Lucid dream

A lucid dream, in simplest terms, is a dream in which one is aware that one is dreaming. The term was coined by the Dutch psychiatrist and writer Frederik van Eeden (1860–1932).

A lucid dream can begin in one of two ways. A dream-initiated lucid dream (DILD) starts as a normal dream, and the dreamer eventually concludes it is a dream, while a wake-initiated lucid dream (WILD) occurs when the dreamer goes from a normal waking state directly into a dream state, with no apparent lapse in consciousness.

Lucid dreaming has been researched scientifically, and its existence is well established.

Scientists such as Stephen LaBerge and Allan Hobson, with his neurophysiological approach to dream research, have helped to push forward the understanding of lucid dreaming into a less speculative realm.

Scientific history

Illustration from "The Secret of the Golden Flower", a Chinese book of alchemy and meditation

The first book to recognize the scientific potential of lucid dreams was Celia Green's 1968 study Lucid Dreams. Green analyzed the main characteristics of such dreams, reviewing previously published literature on the subject and incorporating new data from subjects of her own. She concluded they were a category of experience quite distinct from ordinary dreams, and predicted that they would turn out to be associated with rapid eye movement sleep (REM sleep). Green was also the first to link lucid dreams to the phenomenon of false awakenings.

In the early 1970s, Daniel Oldis of the University of South Dakota leveraged the scientific principle of external sensory incorporation in an attempt to influence dream content and evoke lucidity. Three psychological techniques were employed: subconscious suggestion using a tape played before and during sleep; associative signaling using a muffled bell alarm timed to go off during REM sleep; and classical conditioning using a REM detection circuit and a bright eye-light. The results indicated that lucid dreaming can be facilitated using external cues and psychological methods.

Philosopher Norman Malcolm's 1959 text Dreaming had argued against the possibility of checking the accuracy of dream reports. However, the realization that eye movements performed in dreams may affect the dreamer's physical eyes provided a way to prove that actions agreed upon during waking life could be recalled and performed once lucid in a dream. The first evidence of this type was produced in the late 1970s by British parapsychologist Keith Hearne. A volunteer named Alan Worsley used eye movement to signal the onset of lucidity, which were recorded by a polysomnograph machine.

Hearne's results were not widely distributed. The first peer-reviewed article was published some years later by Stephen LaBerge at Stanford University, who had independently developed a similar technique as part of his doctoral dissertation. During the 1980s, further scientific evidence to confirm the existence of lucid dreaming was produced as lucid dreamers were able to demonstrate to researchers that they were consciously aware of being in a dream state (again, primarily using eye movement signals). Additionally, techniques were developed that have been experimentally proven to enhance the likelihood of achieving this state. Research on techniques and effects of lucid dreaming continues at a number of universities and other centers, including LaBerge's Lucidity Institute.

Research and clinical applications

Neurobiological model

Neuroscientist J. Allan Hobson has hypothesized what might be occurring in the brain while lucid. The first step to lucid dreaming is recognizing one is dreaming. This recognition might occur in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, which is one of the few areas deactivated during REM sleep and where working memory occurs. Once this area is activated and the recognition of dreaming occurs, the dreamer must be cautious to let the dream continue but be conscious enough to remember that it is a dream. While maintaining this balance, the amygdala and parahippocampal cortex might be less intensely activated. To continue the intensity of the dream hallucinations, it is expected the pons and the parieto-occipital junction stay active.

Treatment for nightmares

It has been suggested that sufferers of nightmares could benefit from the ability to be aware they are indeed dreaming. A pilot study was performed in 2006 that showed that lucid dreaming treatment was successful in reducing nightmare frequency. This treatment consisted of exposure to the idea, mastery of the technique, and lucidity exercises. It was not clear what aspects of the treatment were responsible for the success of overcoming nightmares, though the treatment as a whole was successful.

Australian psychologist Milan Colic has explored the application of principles from narrative therapy with clients' lucid dreams, to reduce the impact not only of nightmares during sleep, but also depression, self-mutilation, and other problems in waking life. Colic found that clients' preferred direction for their lives, as identified during therapeutic conversations, could lessen the distressing content of dreams, while understandings about life—and even characters—from lucid dreams could be invoked in "real" life with marked therapeutic benefits.

Perception of time

In 1985, LaBerge performed a pilot study which showed that time perception while counting during a lucid dream is about the same as during waking. Lucid dreamers counted out ten seconds while dreaming, signaling the end of counting with a pre-arranged eye signal measured with electrooculogram recording. LaBerge's results were confirmed by German researchers in 2004. The German study, by D. Erlacher and M. Schredl, also studied motor activity and found deep knee bends took 44% longer to perform while lucid dreaming. However, a 1995 study in Germany indicated that lucid dreams can also have varied time spans, in which the dreamer can control the length. The study took place during sleep and upon awakening, and required the participants to record their dreams in a log and how long the dreams lasted.

Awareness and reasoning

Düsum Khyenpa was a master-level practitioner of Tibetan lucid dream yoga.

While dream control and dream awareness are correlated, neither requires the other—LaBerge has found dreams that exhibit one clearly without the capacity for the other; also, in some dreams where the dreamer is lucid and aware they could exercise control, they choose simply to observe. In 1992, a study by Deirdre Barrett examined whether lucid dreams contained four "corollaries" of lucidity: knowing that one dreams, that objects will disappear after waking, that physical laws need not apply, and having clear memory of the waking world, and found less than a quarter of lucidity accounts exhibited all four. A related and reciprocal category of dreams that are lucid in terms of some of these four corollaries, but miss the realization that "I'm dreaming" were also reported. Scores on these corollaries and correctly identifying the experience as a dream increased with lucidity experience. In a later study in Barrett's book, The Committe of Sleep, she describes how some experienced lucid dreamers have learned to remember specific practical goals such as artists looking for inspiration seeking a show of their own work once they become lucid or computer programmers looking for a screen with their desired code. However, most of these dreamers had many experiences of failing to recall waking objectives before gaining this level of control.

Near-death and out-of-body experiences

In a study of fourteen lucid dreamers performed in 1991, people who perform wake-initiated lucid dreams operation (WILD) reported experiences consistent with aspects of out-of-body experiences such as floating above their beds and the feeling of leaving their bodies. Due to the overlap between lucid dreams, near-death experiences, and out-of-body experiences, researchers say they believe a protocol could be developed to induce a lucid dream similar to a near-death experience in the laboratory.

Cultural history

Michael Willmann (1630–1706), "the Dream of Jacob"

Hypnos and Thanatos, Sleep and His Half-Brother Death, an 1874 painting by John William Waterhouse

Even though it has only come to the attention of the general public in the last few decades, lucid dreaming is not a modern discovery. A letter written by St. Augustine of Hippo in 415 AD refers to lucid dreaming. In the 8th century, Tibetan Buddhists and Bonpo were practicing a form of Dream Yoga held to maintain full waking consciousness while in the dream state. This system is extensively discussed and explained in the book Dream Yoga and the Practice of Natural Light. One of the important messages of the book is the distinction between the Dzogchen meditation of Awareness and Dream Yoga. The Dzogchen Awareness meditation has also been referred to by the terms Rigpa Awareness, Contemplation, and Presence. Awareness during the sleep and dream states is associated with the Dzogchen practice of natural light. This practice only achieves lucid dreams as a secondary effect—in contrast to Dream Yoga, which aims primarily at lucid dreaming. According to Buddhist teachers, the experience of lucidity helps us understand the unreality of phenomena, which would otherwise be overwhelming during dream or the death experience.

An early recorded lucid dreamer was the philosopher and physician Sir Thomas Browne (1605–1682). Browne was fascinated by the world of dreams and described his own ability to lucid dream in his Religio Medici: "...yet in one dream I can compose a whole Comedy, behold the action, apprehend the jests and laugh my self awake at the conceits thereof". Similarly, Samuel Pepys in his diary entry for 15 August 1665 records a dream "that I had my Lady Castlemayne in my arms and was admitted to use all the dalliance I desired with her, and then dreamt that this could not be awake, but that it was only a dream". Marquis d'Hervey de Saint-Denys argued that it is possible for anyone to learn to dream consciously. In 1867, he published his book Les Reves et les moyens de les diriger; observations pratiques ("Dreams and How to Guide them; Practical Observations"), in which he documented more than twenty years of his own research into dreams.

The term lucid dreaming was coined by Dutch author and psychiatrist Frederik van Eeden in his 1913 article "A Study of Dreams". This paper was highly anecdotal and not embraced by the scientific community. Some consider this a misnomer because it means much more than just "clear or vivid" dreaming. The alternative term conscious dreaming avoids this confusion. However, the term lucid was used by van Eeden in its sense of "having insight", as in the phrase a lucid interval applied to someone in temporary remission from a psychosis, rather than as a reference to the perceptual quality of the experience, which may or may not be clear and vivid.

In the 1950s, the Senoi hunter-gatherers of Malaysia were reported to make extensive use of lucid dreaming to ensure mental health, although later studies refuted these claims.

Induction methods

Many people report having experienced a lucid dream during their lives, often in childhood. Children seem to have lucid dreams more easily than adults. Over time, several techniques have been developed to achieve a lucid dreaming state intentionally. The following are common factors that influence lucid dreaming and techniques that people use to help achieve a lucid dream:

Dream recall

Dream recall is the ability to remember dreams. Good dream recall is often described as the first step towards lucid dreaming. Better recall increases awareness of dreams in general; with limited dream recall, any lucid dreams one has can be forgotten entirely. To improve dream recall, some people keep a dream journal, writing down or recording dreams. Some record their dreams upon awakening, some take notes which they work out later. It is important to record the dreams as quickly as possible as there is a strong tendency to forget what one has dreamt. For best recall, the waking dreamer should keep eyes closed while trying to remember the dream, and one's dream journal should be recorded in the present tense. Dream recall can also be improved by staying still after waking up, so the principles of state-dependent memory may apply. Similarly, a dreamer who changes positions in the night may be able to recall certain events of the dream by testing different sleeping positions. Autosuggestion may also help improve dream recall, by repeating (in thoughts or out loud) "I shall remember my dreams", before falling asleep. Stephen LaBerge recommends that you remember at least one dream per night before attempting any induction methods. However, Lucid dreamers who are lacking in strong dream recall can assist the process by forcing themselves awake when they feel the Lucid dream coming to a close in order to record the dream while fresh in memory.

Wake-initiated lucid dreams (WILD)

Wake-initiated lucid dreams occur when "the sleeper enters REM sleep with unbroken self-awareness directly from the waking state". There are many techniques aimed at entering a WILD. The key to these techniques is recognizing the hypnagogic stage, which is inbetween being awake and being asleep. If a person is successful in staying aware during this stage, that person will eventually enter a dream while lucid.

There are key times when this technique has a higher rate of success. While success at normal bedtime after having been awake all day is difficult, it is relatively easy after sleeping for 3–7 hours or in the afternoon during a nap. Techniques for inducing WILDs abound. Dreamers may count, envision themselves climbing or descending stairs, chant to themselves, control their breathing, count their breaths to keep their thoughts from drifting, concentrate on relaxing their body from their toes to their head, or allow images to flow through their "mind's eye" and envision themselves jumping into the image to maintain concentration and keep their mind awake, while still being calm enough to let their bodies sleep.

During the actual transition into a dream, dreamers are likely to experience sleep paralysis, including rapid vibrations, a sequence of loud sounds, and a feeling of twirling into another state of body awareness, of "drifting off into another dimension", like passing from water into air. A notable sensation is also "seeing" gradual sharpening and becoming "real" of images or scenes they are thinking of and trying to visualize. This in contrast to the indefinite sensations felt when imagining something during waking.

Reality testing

Reality testing (or reality checking) is a common method used by people to determine whether or not they are dreaming. It involves performing an action and observing if the results are consistent with results expected when awake. By practicing these tests during waking life, one may eventually decide to perform such a test while dreaming, which may fail and let the dreamer realize they are dreaming.

• The pain test—"Pinch me, I think I'm dreaming!"—is only effective in very few dreams. Stephen LaBerge's book Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming shows that dreamed action produces real effects on the brain and body. Therefore, if the dreamer pinches his or herself, he or she indeed feels pain but it is unlikely to induce lucidity, because the schema for pain in the dreamer's brain activates and the dreamer feels pain even if there is no real physical stimulus. This same logic applies for other sensations, such as pleasure, heat, cold and a variety of other feelings the dreamer could experience in the waking world.
• Looking at text or one's digital watch (remembering the words or the time), looking away, and looking back. The text or time will probably have changed randomly and radically at the second glance or contain strange letters and characters. (Analog watches do not usually change in dreams, while text and digital watches have a great tendency to do so.) A digital watch or clock may feature strange characters or the numbers all out of order.
• Flipping a light switch. Light levels rarely change as a result of the switch flipping in dreams.
• Looking into a mirror; in dreams, reflections from a mirror often appear to be blurred, distorted, incorrect, or frightening.
• Looking at the ground beneath one's feet or at one's hands. If one does this within a dream the difference in appearance of the ground or one's hands from the normal waking state is often enough to alert the conscious to the dream state.
• Holding one's nose and mouth closed while attempting to inhale. If dreaming, one will find themselves breathing and aware.

A more precise form of reality testing involves examining the properties of dream objects to judge their apparent reality. Some lucid dreamers report that dream objects when examined closely have all the sensory properties, stability, and detail of objects in the physical world. Such detailed observation relates to whether mental objects and environments could effectively act as substitutes for physical environments with the dreamer unable to see significant differences between the two.

Prolongation

One problem faced by people wishing to experience lucid dreams is awakening prematurely. This premature awakening can be frustrating after investing considerable time into achieving lucidity in the first place. Stephen LaBerge proposed two ways to prolong a lucid dream. The first technique is spinning one's dream body. He proposed that when spinning, the dreamer is engaging parts of the brain that may also be involved in REM activity, helping to prolong REM sleep. The second technique is rubbing one's hands. The intention is to engage the dreamer's brain in producing the sensation of rubbing hands, preventing the dreamer becoming aware of the sensation of lying in bed. LaBerge tested his hypothesis by asking 34 volunteers to either spin, rub their hands, or do nothing. Results showed 90% of dreams were prolonged by hand rubbing and 96% prolonged by spinning. Only 33% of lucid dreams were prolonged with taking no action.

Other variations on this theme have been proposed by lucid dream enthusiasts, the common basis for all these techniques is to focus on and/or increase one's tactile or sensory engagement with the dream world.

Other associated phenomena

Rapid eye movement (REM)

REM Sleep. EEG highlighted by red box. Eye movements highlighted by red line.

Main article: Rapid eye movement sleep

When a person is dreaming, the eyes move rapidly up and down and vibrate. Scientific research has found that these eye movements may correspond to the direction the dreamer "looks" at in the dreamscape. This has enabled trained lucid dreamers to communicate with researchers while dreaming by using eye movement signals.

False awakening

In a false awakening, one dreams of having awoken. The room the dreamer falsely awakens in is often similar to the room he/she fell asleep in. If the person was lucid, they often believe that they are no longer dreaming and begin their daily routine, thus giving up their dream awareness. However, it can also cause a dreamer to become lucid if the person does a reality check whenever he/she awakens. People who keep a dream journal and write down their dreams upon awakening sometimes report having to write down the same dream multiple times as a result of false awakening. It has also been known to cause bed wetting as one may dream that they have awoken to go to the bathroom. The makers of induction devices such as the NovaDreamer and the REM Dreamer recommend doing a reality check every time you awake so that the dreamer becomes lucid when a false awakening occurs.

Sleep paralysis

During REM sleep the body paralyzes itself as a protection mechanism to prevent the movements that occur in the dream from causing the physical body to move. However, this mechanism can be triggered before, during, or after normal sleep while the brain awakens. This can lead to a state where the awakened sleeper feels paralyzed. Hypnagogic hallucination may occur in this state, especially auditory ones. Effects of sleep paralysis include heaviness or inability to move the muscles, rushing or pulsating noises, and brief hypnogogic or hypnopompic imagery. Experiencing sleep paralysis is a necessary part of WILD, in which dreamers essentially detach their "dream" body from the paralyzed one.

Out-of-body experience

An out-of-body experience (OBE or sometimes OOBE) is an experience that typically involves a sensation of floating outside of one's body and, in some cases, perceiving one's physical body from a place outside one's body (autoscopy). About one in ten people think they have had an out-of-body experience at some time in their lives. Scientists are learning about the phenomenon.

Techniques to induce OBEs (with the intention of achieving astral projection) and lucid dreams from waking cover such similar ground that common misinterpretation of one as the other (or even equivalence) can be hypothesized. Realistic-seeming yet physically impossible impressions of flying, time-traveling or walking through the walls of an environment matching one's bedroom are equally hallmarks of either. (As those who have experienced them will attest, neither "feels" like ordinary dreams at all.) Both are easier to perform at times typical for afternoon naps and late morning REM cycles.

Despite these similarities, EEG studies do not suggest an equivalence between OBEs and lucid dreams. Lucidity is strongly associated with stage 1 REM sleep but OBEs are far less consistent, producing EEG traces that can variously resemble stage 3 sleep, a waking, eyes-closed state or other uncategorized states.

Rarity and significance

"We are asleep. Our life is a dream. But we wake up, sometimes, just enough to know that we are dreaming."

— Ludwig Wittgenstein

Zhuangzi dreaming of a butterfly (or a butterfly dreaming of Zhuangzi?)

During most dreams, sleepers are not aware that they are dreaming. The reason for this has not been determined, and does not appear to have an obvious answer. There have been attempts by various fields of psychology to provide an explanation. For example, some proponents of depth psychology suggest that mental processes inhibit the critical evaluation of reality within dreams.

Certain physiology studies suggest that "seeing is believing" to the brain during any mental state. If the brain perceives something with great clarity or intensity, it will believe that it is real, even when awake. Dream consciousness is similar to that of a hallucinating awake subject. Dreams or hallucinatory images triggered by the brain stem are considered to be real, even if fantastic. The impulse to accept the experience as real is so strong the dreamer will often invent a memory or a story to cover up an incongruous or unrealistic event in the dream. "That man has two heads!" is not usually followed with "I must be dreaming!" but with something like "Yes, I read in the paper about these famous Siamese twins." Other times there will be an explanation that, in the dream, makes sense and seems very logical. However, when the dreamer awakens, he/she will realize that it is rather far-fetched or even complete gibberish.

Developmental psychology suggests that the dream world is not bizarre at all when viewed developmentally, since we were dreaming as children before we learned all of the physical and social laws that train the mind to a "reality". Fluid imaginative constructions may have preceded the more rigid, logical waking rules and continue on as a "standard" lifeworld alongside the acquired, waking life world. Dreaming and waking consciousness differ only in their respective level of expectations, the waking "I" expecting a stricter set of "reality rules" as the child matures. The experience of "waking up" normally establishes the boundary between the two lifeworlds and cues the consciousness to adapt waking "I" expectations. At times, however, this cue is false—a false awakening. The waking "I" (with its level of expectations) is activated even though the experience is still hallucinatory. Incongruous images or illogical events during this type of dream can result in lucidity as the dream is being judged by waking "standards".

Another theory presented by transpersonal psychology and some Eastern religions is that it is the individual's state of consciousness (or awareness) that determines their ability to differentiate between what is real, and what is false or illusory. During dreaming, many experiences are accepted as real by the dreamer that would not be accepted as real in the waking state. Some religions such as Buddhism and Hinduism describe states of consciousness (i.e., Nirvana or Moksha) where individuals "wake up", and discover a new or altered state of consciousness that reveals their normal waking experience to be unreal, dream-like, or maya (illusion). The assumption is that there are degrees of wakefulness or awareness, and that both lucid dreaming and normal waking experience lie somewhere towards the middle of this continuum (or hierarchy) of awareness. Under this assumption there must be states of wakefulness that are superior to normal waking awareness. According to such views, it is possible to undergo a spiritual awakening and realize that what is called normal waking awareness is, in fact, a dream, just as when the dreamer awakens to realize that a nightmare was illusory.

Related theories on Lucid Dreaming

Paul Tholey

Paul Tholey (1937-1998) as a gestalt psychologist and professor at the Psychological Institute of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt and later professor for sports psychology at the Technical University of Braunschweig, both in Germany. He began studying the phenomenon of lucid dreaming in 1959 and was led to it in an attempt to prove whether dreams are in color (it has been commonly maintained that they are not). By nature he was a bad dream recaller, though, and realized, too, that memories of his dreams did not supply him with very reliable data. As a gestalt psychologist he was committed to critical realism which distinguishes between objective reality and experienced reality, and had the idea that it should be principally possible to bring a critical consciousness into dreaming by asking repeatedly now and then during the day: "Am I dreaming?" He hoped that the repetition of the critical questions would become second nature and it would also manifest itself in his dreams. After an intensive and long training he succeeded in obtaining a critical consciousness while dreaming and that led to a completely new quality of dreaming.

Tholey was now able to examine critically whether his dreams were in color or not. After that he initiated a study group with students and they all became experienced lucid dreamers. He researched with them the fascinating phenomenon systematically and scientifically according to the gestalt theory of psychology. Unfortunately, this pioneer of lucid dream research died much too early. Some of the results of this research are available on the Internet. On this site I have tried to collect them all.

The Erraou theory

The Erraou theory was proposed in March of 2011, by S.Erraou (1994 to present).

Linked to the idea of Lucid Dreams, in a sense that- (definition) "The Erraou Theory- a process in which one must achieve lucidity in a dream to combine the conscious and subconscious together, and taking control of that dream to therefore take control of the subconscious mind and its latent power."

The general concept of this fairly recent theory is that entering a dreaming state will bring you into the world of the subconscious, and when you enter the dream, you reach lucidity by carrying out all the neccesary reality checks, hence bringing in your consciousness into your subconsciousness, effectively combining the two together. When lucidity has been achieved, prolong the lucid state by rubbing your hands together, or spinning around in the dream, which enhances the dreamers visual senses, hence increasing your chances of not waking up (proposed by Stephen LaBerge)

The proposed next step by S.Erraou would be to to control your "dreamland" by distorting or changing certain aspects of the environment. Once the dreamer is in control, the general concept is to try to communicate with one's subconscious projections (the people you see in the dream), as they are part of the subconscious, hence being very much part of the dreamer, and if one is able to control them, one is then able to ask them questions on your problems, demand they solve your problems, even demand that they (since they are you subconscious, and therefore are the people that have the key to unlocking the latent power) unlock certain parts of your subconscious mind, and allow access for the consciousness mind.

This theory is criticised as it can be seen as being partially dangerous, due to the fact that the dreamer is somewhat dabbling with the subconscious, which could be suggested that this might interfere with its control over the subconscious breathing, or over the control relative to the heartbeat. However, these worries were suggested to be unlikely to ever occur.

Notable people

Scientists

• Celia Green - first scientific book, Lucid Dreams, 1968
• Stephen LaBerge
• Allan Hobson
• Keith Hearne
• Paul Tholey

Lucid dreamers

• Alan Worsley - first to use eye movement to signal the onset of lucidity (Keith Hearne's experiment).
• Alejandro Jodorowsky
• Richard Feynman

See also

• Astral projection
• Dream argument
• Dream question
• Hemi-Sync
• List of dream diaries
• Orphism (religion)
• Pre-lucid dream
• Psychedelic
• Simulated reality
• Sleep paralysis
• Yoga Nidra – the practice of sleep yoga
• The Art of Dreaming, non-fictional book
• Waking Life, film about a lucid dreamer
• Vanilla Sky, film about medically-induced lucid dreams.
• The Science of Sleep, film about lucid dreaming and interference with reality
• Inception, film about fictional, technologically-induced, shared lucid dreams.
• Paprika, film about technologically-monitored dreams for the purpose of psychotherapy.
• Dreamside, a fictional book by Graham Joyce that focuses on lucid dreaming.
• A gólyakalifa (Stork Caliph, 1913), a novel by Hungarian author Mihály Babits about a teenager living a parallel life in his dreams

Further reading

• Barton, Mary E. (2008). Soul Sight: Projections of Consciousness and Out of Body Epiphanies. ISBN 978-0-557-02163-5.
• Brooks, Janice (2000). The Conscious Exploration of Dreaming. Bloomington, IN: 1st Books Library. ISBN 1-58500-539-8. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthor= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Castaneda, Carlos. The Art of Dreaming. New York: HarperCollins, 1993.
• Conesa-Sevilla, Jorge (2004). Amazon.com, Wrestling With Ghosts: A Personal and Scientific Account of Sleep Paralysis—and Lucid Dreaming. Philadelphia, PA: Xlibris. ISBN 978-1413446685. {{cite book}}: External link in |title= (help)
• Conesa-Sevilla, Jorge (2003). Sleep Paralysis Signaling (SPS) As A Natural Cueing Method for the Generation and Maintenance of Lucid Dreaming. Presented at The 83rd Annual Convention of the Western Psychological Association, May 1–4, 2003, in Vancouver, BC, Canada..
• Conesa-Sevilla, Jorge (2002). SleepAndHypnosis.org Isolated Sleep Paralysis and Lucid Dreaming: Ten-year longitudinal case study and related dream frequencies, types, and categories. Sleep and Hypnosis, 4, (4), 132-143.. {{cite book}}: External link in |title= (help)
• de Saint-Denys, Hervey (1982). Dreams and How to Guide Them. London: Duckworth. ISBN 0-7156-1584-X.
• Gackenbach, Jayne (1988). Conscious Mind, Sleeping Brain. New York: Plenum Press. ISBN 0-306-42849-0. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthor= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• Garfield, Patricia L. (1974). Creative Dreaming. New York: Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-671-21903-0.
• Godwin, Malcolm (1994). The Lucid Dreamer. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-671-87248-6.
• Green, Celia (1968). Lucid Dreams. Oxford: Institute of Psychophysical Research. ISBN 0-900076-00-3.
• Green, Celia (1994). Lucid Dreaming: The Paradox of Consciousness During Sleep. London: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-11239-7. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthor= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• LaBerge, Stephen (1985). Lucid Dreaming. Los Angeles: J.P. Tarcher. ISBN 0-87477-342-3.
• LaBerge, Stephen (1991). Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming. New York: Ballantine Books. ISBN 0-345-37410-X.
• McElroy, Mark (2007). Lucid Dreaming for Beginners: Simple Techniques for Creating Interactive Dreams. Woodbury, Minn.: Llewellyn Publications. ISBN 978-0-7387-0887-4.
• Oldis, Daniel (1974). "Lucid Dreams, Dreams and Sleep: Theoretical Constructions". Univ. of South Dakota. Plain Label Books. ISBN 978-1-60303-840-9.
• Oldis, Daniel (March 2010). "Multi-Player Dream Games" (PDF). Lucid Dream Exchange. 54: 5–6.
• Robert Waggoner (2008). Lucid Dreaming Gateway to the Inner Self. Needham, Mass.: Moment Point Press. ISBN 978-1-930491-14-4.
• Wangyal Rinpoche, Tenzin (1998). Tibetan Yoga Of Dream And Sleep. Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publ. ISBN 1-55939-101-4.
• Warren, Jeff (2007). "The Lucid Dream". The Head Trip: Adventures on the Wheel of Consciousness. Toronto: Random House Canada. ISBN 978-0679314080.
• Yuschak, Thomas (2006). Advanced Lucid Dreaming – The Power of Supplements. United States?: Lulu Enterprises. ISBN 978-1-4303-0542-2.
• Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams (MILD)
• Wake-back-to-bed (WBTB)

External links

• A look at four psychology fads — a comparison of est, primal therapy, Transcendental Meditation and lucid dreaming at the Los Angeles Times
• Template:Dmoz