9 Strange Ways to Induce Lucid Dreams That Curl Your Toes

Posted on January 24, 2014 by Sean Kelly in Techniques

When learning how to induce lucid dreams there are lots of methods, but I’m going to give you 9 of the best. Got your toe curlers ready?

Some of these methods to induce lucid dreams might be strange to you, but you know what?

They work.

Later in the post I’ll give you the most important lucid dream induction method of all, so make sure you keep your eyes peeled.

1. Explosively simple reality checks

If you’ve learned a bit about lucid dreaming then you are probably familiar with reality checks, but for those who haven’t…

A reality check is when you stop the hamster wheel of your mind for even just a moment and truly question whether you are awake or dreaming.

A true reality check requires that you stop, truly ask yourself if you are dreaming, and then perform a certain action that will confirm whether you are dreaming or not.

You must perform these reality checks throughout the day if you want to become a lucid dreamer.

One of the better ones is to hold your nose and try to breathe. In a dream you’ll be able to breathe, whereas here in waking life you of course won’t be able to. However, this check works 80-85% of the time.

I teach a method that will work 100% of the time in Lucid Dreaming Mastery. I also give you an exact step-by-step process of performing a proper reality check that can save you months of wasted effort.

Unfortunately most people do reality checks wrong, which means their progress goes very slowly.

When you do reality checks often during the day, you’ll start to do them in your dreams. This will in turn induce lucid dreams because your check will tell you that you are dreaming.

2. Triumphant affirmations that rock your world

Before falling asleep at night and the first moment of waking up in morning are two crucial periods for learning how to induce lucid dreaming.

Before you fall asleep you must focus all your intent on one affirmation: “The next time I dream I’ll realize I’m dreaming.”

Repeat this as you fall asleep. Make sure it is the last thought you have as you drift into sleep.

In order for this to work well, you have to actually feel it. If you repeat it mechanically then it tells your subconscious that you really aren’t interested to induce lucid dreams.

Feel and think this affirmation as you fall asleep.

3. Binaural beating your way to inducing lucid dreams

Still a relatively new technology, lucid dream binaural beats allow you to induce lucid dreams with sound.

They work by entraining your brain into the right frequencies for inducing lucid dreams. One frequency plays in the right ear, another in the left. Your brain takes the difference of these frequencies and entrains to that.

So if I want to entrain my brain to a 21 hertz beta frequency, then I could play 300 in my left ear and 321 in my right.

By using multiple frequencies you can guide your brain into the right state to induce a lucid dream. It’s pretty cool stuff.

See our full article on how to use binaural beats for lucid dreaming.

Sometimes people refer to these binaural beats as lucid dream music. It might be 8 hours long, with nice soothing nature sounds in the background.

4. The science of siestas

Taking a nap??

Seriously?

It can’t be that easy, can it?

Turns out that our normal sleep biorhythms make naps a natural part of our day.

What hidden power lies in our afternoon naps?

We can use these natural biorhythms to induce lucid dreams in a very efficient way.

During naps we normally go straight into REM sleep, which is where most “storyline dreams” occur. The key is that we don’t have to go through deep sleep in order to get into this REM state.

We can go straight into it.

When trying to maintain consciousness what do you think is easier?

Going through the coma-like state of non-REM sleep before starting to dream
Going right from waking into dream-like states

#2. Obviously.

This is called the Wake Back To Bed method, or WBTB. Often this lucidity technique is combined with the wake-initiated lucid dream (WILD) method to allow someone to lucid dream tonight (it can happen).

Using this method you’ll often cross through sleep paralysis, where you’ll see hypnagogic imagery and can experience various fears and intense sensations.

So why go with #2?

People don’t have much success retaining consciousness in comas, and that is exactly the challenge of trying to retain awareness as you going through deep sleep.

It’s an advanced practice and one to strive toward, but for now we are mostly focused on how to wake up inside our dreams. Deep sleep will come later.

5. Magic lucid dreaming devices that do the work for you?

Lucid dreaming devices attempt to induce lucid dreams by sending a signal to the dreamer while they are in the dream.

The dreamer is supposed to recognize the signal coming through the dream and then realize they are dreaming. This basically acts like a dream sign: a sign that you are dreaming.

The most common device is a mask that detects REM sleep, then flashes lights on your eyelids. These lights are supposed to come through in your dreams.

When you see the lights in your dreams you are supposed to realize you are dreaming.

You might have noticed that I said “supposed” to multiple times.

That’s because it’s often not as easy as it’s made to sound.

You actually have to go through a similar process if you learn to lucid dream without one of these devices.

There still needs to be a trigger, a signal. You still must recognize this signal and from that recognition realize you are dreaming.

The lucid dreaming devices help with the first part, the signal, but the second part is still your own work.

6. Supplements…a tricky path

I am usually very wary to recommend people induce lucid dreams using supplements instead of using a proper lucid dream technique.

First, there are all the medical aspects to take into account, and this is something everyone must research or talk to a doctor on their own about.

That being said, I can’t deny that supplements can be used to induce lucid dreams, and I personally have experimented with many of them during my exploration into the lucid dreaming universe.

The two best I found were Calea Zacatechichi and Galanatamine.

Calea Zacatechichi is also known as the “African Dream Herb” and was used by African shamans to explore the dream world.

It can give VERY intense dreams, so make sure you are ready if you take it before bed.

Having these super vivid dreams can truly enhance your dream recall, allowing you to remember your dream in stark detail. This is a good time to get out your dream journal and start writing down your dreams.

Galantamine is an extract from the Red Spider Lilly plant is also a very powerful way to induce lucid dreams.

Unlike Calea, Galantamine is an extract, not a plant (though you can get stronger extracts of Calea).

Use your own common sense when experimenting with these.

7. The miraculous and mysterious power of meditation

Meditation allows one to work more consciously with the various states of consciousness that are possible for a human to experience.

Normal our awareness is limited so a small band of states of consciousness, but as we explore meditation and lucid dreaming we expand our awareness to include other normal, but subtle states.

A good example is our eye’s ability to see only the “visible spectrum.” It’s named visible spectrum not because nothing can see outside of this range, it’s just that human eyes can’t.

Bees and other insects have the ability to perceive frequencies outside of the “visible spectrum.” It’s actually pretty arrogant for us humans to call it that when you think of it.

Meditation expands our ability to be aware in states of consciousness that are normal outside the “perceivable spectrum.”