Thread: My biggest fear has happened. Please help.

Originally Posted by Clairity

You could always try pushing your tongue through the roof of your mouth or through your closed teeth.

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haha i never would have thought of that. I like that better than breathing through a pinched nose because you don't even have to move.

yea i read something, its kinda like the nose pinch rc, but you just try breathing thru a closed mouth. easy. at least until you find another one. but im pretty sure that your brain will start to forget about them the less you use them. so mayb try mixing them up during th day. i mean i'm not an experienced ld'er at all. sheesh i've had 1 and have been tring for months. that one lasted for like 2 seconds.
any way another good one i read about that you can do at work is pick something in the room and make sure its there the next time you look. if your in your house, look for little things. make sure the mark on the walls still there. the stain on the couch. the mole on the boss's face. unintrusive and easy to do. pretty much exactly wat you need. i'd love to see your brain simulate your whole life exactly haha but yea. try that.
i'm pretty sure expectation has a lot to do with it. like now that you expect the nose rc to fail, it prob will. so mayb try one of the other rcs on here and start afresh. act like its the first time and you fully expect it to work. gud luck!! i understand your frustration. like i said, 1 ld, 2 seconds. 4 months...

Originally Posted by 16Candles

here's something i learned recently. when doing the nose pinch rc, first take a deep breathe in and then a deep breathe out. feel the sensation of breathing. expect to feel the same sensation when you pinch your nose. if it's a dream, you should breathe no problem. i've had 3 lucid dreams since joining this site, and two of them involved that method!

This is very good advice, and well thought through.
It also eliminates the possibility that your sleeping body may be having trouble breathing (we've all slept with people who snore, we know that the sleeping body dosn't always breathe quite as smoothly as whilst awake)

There is the possibility that your failed NP reality check was in fact caused because your sleeping body was having a temporary issue breathing clearly. In the same way that an alarm clock can enter the dream scene... there is no reason this wouldnt have entered your dream scene as a NP reality check. Especially considering how much part of your life it is now.

Hey thanks everyone. Sorry I've taken so long to reply, I got held up at work for 13 hours.

There are some really helpful suggestions in there. I do think I've been rushing my nose pinch checks. I've realised that however much time and attention I give my RCs in RL is the same amount I'll give them in a dream. So I'm going to be more careful with them and take my time from now on. I'm also going to expect to be able to breathe rather than the other way round as a couple of people have suggested.

Thanks guys. Will check back for more suggestions in the morning!

May I suggest trying to levitate.

This is an RC you can do at work, in front of people, etc. Just mentally will yourself to float up into the air - if you do then you are dreaming - if you stay stubbornly in the grip of gravity then you are awake.

RCs dont work for me too well either - I just tend to realize I am dreaming when seriously weird stuff is occuring.

you have done the NP RC so many times you know already that you wont be able to breath,that has mabey become part of your RC,trying knowing what gonna happen...

One reality check you should try is just looking around you, and asking yourself if this place is familiar to you. If you are somewhere unfamiliar, then you are probably dreaming.

You're thinking about this the wrong way, like you've been jipped. You shouldn't "be" doing anything. Lucid dreaming owes nothing to you. There's no rule "I put in X hours and get Y results." Don't demand or force or feel denied when it doesn't happen. Just say, "Well, that was a close one! Such progress. I'll catch it soon, maybe even next time!"

I strongly suspect that if you're putting in this much effort you're just missing some key element. How much of the mental awareness are you putting into your RCs?

Originally Posted by Shift

How much of the mental awareness are you putting into your RCs?

Nowhere near enough it seems. I've realised I've been completely relying on the physiology of the nose test and letting it do all the work for me. My lazy RCs have been successful so far but my luck has finally run out. From now on I'm going to pay a lot more mental attention and do some serious questioning every time I RC.

I should have taken your signature advice long ago, shift. Time to start now!

Everyone in this thread has been so very helpful.

Thanx so much

look at something, look away from it then look back again it should be diffrent...hoped this helped!

The most effective reality test i have ever found is to carry around one of
thoses key ring torches and switch it on and off at least three times.
In my experience its never worked correctly three times in a row it either will
at best work on the first press and on the second and third press either does
not work or does something strange like spark.

Hi DreamQueen! Man, I'm still not lucid, but I've had some very close calls! Again! Anyway, sounds like you've got some very good advice already. If you don't mind me adding...one of my favorite RCs is thinking back an hour ago...two hours ago...four hours ago. Can you remember what you were doing? This one gets me to think, really think. Plus it doesn't take too much effort. Well, sometimes it does! But like I said, it looks like you've gotten a lot of good advice already.

My current favorite reality check is to try distorting reality. Simply look at something (A wall, a book, a cup of coffee) and stare aggressively at it, trying to make it look different. Focus really hard on it. If you do it properly, you should look like you're constipated. If you're dreaming, you'll start to see the angles of what you were looking at change, the colours, and maybe hear strange sounds. If you're awake, on the other hand, you'll just look funny yourself.

I do this check a lot because it is quick, efficient, and almost always works in dreams.

Do the Memory Check. If you suspect your dreaming, and want to do a reality check, simply try to remember how you got somewhere. Try to remember what you were doing just before you wanted to do a reality check. Try to remember what happened before that, and before that, and so on. It shouldn't take long, but you should be able to accurately come up with the conclusion that your dreaming, simply by figuring out that you just "appeared" into the dream when you come to a gap in your memory.

I mean no offense but really? Come on. I rarely even post, but here goes (also, I consider myself experienced in DILD, I take an unconventional method which allows me to realize I'm dreaming several times a night (if you think im lying/exaggerating it doesn't affect my advice)):

1. If I were you I'd be pleased that my dreams are so realistic.
2. By mindlessly repeating reality checks in real life all you do is tell yourself they say you're awake, and your dreams reflect this.
3. As some other posters described there is such a thing as a mental reality check. Question not only how you got into your current situation, but how logical, coherent, and realistic your situation is. Not only that, did you go to sleep? I use physical RCs (my favorite being the nose RC) as a secondary reality check after the mental one fails, to confirm it. I therefore expect the RC to fail, and it does (I breathe freely.) To tell you the truth, it's not that complex. When I ask myself if I'm dreaming, I KNOW
(Edit)
4. You shouldn't have your RC depend on the dream. Dreams can be very unpredictable.
5. It's not the end of the world but it's kind of sad that you think it is.
(Last edit, I promise)
6. If you depend on physical RCs, they can get very overelaborate and require you to completely step out of your way to check.


Hopefully I helped (And didn't offend too much: Honestly, I don't mean it! It just comes out that way ),
-Pojmaster

P.S. I had such a nightmare writing this on my phone.

Thanks for all your responses, but i think i've got the answers i need now.

Hey DQ -

Interesting thread. Looks like you're ditching the behavioural RCs in favour of increasing mental awareness... I like that.

Personally, I don't buy into pinching, slapping, pushing, jumping, etc... to me it seems a bit silly. Much cooler is to develop your general alertness and let that spill over into your dreams. Constantly think about what you have just done and what you are going to do, the feel of your breath, thinking about your posture, the tone of your voice, actively engaging with others, etc. Such things also develop your presence and alertness in the real world. You can use some extra imaginary RCs for fun once in a while... try bending or shifting an object by looking at it, for example - distort it into new shapes, or make a dragon pop out of it. When done during the day, you're just exercising your mental imagery and pushing your creativity. It's fun.

...But the point is that all this mental work does you good - by increasing your self awareness, increasing the awareness of everything around you, breaking the autopilot of the day, and increasing your chances of being self-aware and creative even during dreams.

:0)

Originally Posted by Old goat

Hey DQ -

Interesting thread. Looks like you're ditching the behavioural RCs in favour of increasing mental awareness... I like that.

...But the point is that all this mental work does you good - by increasing your self awareness, increasing the awareness of everything around you, breaking the autopilot of the day, and increasing your chances of being self-aware and creative even during dreams.

:0)

Thanks Old Goat (ha ha, cool name). I agree entirely. This has been a huge lesson on my personal lucid dreaming learning curve and finally today I had the break through I've been working so hard for over the past week.

My new RC involves a lot more mental questioning and looking at my digital watch and text etc. It has been hard to break the very ingrained habit of the nose pinch test but I have done it.

A huge thank you to all the people who gave supportive answers. A few of you whom I have conversed with are aware of the very personal reason my lucid dreaming is so important to me, others are not, but the good news is that I now feel able to achieve lucidity again.

Thank you so much

Oh my gosh, too much drama! Seriously girl, you talk as if it is the end of the world, and your life is meaningless.

I haven't read the other posts, so I don't know what has been suggested, but here are some of my ideas:

1. Tone the drama down, your brain many times gives you dreams to help you overcome problems in your life, or things in your past that are hard for you to deal with. Since you stress over the fact that your brain will simulate RC's perfectly, it is very possible that that is the very cause of it happening. (This is just a possibility)

2. Why use reality checks? They aren't really necessary, though they are very helpfull. In fact, I have only had three of my lucid dreams require a reality check, while the other times I was simply confident that I was dreaming, of which my flying confirmed. To help improve this, you can try becoming more aware of the world around you. Pay attention to every little detail through all 5 senses, this will not only help you realise the dream-state better, but increase the clarity of your dreams.

3. As for running out of reality checks, there is an unlimited ammount that you can do. For example, try turning everyone in the room purple, levitate a piece of furniture, try falling through the floor, and on and on.

4. Another way that I have heard people talk about is simply think back on what you did that day. In dreams, you won't be able to remember very far back, or you will remember things you did in real-life and notice they don't fit your current situation.

Anyway, good luck with your future Lucid Dreams!

Originally Posted by -InsaneKid-

Seriously girl, you talk as if it is the end of the world

Yes. I do don't I? Now I wonder why that could be...

*closed at OP's request*