Thread: OPEN BETA - Open beta TWOTLD - Day 3

Interesting awareness exercises. The framing lends them more credence and power than they'd otherwise have--context is important for developing the necessary schematic associations required to make such tech effective, as you're probably aware.

But my lingering question: How do you propose someone who has never experienced lucidity, false awakenings, or similar events flex a muscle they've never once flexed?

Obviously, the benefits of concerted awareness have been proven in the wild time and time again, but the approaches you've presented seem more viable for someone who has an initial frame of reference. One which a complete novice would lack. I don't know if there's an effective way to address this in the prose, but I worry these exercises have the potential to erode confidence. I may be completely off-base here, but as another user (Nailler) previously commented:

Originally Posted by Nailler

You have to decide who your proper audience is for the book.

Regardless, I'm always pleased to see new tech floating around. =)

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

But my lingering question: How do you propose someone who has never experienced lucidity, false awakenings, or similar events flex a muscle they've never once flexed?

That's one of the things I want to find out with the open beta test. In the local tests, everyone had had at least one lucid dream before, had remarkable experiences as we went along, but as you say, they had a frame of reference. Hopefully someone who hasn't had a LD yet will try these out and report on their experiences. Later on, we'll find out that lucidity isn't a prerequisite, but I do want to have non-lucid reports before we get there...

Originally Posted by cvdmehden

Later on, we'll find out that lucidity isn't a prerequisite, but I do want to have non-lucid reports before we get there...

That's my intuition as well. After all, the mechanisms already exist in each person, whether they're cognizant to that fact or not... As a whole, I think what you've presented thus far will be enough to get most anyone's gears turning.


Aside: most of the criticisms I've read focus on the tech itself, but the story and explanations that surround the exercises are what I find most valuable here. The tech is solid. Attempting to construct a proper frame of reference make them much more useful than if you'd simply thrown them into a vacuum (as is typically the norm). I do hope others on this site realize that and shift their focus accordingly.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

Aside: most of the criticisms I've read focus on the tech itself, but the story and explanations that surround the exercises are what I find most valuable here. The tech is solid. Attempting to construct a proper frame reference make them much more useful than if you'd simply thrown them into a vacuum (as is typically the norm). I do hope others on this site realize that and shift their focus accordingly.

Good point.

Originally Posted by Mzzkc

The framing lends them more credence and power than they'd otherwise have--context is important for developing the necessary schematic associations required to make such tech effective, as you're probably aware.

I had a similar thought.

I believe that the workability of most "new" LD technologies is dependent almost entirely upon the framing and back story. When it comes to LDing, I don't think it's possible to overestimate the power of expectations.

Memories of past events have the greatest effect on expectations. The greater one's history of having difficulty in their LD efforts, the greater the expectation that it will continue to be difficult. A "new" approach with a good back story can break or even reverse that cycle. So I would expect that some will find cvdmehden's exercises quite effective.

I'm not saying cvdmehden's exercises are bogus. Quite the opposite in fact. If a technique works, even if it's only because it raises expectations, it works.

I also believe that awareness exercises like the ones in cvdmehden's book effect brain chemistry, and that can effect ones success rate... but similar exercises have been around forever.

The true test is whether or not the approach produces consistent results in the long term.