Lucid Dreaming

The Steven Hawking of the Dream World

The website of Werner Zurfluh, from Germany, contains a wealth of information about lucid dreams and OOBEs.  And his life story is as fascinating as his dreaming life.

Werner began to gradually experience the symptoms of multiple sclerosis back in the 1980s, when he was in his late thirties.  Now he is confined to a wheelchair (although I don’t know if he is still living). To compensate for this severe physical limitation, Werner experiences a rather amazing nocturnal life.   

He may be confined to a wheelchair while in the waking world, but in another world he flies, encounters UFOs, dragons, goes on quests, enters the body of animals, and explores the world of fairy tales, and much more!

The text here is translated into English, courtesy of Google.  Unfortunately, the translation is rough, and Google only translates the first 1700 or so words.  To translate the rest of the pages, you can paste parts of the text into Google’s Translator.

Werner also includes an English version of the site, but this version is unfortunately very truncated.  But here is a rather long, fully translated lucid dream (about 1200 words) in which he joins a group of birds, enters a new world, and climbs a mile high tree with his wife.

On this English version of his website, you can also find pages and pages of his OOBE experiences, as well as some great pictures.

Germany and Lucid Dreaming

Overview of the Development of Lucid Dream Research in Germany , by Paul Tholey, gives a great summary of what's going on in German Lucid Dream Research (at least up until 1989).

Here are some of the things lucid dreamers in Germany are doing:

• Slowing down and speeding up time.
• Solving logic problems they failed to solve before falling asleep.
• Attaining a panoramic, 360 degree field of vision, in both vertical and horizontal directions.
• Demonstrating artistic creativity.
• Having other dream characters perform artistic and logical feats.
• Entering the body of another dream character.
• Helping other dream characters attain lucidity.
• Meeting dream characters who know things the dreamer, in waking life, had long ago forgotten.
• Destroying one's dream body, and attaining a sense of boundlessness and oneness with the universe.
• Cutting one's body in half, and having each half complete themselves.
• Similarly, attaining two differenct pespectives at the same time (such as simultaneously looking up at a tower, and standing on top of that tower looking down).

Tholey also shares an interesting lucidity induction technique: Creating a dream character who is lucid, and having this dream character help you become lucid in the future dreams.

A Conversation Between Steven LaBerge and Paul Tholey

A Conversation between Steven LaBerge and Paul Tholey -  Here is a fascinating dialogue between   two people who could be called the most distinguished lucid dream researchers in the world!  Paul Tholey is from Germany.  The conversation took place in 1989, and this is the first time LaBerge and Tholey had met in person. 

French Lucid Dreams

" Just after I went sleeping, the surrounding noise inside airplane gets increased. I get aware I'm at my seat but I'm dreaming. I leave my body turning around my conscience center and trying to see my resting body and what is around it. The only similarity is that there is yet an airplane but everything more is different. People are talking loud, there is a whole party in that airplane. As I'm aware I am free to go where I want, I decide to leave the airplane. Outside it's dark night, I fly over the ocean..."

--Jorge's Lucid Dream Diary, Lucid Newspaper of Dreams

Lucid Newspapers of Dreams is a french site, translated here into English by Google.  From what I can tell, 'newspaper' is better translated as journal, or diary, as this web page contains links to the lucid dreams of french speaking lucid dreamers.

How the French Lucid Dream

Christian Bouchet, from France, did his doctoral thesis on lucid dreaming.  He has developed his own methods for inducing lucid dreams. He teaches classes on how to have lucid dreams.

Here is his site, Lucid Dream, translated into English by Google.  On this site is a webpage about the method he developed for inducing lucid dreams, which he calls To Tremble in the Spirit.

You'll also find here information about his doctoral thesis on lucid dreaming, as well as about half a dozen lucid dreaming articles from various authors.