It just feels fake when I RC

So: first post, five months into learning, and nine really brief LDs. This forum is such a great resource, and I'm hoping to get some input on the areas I struggle with.

I read a lot of people saying that when you RC "you should feel that you could be dreaming at that very moment". And I never can. I believe the first one of the day, when I wake up - "this could be a false awakening". But then, if an hour later, I see one of my dreamsigns (chocolate, comics or animals!) and say; "this could be a dream", my brain instantly replies: "um - no it couldn't, becase I remember that nose pinch I did an hour ago when I woke up, and I haven't gone to sleep since then, and I remember what I've been doing in the house since I got up, and it hasn't changed shape or location in that time at all, so I know I'm still awake". So that thought goes through my head in a flash, and before I can even nose pinch - I've talked myself out of believing. And so it goes all day.

I can role play it and say : "what if I had a dream tonight that was just like this, and then I'd do a nose pinch and discover I was dreaming" - and act that out - maybe that'll be as far as I can get. But do people really believe they might be dreaming when they RC ? Even when you remember doing your last RC earlier in the day?

Jo

There is no need to worry about this unless it starts happening during dreams. Besides, by thinking back what was done more than 5 minutes ago, an RC is already being done before the nose pinch.

Associating the dream signs with dreaming is more important than the way the RCs are done.

Here's an apparently arcane facet of RC's you may have never heard before, Jo1: Critical state tests (RC's), as originally designed, are meant to confirm that you are awake, and not that you are dreaming.

In other words, you always know you are awake when you are doing a RC and it is only when a RC fails (i.e., your finger passes straight through your palm, instead of being stopped by it) that you will believe you are dreaming... this is true during a NLD, BTW, the theory being that you believe that you are awake when not lucid, and a failed RC proves otherwise, encouraging lucidity.

Also, for me, convincing yourself that you are dreaming when you are awake should never be possible: unless you have a mental disorder that allows psychotic breaks, you will always know you are awake, no matter what you tell yourself. And, ironically, if you can convince yourself you are dreaming when you are not, you are abandoning your presence in the actual moment, and thus sacrificing lucidity to support a fantasy of dreaming.

So there is no reason to convince yourself that you are dreaming when you do a RC; all you need to do is take a moment -- say, after you spot a dreamsign -- to ask yourself "Is this a dream?" and do a RC to confirm that it is not. I think this whole theme of imagining that you are dreaming came from a misinterpretation of LaBerge's (the guy who popularized state tests) suggestion that, after you have done a RC, to continue the moment by imagining what it would be like if you were in a dream, and look for dreamlike things in your surroundings. These are two separate things to do that seem to have been combined into one, resulting in RC's becoming much more difficult than they were originally meant to be.

tl;dr: Don't worry about believing you are dreaming, both because you really can't, and because that is not part of a RC anyway.

Oh, and welcome to DV's, Jo1!

That's so helpful guys, and makes so much sense. I fits with something that I remember LaBerge saying which is: if you really tink you might be dreaming, then you almost certainly are ... because we never think we're dreaming when we're awake. I was wondering how to square this with the way RCs get talked about sometimes - but now it all fits together nicely :)

So question two: my prospective memory sucks ! No matter how often I say "next time I find myself talking about dreams, I'll test whether i'm deaming" .. it won't go in. I notice that i'm like this in all areas of my life too: "remember to pick up milk next time you go out" .... no chance! I've got a couple of dream signs that come up a lot in my life .... but can I remember to RC when I see them ? Absolutely not! It's always about half an hour afterwards in waking life that I go .. "oh wait a minute, having a conversation with my friends about dreaming, isn't that supposed to be a dreamsign - doh!"

So as someone with a defective prospevctive memory - what's the best way forward ? Maybe to focus on WILD ? which is harder I know, but doesn't require teh prospective memory skills.

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Originally Posted by Jo1

So as someone with a defective prospevctive memory - what's the best way forward ? Maybe to focus on WILD ? which is harder I know, but doesn't require teh prospective memory skills.

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I would say that I too have "defective" prospective memory, and yet I have had thousands of DILD's. With my DILD's, I generally just "know" I am dreaming, and have pretty much never used dreamsigns. I think successful DILD'ing lies more in nurturing the potential for that knowing by having a solid lucid mindset* than it does in mastering a technique like setting prospective memory (though for those who can do that, I highly recommend that they use it! ;)). So DILD's could still work for you, regardless of your ability to recognize and react to dreamsigns during a NLD.

That said, WILD really is no harder than DILD; it's just different. DV's WILD tutorial is pretty good, and if you're interested I also have a WILD class in the DVA... you might want to check them out.

* A lucid mindset, for me, equals easily accessed self-awareness and memory, plus solid expectation that you will be lucid (aka, the fundamentals).

Another helpful answer ! Good to know a strong prospective memory is not essential.

Yes, I'm working through the information on fundamentals, and that great WILD tutorial.

Like you, the DILDs I've had haven't involved recognising a dreamsign - I just knew.So I'll just keep building that self-awareness during the day, and trusting that it'll come online in the night!

Regarding non-prospective (retrospective?) memory, I would just add that memory can often be deceptive in dreams. So even though you have that feeling that "I just did an RC an hour ago, so this can't be a dream", you should still definitely check, because your memory could be lying to you. I can't tell you how many times I've missed becoming lucid because of a false memory the dream created. Once I was breathing underwater and thought that I might be in a dream, but then I recalled that the lake I was in was on the news the night before because it had some "futuristic water that was infused with oxygen to allow you to breathe", so I didn't become lucid. :doh:

So I guess just springboarding off of Sageous's point: for a lot of people, both prospective and retrospective memories can be a bit defective (at least in the dream itself), which is why RCs and awareness are so important, because you can trust what you feel here and now more than what you think you might remember.

Thanks for that spellbee2 - that's worth looking out for - I hope the breathing underwater dream was good anyway!

There's so much information out there, and talking the issues through here is really helpful for me. It seems like there are so many different ways that we all approach our practice. I like that on a forum you can see them all, and thereby see that theres no one right way, but such a lot of variety.

I'm also finding - and I know other people have made this point - that just taking some time to read and post on here focuses my brain on lucidity during sleep. After a frustrating dry spell I just had a very funny group sex DILD - so thanks to everyone on this thread for making that happen!

spellbee2 pretty much made the point I was going to. Memory recall can be very convincing, yet completely wrong in a dream. I've found it prudent to force myself to redo a RC if I feel so compelled, even if I think I just did one earlier. I've had a surprising number of cases in which I was sure I remembered just doing an RC that indicated I was awake, but decided to do it again anyway and discovered that, lo and behold, I actually was dreaming all along. Some experience with this, as well as the other aspects in which dreams can trick you into believing they're real, can help make the RCs you do in waking life more sincere.

You don't have to completely convince yourself that you're dreaming when you do a RC, but you should allow enough room for uncertainty that you aren't just expecting the RC to indicate reality without paying much attention or thinking about it. When I do them, I ignore everything I think is true at the moment, forget about any kind of memory of recent events (as I've learned countless times that they're potentially unreliable), and give myself a moment to consider what I'm actually observing in the RC at the present moment. And then I try to remember that this result is only valid for now, at this moment, and not later. If I care later, I should just do another one. :)

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Originally Posted by Sageous

In other words, you always know you are awake when you are doing a RC and it is only when a RC fails (i.e., your finger passes straight through your palm, instead of being stopped by it) that you will believe you are dreaming... this is true during a NLD, BTW, the theory being that you believe that you are awake when not lucid, and a failed RC proves otherwise, encouraging lucidity.

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This is exactly it. When an RC works in a dream you'll have that "Holy sh*t!" moment that really contrasts waking time. And I think doing RC can be trained into a habit, which will also increase your chance of doing it in a dream. Nose-pinch is probably the best one for it. It works without too much thinking because of phisiology reasons.

A dream where I think I've already done my RC !? That's a new one on me Travis. I've stil got so much to learn - thanks.

I have though had an LD where I came to do my nose pinch ... only to find I had no arms! "Oh" I thought "now I can't do my nose pinch, I guess I'll never know whether or not I'm dreaming" - shortly followed by "hey, wait a minute if I've got no arms, doesn't that mean I'm dreaming , cos i'm kind of sure I have arms in real life ..."

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Originally Posted by Jo1

I have though had an LD where I came to do my nose pinch ... only to find I had no arms! "Oh" I thought "now I can't do my nose pinch, I guess I'll never know whether or not I'm dreaming" - shortly followed by "hey, wait a minute if I've got no arms, doesn't that mean I'm dreaming , cos i'm kind of sure I have arms in real life ..."

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Haha, that's a good sign. I think part of the true art of mastering RCs is catching those times where the RCs don't go quite the way you were expecting and yet recognizing this oddness as itself a RC. It's very easy to get confused in a dream and fool yourself into thinking you're not dreaming, and then you end up sort of kicking yourself when you wake up for missing something so seemingly obvious. With time and experience, though, I think one starts to get better at correctly handling these tricky cases and maintaining lucidity.

Thanks so much for this thread. I was having the same issue.

It's always good to find it's not just you, kamenriderbaron - thats what forums are for, right? This thread made me both more focused on my RCs, which is great, and less worried about whether I was doing them "sincerely enough", also great! Now I'm doing them more, and am happy if I can just think: "well, everything around me seems stable and familiar, but you can never be sure until the nose pinch, can you ?"

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Originally Posted by Jo1

It's always good to find it's not just you, kamenriderbaron - thats what forums are for, right? This thread made me both more focused on my RCs, which is great, and less worried about whether I was doing them "sincerely enough", also great! Now I'm doing them more, and am happy if I can just think: "well, everything around me seems stable and familiar, but you can never be sure until the nose pinch, can you ?"

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Lately, I notice I have a hard time remembering them. What is a good way to get motivated and excited on this?

Sageous did a good job covering what I think. When it comes to doing RCs there isn't really any particular way you're supposed to "feel". If it feels fake, I doubt it would have any significant impact on the number of incidences you recognize you are dreaming. How the act of performing an RC itself specifically feels isn't in itself consequential to success rate and isn't really a factor you should find concerning.

The most essential functions performing RCs serve are increasing your awareness of reality, your place in it, and focusing on the sensation of actually being during a given point of time. They're also meant to help you realize what potential dream signs you may have, the idea being to exploit those signs by performing RCs while awake when encountering those signs in the hopes that you begin to perform RCs while dreaming when you encounter those signs. Even with that, the goal involves becoming more aware of what's happening to you and aspects of your own personality and patterns of behavior. The name of the game here is cultivating and practicing increased awareness, so try to keep that in mind when questioning whether or not you happen to be performing the exercise correctly (like in this case, for example, you're getting caught up on a detail that doesn't tend to make a whole lot of difference).

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Originally Posted by kamenriderbaron

Lately, I notice I have a hard time remembering them. What is a good way to get motivated and excited on this?

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I take a couple of minutes before i get up to remind myself that i'll be doing them throughout the day. I find it helps picturing a few situations in which I'm likely to do them
And a bit of encouraging self-talk goes a long way: "keep working towards the next lucid dream!" is what I often say when i become a bit unenthusiastic