Change Your Dreams. Change Your Life.

Only one in ten people have a lucid dream at least once a month: most of us will never have one in our entire lives. Yet those who do experience it say that, while asleep, they feel emotions and a sense of freedom that most of us can only dream of when awake. As a boy, the author of this story would fly over the Grand Canyon—even though he had never been there—or dine with Michelangelo, who would paint with one hand while eating. For him, this was normal, until he discovered that almost no one experiences that kind of dream lucidity. And here comes the twist: we think of dreams as a spectacle we passively watch, but in reality, when the brain becomes aware that it is dreaming, it can steer the plot, change the scenery, and explore possibilities that real life never even comes close to. Science says that to unlock this power, you need to train every day, even while awake: small “reality checks,” such as asking yourself, “Am I dreaming?” and trying to pass one hand through the other, or observing whether the text in a book changes when you look away. Only those who cultivate attention to and curiosity about details—such as noticing the position of their teeth in the mirror—can then recognize those details in dreams as well and realize that they are experiencing an alternative reality. All of this unfolds during the second half of sleep, when the brain activates the areas responsible for awareness and memory, such as the precuneus and the prefrontal cortex. A single fMRI study of a person experiencing a lucid dream showed that those same areas, which are usually inactive during normal sleep, become active when we dream consciously. Another experiment, conducted on people who frequently have lucid dreams, found that their brains are more connected even when they are awake, especially in the areas that regulate self-reflection. One scene makes it all more tangible: Jesse Ball, a writer and lucid dreaming instructor, has written a guide for two groups that most acutely feel the lack of freedom—children and prisoners. For them, Ball says, lucid dreaming is not just an escape, but a way to regain a sense of being able to change things, at least within themselves. But there is one aspect that no one mentions: the older we get, the less often we have lucid dreams. As an adult, the author saw them disappear, and only by practicing every day did he manage to bring them back. This forces us to ask ourselves: If lucidity in dreams can be trained, then our mental freedom while awake is also not fixed—it can be expanded. Here's the point: lucid dreaming is not an escape from reality; it is training for mental freedom. If you feel inspired to try changing your dreams, you can indicate this on Lara Notes by using I'm In – it's not a 'like'; it's your way of saying: This idea now concerns me. And if, in a few days, you find yourself telling someone the story of Michelangelo painting at the table or sharing tips for lucid dreaming, you can tag the person who was with you using Shared Offline: on Lara Notes, that's how you remember that the conversation mattered. This Note comes from The New York Times and saved you about six minutes of reading time.