Please help me... I want to give up trying to LD

After one month of keeping a dream journal and doing RC, this is where i stand. I can recall at least 1 dream MOST nights. There is the occasional night where i remember nothing. I RC quite often. I don't know if im trying to hard or what is going on but i just cant LD. I have had dreams in which I (my dream character) does a RC. It was not me consciously doing a reality check. I then proceed to say "This is all a dream. Everything I see right now is being controlled by my mind." Yet this doesn't seem to set anything off in my head to make me really aware. I am starting to become EXTREMELY discouraged. :( Any tips?

Well technically speaking you were lucid if you said this is all a dream.

You know one thing that might help you is meditation. Now I'm not talking about anything spiritual, just for awareness' sake. You seem to have trouble being present in yourself and in your mind. Don't worry necessarily about all of the RC's. You need to boost your awareness. Set aside 10 or 15 minutes before you go to bed to just sit down, close your eyes, and clear your mind. Focus on your breathing, and relax. Once you are comfortable, remind yourself how confident you are that you are and always will be fully aware of yourself and of your surroundings. Be present in the moment. Appreciate the Now.

Do this for a while and hopefully you will see a change in the amount of awareness you exert through the day and while dreaming.

Good Luck!

Try to be satisfied with just dreaming and remembering it. Dreams are amazing and most people just ignore them. Don't look at dream journalling as a chore but an enjoyable thing that you get to do. Keep up with the dream journal and eventually you will have one, even if you don't RC or anything.

Meditation is also amazing. Do anything you can before bed to make yourslef calm and alert.

Have you tried any techniques, like MILD or WBTB? WBTB works extremely well. It puts you in a different state of mind before you go to sleep and I think it's 10 times easier to become lucid when you WBTB.

You need to realise that for some people keeping a DJ and doing RCs doesn't get them lucid. Go read puffins DILD guide and Mzzks WILD guide.

I don't RC and I don't write down my normal dreams, but I do write down my lucid dreams because I do some experiments.
But I still lucid dream very frequently =) Look into the "How to have an instant WILD" thread which learned me how and gave me 5 lucid dreams in two weeks and two of the lucid dreams felt like reality.
And 3 of them was in a row and I am still on a streak and I will try to get my fourth this night. You should look into it. :)

It takes patience. The more you try to bring upon a lucid dream the harder it may seem in most cases. Sometimes taking a step back and not doing RC's for a day or so will trigger a lucid that very same night. If you try too hard chances are you won't get what you seek. Just let it all come naturally. Try mantras and get into DEILD and make sure your RC's actually work when you try them out in dreams. When something isn't working, be willing to try something new. Let us know if any of this has helped!

-Chase

Actually, it sounds like you are trying too hard, take it easy or take a break, you might be surprised by the results. It also sounds like you don't question reality when doing RCs, so that you just mindlessly assume they worked and say the lucidity thing without really understanding it, so when doing a RC, try to stop and actually think about it. It isn't really the number of RCs (Well maybe for some) but the quality.

Oh and btw, one month of trying and no sucess is nothing, try years.

Thank you everybody for all of your responses. I greatly appreciate all of this advice. Something else that just occurred to me is that I seem to have this idea way in the back of my head that LD is something difficult to achieve. I have read in 'Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming' that this may actually lead to some sort of mental road block that will actually make it so that it is difficult to achieve lucidity. Is there anything I can do to convince myself otherwise? Also, what methods are there for me to increase my awareness?

Dreams occur in the secondary visual cortex in the occipital lobe near the back of our brains. Visualizing a scene, or simply imagining, also occurs in the secondary visual cortex. By visualizing your are prepping your brain for dreaming. Try visualization or visual meditation while deeply relaxed. Picture the dream before you fall asleep... and don't try so hard. Good luck! :shadewink:

Your frustration is justified , LDing unfortunately is difficult for some people and thinking otherwise or not is not gonna make a difference, it all has to do with the way your brain works . I have been trying it for a year and only had 3 accidental lucids and 2 of them were semi lucid :( and i tried pretty much everything ranging from LD supplements , and professional hypnotist etc....As for the meditation i am an advance meditator who have been meditating for the past 17 years and i am able to experience pure conciousness during my meditations yet clearly it hasnt made a difference in my LD ability , meditation as far as i know is only good for increasing and maintaining the focus once you go lucid...

Analyze the lucid dreams you had in the past before practicing DILD. Within the branch of DILDS, sone people primarily get their LDs from remembering to do a RC in a dream, and some people find themselves aware or find something wrong even without a RC. I tend to be the second kind, so in daytime I choose to observe my surroundings and recall recent events instead of doing a series of reality checks. That makes me more aware at night. A few peoples' minds favor WILDS and practice WILD more often. Guess what suits you best. If you get your first LD, your progress will likely speed up but still, be patient.