Meaning of a Dream

Members of our lucid dream forum have recently been asking how to create dream characters while lucid. It's a common issue to call out for or seek a new character only to find they don't show up. And when they do finally appear, they look nothing like the person you were seeking in the first place. So, how to combat this?

Here are a number of techniques from my own research and experience that you can use to summon new lucid dream characters into existence. I'll also show you how to adapt their appearance once they're standing in front of you.

Beyond this, it's important to realize that dream characters (or dream figures) are not merely made-up drones that exist solely for our amusement. They may be purely symbolic, but they may also represent one element of your psyche, or even have greater consciousness than you, dear dreamer.

Dream characters can be a great learning opportunity. So treat them with respect and consider allowing them to portray themselves as they wish, instead of always trying to mold them into the perfect object of affection.

Before attempting to summon a new figure, make sure you increase your lucidity by doing a tactile reality check, reminding yourself that you're dreaming, and making some firm observations about your current environment.

1. Round The Bend
Visualize or expect the character you want to see standing behind you or just around a corner, out of sight. When your expectation is fully ingrained and you can truly sense their presence, turn around or go look around the corner. Bingo!

2. Ask The Dream
Try Robert Waggoner's method of asking the "awareness behind the dream" to do the work for you. This simply means calling out to the dream with your wish. Try "show me my dream guide", "show me myself in 10 years" or even "show me my ultimate fantasy". That way, you're allowing the dreaming subconscious to present what it wants and you wont risk violating dream figures that exist for a whole other purpose.

3. Dream Door
Open a dream door and reach inside, expecting to grab the hand of your intended dream figure and pull them through. This also works using mirrors as liquid portals. Just reach in and expect to find the person you seek. As with most of these methods, your underlying expectation is absolutely key to your successful conjuring.

4. Paint a Picture
Remember Penny Crayon? This one's quite surreal but, then again, that's the nature of the subconscious dreaming mind. Get creative and paint a picture (your hand in the air works fine) of the person you want to meet, however crudely. It's not the motion of your finger-brush but the image you create in your mind that will pop into life!

5. Get Morphing
This is another highly creative way of summoning a dream character into existence. Choose an object, like a wall or a lamp post, or even another person, and sincerely will them to morph into a specific dream figure. I once watched my lucid dream guide peel himself out of a tree this way. It was A-W-E-S-O-M-E to watch.

6. Shaping Up
Finally, if the summoned character looks somehow different from reality, you can ask them to do better. Say "I'm going to look away and when I look back you will look like the closest representation of X my imagination can create." Be warned, the effect may be short lasting if your dream has no interest in humoring you...

Many consciously-created dream characters can be rather fickle. They can unexpectedly become ugly or turn into someone else altogether. It's not their will to look like the person you've molded them into. And it's not the will of the dream either. So they may degrade into perfect strangers pretty fast if you don't invest a lot of conscious effort into their ongoing appearance.

I believe this is the battle that occurs between the conscious mind (let's say, you seeking a gratuitous sexual partner) and the subconscious mind (the awareness behind the dream that is quite separate from your own awareness and agenda).

This is one reason why it's wise to heed experts like Robert Waggoner and allow your dream figures to choose what they want to do and how they interact with you. Because this is the dream world, and when it comes to conscious vs subconscious, the latter always wins in the end.

So, if you really want to put your dream characters to good use, instead of demanding they look different and fulfil your superficial needs, you might want to try asking: "How's things?" "Why are you here?" "Can I help you?" or "Tell me something cool!" When you delve deeper with lucidity you're more likely to be impressed with the result.

For step-by-step tutorials in lucidity, check out The Lucid Dreaming Fast Track, my digital course that shows beginners the fastest way to lucid dreams.

Is it possible to create original music during a lucid dream? Yes, it certainly is. Not necessarily more possible than while you're awake, but definitely possible.

I know this because I've managed to create music while dreaming, on multiple occasions. Music that has been described by random YouTube users as ‘fantastic', ‘great' and even ‘awesome'. How did I do it? Can you do it too? Yes to the latter and the former will be explained post haste.

One night, a few years ago, I was making an introductory video for this website. The video needed a musical soundtrack that would be simple and unobtrusive, yet tuneful and hopefully pleasant. At risk of sounding vain, I admit that I am very vain. Especially when it comes to my music. So I decided that I would make a bone-rattlingly good tune that would nicely fit the fantastical lucid dreaming video.

I put together four chords that I've always liked and started creating a song. It started nicely enough, but nothing was clicking. I kept repeating the chords in the hope that my brain would autopilot its way to something decent, but no such luck. I was tired, it was late, so I went to bed and subsequently to sleep.

Now! We've all done that thing where our brains replay the last song we heard on persistent auto-repeat. Yes? And we've all done that thing where we spend some time doing a repetitive activity in the evening, then when we go to sleep we dream about doing the same activity. I dreamed about playing the four chords over and over. I was not lucid at this stage. To the hazy recollection of my repeatedly impact-damaged brain, I spent the rest of the night dreaming about random other things, probably such as flying carpets, mountain climbing, waterfalls and swimming.

In the early morning, probably an hour or two before I woke, I realized I was dreaming. Those chords were still playing on my brain's one-song-on-an-endless-loop (TM) radio station. Being lucid, I wiped out everything and stood in the clouds. I constructed a huge piano out of light and started conducting it. I say conducting rather than playing, because I didn't have to touch the piano to make it play. I was waving my fingers at it like a wizard. Every time I played a key, that note would send light up into the sky.

I played the four chords with my left hand and the music became louder and warmer. Then I started playing the other parts of the song. This continued for at least twenty minutes. My mood lifted with the pace of the music. Drums joined in out of nowhere. A soft bass hummed underneath us and buzzed in elation at the end of each bar. I made fills and solos and flourishes. It was awesome. But I wasn't trying to remember any of it, I was just enjoying conjuring my lucid dream song.

I woke up some time later and thought about the song I had played in my sleep. I hopped on my piano and tried to work out how I was playing the song. After I had worked out the gist of the note patterns, I got on my computer's piano and made an attempt to record what I remembered from the song. Let me tell you, most of that amazing lucid dream song is lost forever. The complexity of it was too great to remember.

The parts I did remember (and some that I embellished) went into the final recording of the track Lucid (click to listen). So far, Lucid is my most successful and popular song. I've sold upwards of fifty copies over the internet, which I don't have to tell you is a pretty big deal. I was even forced to make myself my own Grammy award for best song written while asleep.

Another attempt at a lucid dream song was my more recent piano piece Abresolute. Same as the last time - I was in the clouds - but instead of playing a piano of light I was trying to explain the song to a future being, most likely my firstborn child. Pretentious? Moi? Not only that, I wanted to name him Basil, which I still maintain is a perfectly good name.

Pete Casale is a lucid dreamer and musician, among many other things. Listen to his music for free here, including the lucid dream-inspired songs Lucid and Abresolute.

You can hear his latest musical works by subscribing to his YouTube channel or joining his Facebook page. All of his music is free and donations are welcome.