During a dream last night I suddenly became lucid; and since i hadn't been in such a while, it came as such a surprise to me that i couldn't think of anything to do at first. I was trying to change the environment but it didnt work. All I remember now is flying around for a bit, then my dream changed and was totally different and it doesn't seem in retrospect like I was lucid anymore during this second part. In fact, when I awoke, at first I forgot that I had ever been lucid at all because it was the second part of the dream that was still in my memory. I can't remember how I shifted from lucidity into some other dream! But now that I think about it, I remember being in control in the second dream; so I guess I retained control but forgot that I was dreaming.

Now, I have a theory, though. Perhaps some of those more experiences LDers can answer it. Is it possible that I felt like I "lost lucidity" because I merely became used to the environment I was in? I mean, when you're awake in the "real world", you aren't always thinking "hey, I'm awake." You don't need to always consciously verify that you're awake - you just know (although during the waking hour, I find it helpful to always ask myself if I'm dreaming). So wouldn't the same effect apply to when you're "awake" inside your dream? After you've realized that you are lucid, do you ever forget that you are lucid, and it just becomes known and unnecessary to constantly re-confirm? Or is constant reminding and re-confirmation of your lucidity crucial in maintaining lucidity? I know that lucid dreaming, by definition, is knowing that you are dreaming, just as lucid wakefulness is knowing that you are awake. But isn't an inevitability of waking in a dream forgetting that you are awake in the dream, just as the same is true of waking in the real world? Or is forgetting your lucidity similar to slipping into a real-world daydream?