the POINT of LDing

If you got bored of LDs you got bored of life too amirite?

not necessarily, i enjoy not being in control of other people and weather, and what is going on in the world. that is unpredictable…

could that mean that RL is similar to both LD’s and ND’s at the same time? in a sense it kind of is

Maybe, (for me anyway.) I don’t like to control DC’s because I like talking to them like real people, they’re interesting. I like letting the dream run its own “plot” and kind of going along with it, like a character in a book. However, I LOVE controling stuff like the weather, what time of day it is, (like day or night,) stopping time, changing the colors of the sky, stuff like that. But I don’t create buildings and stuff just to destroy them like my brother does. laughs I also love to use powers of any sort and am always looking to master more. For example, I really want to master fire because right now I suck at it, I want control of that element badly. Why? Because I don’t have it yet, so I want it. :tongue: I want to eventually be able to use any power at any given moment, without screwing up. So yeah, I guess it is the desire for control for me. (That, and it’s just plain fun to do stuff you can’t do in real life, Mwahahahahaha! :grin: )

Iteresting perspective you have. I’m not so much for the total control thing, I want to be able to do things, fantastic things, but I don’t care much about controlling DCs. You can basically go through a lucid dream and not control anything at all anyway. Lucid dreamin is not about control, it’s about consiousness. Am I to take it that your normal dreams are extremely vivid? Because lucidity is also associated with vividity, this I think is reason enough to pursue them.
You can’t possibly exhaust the possibilities of lucid dreams. There is always something to explore, and they are unpredictable just like normal dreams. I enjoy all this much much more if I am lucid at the time it’s happening. The state of consciousness itself is marvellous, I don’t have to do anything, just look. Ofcourse I can’t stay still. Then there is the complete sense of freedom that is never felt in the waking state. Those are soem of the reasons why I am into lucid dreaming.

There happen to be two reasons for me:

  1. Fun, mainly. Being able to steal a car and speed down the road at 100 MPH and then jump out and fly away is nothing short of awesome.
  2. Spirituality, if I have the time. More of an exploring yourself thing, not “what is the meaning of life thing”, unless the two coincide.

LDs aren’t a big deal to me any more.

I’d much rather have NDs as they are much more fun to me. Sure it’s nice to know that if I want to I can take control and perhaps try something new, or complete a specific quest.

But I like the randomness and excitement of following a storyline that my subconscious gives me, so regular dreams are much more fun to me, particularly when they are nightmares the rush of fear I get in nightmares is unparalleled by anything I have experienced in an LD.

I dont believe LDing is mainly a desire for control. Sure, that is the main way that people thing of LDing, but the actual definition of LDing is becoming aware of being in a dream. In general it is just a way of becoming more aware of what is going on around you. For me personally, it is mostly just a way to have a whole lot of fun, but that doesnt have to be the case.

Also, in specific response to your preferring the unpredictability of NDs; you can have that in LDs too! You can continue to let the dream take its own course even after you become lucid. If anything, you could use your newly gained lucidity to make the experience even better, such as by making the dream more vivid. You could also take a more direct approach and try to create something random or go through a door with the intention of appearing in a place of your subconscious’s choice.

The possibilities are endless and I dont think you can narrow the point behind LDing down to just a desire for control.

As for us, we would rather experience the random majesty of dreams while still in them instead of merely remembering them when we wake up. LD’s are just as random as ND’s most of the time, unless you make it otherwise. It’s all about awareness, not control, although the ability to control does follow awareness.

this is kind of where im a too.
because when i become lucid, its as if everything stops and waits for me to do something… and if i dont do anything then i wake up.
i cant just expect my LD to show me something “random” without me actually coming up with the idea first, which to me isnt random at all.
its like me thinking in my LD “okay, im going to open this door and let my subconscious take me wherever it wants!” then i open the door and wake up…since i didnt think up an idea of where the door should lead me.
thats the only reason why it seems less likely that a LD can be unpredictable.
when i say “control” that is what people are doing when they say they do it “to have fun” or “to learn more about myself” …isnt this still control? you are controlling your dream to do these things, right?

you put it perfectly!

You’ll have to explain that one. Since my LDs and NDs are more or less identical in all aspects, with the obvious exception of not knowing I am dreaming and having no control. I have the same level of depth and “majesty” in my NDs as I do my LDs, I can’t say I just “merely remember them on waking up” regardless as to whether I have control/knowledge that I am dreaming.

I can’t say I am quite that bad. I do have LD’s where I do continue to follow the dream, but if I try to take control sometimes the world ceases to do anything interesting, the dream it’s self seems to be too bland and boring as though becoming “too lucid” turns off the creative part of me that was running the dream. Granted I can choose to do something interesting myself, but the dream story becomes dull and monotonous or ceases to exist without my direction.

That’s the way I see it. Although it you want to “learn more about yourself” I personally think that you are going to learn more from your actions in an ND than an LD, although with an LD you do have the chance to ask your DCs what they represent about you, though I don’t really think the answers you will get are always accurate or genuine since you can influence the DC’s response by thinking what it may represent.

Now I noticed I haven’t really answered the original question posed: my question is: is the desire to LD the desire for control?

For me, the desire to LD is usually to do a specific thing as opposed to all our control. For example, one of the tasks from another forum was to become a non-animal being. When I actively pursue lucidity, it is to do that sort of thing.

In one dream I became lucid, I attempted to turn myself into fire. In other’s I wanted to see what would happen if I walked through a mirror. So control is part of it in that aspect, but my goal is to try things that I couldn’t normally do but as I mentioned above, I prefer to follow the dream to lucidity often slips away from me.

The downside to that is that when I want to do something, when lucidity comes I often forget and follow the dream. :peek:

You’re right that self control IS control. But I make a difference between dream control and self control in a dream. It depends a little on what you do. Basically, anything you can do in real life, I say, is not dream control, it’s just opportunistic. And if the dream gives no resistance, you don’t have to “bend the rules” so to speak. But changing the scenery and all that, is definately dream control. However if the dream already grants you powers, such as flight, or a remote control that changes the weather, AS the case might be with DILDs, Then you are just going along with the dream, not controling it. That’s how I see it.
If you ask if lucid dreaming is the desire for SELF control, then I say yes perhaps, if what you hope to get out of the dream is the control itself. For me it is not the control itself that is the attraction but what I can experience using it. The experience is the point, of everything in life, I believe.

my best lucid dreams have been when i walked around exploring not trying to control anything

just seeing where my mind wants to take me, and going for walks

i have had some really interesting experiences that way, like traveling into what feels like past lives

one time i was in the past and wanted to see what their beers looked like

let me tell you, the past is weird

my worst and least fulfilling lds are when i seek drugs or sex

do you think you could experience drugs in a dream? …or only what you remember from experience, or what you imagine it would be like?

im really enjoying everyones opinions of LDs :smile:

maybe, but my subconcious makes most of my (lucid) dreams, i don’t like to change the scene much, i just like to go out of a door and then be in a town when i didn’t change anything about it(off course, in those few LD’s that i’ve han i’ve often exerted more power on my dreams because i was interested in my powers in dreams)

not saying i don’t enjoy the feeling of control

Well the main point of LDing other than experience is it’s benefits.
-do whatever a mind can imagine(fun, adventure, explore, do things that aren’t possible in real life)
-practicing real-life skills(jumping from high altitude with no parachute to make sure you’re not afraid of heights)
-creativity and problem solving, learning, personal growth
-overcoming your #1 fear, nightmares
-therapy both for mind and body
-full sense of freedom for anyone disabled(permanent injuries)
-direct connection to the subconsciousness
-telepathy:subconsciousness is WAY much better at telepathy than we are, so it can help you talk to your relatives at alaska or even have a shared lucid dream with someone

It’s the same like asking: What’s the point in playing Video Games?
Desire to control? (Cheats)
Escapism? (RPG’s)
Mental-Rebuilding? (Intelectual and games such as “Cloud”)
Or just pure fun? (NWN2 :razz:)

I agree with most, the point is being able to do things that are
impossible in RL. Which is mad.
xx.

The knowledge that all you see is in your head, that another reality is so easily assessable is pretty mind blowing. Nothing fascinates me more the the mind, what the hell is going on in there!

Yeah, that and among other things, experiencing things that you wouldn’t normally want to do, like fly. It can help you overcome problems you have like public speaking, or you know, living out such fantasies.