[Bad Luck for Beginner]

Okay so lemme apologize firstly if this is in the wrong section of the forum.

Right so for over a week now I've dedicated myself to attaining lucidity. The last lucid dream I had was about 5 years ago, and was one of the only two I have ever had. Those two occurred accidentally and had nothing to do with conscious effort. However, I've been doing dream recall since I was very young and have above average dream recall that has only improved with recent conscious effort.

However, since I've made lucidity my goal, I've noticed a negative shift in quality/enjoyability of my dreams. My dreams lately are simply dull so that when I awaken early in the morning, I have little motivation to make the effort to wake up and note the dream in my journal. As a result, I keep falling back to sleep before I can practice WILD techniques. So it is something of a continuous cycle of bad, non-lucid dreams.

So my question is, for dreams in general (non-lucid as well), what sort of things can I do to try to make them more interesting and enjoyable? Are there any good incubation techniques that seem to work for you guys?

Also, since I've yet to have another lucid dream so far, I'm thinking I should try some other techniques than what I am currently employing. I understand that a week is by no means a long time and I do not mean to sound impatient. I'm certainly willing to work hard for a long period of time, and my goal date by which to have a single lucid dream is August 26th (right before I leave for school :P) So basically, I want to know: What techniques were the most helpful for you when you first began (assuming you're not a natural!)?

Thanks in advance.

When I first started working hard toward increasing my lucidity and dream control I experienced what you described. My recall went down and my dreams got boring. I struggled with staying motivated, especially in the wee hours of the morning when I'd wake from a dream.

For me it got better with time (a week). After that I had a resurgance of my good recall, had cool exciting dreams, and was feeling excited about LDing in general. I think this sort of "bump" is pretty normal.

Read some DJs to help inspire you. Spend some time doing something fun, something unrelated to LDs.

Okay thanks a lot! I have to just refrain from reading my own journals because that just reminds me of what I could be dreaming. It's frustrating because I haven't had an LD in so long and having experienced it, I know what I'm missing now.

This is the same user as TheCosmicOctopus in case anyone is wondering why I am replying to this thread as if I wrote it (I did).