ADA, Mindfulness, Self awareness, Lucid living - Let's dig deeper, What's important?

Hello fellow Oneironauts, I have been thinking for a while now about starting a thread to discuss the aspects of Mindfulness, self awareness, ADA so here are my thoughts:

It seems the general consensus is that if you are more “aware” during waking reality you will be more aware in your dreaming life. I believe this to be true so let's try to define what we mean by “aware” because there are so many things that we could be “aware” of the list could be endless.

“Being Mindful” or “Having Self awareness” or “All day awareness” are probably understood differently from one person to the next as we all interpret things from our own understanding and subjective point of view.

Because of this I think it would be a good idea to have a discussion on what in particular we should be putting our awareness/focus on with regards to increasing the odds of inducing Lucid dreams. I think we could narrow it down more as to what we mean when we say self awareness and what we put our awareness/ focus on exactly.

I need to also state that one thing that prompted me to look further into this is Eckhart Tolle’s books and increasingly the practice of Buddhism and maybe Hinduism (I Love a bit of Yoga). Eckharts books are nothing short of amazing IMO. I first listened to A new Earth Audiobook and at some point in that book i had a glimpse of this oneness, pure consciousness, present awareness whatever you want to call it. I felt a calm peacefulness and felt like I was seeing/feeling everything in a new light (The Buddhists call this Satori if this is what it was). During that period I had my first ever spontaneous Dild, granted it was a Saturday morning so no work and a longer Rem period than usual but this was right out of the blue and i put it down to being more Present and more “aware” at that time.

Now if the reason for my spontaneous Dild was caused by increased awareness, presence, mindfulness etc and i strongly believe it was then all we need to do is be more present and aware right? Easy one would think and this is the general idea of most spiritual practice. Being more present and more aware firstly means being free from the mind or incessant thinking, not being caught up in our emotions and thought patterns. This can be a very difficult state to maintain but i think with continued practice it gets easier and easier. I'm in no way an expert either by the way and I get caught up in it more than I would like.

We could talk about the subconscious/ unconscious mind being full of traps and when we get “trapped” we are taken away from being consciously aware and present and trapped in the mind of thought patterns and emotions. Eckhart talks about this and so does Buddhism which calls it Karma. Obviously we need to watch semantics and what we name these things so in general I think it's more conducive if we keep the terms as general as possible but then also quote similar translations (spiritual/religious) etc for broader understanding as it could simply make or break our understanding of concepts and ideas etc depending on our back ground or line if teaching.

The word “Self” for example probably conjures up all manner of definitions for different people and i would now define the word “Self” as the Ego or the things you identify with in life. Or you could see yourself as your Emotions and thought patterns.

Any way after that bit of a rant I would like to start a list of things (hopefully practical things) that we can put awareness/focus on during the day to Increase our awareness during our dreams. We could then prioritise these things to further increase our odds. We can also categorize them for further understanding.


The senses
Sight, Sound, Touch (Nervous system), Smell, Taste
Outer environment (The usual stuff people associate with increased awareness).
Sight - Nature, colours, textures, geometry, shades/Shadows, Movement etc.
Space and matter - being aware of space as well as the material world. These seem to be polar opposites.
Sound - Nature, Weather, birds and animals, humming of machines, roaring of motors, Doors & drawers opening & slamming, foot steps and Voices etc
Touch - Nature and weather, Textures, Clothes tightness etc, temperatures, aches, pains & tightness (could be classed as inner environment), gravity & pressure, weights, hardness and softness etc

I think it is important to try not to label everything as we put our attention on them as this increases mind chatter and takes you out of the present moment and also takes away the amazement of the world around us. I mean WOW people we are F*****g alive look at this shit it's amazing.


Inner enviroment
Sound - Ringing in the ears, Heartbeat, Breathing,
Feeling -
(Inner body) - Eckhart talks extensively about keeping at least some awareness on the inner body at all times to remain present and that you can always go deeper. I have found this to be the case, it can give an awesome sense of peace and can almost feel ecstatic. This is a great tool and highly recommended.

Emotions - I am increasingly realising that it seems as though some/most of the emotions are felt at the Chakra points, stomach and throat being two main ones for me (butterflies and a choked up feeling come to mind).
Anger however is all pervasive if you allow it to be and rise up all over the body.
Anxiety can be mainly caught in the stomach I have found and belly breathing works wonders.

Thoughts - (“You are not your thoughts” so try not to get attached to or identify with them)
I can't state enough that being aware of your thoughts and not getting caught up in them is so important to being in the present moment. If you are caught up in them you can't be aware of your inner body, your environment your emotions or any thing it's basically just daydreaming. Your emotions are influenced by your thoughts which will then influence your thoughts in a never ending cycle of hell (if you let them). The practices for remaining present/aware/mindful will prevent you from getting caught up in your thoughts and emotions and will slowly but surely dissolves these mind patterns that rule us.
This is not to say that we can't use our minds for thinking day to day, Creating etc but don't let it take over use it as a tool and don't let it use you.

Visualization - With regards to day dreaming though it is close if not the same thing almost as visualisation so maybe there's some crossover. Maybe visualization is daydreaming but with awareness but can turn into daydreaming or a dream or a lucid dream depending on maintaining that awareness. Any visualisers care to comment as i don't know if I'm good or bad at it.

The manifested and unmanifested. This i felt was quite profound but hard to explain if you can bear with me. The manifested could be all matter as well as thought/thinking and emotions. The unmanifested Could be Space, no thought and is the source of where everything comes from. This may also be what people call Pure consciousness, God, Divinity etc. Again my understanding of this comes from Eckhart tolle but I am only scratching the surface however. This could give us a glimpse of what true reality is behind the veil as they say and without obscurity of the mind.

I need to rap this up as I could go on and on but lastly I have also purchased a Xiaomi Mi Band 3 cheap as chips and use this with Blip Blip app to give me a subtle vibrating reminder on my wrist every half hour to remind me of what ever practice I'm doing. I'm hoping this works as training wheels and eventually engrains some of these things as habit maybe. For an example as soon as i get the reminder at the moment my band notification reads:-
(IB Br Feel Whe Wha Rec NRC IB Br)
and i put my awareness onto the following -
IB - Inner body, put awareness on the inner body.
BR - breath through the diaphragm /Belly breathing create coherence.
Feel - how am i feeling physically and emotionally, put awareness on any strong emotions like anxiety at the stomach area mainly.
Whe - Where am I.
Wha - What am I doing/Where am i going.
Rec - Recall the last half an hour to an hour or more depending on time.
NRC - Nose plug RC
Then back to finish on Inner body and Breath.
This sounds like a lot to do especially if busy but it doesn't actually take that long once you get the hang of it. My mind flows like the following:-
Buzz on my wrist - vibrations send me into inner body awareness - Belly breath - feel emotions at stomach - Where I'm at such n such a place doing this or that going nowhere in particular- I've been doing this and that spoke to that person did this and that, that all do bout half n hour - Nose plug - back to inner body deep breath to finish. But try to keep some inner body and breath awareness going.
This is a short version but i spend as much time as i have/want on the details of each part. And obviously some things are more important than others and this is the whole point of the thread.

Well there's probably a ton more I could say but I'm hoping some of you guys with probably more experience with regards to this stuff can point us all in the right direction (especially if I'm not on point or just plain wrong about something).

Let's try to prioritise our Focal points/ awareness on the most powerful lucid dream inducers so that we use our time wisely.

What are the most Important aspects of all this awareness stuff?

Consider the phrase "I am dreaming." It is a connection between the self, the present moment, and dreaming.

What self-awareness does is connects awareness of the self, the present moment, and other things. Connecting the self with other things at the present moment is the most important part of the awareness exercise. A member here named Sageous made a post that goes into more detail about this. He calls the self-awareness practice a reverse RC (RRC) WILD Session 1: Mental Prep Part A

During the dream, the thing we want to connect our self with at the present moment is dreaming. To do this, we have to be able to tell whether or not we are dreaming. Identifying any difference between dream and reality during the dream can be used to tell we are dreaming. Dreams can differ from reality in their context, their form, the action that occurs during them, and the dreamer's inner awareness.

Some people, during the day, develop a habit of using self-awareness to connect their self with something that is different during dreams. When this habit carries over into their dreams, it results in lucidity. For example, a member here named Hukif has great success habitually using self-awareness to focus on the connection between himself with the feeling of gravity. He made a thread about it here: Gravity RC - For real this time

The focal points/awareness other than the self, the present moment and the connection between them, should be something that is obviously different during dreams and almost always occurs during dreams.

Appreciate the reply Dolphin and Sageous's take is good I will reread that. So Sageous's view is that Self awareness is just keeping attension on the fact that you exist in conjunction to you surroundings. You also suggest connecting this awareness to dream signs if I understood that correctly.

Do you think there could be practical, universal but also powerful dream signs that we could try to connect our awareness to during the day?

I think for many including myself our own minds can get in the way and just having a clearer mind and being more present and in the moment during the day can bring on lucidity all by itself as it did for me. This is the same thing i think as a non lucid dream, our minds are to frantic and we get caught up in our own dream/thoughts to much and don't know we are dreaming. So as many have suggested we are kind of dreaming while we are awake because we are caught up in our own minds and not in the moment etc.

If this is true then all we need to do is be more present and in the moment during the day but thats easier said than done I know.
This is where meditation comes in I suppose but if we can some how remain in this state for the whole day or as much as possible this will surely increase our chances as we would be doing exactly what we want to do in our dreams, be more aware/awake

Nice thread that raises questions I am thinking about myself. I've been wondering what the most effective way to practice awareness is to attain frequent and high levels of lucidity in dreams.

I've mostly been following the sticky by Sageous on awareness and supplementing that with an exercise called "Your Present State of Consciousness" from Stephen Laberge's book Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming, which takes you through one minute of focusing on all of you senses, touch, taste, vision, smell, feel, and then emotions, thoughts, I, and then awareness of awareness. Since I have done these supplemental exercises I have noticed my dream senses have increased. For the first time in my memory, I've felt distinct and memorable textures within dreams, as well as hearing things more clearly.

Hi Zelcrow

I remember that section of the book, I'll reread it thanks for the reminder.
Yes i definitely remember from my spontanious Dild that there was more awareness in general due to the mindfulness techniques etc. Come to think of it now most of the time when I remember normal dreams I am always interacting with someone or a group but in that Dild i was just scanning the environment in wonder until I realised it was a dream, there were some people off to one side but they were just chillin.

Since I am late to this thread and I am unsure if this thread has more legs left in it, I will just copy and paste something I've prepared previously. I will hold some other comments I thought of for later, if the discussion continues. You will see where it ties in to awareness/self-awareness as marked with an asterisk (*) towards the end:

------------------------------------------

Techniques/Dreamsigns/Stacking:

Dream signs that have been the most successful at making me lucid are:
weird sky/stars
deceased father in law
dream only solutions (floating up over a crowd or obstruction)

There are quite a few other dream "signs" that show up more frequently but are not very good at making me lucid.

If there is no awareness, even the best dream signs fail. But my 3 best dream signs above are quite effective at spiking my awareness even when it seems I had very little awareness before I came across one of those 3 dream signs.

Crates

You could think of it like collecting crates that you can stack up to look over the wall to lucidity:

(Very rough and maybe very personal estimates)
Daywork ~1 to 2 crates
Wake back to bed +SSILD or MILD ~2 crates
Night work right before first going to sleep ~0.5 to 2 crates
Powerful dream sign ~2 to 3 crates
Galantamine+Choline ~3 crates
Normal dream sign ~0.5 crates
other things like diet, sleep pattern ~0.5 crates
(*I believe superior self-awareness would give you all the crates you would need (Sageous seems to say something similar), but I am not there yet, so I can't speak from experience like I can in the above examples. Above, *self-awareness is part of my daytime work.)

You might need 4 crates (using the above guide) to be able to peer over the wall to lucidity.

------------------------------------------

Reviewing the "crates" idea today, I feel it still holds true, for me at least. I know that the self-awareness work of the type that I learned from Sageous both helps with lucidity and with having higher level lucids. Self-awareness is a journey, so the other "crates" above may be shorter-term ways to get some lucidity while you build up your self-awareness.

"I am" "Here and Now" and "everything else"!

If you can seperate "I am" from "everything else", "here and now". You can experience true awareness, you will become a point of awareness.

think like this, when you are in a dream you dont know whether you are dreaming or not until u make a reality check, similarly when you are in waking state actually you dont know whether you are dreaming or not, you just accept it as real like you do in non lucid dreams . that means unless you have continues moment to moment awareness you cannot be sure that you are not dreaming . make this idea sync into mind and practice ADA and do frequent RC