Contributions to the checklist are welcome, just send a pull request by following contribution guide.
Caution
I'm not a neural or oneirology scientist, nor am I a medical professional in any field, I'm just a dude that formed a small list of ideas I came across during lucid dream experimentation back when I was a small kid. Lucid-dream techniques can cause sleep disruption, intense hypnagogic imagery, anxiety, or prolonged sleep paralysis for some people. Try these techniques at your own risk.
I noticed that not a lot of people go so far with lucid dreams, most of my friends report only experiencing this effect once or twice in their lifetime. But in fact you can force yourself to lucid dream more often and do quite a lot. I always wanted to somehow share this checklist, but some concepts were hard to explain with words. Thankfully now we have diffusion models that generate images from text quite well. Moreover, the first open source model that can generate videos from text came out - Wan2.2, although it was not used for visual examples in the repository yet.
Tip
Simply fork this repository and slowly check off the things you've already tried.
Lucid dream - a type of dream where you are aware that you’re dreaming while it’s happening.
NPC (non‑player character) - a self-generated, subconscious dream character created and controlled entirely by your own brain during REM sleep. These entities arise from memory fragments and social schemas via hippocampal and neocortical systems, are placed into the dream narrative by your Default‑Mode Network, and are emotionally charged by limbic activity. With reduced prefrontal oversight they follow scripted behaviors—but once you become lucid, your reactivated prefrontal cortex lets you override or reshape their roles.
Other sleep-related experiences I had and managed to find names of:
- Alice in wonderland syndrome - Wikipedia
- Exploading head syndrome - Wikipedia
- Hypnagogic hallucinations - Wikipedia
- Hypnic jerk - Wikipedia
- Sleep paralysis - Wikipedia
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Look in a mirror
This is an interesting mental exercise. What you will see in the "reflection" is how you remember yourself, so all your complexes will be exaggerated. -
Heal or induce a mental illness
There’s no solid scientific evidence that lucid dreaming can directly cure a mental illness. But in theory, lucid dreams could be used as a therapeutic tool in a few ways. Since the dream world is vivid and immersive, practicing new behaviors or reframing traumatic experiences might help rewire emotional responses. -
Ask for interesting ideas
In the most likely scenario, if you actually pay attention to what NPC's are saying, you will hear gibberish. I once tried an interesting experiment. I forgot something and thought it could help me remember something if I just tried asking subconscious me about that thing I forgot. NPC indeed answered, however, when I woke up and analyzed their words I realized it's just completely made-up nonsense. -
Ask NPCs for math problems
Similarly to the previous experiment, the most likely result is that they will hallucinate answer just like a bad LLM model. -
Chat with your subconscious
- Talk to your subconscious about problems and how to solve them
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Eat an inedible object
That’s actually a fun way to explore how your mind generates sensations - concrete is pretty crunchy.*Image example:
Model: GPT-4o
Prompt: "A first-person perspective: I’m in a dream and eating a block of concrete. I can see my hand holding block of concrete with a bite already taken out. The edges softly blurred as if through a foggy lens. Soft focus on the periphery adds to the dreamlike quality. The lighting is hazy but vivid, colors muted pastels with sudden glimmers of brilliance."
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Simulate scenes from movies
Not something mind-blowing but if it is your 50th time lucid dreaming, it might be an ok way to spend some time. -
Simulate astral projection
Astral projection is usually described as an “out-of-body experience” where you feel like your consciousness separates from your physical body and can travel around. In reality this is, of course, just a lucid dream where you imagine separating from your body, looking at yourself sleep and walking around the house. If you want to prove that this is actually just a dream and not some "astral projection", just look at the clock, remember the time, and force yourself to wake up. Time on the clock in real life would most definitely be different from what your brain imagined.Image example:
Model: GPT-4o
Prompt: "A first-person perspective from my eyes. I'm in a dark room looking at someone sleeping. I can't see his face, because he is turned from me. The edges of the image are softly blurred as if through a foggy lens. Soft focus on the periphery adds to the dreamlike quality."
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Listen to music
Listening to music inside a lucid dream is a mind-blowing experience, because your brain is basically composing and performing it in real time without any external input. -
Visit an art exhibition
There are rumors that some famous artists throughout history used dreams as inspiration for their work. -
Control yourself from third-person view
An over-the-shoulder view like in Dead Space also cool. You can even try 2D world, I once, after working a full day on cellular automata had a 2D dream - a weird experience.
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Change logic and physical parameters
Reverse gravity, imagine world without friction force etc. -
Levitate an object
Obvious stuff.Image example:
Model: GPT-4o
Prompt: "A first-person perspective: I’m in a dream and levitating a soviet building using my hand. I can see my hand. The edges softly blurred as if through a foggy lens. Soft focus on the periphery adds to the dreamlike quality. The lighting is hazy but vivid, colors muted pastels with sudden glimmers of brilliance."
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Speed up time
And spectate how black holes evaporate and the universe becomes forever dark.
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Imagine you’re the opposite sex and have sexual intercourse with someone
Another way to explore how your mind generates sensations. -
Scream endlessly
If you try right now to scream in your head (if you do have a constant inner monologue), you may have a hard time actually screaming endlessly. You will feel like you need to take a breath, like in real life. It's way easier to do in a lucid dream, through, so take this as a mental exercise. -
Become invisible
Hollow Man (2000) -
Stretch your limbs for many kilometers
Image example:
Model: GPT-4o
Prompt: "A first-person perspective: I’m in a dream and my limbs are stretching for many kilometres, I can see how my left leg disappears behind horizon, while my right hand is making big arch. My right leg and left hand are not in the field of view from my eyes. The edges softly blurred as if through a foggy lens. Soft focus on the periphery adds to the dreamlike quality. The lighting is hazy but vivid, colors muted pastels with sudden glimmers of brilliance."
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Walk through a wall
A good exercise to learn how to teleport. -
Walk into a mirror
I guess this is onto your brain on how to simulate this scenario, but it could yield an interesting result. -
Teleport to a random place
From my experience the easiest way to do so is to spin around and imagine the place you want to teleport to. Alternatively, just looking at some wall/ground works too. -
Fly
This is the first thing people do in lucid dreams and yet it may be hard to take off actually. This is a lot like running in a dream, there is a reason why it feels weird: the brain areas responsible for movement do light up during dreams, but they aren’t fully synced with the sensory feedback loops you’d normally get when awake (like feeling your feet hit the ground). Without that feedback, your brain "fills in" the experience, often in distorted ways—like sticky ground or sluggish running. -
Experience weightlessness in space
There are multiple strategies that work pretty well for me:
- MILD Technique (Mnemonic Induction of Lucid Dreams) - one of the most effective methods is to simply think about lucid dreaming before bed. This strengthens intention, which is surprisingly effective.
- WBTB (Wake Back to Bed) - set an alarm ~4–6 hours after falling asleep and drift off into sleep thinking about lucid dreams.
- WILD (Wake Initiated Lucid Dream) - as you’re falling asleep, keep your mind awake while your body drifts off, you might feel sleep paralysis or see hypnagogic imagery - just let it happen. If you stay calm, you can step straight into a lucid dream.
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