Thread: Possible method to break dry spells - the "AILD"

The essence of my task is this: avoid thinking about LDs for a while, and get one!

The premise: I've noticed my subconscious tends to throw stuff at me in dreams that I try to avoid seeing, thinking, or doing in real life. When I was younger, I saw something on TV that scared the HELL! out of me and then I'd always avoid trying to see it. I'd have several nightmares where I'd see this thing, always scaring me. The nightmares didn't subside until I worked up the nerve to look it up on the internet, and lo and behold, only a few more nights of that crap and i never saw it again.

The same thing began occurring with more realistic situations as I got older. I'd fear getting a bad grade on something and so I'd try not to think about it, or when I did get it back, I'd turn it upside down and wouldn't even look at the mark. I'd get bombarded with dreams where I failed the project or got a bad mark. The dreams only subsided when I went up to the teacher and asked to see my mark again.

See where I'm going with this?

As we're in a dry spell, some of us may tend to think about LDs frequently. If we made several resolutions during one: not to think about LDs, not to visit DV for a bit, not even to attempt a technique while we're in one, our subconsciouses may throw us the thing we're trying to avoid.

Therefore, I've came up with the Avoidance Induction of Lucid Dreams (AILD). Theoretically, you can use this technique to induce lucids anytime, but it's best tailored for breaking dry spells, as avoiding the thought of lucids may not get you frequent lucids. This technique is best for extended dry spells, when you really start to get frustrated.

The technique: Basically avoid anything about lucid dreams for a week or however long you wish. Skip over pages with past LDs in your DJ when you go to write in it. Maybe stop from going on lucid sites for a couple of days, or not read lucid books for a couple of days. The idea is, when confronted with an opporotunity to see anything related to a lucid, avoid it. Don't just "not look at it" or "not think about it", outright avoid it. By doing this, you can take advantage of the mechanism your subconscious uses to get you to confront something, and your subconscious will present you with the thing you are trying to avoid. When it does, remember to do an RC, as you resolved not to see it in real life!

This technique is entirely conceptual, it makes sense on paper but I haven't had the dry spell nessecary to give it a shot. If you're in a dry spell, or maybe even struggling to get your first LD, this could be a good last resort for you to try.

That's a horrible idea. Technically I used this technique for 20 years, and in that time I had 1 lucid dream. But now that lucid dreaming is on my mind, I've had dozens over the span of months.

What the hell. I think you might be onto something. 3 DILDs in the last year, nothing for almost 6 months. THANK YOU!!! I'll be trying this starting today.

let me know if it works thanks

It indeed is true that if we have some kind of undesirable thought and we try to do away with this and forget it, immediately a sort of automatic function of our consciousness is set in motion to retrieve the "forbidden thought" and shove it back into our faces. I've had this with many things.

It wouldn't work if you'd GENUINLY forgot apbout lucid dreaming though. You'd need to forcibly try to do away with the thought and for that I guess you'd need to GENUINLY want to do away with the thought. This is going to be tricky and can you see why? It's the same problem I've had with Autosuggestion/SelfHypnosis. They are basically a sort of way of "fooling" yourself and implanting beliefs in yourself. It's like you're trying to surprise yourself with an ambush: A little hard to do when you yourself know when, where and how you've set yourself up to run into an ambush...since you've set it up yourself. My problem with Autosuggestion explained in a nutshell.

The same problem kind of goes for this idea of yours.

It's still entirely conceptual. Really, it's only useful for breaking dry spells because it takes a fair bit of time before your subconscious throws you what you are trying to avoid. I don't recommend it as a general induction technique.