A Field Guide To Lucid Dreaming: Mastering The Art Of Oneironautics

A Field Guide To Lucid Dreaming: Mastering The Art Of Oneironautics

Imagine being able to fly. Walk through walls. Shape-shift. Breathe underwater. Conjure loved ones?or total strangers?out of thin air. Imagine experiencing your nighttime dreams with the same awareness you possess right now?fully functioning memory, imagination, and self-awareness. Imagine being able to use this power to be more creative, solve problems, and discover a deep sense of well-being.This is lucid dreaming?the ability to know you are dreaming while you are in a dream, and then consciously explore and change the elements of the dream. A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming, with its evocative retro illustrations, shows exactly how to do it. Written by three avid, experienced lucid dreamers, this manual for the dream world takes the reader from step one?learning how to reconnect with his or her dreams? through the myriad possibilities of what can happen once the dreamer is lucid and an accomplished oneironaut (a word that comes from the Greek oneira, meaning dreams, and nautis, meaning sailor).Readers will learn about the powerful REM sleep stage?a window into lucid dreams. Improve dream recall by keeping a journal. The importance of reality checks, such as ?The Finger??during the day, try to pass your finger through your palm; then, when you actually do it successfully, you?ll know that you?re dreaming. And once you become lucid, how to make the most of it. Every time you dream, you are washing up on the shores of your own inner landscape. Learn to explore a strange and thrilling world with A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming. From Publishers Weekly Three self-professed lucid dreamers take a modern look at oneironautics, or lucid dreaming, in this refreshingly practical guide to controlling dreams. Tuccillo, Zeizel, and Peisel bring a casual, youthful tone to a topic about which much has already been written. In dreams, they note, you can be free of your physical body, leaving behind silly things like gravity. The writers focus on instruction-to encourage lucid dreams, for instance, set your alarm for six hours after bedtime, then wake up and go back to sleep after 20 minutes. The trio broadly covers the cultural history of dreams and the science of sleep, but always returns to the core idea that guiding your dreams is a great adventure, as emphasized by old-fashioned line drawings by Mahendra Singh, featuring travelers discovering new lands and walking through walls. Excerpts from lucid dreamers&' own experiences also add to the text. The variety of material limits the book&'s depth-more neuroscience coverage would be welcome-but it makes for an easy read. (Sept.) Review ?[A] refreshingly practical guide to controlling dreams.? --Publishers Weekly