Stephen LaBerge (& Howard Rheingold) - Books

[Pauli2]

I use a grade from 0 - 10 (10 is the best/highest) on the books.

Stephen LaBerge became Ph.D. in psychophysiology 1980. Rheingold is a writer among others.


Lucid Dreaming: The Power of Being Awake & Aware in Your Dreams, 1985, Stephen LaBerge

GRADE: 7.0

This is the first of LaBerge's books. Here he describes how he managed to be
the second researcher in the world who managed to get a dream sign from a
person in a lucid dream (LD).

The first person who succeeded with getting a dreaming person giving a dream
sign from a lucid dream was the British scientist Keith Hearne in 1975. Hearne
registered the LDer Alan Worsley moving his eyes 8 times in a pre-decided way,
while sleeping (see Waggoner's book).

LaBerge managed to convince the scientific community that LDs are in fact possible,
something many scientists at the time objected to. LaBerge had difficulties getting
his findings published in a scientific paper until 1981.

LaBerge writes in his book about the history of LDs and makes reference to several
authors and scientists on the matter of LDs.

LaBerge also describes REM and NREM sleep and some other factors which were
important for scientifically detecting LDs. The book contains a lot of stories from
people in LDs and how they perceive their LDs. LaBerge also describes some things
about various sleep patterns like alpha and delta sleep.

I would have like LaBerge tell us a little more details about the various dream stages,
and their connection to REM/NREM sleep but perhaps there a better books for that?

LaBerge also describes his MILD and WILD methods in this book.

The last part of the book touches on NDEs and OBEs. LaBerge doesn't believe in OBEs
and think they should be regarded as LDs and called Out-of-Body-Sensation (OBS).

Surprisingly LaBerge believes in something he calls 'dream telepathy', but also states
that there is a need for more research before it can be established as a fact. LaBerge
even refines his concept of 'dream telepathy' and states that the telepathy between
dreamers may only be sharing of the 'dream plot' and not a full dream telepathy and
not a full presence in the other person's dream.

The book is a heavy and sometimes boring read, and also at some times a little unstructured,
which lowers my grade. But I still think it is important and if you're interested in LDs, and
certainly if you're interested in LDs from scientific perspective this could be the book for you.

The books contains a very short section on nightmares and how to overcome them by facing
your fear or by sending something which resembles PUL.

Somehow I think the book is just a little too fuzzy at some sections and I would have wanted
something more from a scientist.


Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming, 1990, Stephen LaBerge & Howard Rheingold

GRADE: 7.5

This book was written by LaBerge and Rheingold together. It is a similar heavy and somewhat
boring read as LaBerge's first book was. But, the big advantage is that the book contains a
lot of methods for inducing LDs.

The methods are put inside small boxes so they can clearly be read. LaBerge's MILD method
is re-stated here in a slightly different and perhaps improved form.

The book contains numerous experiences from LDers and from other authors on the subject
of LDs.

What's interesting is that some of the methods cited for inducing LDs are in fact methods for
inducing OBEs. But LaBerge states clearly that there doesn't exist anything like an OBE, it's
all various forms of LDs. And he 'proves' that OBEs are LDs by various arguments which mostly
are related to Alice-in-Wonderland-Effect or reality-fluctuations, which invalidates the OBE:er
any possibility to perform the look-at-the-hidden-playing-card experiment.

The books contains various sections on nightmares and how to overcome them by facing
your fear or by sending something which resembles PUL.

The book also contains some methods for physical healing and improving skills in sports through
the use of LDs.

A little surprising is that there is no mentioning about 'dream telepathy' in this book.

Again there is a section about NDEs and some small other subjects. Some small parts of
the book are exact repetitions of sections from LaBerge's first book.

I've seen that some readers think this book is worse than the previous by LaBerge, but from my
point of view this is a slightly better book and more clearly helps the reader with various exercises,
perhaps the book became this good because Rheingold was one of the authors?

Maybe someone very interested into LDs will give this book a higher grade?


Lucid Dreaming: A Concise Guide to Awaken in Your Dreams and in Your Life, CD included, 2004, Stephen LaBerge

GRADE: 5.0

This is a poor book of only 70 pages, and I am not clear why LaBerge wrote it. I would
also say that more than 40 of those pages are directly copied from LaBerge's previous
book(s).

This book claims to help you induce LDs, but I'm not sure it will help me. There is a CD
included with the book but I'm unsure what's the purpose of the CD, after having
listened to it. I compare it to the HumanPlus (H+) Hemi-Sync CDs I have and must say
that LaBerge's CD is poor in comparison.

The most important question on the CD is "Who is aware?", but I got little clue why
LaBerge repeated that question. Maybe I get the answer if I LD a lot of times? I started
a thread on this subject here -> http://www.astralpulse.com/forums/welcome_to_dreams/who_is_aware-t33811.0.html

I would only recommend this book if you give very high grades to the other LaBerge
books and you love his style of writing.

[blis]

Helpful reviews. Thanks.

[Summerlander]

LaBerge is great. In fact, I found this out sometime ago from experience...:

"Surprisingly LaBerge believes in something he calls 'dream telepathy', but also states
that there is a need for more research before it can be established as a fact. LaBerge
even refines his concept of 'dream telepathy' and states that the telepathy between
dreamers may only be sharing of the 'dream plot' and not a full dream telepathy and
not a full presence in the other person's dream."

...before I even heard of him and his views. Mode 2 OOBEs can turn 'telepathic' too when you visit people in that state. The realm of thoughts can both be personal and collective in my opinion.

[personalreality]

LaBerge gave a great review to this guy that lives near me, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche.

He wrote "The Tibetan Yogas of Sleep and Dream".  It's a daily meditation practice and movement art that is supposed to make you lucid when you dream at night.  It's a good book so far.  I started it a while back, but then I got a kindle and I've been reading other things.  LaBerge thinks it's good though.

http://www.amazon.com/Tibetan-Yogas-Dream-Sleep/dp/1559391014

[Summerlander]

Wow. that's good. I like the guys in Tibet. They embraced this altered states of consciousness business better than most in the West.

[Stookie_]

I recently watched a documentary that was narrated by Leonard Cohen about the Tibetan Book of the Dead. It was pretty good. http://www.leonardcohenfiles.com/tibetan.html

There's another one called "Yogis of Tibet" that they say was done to help preserve the Tibetan culture and practices before it disappears. It's pretty good too. Here you can watch it for free: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=1120080712987405885#

To keep on topic, I read a LaBerge book on LD about 10 years ago that I really liked. I don't know which one it was, but I liked his approach.

[personalreality]

isn't leonard cohen a musician?

[Pauli2]

To keep on topic, I read a LaBerge book on LD about 10 years ago that I really liked. I don't know which one it was, but I liked his approach.

I have to admit that at times, when reading the two first LaBerge books,
I felt some parts were so good that they deserved a GRADE of 8.0.
But as a whole, the style of writing and perhaps LaBerge's own doubts
about drawing clear conclusions, perhaps caused by his fear that the
scientific community would treat him in a bad way, put him in a state of mind
where his writings at some points became a little too fuzzy to my taste.

I think this pressure from the science community put some burden on the
end result on the books.


Both LaBerge's two first books are quite similar, including the front covers. On a grade from 0 - 10,
do you want to give an number as a grade?

[Stookie_]

isn't leonard cohen a musician?

Yep: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zqu3U05tkAw
You've probably heard this one before: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh9AC0jCGjY

His voice is perfect for narration

Both LaBerge's two first books are quite similar, including the front covers. On a grade from 0 - 10,
do you want to give an number as a grade?

From the way I remember it, I would probably give it an 8, but I really need to read it again to be more objective.