I had a pretty unique psychological experience this morning, at least for me, so I figured I had better write about it before it evaporates from my brain like the morning dew.

I basically experienced a period of semi-lucid dreaming. I was not directing the dream, exactly, so it was not fully lucid. But I was choosing to dream, and influencing the dream a bit, so it was definitely on the path to the lucid dreaming experience.

And I would love to say this was the result of a diligently applied regimen of soul-searching, inner reflection, and psychotropic experimentation, but honestly, it was just a fluke.

Or so I assume. I don’t know. Maybe I have been striving for this sort of thing for a long time, but not on the conscious level, and that is what all this super intense dreaming has been leading to all these years.

That is an intriguing notion and it would certainly be nice to imagine that all this fucked up dream time has meaning and purpose after all. I have been striving to master my dream state! I have taken my metaconscious to the next level! I am getting what ascetics strive for, and without all that self-denial and flagellation and shit! Sweet!

But I am a little too realistic for that. We will see if it ever happens again, and only when I have established that I can do it regularly will I draw conclusions of that sort.

Despite my many skills, I make a lousy mystic.

The experience was quite fascinating. It was as though the dream world was the ultimate in virtual reality. It was like it was an invisible helmet I could don with an act of will, one that completely covered my head and replaced all that I saw and heard with an illusion.

It was like I could just refocus my eyes somehow, and be in this other realm. I was still aware of standard reality, the Real World, but I was consciously choosing to enter the dream realm with all the casualness of someone deciding to watch TV.

Given that television practically raised me, that is not an idle observation.

I even remember thinking that I knew I could go back to the real world whenever I wanted to, so it was safe to just mess around in the dream realm for a while.

And congenital escapist that I am, I was not exactly eager to come back to my boring, stupid, pathetic real life. The world of my imagination was so much nicer in every way!

And you don’t have to be Freud to figure that one out, savvy? That has basically been my priority ever since I was a bored kid daydreaming his life away in elementary school.

When you are smart enough to finish your work in five minutes, and you are not allowed to read in class (because that is the real problem these days, kids reading too much), and you have no friends to talk to even if that was allowed, what is there to do but to retreat into your own mind and just, well, think about stuff? Process information? Deepen your understanding?

Damn, I was a weird kid.

And all the dreaming I did when semi-lucid was pleasant. No monsters of the subconscious rearing their ugly stupid heads to turn my daydreams into nightmares, Better Than Life style.

In terms of lucidity, the most interesting part was when I was dreaming that my bed was lying on a beach on a pleasant summer day. That was when I began experimenting with my lucid state like it was a form of entertainment, marveling at how I could look all around and see the same scene all around me, just like I was really there.

Yet also knowing that I wasn’t really there. I didn’t realize that at first… at first it was just a dream like any other and I was fully immersed.

But eventually I figured out this whole refocusing the eyes business, and then things got meta. I remember looking out at the water, and looking up at some houses near the shore and thinking “So those are the people I envy. To have a house right on the water like that has been a dream of mine for my whole life. ”

Or at least since my first trip to the beach, I suppose. Still, even as I thought that thought, I knew that what I was seeing was an illusion. I knew that I was basically looking at a VR photograph.

In fact, there was part of the dream where the image froze as I turned my head, and I remember thinking “Oh no, I broke it… maybe my computer can’t handle the frame rate when I move my head too fast!”

And then the scene unfroze when I moved my head more slowly. How messed up is that? Keep in mind, to me this scene was as real as what I am experiencing right now.

Except I knew it was not totally real. And I was still in my bed, naked with a blanket on me (I sleep in the buff. Now you know. ), just like in real life.

I rather liked the idea of sleeping on a comfy bed on the beach, truth be told. All the peacefulness of being at the beach with all the comfort of being in bed.

In fact, I remember thinking that if I lived by the water, someplace where I could go to sleep looking at the ocean, I would sleep so well!

One more interlude worth noting : I dreamed (still semi-lucidly) that I was living in a house full of furries, some of whom snuggled up in bed with me and asked me if there was anything else I needed before I felt fully moved in, and I felt such peace and contentment!

And I remember thinking “This is how it should be. This is what I deserve. ”

That is a very significant thought for the likes of me. To consciously and completely think “I deserve better than what I have!” is a big deal thought on my journey to overcome my low self-worth and my resulting/codependent passivity.

The form it took is also intriguing. A place where I felt safe and accepted and welcome. That suggests that I feel, on some level, that I have worn out my welcome where I am.

Or maybe I jsut can’t believe that anyone could still like me after knowing me well. I don’t know.

Still, this all feels like progress to me.