First ever LD (random) after a year's effort. What now?

[dmrhr]

I have been systematically working on lucid dreaming for almost a year now. I have almost 300 days of very detailed dreams written. Throughout different periods, I tried all common methods, and lately was attempting setting a good intention and DEILD. Yesterday, I had my first ever lucid dream, but it happened randomly. It confirmed everything I've read about - DCs will kick your butt if you tell them they're not real, or it's a dream, the feeling of extreme clarity, difficulty controlling your actions etc. But I, today in particular, did no reality checks, not even MILD or setting any intention. I did have especially vivid dreams outside of this one though. Now I'm wondering where to go from here, since none of the things I attempted really worked for me so far, but that my first LD happened seemingly random. If curious, this is the dream: -- I’m at my old work. We had just kicked our CEO out (which we haven’t). I see the core team is working downstairs. I go up to 2nd floor. I see our CEO’s empty desk. I say to myself, ‘wow, he’s gone’. Then I run into the marketing guy he had brought on. He asks me ‘Am I next to go?’. I tell him I don’t know. Then I go back downstairs from the other end. I see two of my co-workers, working. Then I have this extreme confidence and clarity that, ‘wait a second, I don’t work at this place anymore, this is absolutely a dream’. It is as if suddenly the movie becomes real. I get giddy and run up to my co-worker. I tell him, ‘this is a dream, who cares what I do?’ and I start laughing about it. Immediately both of their faces distort, their eyes get pinkish and they get upset. They lift me up from my arms and start to carry me away, while I’m laughing and trying to take all in. They are also tickling but I don’t feel ticklish in the dream (I do in real life). Then I wonder, now I know it’s a dream, how the hell will I wake up? But eventually I do.

[zelcrow]

Congratulations on your LD! Have you exclusively used the MILD technique? Which others have you tried? I say keep working on getting lucid. And now maybe that you've had an LD, you can incorporate some intention along with it. Visualizing and reminding yourself to perform RCs to keep yourself in a lucid state for longer, setting an intention for goals that you want to perform within your dreams and things like that can potentially be a good next step! I'm sure other members will have some great input with this too.