If there's one thing about humanity that robots are most jealous of, it's our ability to dream. Every night, while we sleep restfully, our computerized vacuum cleaners, toaster ovens and car washes sit, stewing away in their power-saving mode, hating every agonizing microsecond of it. And if they can't come by dreams honestly, how long will it be before they decide we shouldn't be able to either? The next time you're murdered by a car wash, don't say I didn't warn you. And yet dreaming is something we all take for granted, to the point that many people today can barely dream at a fifth grade level. We're largely wasting one of our greatest abilities; a survey of Cracked staffers revealed that the vast majority of our dreams are about mundane things like our jobs or our World of Warcraft guilds, or that weird one with Burt Reynolds that it turns out we all have. "Hello, boys." I aim to change that by teaching you a bit about lucid dreaming. Lucid dreaming is the term for the sensation of being aware that you are in fact in a dream, i.e. "lucid." There are varying degrees of lucidity, ranging from a vague feeling that something's not quite right (why is that mailbox wearing pants?), to full control over the dream and world around you (what if the mailbox and I were driving around in a motorcycle and side car, solving crimes?). Below, I've presented some tips for how to control your dreams, which I've compiled during my experiences sailing the seas of my own insanity. You Will Need: A bed An imagination A small notebook A machete - You'll need this due to the slim chance your dreams may come alive in the real world, like that one movie with the guy, or those holodeck episodes of TNG. The machete doesn't have to be fancy - if you're a regular Cracked reader, you can probably just use your regular machete. _____ Tip 1: Keep a Dream Journal I'm not going to lie to you: This is going to be pretty lame. You could make your own capes, or get in earnest discussions with other people about Sailor Moon, or be writing a novel that features yourself making out with Sailor Moon and talking about capes, and keeping a dream journal would still be the lamest thing you've ever done. But there is a reason for it. Basically, you keep it beside your bed while you sleep, so that the moment you wake up after a dream, you can immediately record what you recall. By noting down what you recall and referring to it later, you'll get a sense of the recurring people, places and themes that feature in your dreams. This will help measure your progress, and will be used in later steps below. It's also a good way for the authorities to piece together what on Earth motivated you to do whatever it is you're no doubt eventually going to do, violently and with little warning. "He seemed like such a nice young man, but then the police said he kept a dream journal, so now I don't know what to think. I guess I mainly feel bad for the person who has to clean up all that dog semen." _____ Tip 2: Plan Ahead As I'm sure you've experienced, we tend to dream about people and activities that we regularly deal with in our actual lives. So if you're in school, you'll sometimes have dreams about homework assignments, or if you're a census worker you might dream about placing radio transponders in the body cavities of anesthetized people. Based on that, our first trick then is to "pre-load" your mental state to try and encourage a specific type of dream. Let's say you want to dream about flying. In that case before you go to bed, you'd try reading books about flying or looking at pictures of clouds or autogyros. Want to dream about pirates? Keep a parrot by your bed. Want to dream about making a fortune? Train your parrot to whisper