I had a brief lucid dream last night at 2:30am!
In my dream I was with my boys, and in particular, in the kitchen with my son, B.K.
[The environment and characters in my dream were an obvious continuation of my waking life experience last night, having my sons over for Thanksgiving dinner and a movie].
In the kitchen, I picked up a salt shaker and began dumping salt on the ground, saying, “Whenever you see me do this, it means that I am aware that this is only a dream.” While B.K. and I had a brief conversation about this, my level of awareness, or lucidity, was fluctuating, because I said something else that didn’t make sense. I told B.K., “If you ever pour salt on the ground in my dream, that will be a signal to me that you are lucid.” Of course, one of my characters being lucid in my own dream is silly. But how fascinating to recall how I was trying to instruct my own son to learn lucid dreaming.
I decided that I wanted to experiment with lucidity within the dream, thinking I might manipulate the environment or something. My apartment was strangely empty, so I felt the need to walk outside for more stimuli. First, I needed privacy, thinking interaction with people would cause me to lose awareness. So I led my sons into the back bedroom and closed them in. At this very moment I woke up.
Although my state of awareness was unstable, I felt exhilarated that I had accomplished lucidity.
Two observations: 1) In LaBerge’s book, Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming, he mentions that lucid dreams should be handled in an “open, flexible, and noncommanding” way. The instant I woke up, I realized that I had been too rigid and self-interested to stay asleep. Having forced my boys to be shut into a back room seems to have forced me out of the dream. 2) I felt guilt upon awakening, for trying to force my sons out of my dream, even though I was not rude, mean-spirited, or unfair in any way. This may show me something about my sense of responsibility to my boys, even in my dream state.
I checked my clock when I woke up, and it was 2:30am.
My last dream of the night was about my older brother, Daniel. My dad was there too. We were in a local convenience store, and the clerk was extremely rude to my father, who had come in from out of town. I told her that she should improve her performance as a customer service agent. She made an excuse, so I told her that she had insulted my father, and then I said something very witty which I cannot now recall.
My brother had received some legal papers of some sort. Apparently some agency wanted them signed, essentially agreeing that he did not endorse his brother (me or our other brother, Donn?) as a political candidate (or something). At no time during this dream sequence did I ever become lucid.
DREAMSIGN CATALOGUE:
1. Inner awareness (1/2)
- I told B.K., “If you ever pour salt on the ground in my dream, that will be a signal to me that you are lucid.”
2. Action (1/1)
- I picked up a salt shaker and began dumping salt on the ground
3. Form (0/1)
4. Context (1/1)
- led my sons into the back bedroom and closed them in
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