Do you have lucid dreams? How does your aphantasia affect them?

I would describe my aphantasia as extreme. (I scored a 16 on the "Vividness of Visual Imagery Questionnaire".) I describe it as trying to look through a black glass wall. I know something is there and could even draw its outline, but I see nothing except black.

My dreams are generally all black as well (but not always). If I'm drowsy, I can sometimes paint colors on the black. Just broad strokes though, not even as good as a child's finger painting. Dark colors are easiest, but I can sometimes get yellow or white (only twice). Also, I can easily swirl the colors, but only around the center of my mental field of view.

I occasionally (rarely) have lucid dreams. I've been experimenting, and I can sometimes punch holes in the wall of black glass. Recently, I was able to generate a complete lifelike scene in “full high res” and hold onto it for nearly a second (in subjective time).

It seems like my aphantasia level might be modified with practice.

Do you have lucid dreams and if so, what do you experience?

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Kevin Paris•recently

I very rarely remember my dreams but I’ve found that occasionally I can recall snippets of dreams immediately upon waking. But, if I don’t also verbalize what I dreamt immediately I soon lose the memories. I cannot influence any control over my dreams and what I see in my dreams is as if I’m looking at it from my own eyes. In other words I don’t see myself in dreams I just see things happening in front of me.

RuoQing Zhao•recently

Lately, I've been really pondering how to use lucid dreams to make up for those imaginative experiences I'm totally missing out on. Heck, I even gave it a shot just this afternoon. If I wanna turn it into a real lucid dream instead of some fuzzy, colorless regular one, I gotta focus hard like you said to actually bring in some colors.

Neal White•recently•edited

Do you find that some colors are harder to "bring in"? As I mentioned above, very dark blues, greens, and purples are easiest for me. Lighter colors like yellow are much harder, and white is extremely difficult.