A lucid dream occurs when you become aware that you are dreaming. That is, you become lucid. Lucid dreaming is rare because the brain tends to accept the experience it is having. To the brain, the experience is real, whether it is a dream reality or a conscious reality. Here's my dream from Tuesday morning:
I am about to give a training seminar. All my booklets have been printed. The seminar organizers are helping me put the desks into a circle. The participants will be applicants to medical school, but they have not arrived yet. It is getting time to start and I'm aware that I should review my handouts, but I decide to change first. I'm wearing a long warm dress, but I seem to have a lighter dress that I want to put on. There is a washroom behind the seminar area and I go there. I put on the other dress, and look in the mirror. I notice I have waist-length hair. The dress seems shabby though. I decide to put the long warm dress back on, but when I take off the shabby dress, I find that I am wearing a yellow raincoat underneath it.
In my dream, I see that the raincoat is a clue that I am dreaming. I recall two previous dreams where I am removing clothes, but keep finding more items of clothing underneath.
In my dream, I start yelling, "THIS IS A DREAM!! WAKE UP!!" The dream reality is very strong and wants to pull me back into the dream, but I resist it and I manage to wake myself up with the yelling.
Any other lucid dreamers out there?
----------
As for those dreams of undressing: no matter how much I undress, I just can't get naked. In this dream, I find I am wearing a raincoat underneath my clothes. If I ask the raincoat what it wants, it replies, "I want to protect you."
Am I am covered by layers and layers of defences keeping me from being truly open and vulnerable? The message from the dream unsettled me, and yelling myself awake left me feeling Matrix-y the rest of the day.
