The practice library
Practical lucid-dreaming guides and source-led essays by Andrey Zaruev: how to begin, what studies measured, and where personal experience stops being evidence.
Foundations → journaling → limits → methods
01 / 7 min read
02 / 8 min read
03 / 11 min read
04 / 9 min read
05 / 7 min read
06 / 11 min read
From the latest notes to the archive.
· 16 min read
Kekulé told the snake story himself, in 1890. But in the original it is a half-sleep by the fire, the snake seizes its tail rather than biting it, and the famous “let us learn to dream” ends with a warning that usually gets cut. His speech, the 1984 fraud charge, where the monkeys came from, and what science knows about the edge of sleep.
Read more· 11 min read
How to lucid dream if you have never had one: a two-week, step-by-step plan built on dream recall, the MILD technique and a late-night awakening, with honest numbers from the research on how many nights it takes and whether it can happen the first time.
Read more· 13 min read
The sleep paralysis demon is real as an experience, not as a being. Why people in every culture meet the same visitor on their chest, where the Hat Man comes from, whether it can hurt you, and what to do when it comes.
Read more· 10 min read
Astral projection, or an out-of-body experience, happens to a sizeable minority of people, mostly at the edge of sleep. What it is, what neuroscience has shown, whether anyone has seen something only visible from above, and whether it is dangerous.
Read more· 9 min read
The document is real and you can download it: 29 pages, dated 9 June 1983, signed by Lieutenant Colonel Wayne McDonnell. It is not a CIA report and not a manual for astral projection — it is an Army memo assessing a commercial audio course. Here is the primary source: what it says about leaving the body, why one page was missing for eighteen years, and what turned out to be on it.
Read more· 8 min read
Shelley called it a waking dream. Her 1831 introduction is a primary but late account of creativity, not evidence of a sleep stage or WILD training.
Read more· 7 min read
The familiar story comes through recollection. Distinguish Mendeleev’s scientific work, a second-hand account and the limits of verification, without claiming that no dream occurred.
Read more· 7 min read
In 1960 the Jungian analyst Ernst Bernhard told Fellini to write his dreams down and draw them. Two volumes came out of it, published only in 2007. What checks out, what Fellini never claimed — and why the four-year gap in his diary is more useful than the myth of iron discipline.
Read more· 7 min read
Twain coined the term “mental telegraphy” himself: he wrote the essay in 1878 and only printed it in 1891, afraid of ridicule. What checks out against his own texts, why the famous dream about his brother must be read with care — and which part of all this can actually be trained.
Read more· 6 min read
A public account is not a clinical record. What accessible sources support, and why it is not a safe WILD entry.
Read more· 6 min read
Active imagination, a composite autobiography and an account during illness are distinct sources and states, not a validated WILD regimen.
Read more· 6 min read
Stone describes an experience during a serious medical crisis. Her account is not evidence that dream techniques can safely reproduce it.
Read more· 6 min read
Creative sleep as a writing metaphor: King’s routine, accessible sources and why they establish no on-command WILD mechanism.
Read more· 6 min read
Del Toro connects the faun to his childhood dream. An original transcript verifies attribution, not a clinical diagnosis or treatment.
Read more· 6 min read
Stanford psychophysiologist Stephen LaBerge signalled out of a dream with his eyes and turned lucid dreaming from mysticism into a measurable scientific fact. What he did, why it works, and how to learn it.
Read more· 6 min read
The Nobel physicist didn’t read books on lucid dreaming — he trained it himself by watching how he fell asleep, and ran experiments on perception inside the dream. What he did, why it works, and how to learn it.
Read more· 6 min read
The reported key-and-plate method, what a modern sleep-onset experiment actually measured, and why neither establishes WILD efficacy.
Read more· 6 min read
Nolan’s own lucid-dream account, original interviews, and the boundary between sleep research and Inception’s fictional rules.
Read more· 6 min read
A method invented on practitioner forums, not in the lab. Cycles of attention through sight, sound, touch before sleep. Who it suits and where the limits are.
Read more· 7 min read
Practical observation inside a lucid dream, without promised duration or claims of returning the brain to REM.
Read more· 7 min read
Bring one modest topic to bedtime and record the morning, separating ideas from verified answers and research from promised results.
Read more· 8 min read
Ten practical sleep habits based on AASM guidance, with clear limits: enough sleep before induction, and no self-prescribed supplements.
Read more· 7 min read
Awareness, vividness and distress can overlap. How to record them separately, and when nightmares call for clinical support.
Read more· 9 min read
Pooled lucid-dream EEG data reveal activity and connectivity differences. That does not show that lucid dreaming ceases to be sleep.
Read more· 10 min read
Concrete applications I observe in my work with C-suite executives and company founders.
Read more· 8 min read
42% reported a lucid dream with the studied dose versus 14% with placebo. That is not a 42% increase or advice to take the drug.
Read more· 7 min read
What alpha, beta and gamma EEG measurements mean, and why forty hertz is not a universal lucid-dream marker or an induction recipe.
Read more· 8 min read
A simple dream-journal template, an example entry and a weekly review method — without fixed improvement promises or supplement advice.
Read more· 10 min read
What a small LDT study in patients with PTSD did and did not find, and why coaching cannot replace clinical care.
Read more· 11 min read
A more advanced technique — the transition into a lucid dream without losing consciousness. When to use it, and what to be careful about.
Read more· 9 min read
A small darts pilot: what was measured, why its findings are preliminary, and why they do not establish rehabilitation benefits.
Read more· 6 min read
A five-day B6 experiment increased recalled dream content, not lucid dreaming. Its dose and duration are not evidence of a safe supplement course.
Read more· 9 min read
How to practise MILD with a remembered dream, a recognition cue and an intention — plus what induction research does and does not promise.
Read more· 7 min read
How to make a safe, thoughtful reality check, why mechanical checks can fail, and why research does not show a guaranteed route to lucidity.
Read more· 8 min read
WBTB pairs a late-night awakening with returning to sleep. How to combine it with MILD while protecting rest; there is no universal doubling of effectiveness.
Read more· 7 min read
A short introduction for people who have heard of the phenomenon but are unsure why it should matter to them.
Read more· 7 min read
A month of observing unusual details in your own dreams, not a success deadline or a required table for every technique.
Read more· 11 min read
Safety is discussed less than effectiveness. What to watch for and who should not attempt the practice.
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