Extending mental practice to sleep: Enhancing motor skills through lucid dreaming

Lucid dreaming—becoming aware of a dream while asleep—can be used to practice motor skills, potentially improving real-world performance. The brain generates an immersive, VR-like environment with realistic body sensations during lucid dreams. Experimental studies show promising performance gains after lucid dreaming motor practice, with similarities in brain activity, eye movements, muscle activity, and autonomic responses to physical practice. Surveys indicate athletes already incorporate lucid dreaming into training. Placebo effects and increased motivation after practice need further investigation. Challenges such as the rarity of lucid dreams, lack of proper training, and limited control over dream content must be addressed to strengthen this approach for broader use.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Improving motor performance without physical movements might seem counterintuitive, however, decades of research on mental practice have demonstrated its feasibility. The phenomenon of lucid dreaming – i.e. becoming aware of the current dream state during ongoing sleep – bears some resemblance to mental practice: behaviors such as motor tasks can be intentionally simulated with mental imagery. During lucid dreaming, however, the brain generates a highly immersive, VR-like environment and realistic proprioceptive impressions to match the mental practitioner’s needs. In recent years the hypothesis was thus proposed that lucid dreaming can be used to extend motor practice to the sleeping state, thereby improving motor performance during subsequent wakefulness. Here, we examine this hypothesis by exploring the theoretical foundations and efficacy of this inventive approach in sports science and beyond. Experimental studies show promising performance improvements after lucid dreaming motor practice. Similarities have been observed in brain activity, eye movements, muscle activity, and autonomic responses compared to physical practice support the potential of lucid dreaming practice. Surveys show that athlete populations already implement lucid dreaming practice as part of their training. Potential placebo effects and an increase in motivation after lucid dreaming practice in the post-test should be investigated in future studies. Also, some well-known practical challenges of lucid dream research, such as its rarity, lack of proper training, and lack of control over the dream, need to be addressed. Eliminating these limitations will strengthen the potential of this inventive approach and enable lucid dreaming practice to be incorporated into various disciplines in the future.