All language subtitles for Conscious Dreaming (2013) [1080p] [Documentary]

Conscious Dreaming

For as long as we've been
able to talk about our dreams,

we've been fascinated by
them and try to understand them.

Within us, we have
this inbuilt virtual reality.

We don't have to make it up.

We don't have to invent it.

It's there already.

Even though strange
and impossible things

often happen in dreams,

we usually realize it was a
dream only after waking up.

Many people will have
experienced this at some point

and realize it was a dream

and then they will have
woken up straight away.

However, it is possible to learn, to
become aware that you are dreaming

and start controlling the events.

These dreams are called lucid dreams

and the experience is like
waking up in your dream.

A lucid dream is
when you become

aware of the fact that
you are the dreamer

during the dream and you
can actually vocalize that

to yourself intellectually.

But the odd thing
about that is, it

tends to go along
with both the feeling of,

oh, now I am aware in my dream

or I've woken up in my dream.

And also it goes along
with a sense of

control, that I can control my dream.

It's much more than
a vivid dream 'cause

we all know what
vivid dreams are like,

but there's another element
and that is

that you are fully aware
that you are in a dream.

Everything's sort of solid.

My God, this is a dream.

It's an incredible situation.

Lucid dreaming itself
as a form of mind training

goes a bit deeper.

That is using the canvas

or the platform of
the lucid dream

to gain insight and
access to levels of mind

which in the waking state
are often inaccessible.

- The only limit is your imagination.

So whatever you can imagine
you can do, you can pretty much do.

In order to find out
more about different

techniques of becoming
a lucid dreamer

and the challenges faced
along the way for beginners,

three individuals have been
selected and given different methods

of trying to achieve
their first lucid dream.

To ensure that the results are accurate
representations of the techniques,

each of the candidates were
chosen with a consistent demographic.

The first candidate to pursue
their lucid dream is Melanie Hindle.

- My name is Melanie and I'm 26 years old.

I like to socialize, obviously,

like most young people do.

And I like to travel mainly.

That's like my, probably one
of my main passions really.

I've always been a keen traveler.

- Melanie will be using
meditation as a way

of becoming more
aware in her waking life

and will soon be meeting
with a meditation teacher.

Meditation is regarded
as one of the most effective

and important methods
for inducing lucid dreaming.

- Okay, so it was my friend Patricia
who first told me about lucid dreaming

just a couple of years ago, I think.

And I was a bit cynical
about it at first,

but I did some reading into it

and then I realized that it's
actually not as uncommon

as I thought it was.

So I took an interest in it from there.

It would be amazing.

It would be amazing
to be conscious

in your dream and
to be able to control it

the direction that you'd like it to go.

When I was a student,
it was really impossible

to talk about lucid dreaming
within a scientific context.

People then would say, "Oh, well, it's just

people are lying or they're
inventing it and it isn't really true."

There's been generally
very little research

for lucid dreaming because I
would say funding difficulties.

Who's gonna fund a
study when we can't

see a good solid
monetary outcome for it?

It seems like the path
of lucid dreaming

may follow a similar path
to that of clinical hypnosis.

In that right now,
we've got a lot of

neuroscientific evidence
around lucid dreaming,

a lot of psychological evidence.

Around the benefits of lucid dreaming.

And yet still, there's no such thing

as a registered
lucid dream therapist,

but there could be.

Lucid dreaming was
first scientifically verified

in the early 70s
by Keith Hearn

at Hull University in the UK.

It occurs to me one
day, "Oh, wait a minute.

This is called rapid eye movement sleep.

Although there's this profound
paralysis, the eyes are not inhibited."

So I set up an experiment
with a lucid dreamer,

a frequent lucid dreamer in a sleep lab.

I'd previously told the
subject before sleep,

"Look, when you become
aware you're dreaming,

I want you to make some
regular left-right eye movements."

These had come out in the chart record.

I watched with great interest,
and then suddenly

a sequence of signals,

left-right eye movements,
and there they were.

Absolutely amazing.

Consider the philosophy of this.

There's the subject, unconscious,

in his own sort
of parallel universe

of dreams, and yet

knowing that,
"Oh, I've got to

signal to that other
universe in which I am."

And it was like getting
signals from another planet.

It was utterly staggering.

- Amy Thompson will be the second
individual to attempt lucid dreaming

over the course of the coming months.

She will be focusing on using the
traditional lucid dreaming techniques,

such as reality testing and
wake-back-to-bed methods.

- I've lived in my wee village, Banton,

for all my life now.

I've grown up there,

and I've had horses
for all my life as well.

I started maybe when
I was about eight.

It's a good hobby to get into,

although it is an expensive one.

I've never heard about
lucid dreaming before.

Before, obviously I'd understood
about all the different things you can do

and how you can
control your dreams

and be able to see and touch
and do what you want.

That was one of the first
reasons I got interested into it.

In a few weeks, Amy will be
meeting with Carolyn McCready,

a lucid dreaming teacher
who will go through

the techniques of
inducing lucid dreaming

and help Amy in practicing the
techniques which suit her best.

- I think it'd be very exciting to hear

from an expert's point of
view what lucid dreaming is.

I'm really excited to hear about her dreams

and her stories and about
all the different people

she's met, and I'm
really confident that

maybe not straight afterwards

I'll have a lucid dream,
but hopefully

if I just keep working
on it, then I will

I will experience my first one.

Can anybody learn to lucid dream?

Yes, in my experience.

I mean, I haven't been teaching
long, like four or five years,

but I'm yet to find
somebody who can't do it.

There is no equipment you
need to buy to lucid dream.

Whether you sleep in a gutter or a palace,

you can lucid dream.

Don't have to be Buddhist

Don't have to be atheist

Don't have to be Christian

Don't have to be anything

All you have to be
is asleep.

I think some people are

maybe more naturally
adapted to it than others.

Like a language or,

you know, some people are
better at math than others.

It's that kind of thing, but
I think everyone can do it.

Some people get lucid the first night

after coming to like a half
hour talk at a music festival.

One dude, it took him like a year,

and he was coming to everything.

He was coming to like every
talk, every workshop,

every retreat, and I was like

wanting to give him
his money back.

I was like, "Oh, sorry, dude."

But eventually even he had
his lucid dream.

So everyone can learn how to do it.

- The third and final person
to take part is Katie Riley,

who will be using modern technology,

which is designed to help
her in lucid dreaming practice.

- My name's Katie Riley.

I'm 20 years old, and I'm
from the Scottish Borders.

From a young age, I
wanted to be in theater.

I enjoyed, well, dancing mostly first,

and then I got into singing
when I was at school.

I played piano from a young age as well.

I haven't heard of lucid dreaming.

I mean, I might've
heard of it, but it's

definitely nothing
I've ever known about

or looked into at all.

I think things like
that would sometimes,

I wouldn't believe
in stuff like that,

but actually looking into it, it's made
me more interested about actually

what you can do and what can happen.

Recently, lucid dreaming technology
has become more accessible

thanks to the rapid
increase in iPhone apps

and more affordable
lucid dreaming masks.

Katie will be testing
both the iPhone apps

and a mask to see if
these new waveforms

of inducing lucid dreaming are beneficial.

Before each of the candidates
pursue their individual methods,

Melanie, Amy, and Katie
have arranged to meet

in order to discuss what
they would like to gain

from the experience
if they were successful

in achieving a lucid dream.

That's exactly what I was gonna say.

I'm terrified of heights though.

But because if you're lucid dreaming,

you'll be able to get over that fear

because you won't be scared
be cause you'll be like,

ah, I know I'm dreaming,

and so I'm not gonna be scared of that.

I think that would be
the best thing as well.

I think interest and things like that,

like magic stuff like flying
and everything like that.

Yeah, I want to solve
problems definitely

in my day-to-day
life 'cause again,

I read in a book that
you can ask questions.

So once you realize you're dreaming,

you can go, well, what am I
gonna do about this situation?

Because I think my
subconscious would

definitely have
something to say about it.

Which one of you do you think
would be the most likely one to get one?

I think Mel. I think Mel.

Yeah. I think Mel.

It feels wonderfully
free to be in a lucid dream.

Here I am in this amazing world

that's all kind of strange
and dreamlike

that I can change, flow
through, manipulate.

It's a lovely, free feeling.

Normally, when a person
becomes lucid,

they do so because they notice

some incredible incongruity
in the dream.

Like you see someone who's dead.

You're like, wait a
minute, this is so weird.

This is all fake.

Everything seems solid, but paradoxically,

you can push your hand
through a wall,

a door, anything.

The best way I can
describe it is probably

from a film that
I've seen recently.

It was the race of the Planet of the Apes.

When the apes were sort of in
the cages and someone

gave them this chemical.

In the morning, they woke up.

They looked at the hands.

They looked at each other
and they're like, oh my God,

I know that this is me
and I'm aware of myself.

And this is almost how it
feels in the lucid dream.

It's an amazing thing.

But beyond that is so much
more as well.

I mean, consciousness is something
that modern science can't explain.

And this is a firsthand way

to kind of explore your own consciousness

and maybe the greater
consciousness as well.

In my first lucid dream,

I was walking along
a beach.

It was just an ordinary, vivid dream.

It seemed to be the south of France.

Everything was perfect.

Then I suddenly saw
some coins on the

beach and it seemed
to be like a gold coin,

about that big.

So wait a minute, this is a dream.

This is a lucid dream.

Now, for purely scientific purposes,

I decided to conjure up a young lady.

So I could talk to her.

So I looked down and
I looked up again.

It had worked because there's
this woman walking towards me.

Anyway, she came up to me and
she said, hello, my name is Jane.

But you know, a
couple of weeks later, I

actually met that girl
and her name was Jane.

I went out with her a
couple of years or so.

So today I'm meeting
with Caroline McKinney

who is a lucid dream expert.

Very excited, but I'm
kind of nervous as well.

So thank you very much
for seeing me today, Caroline.

Now for my talk.

So what I wanted to speak to yourself about

was lucid dreaming.

So if you were to get into
lucid dreaming as a beginner,

what kind of techniques
would you start off using?

So the most important thing,

number one thing is a
dream journal.

And a lot of people
start their dream journal

and then after a
couple of weeks,

they get bored of writing
down all their dreams.

But that's when people
really stop having lucid dreams

is when they let the dream journal slide.

So I can't emphasize
enough, it's really,

really important to
have a dream journal.

One thing you can do
is reality tests

or state tests.

And that's things that are kind
of checking your state of reality.

We are unlikely to recognize
the dream as a dream

because we don't question

this waking reality very much.

We just go along like we
know exactly what's happening.

Most often people
would look at their hands

and they would just check,
am I dreaming right now?

And sometimes you can,
for example, pull your finger.

The idea is that if
you do this

several times during the
day you create a habit.

So in your dream, suddenly
you ask yourself,

oh, am I dreaming right now?

And your finger goes
longer and you realize,

oh my God, I'm actually dreaming right now.

Another technique
which I particularly like

is to write a "C" on your
hand for consciousness,

but it doesn't matter
what you write.

All day long, you look at this thing
written on your hand

again and again

and whenever you see it,
you say, am I conscious now?

And you keep on doing that all day.

And with any luck, then
you'll do it in a dream.

And if you do that first
thing when you wake up,

then quite often you will
find you wake up

into a false awakening and
you can come loose that way.

So it's a really good habit to have

to do some kind of reality
check as soon as you wake up.

A false awakening is where
you dream that you're woken up

and you are absolutely
convinced you are awake.

It's your bedroom, it's all there.

Everything is as it is.

But you might then
go to the bathroom,

cleaning your teeth,
pull the curtains,

and it's not your road outside.

So then you go, ah, and the

shock usually will then wake you up.

But you can get repeated false awakenings.

I once spoke to a woman
when she was at school.

She dreamed that she
thought she'd woken up.

You went down for breakfast,
but then she woke up.

She got on a bus to go to school.

The bell went in school, then she woke up.

This happened half a dozen times.

Now this is the ultimate nightmare

because she said to this day,

"I do not know whether
I'm awake or dreaming.".

That's pretty nightmarish.

Carolyn MacReady
is one in a growing

number of lucid dreaming
teachers in the UK

who hold a monthly
lucid dream group

where people can come
to share their dreams

and gain advice on their practice.

Amy joined the group
for a session in London.

I've actually had a couple of dreams

where I've been interacting
with someone in my life

that I've been having some problems with.

And I was like, I'm in New York.

I want to go to my sister's flat.

And I went into her flat

and I was like,
I want to write her a note.

And I was like, I've got to pin it up
somewhere where she's going to see it.

I literally did that and I
wrote this note just saying,

I really want us to be more
in touch with each other

and things like that, things I want to say.

And I pinned it up in her flat.

And then I came out of it

and I woke up and
I was like,

yeah, she's gotten
that note.

It was just this feeling
of this connection.

We should move on to Amy.

What would you like to
either share or ask?

I do feel like I do have weird dreams.

Job that I currently work at just
now, I've been working as a barmaid.

Usually after that,
when I go back

to my bed, I wake up
kind of, and I feel like,

it's not as if I wake up, I
feel like I'm still dreaming.

Do you actually get
out of bed at any point?

You do, yeah, 'cause I
had this with something I did.

Now I get out of bed
and look for somebody

and then realise, oh
no, they're not here

and go to bed.

Yeah, that's usually, eventually
comes to that point.

But for ages, I'm fighting to part with it.

It's just something where I had a
responsibility and sometimes I can't.

Today, I'm hoping to just
learn more tips

because I know that
meditation is one of

the ways to help you
have a lucid dream.

I think that's gonna be really
good to learn how to do that properly

because I've always liked
the idea of meditation,

but I've just never
really known how to do it.

I've never really got into it.

I've never given it the time of day.

Well, I've been practicing meditation
probably about 17 years now.

I'm quite a lucid dreamer.

I dream every night and
I remember my dreams.

When I teach, I always
start with showing people

how to relax their body.

But we do it seated.

We don't do it lying down
for the obvious reason

that if you're lying
down, you will go to sleep.

And really, teaching you
things that aren't

you relying on a teacher,

but more that you can take
into your normal daily life.

So we'll do a bit of body relaxation first.

So like I said, you'll have to be seated.

So I need you to turn so that
you're actually side onto me

and you're gonna need that
cushion underneath your feet.

All right.

And then I'll ask you to
close your eyes.

And then we'll start with the breath.

Because the breath is the
anchor in any meditation.

Just noticing as you
breathe in and out,

the air coming in and out,

whether you're breathing
in and out of your nose.

Or breathing in your mouth.

I think the key to lucid dreaming

is meditation in essence.

Meditation is something

that we in the Western world

have our own misguided view of.

It's not what people think it is.

That is to say, it's not learning

how to think
and think deeply.

It's the exact opposite.

It's learning not to think.

Some people can
go a whole day

and the whole day almost
goes by like a dream.

You know, they're doing the same job.

They're taking the same commute

and they don't really live that
day in the present moment.

It's very interesting
that people who meditate.

Say they have lucid dreams more often.

And this is not just an anecdotal thing.

There is actually evidence that
increasing meditation

increases lucid dream.

And you can open your eyes
when you feel you want to.

Have a stop.

Have a wee drink of water.

Oh my God.

- You okay?
- Yeah.

- Whoa.

That was amazing.

Today, Katie is
researching information

about the different
lucid dreaming devices

which are available to the public.

- Yeah, so for the
past few days, I've been

looking at apps to do
with lucid dreaming.

One is called DreamOn.

DreamOn is a very straightforward idea.

It's an app that aims to
influence your dreams.

So before you go to bed,

you indicate what time
you'd like to wake up

and also what kind of
dream you'd like to have.

Put the iPhone next to you on the bed.

It starts to monitor your movement.

When you are very still, it's an
indication that you're dreaming

and it will quietly play in a soundscape

that matches the sorts of
dreams you want to have.

And the theory is that it
influences your dreams.

Once they have this idea of
their dream being influenced,

some of those dreams become lucid,

that they start to be able
to take control of the dream.

Also, I've been looking at
the Remy mask device as well,

which I'm going to
use to try and see

what happens when
I put it on at night.

There are a lot of
kind of electronic devices

that help you lucid dream
and iPhone apps

and HemiSync CDs and
all these kinds of things.

They're cool

and they can help you
lucid dream.

That's great, but I think they should
be viewed as stabilizers on a bike.

You know, use them until you
know how to cycle on your own

and then you can remove the stabilizers.

One of the weird things
about lucid dreams

is if you read about them or

hear about them or go to
a lecture about them,

it tends to make you have them more often.

We met Caroline and
basically she was just going over

what lucid dreaming is and why she does it.

At first I did think, is this
for just certain people?

Can everyone do it?

After speaking to her, that
did give me the confidence

and the excitement to try this.

So when I had the one-to-one
meditation session,

it just taught me
the sort of basics that

beginners need to
know for meditation.

I wouldn't say I was
cynical before I went,

but it's definitely
made me realize

why people do meditation.

It's really, really helpful.

I'm 99% at the moment that I'll have one.

Is that too high?

Tonight when I go to
bed, I will put it on,

and flick the switch
and see what happens.

I think the motivation
and the intention,

it's a huge part
of lucid dreaming.

Because once you really understand

what benefits you can
get from lucid dreaming,

then you're sending your
unconscious a message

that this is your intention
and you really wanna do it.

Lucid dreams have an
enormous potential for everyone.

We spend a third of our
lives in that space asleep.

So we're active anyway, you're
not resting during dreaming.

So we might as
well make use of that

non-rest time so you
could use lucid dreaming

to just sustain egoistic fantasy,

to engage in like
hedonistic sexual orgies

like I used to do
when I was a teenager.

We also can help
people who are

incarcerated, but if
they can at least escape,

almost literally in
their dreams because

they can be anywhere
doing anything.

People who are paralyzed.

Robert Wagner mentions
a guy who,

within a dream said, "Show me the
most amazing painting "I can paint."

And he saw this amazing
painting, all fully formed.

And he painted that
painting exactly as he saw it.

And as he was painting it, he said it
was as though he'd painted it before.

If you can cure
yourself of a phobia

in a lucid dream, if
you can face a fear,

if you can engage a past trauma

which you were too scared
to engage in the waking state,

if you can do that in the
lucid dream, you'll wake up

and your waking state
will be very different.

You get on the tube,
you see the miserable

looking people
that are sitting there,

but an hour beforehand, they'd all
been flying over the Grand Canyon.

They'd all look rather good, you know?

Because a good dream
can really make your day.

Yeah, people are often worried
that if you do loads of lucid dreaming,

you're gonna get like really
ungrounded, really floaty, hippy, like,

"Oh, where's the dream?

"Where's reality?

"Am I alive?"

It's like rubbish.

The opposite happens.

You know, the unconscious mind
is very happy for us to be lucid.

It wants us there, saying, "Yeah, come on.

"Be conscious.

"Let, you know, listen to
what I've been trying to tell you

"every single night of your life.".

3 Months Later

Because I've kept track
with a dream diary now,

which I never have before,
I've definitely started to realise

that whatever's going on in your
life is reflected in your dreams.

- I've seen a difference in my life.

Like, over the last few months,

I've become more
confident to try new things

and not care about what anyone else thinks.

I used to wake myself up during
the night and believe I was still at work.

But after doing this experiment,

it's actually taken that away.

I do tend to meditate a lot more.

Like, even if I'm like on
the bus on the way home,

sometimes I just
sit there and look out

the window and try
and clear my mind.

That's been really beneficial, like

learning how to do that.

So, unfortunately, I
don't think I've actually

managed to have a lucid dream yet.

I think I've had something
similar to a lucid dream.

The weird thing is I've always, every
time I've been dreaming and I wake up

and I think I forgot to do the test,
but that one time I remembered to do it

and I remember my finger
went through my hand

and then I tried my finger
and my finger went dead long.

Like, I knew I was dreaming,

but the dream was of a
lucid dream.

It's really hard to explain, but I do
think it has opened up a wee doorway.

So, basically, I thought
I'd had a lucid dream

not long ago and I woke up
and I was really excited about it.

So I did some research online, but
it turned out that what had happened

was actually called sleep paralysis,

which is a good sign
because that can help you

it can develop into
a lucid dream.

So, shortly after, it can't
have even been a week past,

the same thing happened
and I had this sleep paralysis.

But because I'd researched
it and understood what it was,

I managed to develop that
into a lucid dream there and then

because I was telling myself,
you're not awake, this isn't happening.

Once I realised,
actually, you're just

dreaming and you're
aware that you're dreaming,

that's how it developed
into the lucid dream.

In my lucid dream, I
ended up flying and

that was amazing
because that's exactly

what I wanted to do.

I flew, man.

What do you guys think
about the idea that this world

where we are just now is some
kind of a dream or an illusion?

I don't believe that our life is all
just a dream, I don't believe that.

I still want to think about it.

Are we all sleeping just
now in another body?

But you might just wake
up and this is a dream.

And then you're like,
"Oh, I dreamt last

night "that we were
at that coffee shop."

I don't think life is
a dream because

I dream and I don't
want to believe it.

Man, I don't know,
now I'm totally confused.

It's a very human thing
to just basically accept

what's in front of your eyes
and believe what you hear.

Some people would say,
"Well, it's all an illusion."

Coming from the lucid
dreaming where everything

seems to be as solid,
as tangible, as real,

I believe it's all a dream.

I agree with that, that's
definitely what I've experienced,

that this is a dream and there's
something bigger than us dreaming us.

Actually, you can't really
say everything is a dream.

It's like saying everything is black,

then you must compare
it to something else,

which is not a dream,
what would that be?

So you can never know for certain,

there's always that
philosophical argument

that everything is
a dream, and so on.

In conclusion, what I would say is.

The only way you would ever
know that you're dreaming

was if you were awake in a dream.

Likewise, right now, this experience,
you'll only ever understand what it is

when you're awake in this experience.

In essence, there's
only the waking up to do.

And once you're awake, you'll know.

You'll know.