Two men looked out prison bars;
One saw mud, the other stars.
—Anonymous
Naturally, it is often not so obvious which outlook or course of action is best. Life often presents us with complex situations that require difficult decisions. As it happens, lucid dreaming may help us in choosing wisely.
CREATIVE PROBLEM SOLVING
Dreams have long been regarded as a wellspring of inspiration in nearly every field of human endeavor, from literature to science and engineering, from painting to music and sports. Space limits us to presenting only a few of the many available examples, but they should be enough to illustrate the role played by dreams in the creative process.
First, let us consider the case of the Russian chemist, Dmitri Mendeleev, who had been working for years in an effort to discover a way of classifying the elements according to their atomic weights. One night in 1869 the chemist fell into bed exhausted after devoting many long hours in an attempt to solve the problem. Later that night he “saw in a dream a table where all the elements fell into place as required.” upon awakening he immediately wrote down the table just as he remembered it on a piece of paper. Amazingly, Mendeleev reported, “Only in one place did a correction later seem necessary.”[4] Thus the Periodic Table of the elements, a fundamental discovery of modern physics, was first brought forth in a dream.
Jack Nicklaus provides a fascinating example of dream creativity. After winning a number of championships, the professional golfer found himself in an embarrassing slump. After he eventually regained his championship form seemingly overnight, a reporter asked him how he had done it. Nicklaus replied:
I’ve been trying everything to find out what has been wrong. It was getting to the place where I figured a seventy-six was a pretty good round. But last Wednesday night I had a dream and it was about my golf swing. I was hitting them pretty good in the dream and all at once I realized I wasn’t holding the club the way I’ve actually been holding it lately. I’ve been having trouble collapsing my right arm taking the club head away from the ball, but I was doing it perfectly in my sleep. so when I came to the course yesterday morning, I tried it the way I did in my dream and it worked. I shot a sixty-eight yesterday and a sixty-five today and believe me it’s a lot more fun this way. I feel kind of foolish admitting it, but it really happened in a dream. All I had to do was change my grip just a little.[5]
I have seen similar examples of lucid dreams used for problem solving and improvement of performance in athletics, martial arts, and dance. One such report comes from a skater who lucid-dreamed a breakthrough in technique. Tanya writes that she had been a pretty good skater, but felt that something was holding her back. Then one night in a lucid dream, Tanya experienced “complete skating.”
In the dream I was in a rink with a number of other people. We were playing hockey and I was skating in the manner I always had, competent yet hesitant. At that moment I realized I was dreaming so I told myself to allow my higher knowledge to take over my consciousness. I surrendered to the quality of complete skating. Instantly there was no more fear, no more holding back and I was skating like a pro, feeling as free as a bird.
What we learn in lucid dreams usually applies to waking life in some way, and for motor skills, that usually means directly. Tanya reported successful generalization of her dream-learning:
The next time I went skating I decided to experiment and try this surrender technique. I brought back the quality of that dream experience into my wakened state. I remembered how I was feeling during the dream and so in the manner of an actor in a role, I “became” the complete skater once again. so I hit the ice ... and my feet followed my heart. I was free on the ice. That occurred about two and one-half years ago. I’ve skated with that freedom ever since, and this phenomenon has manifested itself in my roller skating and skiing as well.
—T.R., Arlington, Virginia[6]
REHEARSAL AND DECISION MAKING
Closely related to these mental practice dreams are those that serve a rehearsal function. Most readers will probably have experienced instances of the rehearsal function of dreams. By dreaming about a significant, upcoming event in advance, we can try out various approaches, attitudes, and behaviors, perhaps arriving at a more effective course of action than we otherwise would have. We may also be forewarned of certain potential aspects in a future situation that we otherwise would not have imagined or considered.
In 1975, Dr. William C. dement confessed that his “wildest speculation” was “...that REM sleep and dreaming might have evolved to be utilized in the future” and prophesied that “the eventual function of dreaming will be to allow man to experience the many alternatives of the future in the quasi-reality of the dream, and so make a more ‘informed’ choice.” One of Dement’s own dreams provides a striking illustration of how effective this can be:
Some years ago I was a heavy cigarette smoker—up to two packs a day. Then one night I had an exceptionally vivid and realistic dream in which I had inoperable cancer of the lung. I remember as though it were yesterday looking at the ominous shadow in my chest x-ray and realizing that the entire right lung was infiltrated. The subsequent physical examination in which a colleague detected widespread metastases ... was equally vivid. Finally, I experienced the incredible anguish of knowing my life was soon to end, that I would never see my children grow up, and that none of this would have happened if I had quit cigarettes when I first learned of their carcinogenic potential. I will never forget the surprise, joy, and exquisite relief of waking up. I felt I was reborn. Needless to say, the experience was sufficient to induce an immediate cessation of my cigarette habit.[7]
I am happy to report that Dr. Dement is nicotine-free and healthy more than twenty-five years later.
It is clear today that the ecological and political situation of this planet will force upon humanity enormous changes within this coming century. Among the future alternatives are such extremes as have been phrased, “utopia or oblivion.” Certainly the planetary situation is one of unprecedented complexity. And just as certainly, what is needed is unprecedented vision: both to avoid catastrophe and to find the path to a better future. And it is the dream that holds the key to this vision, allowing us, in Dement’s words, “to experience a future alternative as if it were real, and thereby to provide a supremely enlightened motivation to act upon this knowledge.”
Do not forget that we have the freedom to reframe our situation (e.g., mud vs. stars). You have probably heard that the Chinese word for “crisis” is a combination of “danger” and “opportunity.” I believe that we would do well to look at these crucial times optimistically, as the age in which humans finally begin to accept responsibility for their actions as well as their dreams.
That puts us now in an era which in terms of the Judeo-Christian creation myth might be regarded as The eighth day of the Week. According to the tale unrolled in Genesis, after seven days of hard creative work, God rested. As far as the Bible tells us, he may still be napping. Maybe even—as Hindu theology would have it—Vishnu the Creator is dreaming. So it looks as if it is our turn at the wheel.
WISH FULFILLMENT
"Pleasant dreams!"
Thus we bid each other goodnight. however, according to various surveys, the average dream is unpleasant. That average, of course, is of nonlucid dreams. As for lucid dreams, the opposite appears to be the case, with the typical emotional valence being unmistakably positive. Many lucid dreamers have remarked on the emotionally rewarding nature of the experience. The lucid dreamer is free to act out impulses that might be impossible in the waking state. Patricia Garfield, in Pathway to Ecstasy, has gone so far as to propose that lucid dreams are intrinsically orgasmic. She further speculates that during lucid dreaming the reward or “ecstatic” centers of the brain are being stimulated. This rather fantastic notion may actually find support given evidence linking the neural circuits of REM or paradoxical sleep with the brain’s “reward” system.[8] It may be
that in certain circumstances lucid dreaming intensifies activity in this intrinsically rewarding system. Whatever the neurophysiological case, lucid dreams are pleasurable experiences.
Lucid dreaming could provide the handicapped and otherwise disadvantaged with the nearest thing to fulfilling their impossible dreams. Paralytics could walk again in their lucid dreams, to say nothing of dancing and flying, and even emotionally fulfilling erotic fantasies. Thus sings the contralto in Handel’s Messiah:
Then shall the eyes of the blind be opened,
and the ears of the deaf unstopped.
Then shall the lame man leap as an hart, and
the tongue of the dumb shall sing!
LETTING GO: FINISHING UNFINISHED BUSINESS
Resolving difficulties in lucid dreams can help you achieve greater emotional balance and ability to cope with life's troubles. It may help you solve problems of which you were not conscious but that, nonetheless, were limiting your happiness. But lucid dreaming can also be used purposely to address specific difficulties that people are very much aware of. Personal relationships can be the source of some of the most trying problems people face. In many cases, we cannot work through the difficulty with the person involved, and have to deal with it on our own.
When an important relationship ends, people often find that they are left with unresolved issues that cause anxiety and possibly even strain later relationships. In waking life, it is impossible to say those things you never said to your father before he died. And, in waking life, it is often impractical to track down a former mate and work through unresolved issues.
In lucid dreams, however, it is possible to achieve resolution, even if no such possibility exists in the physical world. The absent partner might not be physically present, but he/she can seem phenomenally present. This is enough, since it is your own inner conflicts that you need to settle. dreams do not raise the dead. But lucid-dream encounters with the dead can appear real enough to allow us to feel we are with them once more, and that they live on in our hearts, as in the following account:
My father died of cancer this summer, and I had a long series of dreams in which I was aware that I was dreaming, and insisted that I didn’t want to wake up because I was talking to my father, telling him once more that I love him, but he’d insist that I wake up and accept that he was fine and had to go off on his long journey. In a dream I finally saw him off at the station and was relieved that he’d made the train: he’d delayed so long in saying goodbye that he’d almost missed his connections to go off on his wonderful vacation. That was the last dream in the series.
—Letter to author from C.M. of Framingham, Massachusetts
As Rumi’s epitaph reminds us: “When we are dead, seek not our tomb in the earth, but find it in the hearts of men.”
Lucid Dream Work From Nightmares to Wholeness
***
I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space, were it not that I have bad dreams.
—SHAKESPEARE
There are no bad dreams.
—BUDDHA
***
WHAT ARE NIGHTMARES?
Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary defines nightmares as “frightful or oppressive dreams, from which one wakes after extreme anxiety, in a troubled state of mind.” To say that nightmares are “bad dreams” seems an understatement, little more controversial than asserting, say, that the devil is evil. After all, nightmares can be among the most terrifying of experiences. Whatever horrors you personally believe to be the worst things that could happen—these are precisely the most likely subjects of your nightmares.
All people, in every age and culture, have suffered from these terrors of the night. People’s understanding of the origins of nightmares have varied as much as their understanding of dreams. To some cultures, nightmares were the true experiences of the soul as it wandered another world while the body slept. To others, they were the result of the visitation of demons. nocturnal experiences, which all but the most skeptical in medieval times would have considered the perverse visitations of demons, might now be interpreted as the equally perverse abductions and “medical” examinations by aliens.
In Western culture today, most people are content to say of nightmares that they are “only dreams,” meaning they are imaginary, meaningless, and worthless. That again understates how most of us feel about nightmares; certainly most of us would happily do without the experience.
Not to put too fine a point on it, I believe that this traditional view of nightmares is simply wrong. Yes, nightmares are frightening. But that does not mean they are bad or meaningless, or without positive value. On the contrary, nightmares contain a great deal of potential energy that can provide the impulse for psychological development. Reframing nightmares as opportunities for growth is an important key to learning from your dreams. With a flexible and lucid approach to life, there are no bad dreams.
One of Gary Larson’s The Far Side cartoons delightfully illustrates this creative approach to experience. Two old ladies behind their locked front door are peering out the window at a “monster from the Id” standing on their doorstep. The wiser of the two ladies says, “Calm down, Edna ... Yes, it’s some giant hideous insect ... but it could be some giant hideous insect in need of help.”[1]
SELF-INTEGRATION, WHOLENESS. AND HEALTH TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR YOUR "DREAMLIFE"
In dreams begin responsibilities.
—W.B. Yeats
Homo sum; humani nil a me alienum puto.
(I am a man; so nothing human is alien to me.)
—Terence, Heautontimoroumenos
Since health means increased wholeness, psychological growth often requires the reintegration of neglected or rejected aspects of the personality, and this can be consciously and deliberately achieved through the symbolic encounters of lucid dreaming. The content of a healing dream often takes the form of an integration or union of images. The self-image (or ego) is often unified with elements of what Carl Jung called the “Shadow.”
For simplicity, let us divide our personalities into two parts. On one side, we put all of the characteristics we find agreeable and “good.” The aggregate of this part of our self forms the self-representation or ego. On the other side, we put all those traits and qualities we consider “bad” or dislike in ourselves and consciously or unconsciously wish to deny. We disown them by projecting them on the mental image of an “other”—the Shadow. note that the Shadowless self-representation is by design (whether consciously or not) incomplete. According to Jung, when the ego reintegrates, or accepts aspects of the Shadow as parts of itself, it moves toward wholeness and healthy psychological functioning.
Ernest Rossi has proposed that integration, whereby the synthesis of separate psychological structures forms a more comprehensive personality, is a major function of dreaming.[2] human beings are complex multileveled biopsychosocial systems. Our psyches (the “psycho” level of our system) have many different aspects or subsystems; these different components may or may not be in harmony. Achieving wholeness requires reconciling, or integrating all aspects of one’s personality. According to Rossi, integration is the primary means by which personality growth takes place:
In dreams we witness something more than mere wishes; we experience dramas reflecting our psychological state and the process of change taking place in it. Dreams are a laboratory for experimenting with changes in our psychic life ... This constructive or synthetic approach to dreams can be clearly stated: Dreaming is an endogenous process of psychological growth, change, and transformation.[3]
Lucidity can greatly facilitate this process. Lucid dreamers can deliberately identify with and accept, and thereby symbolically integrate, parts of their personalities they had previously rejected or disowned. The stones once rejected by the builder of the ego can then form the new foundation of wholeness. In the same vein, the poet Rainer Maria Rilke surmised, “Perhaps everything that frightens us is, in its deepest essence, some
thing helpless that wants our love.”[4] In Jung’s view the presence of shadow figures in dreams indicates that the ego model of the self is incomplete. When the ego intentionally accepts the Shadow, it moves toward wholeness and healthy psychological functioning.
The result of failing to accept the shadow aspects of one’s personality is illustrated by some of the horrors that plagued Frederik van Eeden’s dream life. In the same survey of his dreams in which he coined the term “lucid dream,” van Eeden wrote, “In a perfect instance of the lucid dream I float through immensely wide landscapes, with a clear blue, sunny sky, and a feeling of deep bliss and gratitude, which I feel impelled to express by eloquent words of thankfulness and piety.”[5] Unfortunately, van Eeden tells us, these beautiful and pious lucid dreams were frequently followed by “demon-dreams,” in which he was mocked, harassed, and threatened by what he believed were “intelligent beings of a very low moral order.”[6]
Where did these demonic dreams come from? Jung would have probably considered van Eeden’s demon-dreams as an example of compensation, striving to correct the mental imbalance produced by his ego’s sense of self-righteousness and inflated piety. Friedrich Nietzsche would probably have responded more aphoristically: “If a tree grows up to heaven, its roots reach down to hell.” Freud’s view was equally clear: “Obviously one must hold oneself responsible for the evil impulses of one’s dreams. In what other way can one deal with them? unless the content of the dream rightly understood is inspired by alien spirits, it is part of my own being.”
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