On the same note as what others have mentioned, regarding maintaining a positive attitude and keeping at it, I noticed that you said:

Quote Originally Posted by zblack View Post
(Though I'll occasionally attempt W.I.L.D and get to some interesting places of semi-LD.)
To me, this would already be an interesting milestone of sorts. I have been at it for years - OK, more on and off than others at the best of times! -and my lucid dreaming average is maybe once a year, which is still better than zero times a year. Sometimes I get sad about it, sometimes I get happy about it. Overall I feel its a positive for me regardless of that swinging.

My intent in highlighting this quoted bit from you, is because I believe you can use this "occasional" situation as a building point for your confidence and positive attitude(s). I am not suggesting building plans around these occasional situations because if these are spontaneous and unpredictable that would probably be a pointless exercise. And that's fine too, you don't necessarily need to plan everything ahead and I think for me that's what I would read into "playful"ness as mentioned by FryingMan.


Actually, writing out these short thoughts here is really helpful to myself, because I didn't realise that I could be expanding on my own LD intention-setting by being less self-expectant about it. I often get a subtle worry when I'm setting intentions for dreaming, a worry suggesting something such as "oh, I should really think about what I want to do when lucid too though... I know I want to try doing some art, but what? and what if my brain can't come up with anything?". This is setting myself up to be more worried with what I'm going to dream about, rather than about the fact that I'm actually going to be dreaming at all, potentially lucidly. (and in essence, thank you for these thoughts FryingMan!)