Honestly, I don't think I've had any "aha" moments yet on how to achieve lucidity.

The only true moment of this kind for me with dreams, I think was when I realised at some point I didn't need to be afraid of dreaming bad things, of having nightmares, etc. Do I still have fears? Of course, but I have managed to reach a state where I simply don't have bad dreams anymore. I can't really explain how this works, I don't have an understanding of it that I can put into words, but it's like "negative" emotion has become something I can appreciate over time as a result. Not to say I love being sad, scared or angry or whatever, but within the dreaming context these types of emotions are now much easier to accept.

I did have "aha" moments about other things because of trying to achieve lucidity though. My whole perspective on pain changed a lot with my first adult lucid, as it was the first time I understood what it was like to feel no pain; or to be more precise, to feel the absence of pain. It's a small nuance there, but once I achieved this realisation, this small nuance has been obvious ever since and this has been one of my biggest drives towards lucidity and keeping myself motivated on other things too, even just the motivation to continue with life sometimes.

On the path to lucidity I did also find that I could use willpower (when sufficiently motivated) to ignore painful (external) physical stimulus that would otherwise prevent me from doing certain things. I more or less learned how to ignore even very strong pain provided I have enough motivation to do so, for example by knowing that it won't be for long. In a way this has also lead me to understand how to override a lot of automatic things in terms of physical sensation, for example the sensations we get when a limb "goes to sleep" and then is "waking up" again, typically always felt really painful but now I no longer perceive it as pain anymore, but as something entirely different which I can even appreciate now.

I feel like I could ramble on for ages about lots of things but it'll end up not being directly related to lucidity (in the dreaming sense), which is more the point of the thread I suppose.


More on topic, I can identify somewhat with LeaningKarst's first reply to the thread, especially in regards to WILD, because I too never seem to remember to do RCs when I'm dreaming, even during periods when I'm being very conscious of dream-like cues or dream-signs during waking life. WILD and WBTB both work very well for me in terms of getting closer to lucidity, though because of my pain and sleep issues I have never been able to move further with WILD; and WBTB is made difficult for too many reasons but sometimes I can manage to do some WBTB stuff.