Looking for an Escape: Observing the Patterns of My Inner Dialogue

Over the past few months, I’ve been trying my best to take a step back and observe my mind as it runs wild. Now I’m desperate for it to stop, and my dreams are too!

The other night I was lucid in my dream...

In this particular dream, I pulled a woman to the side and said: “tell me something I need to hear!”

— a practice I always follow when I’m lucid. The woman tells me: “you need to stop talking,” and I know exactly what motivated her to say that. Moments before approaching the woman I had told myself to slow down my thoughts so I could remain as lucid as possible. That thought was motivated not long before I entered this dream as I laid in bed awake while my mind filled itself full of useless thoughts. These thoughts felt important at the time, as they usually do, but were backed only by emotion and certainly weren’t helping me to fall back asleep. I decided to use this opportunity to turn my train of thoughts into a meditative practice. Each time a thought aroused, I would reassure my mind that I’d tend to it later. This simple practice allowed me to take a step back and observe my inner dialogue objectively, and eventually, allowed me to fall into a deep sleep where I was able to enjoy a longer period of vivid dreaming.

If you are interested in becoming lucid in your dreams but aren’t sure how, try meditating before bed. This can be especially useful if you wake up in the middle of the night and can’t get back to sleep, like me. This technique rarely fails me and gets better the more I practice it.

Not sure how to meditate, or looking for a different technique than what you’re used to?

Try this instead:

Lay in bed and carefully go through the alphabet one letter at a time. For each letter, think of a corresponding image (the first image that comes to mind), allowing each image to build a story off the next. This technique tricks the brain into thinking you're dreaming, and before you know it, you’ll be fast asleep!

Happy Dreaming!