lucid dream girl

Lucid Dreaming and Buddhism

Lucid dreams a nightmare for the soul?

So I went out for dinner the other night with a friend who’s big into Buddhism and I told her all about my renewed focus on lucid dreaming.

I thought she would be really interested but to my surprise, she was horrified — like I’d told her I’d been drinking the blood of virgins to achieve eternal youth. She said if I didn’t stop my lucid dreaming efforts immediately I would never be able to achieve any kind of “true” spiritual enlightenment.

… Say what now?

My friend’s position was this: Since lucid dreaming is exploration in the realm of the self it encourages the practitioner to focus on all the selfish desires and motivations that stand in the way of true Enlightenment.

She says that Enlightenment only comes when we learn how to silence the jabbering voices in our mind and look beyond our own egos to the greater consciousness that informs reality. (Or something like that… I don’t know a whole lot about Buddhism beyond Siddhartha getting whacked with the Enlightenment stick under the Bodhi tree.)

I argued that lucid dreaming can be a useful tool because it us to open doors in our consciousness and train ourselves to be more aware and more fully exist in the moment — even if that moment is in a dream, the ability carries through to waking life, as well.

… And since Buddhism is apparently so big on living fully the present moment, lucid dreaming could only be positive, yes?

But she said that no matter how many doorways you open in your consciousness, you’re still trapped there — in your individual consciousness — and you’ll never get “out of the box” to experience true Enlightenment.

After that, I started to do some research — and lo and behold, I discovered there’s actually a really strong connection between lucid dreaming and Buddhism. I’ll write more about this in future posts but for now, here are some cool sites to check out if you’re interested:

Lucid Dreaming and Meditation

A Buddhist Perspective on Lucid Dreaming

Lucid Dreaming: Mobilizing the Creativity of the Unconscious

Cool stuff! I’m relieved to know that lucid dreaming will help me as I try to lead a more spiritual and compassionate life.

… Now if only I could find a darned Bodhi Tree.