What causes us to loose awareness?

[Graupel]

Interesting.

Why though do we "fall asleep" and loose lucidity (awareness) without just taking our conscious minds, thoughts, wills, and full lucidity into the dream state naturally?

I'm thinking that without the proper practice and training to keep the mind awake as long as possible.. it is just a natural reflex programming that is built into our minds to shut off any conscious thought during the waking world?

And to break the natural rule of falling asleep to the point where we can fall asleep every single night with our conscious minds fully intact (to do lucid dreaming, OOBE, AP, or whatever we want with full lucidity) just requires a strong will to try to fall asleep passively and keeping the "being" active and the mind passively awake?

[ralphm]

Lack of trained awareness? After trying to do obe's and waking in the middle of the night to do obe's i have found that i have more lucid dreams and some of what i would call epic dreams- dreams that have a good degree of continuity and which i can remember relativly easily.

[LogoRat]

Well, we never loose awareness, our brain just dont put the transition experience to the memorybank.
You may fall asleep and then you are aware of every moment to the dreamland, but the only thing that matters when you are here is the memory of it.
You need to remember.. you need to make the brain open up new channels to store information.

A good way is to keep records in your dreamdiary or whatever on how long it took until you fell asleep, if you had any strange sensations before falling asleep etc etc.
Keep record and try to make the brain accept and create new memorypatterns and storage room for those memories.

[Risu no Kairu]

Maybe it depends on what you consider "awareness."

I've noticed that when I wake up in the middle of the night, or when I'm really tired and stuff and I start to drift off that my senses start to leave me.

If I'm thinking, I usually get lost in my thoughts, unless I notice, "hey, where'd the radio go?" And that's when I zoomp back to full sensory awareness of my body.

I've also noticed that my thoughts start to slow down, and disappear.

It's kind of like that whole void thing. Just there, no thoughts.

Since time seems to become less fluid the higher the mind goes, maybe you don't lose awareness, but phase into a higher realm. Then, eventually, while you're not thinking about anything, just... existing... and your dream mind double is doing stuff, and maybe you have a projected double (or two, or three) wondering around, your body automatically starts to call your mind back.

Mind: "..."
Body: "Hey, buddy. I gots tah pee! Come back and wawk me to da westwoom!"
Mind: pulled from where it is "Huh? Wha? Oh, uh, sure..."
Dream Mind: "Wait for me!!" fades into oblivion
Projected Mind: "Well, uh, let our powers combine!" refuses with energy body, but memories supressed due to Mind being aware.

[Graupel]

Well.. in the simplest way I'll define what I think of consciousness:

Consciousness is the full lucidity that you have while awake.. you can think, react, predict, feel, etc..  

I want to be able to fall asleep consciously and take that lucidity with me so I can think later "Oh I'm ready to begin inducing the vibrations to have a full blown OOBE.  I'm in the state!".  I don't want to fall asleep and loose lucidity.  When we fall asleep, for some odd reason.. a our mind shuts down and a barrier is drawn between the conscious and subconscious.. and the unpracticed mind has absolutely no control over any dream.

I remember every one of my dreams, but I just don't want to fall asleep and loose my lucidity consciousness as defined above.  I want to be able to always fall asleep with a conscious mind intact and immediately have control over any dreams or do experiments with OOBE.

Basically I want to do a controlled W.I.L.D and experience the hypnagogic images whenever I go to sleep (although not totally W.I.L.D.. I want to be in the lull state to experiment with OOBE), somehow stopping my waking mind from going to sleep with my body.

[LogoRat]

Well...about loosing consciousness.
You seem to loose it because you have the automatic operation activated... in a way, you dont give a excrement and just fall asleep.
Most ppl (like me) start sleeping on their back to get WILD and stuff, but after a while they get boored or think "excrement i really need to cut the crap and fall asleep..i need to be full of energy for work".

Cut the Crap and just do it!
Keep records of how long you think you where awake before you fell asleep etc.

[Graupel]

And with time if you continually practice staying awake and keeping the mind clear "passively" and going with the flow.. you'll eventually create a new neural response in your brain's network that makes falling asleep with lucidity intact a "natural" response?

[LogoRat]

Yes, correctly.
The brain is not used to handle this kind of information.
Its main purpose is to handle the data in this dimension that we are in right now.
So we have to consciously create that memorybank.
The brain will with conscious effort create that memorybank and activate more and more networks to it.
The Connections can only be made possible if you want it to be.

The memories will not get mixed tho, cuz it will create a new network for the dream/astral activities.

[Graupel]

So when you say the memories are separate.. we can still carry the lucidity and awareness from the waking state into the astral/OOBE dimensions right?

I just want to be able to have the same thoughts and wills that I currently have in the waking state, so that I can be in the other state and automatically try different OOBE experiments based on what I learned in the waking state.

[LogoRat]

You will still have access to the physical memories yes.
But the thing is that your consciousness in the dreams are not like the one in the physical.
Most people when they are in the physical almost always go through their historical data and the possible future data and scan it back and forth disturbing the concious present moment.
That kind of thing is not something that happends when you are lucid.
When you are lucid you decide when to collect data and what kind.
You can access your physical data because the memories are carried over to the dreamscape.
So you see, most people are dreaming in the waking physical world also.. they are not lucid very often so they never really understand who they are.
You will still be you, even if you dont create mental movies of your memories.

You may have some created personality when carrying out a dream scenario, but when you get lucid in it you will understand who you are. You may still have the characteristics of your created character, but you will still be you.

The physical you is very hard to calm down, most thoughts and ideas from the brain will make you follow the status quo and not do the things like killing other people and stuff because that is not allowed there. But in the dream you can do it like eating candy.
There are no barriers.

Feeling bad about killing another beeing is just a physical created idea. It is a good rule because the physical is not as flexible and if you kill one there it will be very hard for that soul to jump down again,.. it takes a while
Your mind in the dreams are more flexible, you can change it to suit your needs.

You will have the memories of you physical self if you want to, but you dont need it to be yourself.

When you are in the present moment you are more aware of yourself and understand who you are, but when you have thoughts running through your mind all the time you actually only are a character.

When you are lucid you will be aware of your physical self if you want to..its up to you, and most times you will be when you get lucid.

Because if you are not aware of your physical self you would not be able to get the understanding that you are dreaming.

[Graupel]

In a normal non-lucid dream where we are forced to play out the scenario that we can't choose.. is that just a barrier between the conscious and subconscious?

And when you are lucid in a dream.. you just mean it is part of that "expanded awareness" state?  Sort of like you can access both memories better?

[LogoRat]

Beeing lucid really means beeing aware of yourself.
When lucid you can still have very unclear sight and hearing in the dream, but you are still aware of yourself and that you know where you are.
Non-lucid dreams is like the physical world turned insideout.
In the physical you constantly think about stuff and are not really aware of yourself and the stuff around you really much.
In the dream you do the same, but the thoughts become reality.
When you become aware of yourself you have more control of your thoughts.

We are not forced to play out scenario's.. we create them with our thoughts, most dreams are a mix of our daily thouhts we have had during the day or month.

Some dreams can be a mix of stuff that is not personal also, stuff you watch on television etc.

My view on OBE and Lucid Dream is that it is just different amount of awareness(licidity).

You can program yourself before going to bed to make yourself aware of things you want todo when you become lucid.
Its like packing your dreambag with memorypacks(missions).

[Graupel]

And having a strong will (by practice) will allow you to take your awareness into the hypangogic state, in it, and through it to the destination, whether it is AP or OOBE, etc?

You are right, a lot of the times for some reason I just give up and let myself fall asleep.. but I am getting better at observing the states that I go through when I passively clear the mind and go to sleep.

[LogoRat]

Yes, Practice is the key!
Its the focus that counts.
Accept that it takes effort and will to get to that level of awareness, then it will pay off.
Because its very easy to say "ahh forget it" when you practice.. but that is because there are allready created patterns in your brain that snapps you back to the old you.

Like the brain is a network of rubberbands.
The rubberbands will change its positions and tension by time and effort.
If you dont continue your practice you will most likely snapp back to the old you and stop the practice.

If you keep practice and keep focus on what you want for a period of time, the brain will sooner or later change its shape to match your will and you can then more easily have full awareness when the body falls asleep and you will have great recall when coming back from travel.

Beeing negative of the practice and think "ahh this only waste my time", that is your brain talking.
Its the tension that is winning.

The brain has a very good protectionsystem, but when it comes to these kinds of things, you really have to work hard if you have grown up around people that say that these kind of activities is bad for you.
Even tho you consciously know that its not bad for you, your brain still have patterns to block you.

Practice practice.

Think of the tension you feel "go to sleep, go to sleep, turn around and sleep, you only waste your time", think of it as a challenge, win your mind back.
Try to document how long it took before the tension arised, everytime you wakeup.
Document yourself and try to understand your mind.

Also, when you lie there in bed doing the practice and when the tension arises, change your awareness totally on the tension and accept that it is there..dont try to block it, that wont help, accept that the tension is there and try to understand the feelings and thought, know that it is not your will but only your brain talking.
When you know what it is, then you can just accept it and carry on your practice.
Think of it as a little barking dog that dont want you to walk past the house, just accept that its a barking dog overthere and carry on your business.

Know yourself!

[Fat_Turkey]

What causes us to loose awareness eh?

Maybe bad spelling?


T_T

~FT