Examples of such practices include dream yoga (Milam) in Tibetan Buddhism, Swapna yoga or Nidra yoga in India, and dream incubation in ancient Greece.

These practices show that people have long considered dreams to be more than just a form of rest, although they were mainly approached from an esoteric and spiritual perspective.

In the mid-19th century, French Marquis d’Hervey de Saint-Denys wrote Dreams and How to Direct Them (“Les rêves et les moyens de les diriger”), in which he describes his methods for working with dreams. His work can be considered the beginning of the scientific approach to studying dreams.