A regular practice of meditating can be beneficial to both a lucid dream induction program and to your waking life in general. Meditation is not a religion. The literal definition of meditation is to think or ponder about something. Usually, the word is used to describe the act of single-point thinking, where an attempt is made to pay attention to one thing, and one thing only. There are as many ways to meditate as there are ways to think. For our purposes here, let's discuss how to use single-point Attention to benefit our waking and dreaming minds.
The practice of meditation is tied to the concept of consciousness. Without dwelling too much on this point, let me say that consciousness is a tricky concept and to make the idea graspable we will say that it is "that part of the mind which we are living in, in the moment." Most of the processes in the mind - trillions of chemical actions per second - are not available to conscious perception. There is an Observer aspect to the mind which creates an impression of Awareness, and this phenomenological impression comprises a relatively small amount of all of the computations actually being processed by your nervous system. But this Observer is very special and its powers are a main feature that distinguishes humans from all other organisms. It doesn't make us better, but it certainly makes us different. |
The Observer aspect of the mind has to share mental real estate with both our goals and the immediate demands from the environment (including our internal environment). Not only are the environmental demands constantly vying for our attention and reaction, but even our goals and intentions are often in conflict with one another. All of this makes for a very busy mental landscape. Consciousness is probably an evolutionary adaptation to deal with complex cognitive conflicts. We could imagine a robot with an artificial intelligence whom is not actually "conscious" in the way we are, but at some point of complexity where the computational processing requires choosing between "x" amount of conflicting signals it may be the case that a phenomenological awareness of the mind is necessary. The mind observing the mind. Whatever the reason for having this Observer quality, it does not exist in a vacuum and is constantly being compelled to pay attention to an endless stream of threats or desires or seemingly interesting information. Because of the overwhelming number of candidates for our attention, it may seem easier to be constantly reactive than to hold steadfast onto a goal.
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But we all know that it is worth our while to set some goals and work towards them until accomplished (actually, the chasing part is often-times funner than the reaching part). Even if the world seems hell-bent on stopping us. Perseverance is its own reward. Persevering does not mean that we should always be rigid in our approach, rather, it is about dedication to a goal even if we must overcome blockades and tsunamis. Grit is persevering over a length of time even when heavy challenges stand in our way. But how can we display our grittiness when life is so hard? How can we even remember what it is we were after in the first place when it seems so far away and all these unexpected events keep piling up? Well, one time-tested technique to develop our volition, our will-power, our awareness of what we really want and the means to get it is...Meditation.
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For starters, meditation as an exercise for strengthening will-power and "re-setting" the mind can be summed up quickly. Actually engaging in the practice can be challenging (hint: that's why it's worth doing).
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What's the Point?
Correct! The point of this is to develop a single-point of attention. For one thing, the waking mind normally does not have the opportunity to just Observe without chasing after this and that distraction. By practicing placing all of your attentive resources on a single objective the entire cortical brain (your outer-most section) can synchronize as one harmonious unit. This is gratifying and replenishing. Over time, with practice, it becomes easier to reach a highly-synchronized state. The mind re-wires and learns how operate as a team, rather than as a myriad of conflicting forces. When you begin to meditate, to quiet the mind, you may find that upsetting thoughts keep trying to creep into your consciousness. Guess what - these thoughts are probably always there, underneath your conscious threshold (sub-liminal), and by stilling the surface waters you can see these subconscious influencers. While meditating and diligently bringing awareness back to the breath every time these thoughts surface, you are actually building mastery over your deeper concerns and instead of reacting by fear or trying to push these concerns back "down," you simply return to deep breathing and learn how to be in control of the moment. And check this out: Because dreams are often-times ancient threat-rehearsal scripts triggered by waking-stress, a practice like meditation can teach us how to stop acting re-actively to fears and instead enter into a mind-state of resourcefulness. There are other flavors of meditation practice, such as repeating a phrase or word over and over or dwelling on a single problem and listening to what solutions may arise. I urge you to begin with simply watching the breath. Not only is this practice tremendous for building your waking will-power and concentration (not to mention creativity), but is has long been known that regular practitioners of meditation have more spontaneous lucid dreams than the regular population. Just imagine if a meditation practice is combined with other powerful lucid dream induction techniques like dream journaling, dream nootropics, the Wake-Back-to-Bed method, etc. By learning how to return to a single objective despite even convincing hallucinatory intrusions, the skill of lucid dreaming is naturally bolstered. |