This takes us deeper into the question of where our thoughts and ability to control both the internal and external come from. Does the multiple discovery theory further the concept of the collective unconscious, or is it just another spooky coincidence?
Controlling Your Dreams: The Concept of Lucid Dreaming
As we move forward in our exploration of the various degrees of consciousness it should be noted that most of the experiences discussed up to this point have been outside of our conscious control. Intuition, synchronicity, telepathy, and many other psychic phenomena are not usually within one’s ability to manipulate individually. Rather, they are fluke occurrences that are usually unplanned, or unintentional. Therefore, it is important to bring up a topic that is within our control to some degree; one that is by definition a conscious dream, otherwise known as lucid dreaming.
Lucid dreaming is something researchers have studied for years and which has been used as a tool for self-exploration for much longer. Lucid dreaming occurs during sleep, when the dreamer becomes aware of the fact they are dreaming. In terms of the dream, he or she realizes the events surrounding the dream are in fact not waking reality, which requires heightened awareness of their own conscious state. Once you become lucid in the dream, it can be incredibly hard to not “wake up”.
However, practitioners of lucid dreaming, report that by staying asleep (by not getting too excited) you can actually control your dreams. This involves activities such as being able to fly, going to places just by thinking about them, moving objects through thought, and otherwise controlling all other aspects of the dream and the dream environment. The ability to manipulate consciousness in this way, means that we may have more ability in terms of supernatural phenomena than we previously thought. In some instances, reports of finding answers to problems, solutions to future events, and working through past traumas are all possible by being committed to learning how to lucid dream. This is important to our understanding of how we process our own self-discovery, in relationship to the world around us. If theories such as telepathy, intuition, and synchronicity are correct, then we may have more chances for knowing the future and increasing our awareness than we (societally) currently believe.
However, the question we must ask ourselves is: are we totally in control? And if not, what outside forces are we to look to for the answer to this question?
Letting Go of Control: Near Death Experiences
One of the most incredible reported altered states of consciousness are known as Near Death Experiences. These experiences are well-documented and have been the subject of popular movies, books, television interviews, and research. People who experience an NDE are typically transported to an alternative level of consciousness. Some are able to perceive everything in a very dream-like way. They report hovering above their body, going to an afterlife, or spending time with long deceased friends or relatives. One of the most interesting things about NDE’s is that despite hundreds of reported incidents, the same general story permeates many of the accounts.