How to Stop Nightmares With Lucid Dreaming
Nightmares haunt your mind and spoil your sleep, but lucid dreaming can help if you show courage. Welcome to the last week of the seminar Lifehacker’s Lucid’s Dream Workshop , oneironauts.
Get rid of nightmares by facing them face to face
“Dreamers without awareness are like little children who are still afraid of the dark because they believe that monsters and ghosts are real,”says Stephen LaBerge, Ph.D. But the lucid nightmare is more like an older child who is still afraid of the dark, but knows that there are no monsters or ghosts. The fear is still real, but you know it is stupid fear that you can handle. In fact, sometimes it is enough to just become clear in the nightmare for it to go away. You realize that this is just a nightmare, that he can’t hurt you, and that you are actually safe in bed, so you don’t have to run away from him when you wake up.
If enlightenment isn’t enough, you need to face a nightmare to stop it. Of course, it is not enough just to know that what you fear is not worthy of fear. People who are afraid of public speaking know intellectually that they will not harm if they speak in front of an audience, but the fear persists. It works the same way in your dreams. The only way to overcome this fear is to face it face to face, showing yourself over and over again that this is not what it seems.
So, you must control your fear long enough to find a creative way to completely dissolve the illusion. Here’s an example from one of my early lucid dreaming experiences (although I didn’t know what it was at the time):
When I was about eight years old, I sat up late at night and watched the Children’s Games marathon – horror films with the Chucky doll. After that, I had nightmares for several weeks. However, one night I made a clear decision to take control of the situation. However, this was not by manipulating the dream world, but by reasoning with it (it was my own subconscious). I remembered that Children’s Games is a work of fiction and just a film made to scare people. So I looked at Chucky as he stalked me with a knife and asked, “ What was it like being in a movie? The horror stopped, and Chuckie suddenly showed me the set, explaining how they do all the “movie magic”. After that, I didn’t have any more nightmares about Chucky. Why? Because he was no longer a scary monster, but just an actor who had a job.
Managing a lucid nightmare and simply manipulating it to make it something else won’t help you in the long run. This is the same as running away from something over and over again. You will be safe for the moment, but the fear will persist and the nightmares will continue. You have to accept it, confront it, and appeal to it.
Reasoning based on my own sense of logic was my ticket, but it could be something different for you. Maybe you decide to hug your monster and say, “I love you.” Perhaps you will befriend a demon who decides to persecute you and ask if he can teach you to scare people as well. Or maybe the next time you have a disturbing dream about public speaking, you strip naked and play the trumpet horribly to prove that nothing you do there can actually harm you. Be bold, be creative and change the rules of the game. Remember, this is your dream, not a monster.
Assignment: Share your lucid dreaming experiences.
That’s all for our Lucid Dream Workshop ! Hopefully you’ve been able to explore a little bit of the dream world, or at least get something out of it. If you have any great lucid dreaming stories, we want to read them! Share them in the comments below.
For further reading, check out the book by Stephen LaBerge, Ph.D., ” Exploring the world of lucid dreaming.” and Howard Reingold; Lucid Dreaming: The Gateway to the Inner Self by Robert Wagoner; and Lucid Dreaming Simple and Easy: Tips and Techniques for Understanding, Creativity, and Personal Growth , also by Robert Wagoner and Caroline McCready.
Okay, oneuronauts: sleep well and keep dreaming.