minutes at a time.

Some methods have been suggested for lucid dreamers to stay in REM sleep rather than waking up, but I don't know if they'll help with your opposite problem of falling into non-REM sleep where it's impossible to focus. You can try spinning around, or you can try rubbing your hands together. These are pretty disrupting things to do during concentration meditation, so I don't know if they'll help you.

Have you ever read The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep, or any related books? I bet you would find those really interesting!

I'm afraid there is a misunderstanding. My problem is not falling into non-REM sleep, usually it doesn't happen. It's forgetting. For example, I'm doing what I must, time passes, I'm still doing it, time passes, and suddenly I completely forget about it and start engaging in conversations with dream-people or go for a walk in a dream. In other words, I forget that it's a dream and what I'm supposed to do in it. I thought that it's due to not enough concentration, but I'm not sure.


I heard about 90 minutes per cycle, if memory serves me right. It's enough time for practice, and you can do it multiple times per night.

Spinning and rubbing doesn't really help. These things help with making dreams more vivid, but don't help with keeping lucidity.


Yes, although they aren't addressing the problem. But as far as I understand, you're supposed to do practices that are described there for more lengthy times than ~5 minutes per night in your dreams. It's too small time for any practice to have an effect. So solution must be implied.

I'm not sure if this will address your problem, but in order to have a lucid dream remain lucid, you have to remain aware of the fact that you are dreaming, otherwise your consciousness will slip back into the dream and you will lose focus. So to maintain a concentration practice in your dream, you also have to keep some kind of awareness of the dream going as well. My small experience with lucid dreams is that there is more intensity and vividness to my consciousness than in ordinary dreams or waking life, so perhaps even a short time spent meditating in the dream state could be more valuable than the same time spent in waking... Just a thought.

You might be interested in the International Association for the Study of Dreams. Each fall they hold an on-line "conference" and there are several very experienced lucid dreamers participating, some of whom use the dream state to explore consciousness. I find it helpful to talk to them.

Judy

Thanx, but I already found answers to my questions elsewhere. So let me "mark" this topic as closed with this post.