Been trying for a month. Any advice?

I can be frustrating not getting lucid, but you may very close without realizing it.

There are certain sings in you dreams you can watch for to let you know that you're getting closer to lucidity. Like if you frequently notice that things are odd, even though you don't get lucid. Or maybe you'll talk about lucidity with a DC without being lucid. Even those who've already been lucid may find themselves using super powers from those earlier lucids, but without actually being lucid. Sort of just an instinct. Or ever exerting video game like control over the dream, like resetting the scene.

I suspect lucid dreaming isn't a binary on/off kind of thing, but is a growing level of awareness that can rise and fall. Paying attention to those sings can let you know where you're at and if you efforts are paying off, of if it's time to try something different because those things don't happen in your dreams.

All you can do is keep trying. Of particular importance IMO are doing lots of RCs, not just 5 per day. You need to do them whenever anything even slightly out of the ordinary happens. Great examples are bumping into someone you haven't seen for a while, something breaking or malfunctioning, being in a new place, and even just silly little things like say you get a yoghurt out of your fridge and it has gone off. Don't be embarrassed to do them in front of people. Just do them, and do them properly.

You also need to improve dream recall and I find the best way to do this is when you wake up from a dream lie with your eyes shut and continue the story of the dream in your mind for as long as you can be bothered. This is rather boring to do and requires mental discipline but I find it enhances the vividness and length of my dreams which makes it more likely you will think to do a RC in your dream.

Also keep a dream journal to help you discover your dream signs and improve recall and keep you focused on the whole lucid dreaming thing.

Keep practising WILD. Analyse what is going wrong. Are you simply falling asleep? Are you having too much trouble falling asleep? Try an eyemask/earplugs.

Good luck!

Or that, true.

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What is the 'Segmented Impossible Location Technique" method?

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Before I give you the technique, here's some background so you'll understand how and why it works.

I've experimented with dozens of LD and OBE techniques over the past 12 years and have found that MILD, at least for me, is the single most effective technique IF I do it right.

While experimenting with MILD, I've noticed two things - some dreams that I've used to perform MILD seemed to give me better results than others, and the longer I spent doing it, the more likely it was that I was successful. The most important thing when doing MILD is that you do it long enough, about 20 minutes.

Eventually I found that I could use the same dream over and over again with good effect, rather than using my memory of the dream I had just awakened from. The dream that worked best was one in which I found myself wandering through my old barn which was destroyed in a storm several years ago. The reason I think this particular dream is so effective is because it's a place that I know very well and can therefore easily visualize. Also, rather than having to find a dreamsign in my environment, the dreamsign is the environment.

Making sure I did MILD long enough was problematic because I couldn't keep checking a clock. I just had to guess, which is very difficult when I'm half-asleep. One thing I liked about the counting method was that remembering what number I was at when I fell asleep gave me a kind of feedback as to how long I was doing it, but I didn't have as much luck with counting as I did with MILD, and I would often forget what number I was at and had to start over again. I eventually solved the timing problem by dividing my barn into a collection of interesting areas and going through them in a logical order one by one. I found that if I at least reached the second loft before I fell asleep, I would have lucid dreams a majority of the time with an average of over one LD per attempt.

As I've aged, I've found it harder to stay awake long enough to reach that point, so I use alertness aids in carefully measured amounts. I get up after 6 hrs of sleep and make sure I'm awake for at least an hour before falling asleep again. The first 20 min are spent drinking a half-cup of coffee, taking a B-6, and drinking a half-cup of milk. The second 20 min are spent laying on my back visualizing that I'm sliding forward on my back. The third 20 min are spent doing my LD technique (on my side). Don't use any aids unless you find yourself falling asleep too quickly.

In a nutshell:

1) Sleep 6 hrs.

2) Get up and stay awake a TOTAL of an hour, including the time spent doing the technique.

3) Choose your "impossible location" and divide it into a number of areas with some feature that will hold your interest. (My barn has 13 such areas.) If you can't come up with one, make one up and memorize it. (I'm using my old barn now, but I'm planning on trying the island of Myst in the near future.)

4) Go though your impossible location one area at a time, walking from point to point. At each point, visualize yourself realizing that it's impossible for you to be where you are, becoming lucid, and performing a preplanned action.

5) Make the standard MILD affirmation, "The next time I'm dreaming, I want to remember that I'm dreaming."

6) Advance to the next point and repeat.

If you have no success after several attempts, try to increase the number of areas in your impossible location that you go through before you fall asleep. Use alertness aids if necessary. If you go through all the points and still have not fallen asleep, check your clock to see if it's been 20 min. If it has, just go to sleep while concentrating on your intention. If not, you need a larger impossible location or one that contains more parts.

So performing rc's in daily life makes them become sortof second nature in your dreams?

Also, with a MILD, is it like a WILD where you fall asleep with your mind still aware and in a dream, or is it different?

Draoi, I'm willing to try your technique but somehow I doubt I will end up in the location I'm imagining. More likely when I go to sleep I will enter some random dream. How do you ensure you are still in the barn when you eventually start dreaming? Does it just happen for you?

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Originally Posted by DreamQueen

Draoi, I'm willing to try your technique but somehow I doubt I will end up in the location I'm imagining. More likely when I go to sleep I will enter some random dream. How do you ensure you are still in the barn when you eventually start dreaming? Does it just happen for you?

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Yes I often try to visualise a place, but never end up there when I want to.
Love the technique tho.
Maybe that will change the outcome now. Will try it.
I found action is more responsive to me in MILDs, but that may change now too.
:D

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Draoi, I'm willing to try your technique but somehow I doubt I will end up in the location I'm imagining. More likely when I go to sleep I will enter some random dream. How do you ensure you are still in the barn when you eventually start dreaming? Does it just happen for you?

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Don't worry. I rarely ever end up in the barn. I used it a couple nights ago and materalized in my old college dorm. Attaining lucidity is the most important thing. Once you do that, you can experiment with changing your location if you wish.

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Also, with a MILD, is it like a WILD where you fall asleep with your mind still aware and in a dream, or is it different?

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According to LaBerge, MILD is supposed to result in a DILD, where you realize you're dreaming sometime after you start dreaming.

Personally, I frequently have WILDs with MILD. LaBerge says that prospective memory is the key to success with MILD, but I think there's more to it than that...

Most WILD techniques use visualizing the sensation of movement and/or of being in a different place.

RCs use the awareness of anomalies as a means to attain a DILD.

Intention techniques use constant affirmations to increase the chances of maintaining/attaining awareness in sleep.


MILD uses all three off these in a combined technique. I think it's this synergistic combination that increases the frequency of LDs over what you'd likely get using any one by itself.

Thanks Draoi.