Thread: LD frequency goal

Making goals that are unrealistic will fail and result in disappointment, eventually leading to a loss of motivation for future lucid dreaming.

Originally Posted by LDman

Making goals that are unrealistic will fail and result in disappointment, eventually leading to a loss of motivation for future lucid dreaming.

Daily lucidity is not an unrealistic goal, just a difficult one. Many exemples here on DV. Disappointment about something we are capable of is a problem of motivation and work.

I set goals in these categories:
Short goals
Low goal
High goal

Long goals
Low goal
High goal

You set reasonable goals, but aim for higher. You make sure to stay happy if you hit low goals. Setting high goals is always fine if you can deal with disappointment.

I personally aim higher than anyone that I have seen, seems to effect me a lot.

I prefer flexibility and set a monthly minimum and maximum and try to fall somewhere in between.

Of course my goal is to ld every night So far, I can ld every second night due lots of supplements and day/night practice.

Cosmic Iron claims people achieving this with his SSILD method. I've used it with maybe 50-70% success rate as long as I wake up late enough. More than I can say for any other method. And it did help me have my first two powerful LD's where I could interact with the characters, fly, meditate, and other things, with significantly less effort than any other method I've tried.
I like to compare this goal to meditation. Even after 11-12 years of meditation I cannot have a powerful meditation session 100% of the time. There are simply too many variables to account for. But I spent years with maybe 1-2/10 good sessions of meditation, going by the standard "tried and true" methods. Then there's this culture of just willing it more and more because you can't dare question the efficiency and effectiveness of the traditional methods. Well I have been able to be up to 7/9-10 powerful meditation sessions by using the traditions as a foundation but tweaking the methods little by little and studying the results.
Many lucid dreamers seem to do this intuitively. If we can think of methods as suggestions, or starting places for greater experimentation (N=1) experiments and not perfected methods ever, we can innovate and achieve much greater results.

I would say that several a week if not a powerful LD every other night or so is not too much to ask for, with an experienced lucid dreamer. If that's too unrealistic, we need to re-examine our methods and hold nothing sacred.

I'd disagree that you should set daily lucids as a goal.

Originally Posted by VagalTone

Daily lucidity is not an unrealistic goal, just a difficult one. Many exemples here on DV. Disappointment about something we are capable of is a problem of motivation and work.

But it is Many examples here on DV aren't people who "wished daily lucids": they are examples of people that practice consistently over long periods of time. Personally I haven't seen many people match the feat of Marquis d'Hervey de Saint-Denys: after 6 months after his first ld, he has rates of 2 lds every 5 nights and after a year, and I haven't seen anyone reach his even more incredible feat of after just 1 year, 3 lucid dreams per 4 nights. And remember, this was without any information on the topic!

Lucidity is, for the most part, an indirect result of the practice onironauts do. When I say "for the most part", it's obvious that it's a direct process if you're WILDing every day, particularly in the form of DEILD. But outside of that, one can only keep consistency of practice and that course of action naturally leads to improvement on lucidity.
A good way to picture this is if you imagine a person using every possible method to induce lucidity at the same time. The only thing that will help her further is time, nothing else. At some point, even motivation drops being a (huge) factor in lucidity: I remember still achieving several lds a week a month after stopping training completely. It's this automatically (the fact that you automatic respond to dream cues) that dictates your lucid dream frequency (when we're talking about high frequencies ofc).

So in the end, you can say your goal is to lucid daily, but despite any possible effects deriving from positive self-talk, what difference does it make? Sure, it can stress out the importance of achieving a lucid in the near-future, but it's largely still out of your control. Your are indeed right that challenging goals tend to stick better in our minds, but in my opinion daily lucidity is not an attainable goal: you can achieve it, but not by any direct means (once again, unless you're WILDing every night), since any and all lucid dream practice (regardless if you want 1 or 7 lds per week), is exactly the same.

Specially between micro awakenings, i think there is a higher chance to remember or have some thought about LDing. However, if we have a more loose attitude, our mind will probably put LDing to the next time, the next day, and so on..

I did this when I began to ld, and that result in a series of lds in the first week alone. The thing, this type of mentality takes a huge toll on motivation, in the sense that it seems nearly impossible to keep it on for long periods of time (can you seriously wake up 3 times per night, 30 days in a row thinking "MUST HAVE A LD!"?). I think the reason why many people burnout is that they face lucid dreaming as a "the train never stops, only goes faster!!!!" mode, instead of mainting a consistent schedule they can keep going for long periods of time and ripping the benefits from simple practice.

TLDR: Motivation is a like a muscle: use it too much and it will go away. Rely only on it, and eventually you'll fail when it's gone. Much better to simply rely on the balanced habit that naturally develops over time.

That's very good guys! I think daily lucidity is attainable over time. It may take a toll on motivation if you are too attached to outcomes, and if you exert a very strong willpower, which is explicitily not recommended by Laberge and Tholey. LaBerge says its counterproductive, Tholey says that any conscious effort of will must be avoided. And btw he also claims daily lucidity to be attainable by most people who practice his 9 step combined technique.

I would say that one should practice with heartfelt intention, lighthearted attitude and low expectations if that is possible. There's no rush, it's more like a long term goal.

Originally Posted by VagalTone

Daily lucidity is not an unrealistic goal, just a difficult one. Many exemples here on DV. Disappointment about something we are capable of is a problem of motivation and work.

I'm not saying it is unrealistic for everyone, I'm just saying that for someone who isn't a lucid-veteran diving straight into daily lucids is pretty much impossible unless you're a natural.

Originally Posted by LDman

I'm not saying it is unrealistic for everyone, I'm just saying that for someone who isn't a lucid-veteran diving straight into daily lucids is pretty much impossible unless you're a natural.

Let's try out with honesty, patience and perseverance ! Then you decide.

Normally I don't set lucidity goals to avoid putting pressure on myself. It depends a lot on how well and how much I sleep. In periods during which I can get myself to it, of course, I'll aim to get lucid as often as I can. For me a realistic goal right now would be to become lucid once a week. But if you can set your mind to it, sure, aim for daily lucidity, why not? We all know intention has a great influence on these things, so I don't see why you shouldn't do it

Originally Posted by Zoth

I'd disagree that you should set daily lucids as a goal.



But it is Many examples here on DV aren't people who "wished daily lucids": they are examples of people that practice consistently over long periods of time. Personally I haven't seen many people match the feat of Marquis d'Hervey de Saint-Denys: after 6 months after his first ld, he has rates of 2 lds every 5 nights and after a year, and I haven't seen anyone reach his even more incredible feat of after just 1 year, 3 lucid dreams per 4 nights. And remember, this was without any information on the topic!

Lucidity is, for the most part, an indirect result of the practice onironauts do. When I say "for the most part", it's obvious that it's a direct process if you're WILDing every day, particularly in the form of DEILD. But outside of that, one can only keep consistency of practice and that course of action naturally leads to improvement on lucidity.
A good way to picture this is if you imagine a person using every possible method to induce lucidity at the same time. The only thing that will help her further is time, nothing else. At some point, even motivation drops being a (huge) factor in lucidity: I remember still achieving several lds a week a month after stopping training completely. It's this automatically (the fact that you automatic respond to dream cues) that dictates your lucid dream frequency (when we're talking about high frequencies ofc).

So in the end, you can say your goal is to lucid daily, but despite any possible effects deriving from positive self-talk, what difference does it make? Sure, it can stress out the importance of achieving a lucid in the near-future, but it's largely still out of your control. Your are indeed right that challenging goals tend to stick better in our minds, but in my opinion daily lucidity is not an attainable goal: you can achieve it, but not by any direct means (once again, unless you're WILDing every night), since any and all lucid dream practice (regardless if you want 1 or 7 lds per week), is exactly the same.



I did this when I began to ld, and that result in a series of lds in the first week alone. The thing, this type of mentality takes a huge toll on motivation, in the sense that it seems nearly impossible to keep it on for long periods of time (can you seriously wake up 3 times per night, 30 days in a row thinking "MUST HAVE A LD!"?). I think the reason why many people burnout is that they face lucid dreaming as a "the train never stops, only goes faster!!!!" mode, instead of mainting a consistent schedule they can keep going for long periods of time and ripping the benefits from simple practice.

TLDR: Motivation is a like a muscle: use it too much and it will go away. Rely only on it, and eventually you'll fail when it's gone. Much better to simply rely on the balanced habit that naturally develops over time.

Hmmmm... I think that your data is good, but your conclusion is wrong. Let's say that someone wants to go pro in a sport (though one lucid a day is far easier than going pro in any sport). What is needed to go pro? No one would ever tell them to not set your goals on this and that they will "lose motivation" if they set their goals to something like that. It is ok to have a big goal in the future, as long as you don't get mad that you don't have it today. The reason that this frustrates people so much, is because they set unrealistic time restricted goals. You are supposed to set goals according to how you have done in the past (I have graphs and things to figure out where I should be at what time), but if you do not have an overarching goal, how will you know when you have made great progress?

Just because I have a huge goal doesn't mean that I am gonna use all my motivation every day, it in fact means the opposite. If people understood motivation as you do, to be a muscle, and their long term goal was to be lucid every day (a low goal, but it is in the convo), then they would take measures to make sure that they use it more sometimes, and less sometimes (like during the competition) in order to get it a workout. If you look at people that LD more than me, you won't see a lack of goals, but an increase in knowledge in most on how to achieve these goals.

Hope this makes sense. I am putting a big part about motivation and goals in a thread here pretty soon. Almost done with it.

There's a certain frustration in the elusive nature of lucid dreaming. Such as how the last two nights I did everything I normally do which has given me about 4LD's this week, but nothing the last two nights.

But on further thought, my real goal is consistancy of LD's and depth. I would rather only have 1-2 a week but have ones that last through my entire last REM cycle, where I can explore my unconscious and really get into experiments.

Originally Posted by VagalTone

Let's try out with honesty, patience and perseverance ! Then you decide.

I would like you to from now on write down your dreams in you DJ here on the forum each night and I give you one week after which every night you must have a lucid dream...

Or do you mean, you want to have this goal but you will finish it in like a year or something?

Originally Posted by LDman

I'm not saying it is unrealistic for everyone, I'm just saying that for someone who isn't a lucid-veteran diving straight into daily lucids is pretty much impossible unless you're a natural.

I have never seen a natural that has claimed this. All naturals have a normal linear growth of LDing like we do. We just see them after about 15+ years of practice usually.

Originally Posted by LDman

I would like you to from now on write down your dreams in you DJ here on the forum each night and I give you one week after which every night you must have a lucid dream...

Or do you mean, you want to have this goal but you will finish it in like a year or something?

Ok sir
The ideia that led me to start this thread was that one can profit by setting a daily lucidity goal. Simply by adopting this mindset. Even if you fail, i bet one ends up with more lds.
I would like to have daily LDs but i haven't reached that level nor have applied that effort so far.
I just believe it's not a dumb goal, even for beginners. I didn't mean to say one can actually have daily lucids without considerable study and practice.

Originally Posted by VagalTone

Ok sir
The ideia that led me to start this thread was that one can profit by setting a daily lucidity goal. Simply by adopting this mindset. Even if you fail, i bet one ends up with more lds.
I would like to have daily LDs but i haven't reached that level nor have applied that effort so far.
I just believe it's not a dumb goal, even for beginners. I didn't mean to say one can actually have daily lucids without considerable study and practice.

Alright, I put my dreams up here too so why don't we compare how many we've had by the end of July, deal?

I already had one btw...

Glad to see we disagree a lot on this aspect, makes things more interesting ^^

Just because I have a huge goal doesn't mean that I am gonna use all my motivation every day, it in fact means the opposite. If people understood motivation as you do, to be a muscle, and their long term goal was to be lucid every day (a low goal, but it is in the convo), then they would take measures to make sure that they use it more sometimes, and less sometimes (like during the competition) in order to get it a workout.

Like so many, you're misrepresenting the concept of motivation. I was hoping to write a thread on this, but this is as good of a time as any.

Motivation isn't a resource you employ: it's an internal process, a middle ground between a initial factor and the consequent behavior. For example, when you see a bear running for you, and you're afraid to die, you might become motivated to run away. When you're hungry, you become motivated to eat. When you want a car, you might become motivated to get a job. But motivation cannot be analysed in itself: you can only observe it within behavioral responses, and even then you can't always determine if it's motivation impulsing the behavior. More on this in a second.

Now back to goals: if you notice your own post, you contradict OP philosophy and end up agreeing with me, and I'll explain why. Goals, like you said, work better if they are specific (there's actually research on this) and measurable. But here's the catch: Person A and Person B use the exact same methods to achieve lucid dreams. Person A wants to have 3 lucids a week, Person B wants to have 7 lucids a week. Can you honestly say that there is a different methodology regarding person A and B? There isn't. In practice, that would be like saying that Hukif did something to reach 3 lucids per week, then something more to reach 4 a week, and even more to reach 7 a week: it's just unrealistics to assume that there's some minor task that increases frequency so much. The result here is time and consistency, which....is not within the concept of goal, it's in the concept of system. An explanation:

What's the difference between goals and systems?

If you're a coach, your goal is to win a championship. Your system is what your team does at practice each day.
If you're a writer, your goal is to write a book. Your system is the writing schedule that you follow each week.
If you're a runner, your goal is to run a marathon. Your system is your training schedule for the month.
If you're an entrepreneur, your goal is to build a million dollar business. Your system is your sales and marketing process.

As you can see, it doesn't matter if you're going for 5 or 6 lucids a week: imagine for a second that "Method X" was the most effective way to induce lucidity. This makes it pretty clear: regardless of the goal, your system (which is the most important thing since it dictates if you will reach your goal or not) will always be the same. If you're still unsure, think about this:

If you completely ignored your goals and focused only on your system, would you still get results?

Of course! Assuming that person A and person B would stick to lucid dreaming practice, person B (the one who was told to practice lucid dreaming, unlike person A who personally wanted to practice) would still achieve lucidity.

"But crovaxx, you're just guessing?"

No, a famous study in psychology of learning actually supports this conclusion. Look at the graph:

Barely any difference between the group motivated to the task and the group unaware of the task. And this is a short-term duration task. Do you think Sageous/Sivanson wouldn't have their lding rates after all those years practicing unless they really wanted? If I train two people to drive for 10 years, do you really think that their skills are going to differ just because of their motivation? Sure, there might be a small difference, but other factors like their skills and commitment will be way more important in determining their outcomes.

Yourself Sensei, are an example of this. You refer behavior that relates to the concept of system. Yes, you seem to focus a lot in goals, but from what you mention, your systems are the reason for success: you're the one who keeps saying that practice needs to be constant. What would you say contributed more to your improvement over the last year: your motivation, or your work consistency? The answer seems obvious, because it's impossible to be motivated 365 days a week, whereas consistency is a much less goal oriented behavior, and more towards the concept of system I talked about.

So in the end, what does this show?

That we keep encouraging people the wrong way: we keep telling people that they will succeed at lucid dreaming after experiencing their first one, that they need to get motivated and feel good about what they're doing. While I agree that the journey is meant to be fun, I'd say drop any "motivation" speeches and stick with a system that keeps you consistent: make a list about how many dreams you want to recall, and put an alarm for WBTB; do more reality checks, better ones; refine your technique to prevent burnout but to keep yourself focused throughout the day; maintain a strict sleeping schedule and make your body wake up naturally for WBTB. These are tasks for your system. Regarding your goal being "1 lucid per day" or "1 lucid per week", they will improve your ability to lucid dream over time, making your frequency higher and higher. High motivation might even give you a few lucids in earlier weeks, but when it depletes (you become tired, or stressed about something else, or too busy), you will have nothing to keep you going. Habits > motivation. Behavior > mindset.

Motivation. Not like willpower. I knew that, just forgotten and applied wrong. I am also making something about motivation, and how to stay motivated, because it doesn't automatically replenish unless you are in the right circumastances.

I agree with the majority of what you say, there is one problem I see though. If your motivation is low, then your expectation is low, and while expectation cannot increase the likeliness of a lucid above your current level of practice, it can decrease it. also, motivation low, stress high. Same thing, stress will take away your lucids as well. So I guess i am chamging my mind a little on this. (Edit: now that I think about it, negative expectation might just create stress, which is why positive expectation cannot increase ability).

We need motivation in order to get good at LDing, but no matter what, there will be times that you have none. There were months that i didn't give a Crap if I had a lucid. I didn't really see the point. But i promised myself to keep up the effort, because future me would kill me if I gave up (not really, I promise myself to do a hobby for a year at a time, I cannot quit during that time, so there is only one day a year I have a choice of quiting LDing).

Answer to what helped me more:
Motivation will rise and fall, but the system has to stay strong. If you want to consistently LD, you have to sleep consistently, practice awareness consistently, and practice recall consistently.

Interesting stuff! You have informed me a lot here!


TL;DR
Motivation can help you LD, but if losing motivation means stopping your practice, then you will not become a lucid dreamer.

I want 60/month minimum.

After some thinking I found out that I maybe didn't understand the OP's post exactly.
There's a difference between a goal and a desire, currently my goal for July is to have a minimum of 4 LDs, which means roughly 1 LD per week.
However I do desire having atleast 1 LD per night, that's what most people here desire, right?

The way I see it is, I have a goal and if I don't reach that goal then I must evaluate my actions and effort, if I reach that goal I wouldn't be satisfied with it cause I still have the desire to have 1 LD per night minimum.
So everytime I reach a goal I will raise it for next month, I will keep raising it until I reach my desire.


If I rewrite my first post which was this:

"Making goals that are unrealistic will fail and result in disappointment, eventually leading to a loss of motivation for future lucid dreaming."

Then I would now write it as:

"Making such high goals will fail in short term, which will lead to a loss of motivation, however having it as an ultimate long term goal is good. Use smaller goals that you can reach and keep raising them gradually until you reach your ultimate goal."

Mostly agreeing with the above, I'd say that motivation is not like willpower or courage. It's not a resource that you "summon" in a short amount of time in order to overcome an obstacle, which is then depleted. It's more like desire or curiosity. It's inertia. You don't directly control it, but I think you can slowly "cultivate" it over time, just like you acquire an interest in a hobby over time. Someone who has never heard of lucid dreaming will have no motivation. On first learning of it, they may have some motivation. As they learn and experiment, the motivation will increase over time. It may wax and wane in the short term, but there is also a long term trend. But I want to suggest a different language.

I think the mechanism of goals is that they create a conditioning reward/reinforcement system. I think using the language of operant conditioning would be more productive. To pursue a goal is to seek a reward, no matter how intangible it may be. Failing a goal risks negative reinforcement. Too much negative reinforcement will eventually lead one to stop seeking the reward because your experience has conditioned you to believe that the probability of success is too low. Is that motivation? I can't say. But it makes sense to me. I think conditioning is more objective and observable whereas motivation is rather subjective.

So, in that line of thinking, you must always have a challenging goal in order to progress. But if it is too challenging, you will become discouraged. The most effective practice would be one with several intermediate goals, so that the practitioner gets frequent success and reward, but also progresses with increasing challenge. We might call that progressive sequence of goals a "goal schedule." Even better I think is to have many different overlapping goal schedules. One for LD frequency, one for dream recall count, dream control tasks, overcoming a nightmare, and so on.

On the other hand, it can be difficult to condition yourself because if you set the goals, you may be tempted to make them too easy. That's why it helps to have a coach or mentor so that the goal setting is external and preferably chosen by someone with knowledge and previous experience. In lieu of an actual coach, reading and borrowing from others is more accessible while still including an external factor.

If your motivation is low, then your expectation is low, and while expectation cannot increase the likeliness of a lucid above your current level of practice, it can decrease it.

Not really. Imagine a classical conditioning example of lucid practice: reality checking in the face of a dream sign: whether you're motivated or not, chances are that you will automatically respond to the stimulus, performing a reality check whenever you see the dream sign. Like I said above, things like expectation and intention might play a small role, but they aren't largerly significant when it comes to behavioral responses, which in turn lead to lucidity. What's happening here is yet another case of confirmation bias: we see people drooling over their first lucid, and "knowing it will be tonight" and then we automatically assume that expecting to become lucid plays a huge part on it:

- If they become lucid, we assume it's because they were "focused" and "confident" they would eventually become lucid;
- If they fail to become lucid, we tell people they don't "visualize" enough, or aren't confident they will become lucid, that they need to expect it.

As you can see, this is some type of law of attraction in people think that if they want a lucid dream bad enough, they will have one. Not only is this flawed, but counter-productive. Yes, it's probably the biggest culprit of people getting their first lucid dream(s) - and we can even explain to some degree why, they are essentially incubating dream content - but it will never take them far: once again, is not about the goal, is about the process/system.

also, motivation low, stress high.

Why would you say that? At this very moment, I'm not motivated to study not because I'm stressed, but because I'm distracted with more interesting things. There are many factors that influence motivation, and stress isn't necessarily a cause for low motivation. You're committing black-and-white thinking here by assuming that if you have no motivation, you can't get good at lucid dreaming. But I just pointed you out an example of a study that proves that intention isn't the key to successful behavioral responses.

We need motivation in order to get good at LDing, but no matter what, there will be times that you have none. There were months that i didn't give a Crap if I had a lucid. I didn't really see the point. But i promised myself to keep up the effort, because future me would kill me if I gave up (not really, I promise myself to do a hobby for a year at a time, I cannot quit during that time, so there is only one day a year I have a choice of quiting LDing).

So why assume motivation is needed? I'm not saying it doesn't help, just curious what makes you think you can't achieve good lucid dreaming skills blindly following a set of behaviors as opposed to actively wanting to achieve a goal. But now that I think about it, natural lucid dreamers tend to be good at lding because they were (at some point) hugely motivated for it: mostly motivated to avoid/fight nightmares. And at the same time, you can't exactly intentionally repeat a behavior unless you're motivated for it....Hmmm, guess I found my middle ground xD

Still, something I'd like to talk more about in the future is what do you do when motivation doesn't exist: like applying this type of strategies. At the same time, automated behavior is so much easier to do, and certainly more value on the creation and support of habits would help a lot of people fight lack of motivation to ld. Basically, changing the shift of "what you need to be successful in lucid dreaming" from "law of attraction" to "work on your system" type of advice.

Thanks for the brainstorming so far btw

If I may add a little bit to all that's been said about this, I believe action is something that must also be considered when pursuing a goal, whichever it may be. It's such a simple concept, in fact you could almost argue it's a given when it comes to goals, yet it's something people usually ignore. In fact, I'll say action is the most important factor when it comes to reaching goals.

It's true that things like motivation and having a good process/system are of great importance when trying to succeed at anything. However, motivation isn't always present all the time, particularly if the goal in mind takes time to build. Like everything, some days we wake up feeling like anything is possible, while some days we feel like not doing anything at all. Likewise, having a great system or process we can follow is worthless if we don't get out there and DO what that process or system requires us to do in order to reach our goals. That is because habits like these don't form out of the blue. They take time, continuous practice and dedication to forge.

It's just like learning any new ability, and just like any new learning process, starting is the most difficult obstacle one has to overcome. If we take a look at our lucid dreaming journeys, we'll find out that initially we felt motivated because we were marveled by the enticing possibilities the dream world offers. A lucid dream is also something we haven't yet experienced, thus, we're attracted to it and so we dive in eagerly to find out what it is all about. Our high level of motivation may even be enough for us to experience our first taste of results, increasing our motivation to continue practicing. Yet, just like anything else, that drive will only last for a couple of days, maybe a week, and the lack of results as the days go by will most likely decrease our motivation and stunt improvement. That is because willpower and motivation alone will never bring consistent progress to anyone. For that, one must have to take action and practice, one must do to get the results they want, in spite of sometimes finding no source of motivation to draw from. Still though, one has to plan out a form of practice that delivers results. Still, a habit can only be constructed through continuous action.

Now, mindless action will not get us anywhere as well. Determination is also something that should be taken into account. The determination to go out and practice earnestly not because you want to get over with it, but because there's a true intention to improve. With continuous practice we then find a new source of motivation, not found in a specific goal, but in the journey itself that leads us to such goal.

We must understand that motivation is not something we must depend on alone to reach our goals. It might give us that initial push when starting out, yet sooner or later we must find out that taking action despite a lack of motivation is what will ultimately get us to where we want to be. That, and having the determination to get out and forge the habits that will move us to success.

So, is daily lucid dreaming an impossible goal to reach? I don't think so, but I do believe that setting unreasonable goals when starting out is more likely to bring negative results, though that depends on how one deals with challenge. Just the same, someone who sets low goals that pose no challenge whatsoever will just forbid any form of progress. Remember challenge is a double edged sword: too much of it and goals appear unreachable, too little of it and no progress is actually made.