How specific does needs to be target in MILD Dream Sign Intention?

Hi Dreamviews,

I've got a quick question relating to MILD and Dream Signs
How specific does Dream Sign have to be?

Let's say for example a straight one would be seeing a cowboy in red hat
And not so specific would be seeing human.

I'd like to use for my MILD Attempts doing reality check whenever i see any human and i'm not sure if something so unspecific would work ;-)
Example: 'Whenever i see any human i'il remember to do reality check or try to recall what i was doing before to figure out that i'm dreaming'

- Thanks

Not specific at all. I noticed a pathway one time Ina dream that Looked a little like a constant dream location, and I realized it was a dream. Also most of my mild come from just realizing that I'm Ina dream, no DS needed!

It doesn't really need to be a specific dreamsign, the most important idea in practicing MILD is to remember to recognize the dreamstate.

Personally I like to practice MILD the way Stephen LaBerge did it - by coming up with random targets throughout the day, then make sure you remember to do them; and those targets could be anything.
It might be more effective to set targets that you are supposed to do in a couple hours, so that you need to constantly remind yourself to do them.
For example, if you are going to go shopping in two hours from now, then you can make up a target like "when I am at the supermarket, I will ask myself if I am dreaming".
I think that setting targets a few hours into the future like this will have the best effect, because it will be more similar to the time between falling asleep and getting your first vivid dream.

Of course, it is a bit harder to remember future intentions in a dream, since you have to bring those intentions with you from waking life into the dream and everything, but if you become really awesome at prospective memory in waking life then you have practiced that skill enough to have a good chance to succeed with in the dream as well.

Personally, I would estimate your chances to succeed with prospective memory in a dream to be probably about half as good as in waking life, so that if you succeed 100% of the time in waking life then you might expect to succeed 50% of the time in dreams.
Not sure if there is any data on this, but it would be cool to know roughly how good your chances will be when you dream compared to when you are awake.