I could meet my late dad in our family home and chat with him!
SARAH BLADEN, 42, is an author and mindfulness coach from London. She says:
IN MY MOST vivid lucid dream, I jumped from the top of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai (the tallest building in the world!) and flew across bright yellow cornfields before landing in a turquoise sea.
I could feel the temperature of the water and taste the salty sea air on my lips.
When I walked on to the shore I could feel the hot, silky sand between my toes. I ate a coconut and could taste its sweet flesh just as I would in normal life.
You wake feeling so energised and refreshed. It’s so good you want everyone to try it.
After my dad died of cancer in the summer of 2012, I went on what I call a ‘wellbeing shopping spree’ — trying yoga, meditation and mindfulness to help cope with my grief.
It was during this period that I tried a holistic device called Lucia No. 3, a light machine which beams pulsing light at your face with your eyes closed. This triggers an array of psychedelic shapes and colours in your mind’s eye and induces a calm, relaxed meditative state.
I hadn’t heard of lucid dreams before but from that night I had one every night for a month. Mostly I was flying or walking through walls in buildings. I was aware I was dreaming and I must admit I found it disconcerting at first. I worried I’d never sleep normally again.
Then I read about lucid dreams and started to get excited about the possibilities of healing myself during sleep.
I focused on the idea that I could help the pain of my loss. A prime example was a lucid dream I had about my dad. I became aware I was dreaming and I was talking to him. He was alive again and we were sitting in the lounge in the family home where I grew up.
He spoke to me in his usual encouraging, upbeat tone. It was so uncanny how real his voice sounded, how real it all felt. When I woke up, I felt nurtured and comforted by Dad’s presence.
Lucid dreaming has changed my life considerably. Just as you become fully conscious during a lucid dream, I’m now far more aware of my waking life. I used to sleepwalk through the week — rushing from one activity to the next, as if I was always ticking off a checklist.
I was never fully ‘in the moment’. Now, I make a conscious effort to be fully present wherever I go.