Hi,
I have never read any thesis from anybody why LD collapse if you are staring at something for more than a few seconds. I tried to ask a DC once but got a jibberish answer. In a non LD you can concetrate at something for how long as needed but it seems to be a ”rule” in LD when we are conscious to wake up. Why do you Robert think this is? Have you ever asked the awarness why? Kind regards/Tony
Hi Tony,
I provide an answer in my second book, Lucid Dreaming Plain and Simple, co-authored with Caroline McCready.
In the dream state, we normally have REM — rapid eye movement. Our eyes literally move.
But in lucid dreaming, when we decide to stare fixedly at something for more than a few seconds, this becomes un-natural or abnormal to the REM state — and then that tension (of doing something in defiance of rapid eye movement) causes the lucid dream to collapse. When it collapses, the lucid dream ends and the matter gets resolved.
While you may seem able to look at something in a non-lucid dream for a long time, I do not believe it is truly possible (because you lack the lucidity or conscious awareness to ‘stare’ fixedly). For example, in a nightmare, you may be looking at the witch — and then without realizing it, you look at her pointed nose, and her pointed shoes, and then the wart on her face. When you wake from the dream, you think “Oh I really looked at the witch for a long time” — the actual experience is that you looked at differing aspects of the witch (so you have slight eye movements, focusing on various aspects).