Can Lucid Dreaming be Used for Psychotherapy?
Dreams, particularly non-lucid dreams, have been an important part of the Freudian and Neo-Freudian flavor of talk therapy since the genesis of these health modalities. I am of the opinion that Freud and his followers had most of the "why do we dream" and "what do dreams mean" questions wrong, but dreaming is still a rich source of information about a person's psyche.
Without a clear understanding of what dreaming was adapted for, in a psychological-evolutionary sense, most analysis of dream content will be incomplete. Regardless, consider this: It is well known that in dreams we have the capacity for much looser analogies/metaphors and the bubbling-up of old, buried memories. With that said, confabulation (false memories) also run rampant in dreams. But what I suggest is that when lucid, we could ask our own psyche for novel approaches to solve or at least explore our unwanted habits and our desired future goals. Not only can we peer inside our mind with a rarely-glimpsed clarity while lucid in dreams, we can also perform feats like flying over incredibly beautiful landscapes in impossible skies and reap the benefits of experiencing unparalleled bliss. The happiness that can accompany a lucid dream, both during and sometimes for weeks afterward, can surely have a beneficial impact on mental health. These issues need to be examined further by larger groups of people to see to what extent we can harness the powers of an awake-sleeping-mind. |