The Thorn Institute

Lucid dreaming

What lucid dreaming actually is, how it's induced reliably, what the research says, and how to train recall and stability without losing the thread.

01 · Keynote topic

Lucid dreaming sits at an unusual intersection — sleep science, contemplative tradition, and the lived reports of people who've trained the skill for decades. This talk treats it as a learnable practice with a real evidence base, not a novelty.

Source material

Recommended books on the subject

Not a reading list review — these are the works whose intel and lived experience sit behind this talk. The keynote is a distillation, filtered into something you can use in 30, 60 or 90 minutes.

William Buhlman

Adventures Beyond the Body

Buhlman · 1996

Buhlman's practical, technique-heavy guide to out-of-body experience, written after years of his own exploration.

Robert Peterson

Hacking the Out of Body Experience

Peterson · 2017

Peterson takes a tinkerer's approach to OBE — what works, what doesn't, and the trade-offs between methods.

James R. Doty

Mind Magic

Doty · 2024

Stanford neurosurgeon Doty's 12-step protocol for manifestation, grounded in attention, intention, and compassion.

Robert A. Monroe

Journeys Out of the Body

Monroe · 1971

The 1971 field notebook of an American broadcaster who started slipping out of his sleeping body and decided to document it properly rather than panic.

30 min

Primer

A tight introduction — what it is, what it isn't, and the two or three things most worth knowing.

60 min

Keynote

The full talk — the science, the history, the practice, and an honest read of what's serious and what's hype.

90 min

Keynote + practice

Keynote plus a guided demonstration or short practice the audience can take home and run themselves.

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