Am I getting close? +question

Last night I had a dream that I was dreaming lucidly. I remember being in a place then I fell asleep and was dreaming within my dream. I can't distinguish now between when I was dreaming within a dream and just regular dreaming (essentially they're the same though). In my dream-dream there wasn't really an environment. I just remember doing a reality check or something that reminded me I was dreaming. I've been focusing on paying more attention to my senses lately, so my dreams will be more real. All I remember of my dream-dream is that I was standing somewhere and I looked up at sun. I could see it and feel it. Then I remembered smell and taste, and I tasted the sunlight. It was the best feeling ever. This was the only control I exerted in my dream-dream, unfortunately. I also remember thinking, wow, I dreamt lucidly and was going to post it on here. And I don't understand how I could've been thinking about lucidity and being lucid and not realized that my dream world (which I presumed to be the real world) was fake also.


I also have a question about dream recall. I can only remember the last dream I had before I woke up as an actual story with a plot (and only that much sometimes). Other dreams, if remembered, are only fragments that are triggered later in the day when I do something that was in that dream and I get a sense of de je vu. Is there a way to improve this other than setting my alarm clock every 90 minutes, which would totally kill my sleep?

I think I can answer your first question. I do not think I can answer your second.

So, let me say: the fact that you REMEMBERED to reality check in a dream what-so-ever is perfect. I have never, ever, remembered to do it. So, yes, reality checking is really working for you.


-Luke

Well I'm not sure if I actually did a reality check. Just somehow I knew or thought I knew that I was dreaming in my dream-dream, since I thought reality was my dream. It didn't actually help me, though, because I didn't realize that I that I was dreaming.

If you realise you're dreaming in a dream-dream, its still technically an LD! I mean you can't phyiscally dream in a dream, you just move from the first dream to the 'dream'. Everyone worries that their LD might have just been dreamt up, since it feels so dream-like after waking, that you doubt whether it was one or not :P

I know, but it was strange because it was as if I changed the definition of lucid. I was thinking about lucid dreaming, but I didn't actually exert any control or anything, nor did I dream that I was lucid dreaming. I was like I was just calling it lucid dreaming in my dream, even though it wasn't. Maybe it was, and I just have no concentration or ability to manipulate things. :P

Dude, you're almost there. I bet within a week you'll have your first LD. I had what you're having a lot before I started getting real LDs. Just keep on doing what you're doing and getting better at dream recall and RCs and such, and the LDs will come very soon.

About the dream recall question... Don't worry too much about that. It's not like you're going to forget about your LD when you wake up the next morning (you'll probably wake up right after your LD anyways). What you, and a ton of other people, are experiencing is a natural part of the way the brain works. It's annoying and I don't really know why it does this, but when a new REM cycle starts, the brain basically erases the past REM period. This is why even though you have a lot of shorter REM cycles, you never remember anything from them: by the end of the night, they've been thoroughly overwritten by your newer dreams.

As with most aspects of dreaming, all you can do to try to fix the problem is work on it. If, when you wake up (or during the day), you focus on trying to remember those fragments of dreams, you will start to remember more and more of them. Your mind just needs exercise doing this, and over time you will get better.

I hope that helped,
- Pete