Thread: Reality Checking...

Oh you do hapkido? That's awesome!

I only ever do the nose RC, but if that's not enough for you then once you do that one and find that you can breathe, you can then try to fly or walk through a wall or something like that to validate that you are dreaming.

The bathroom is also an extremely common dream sign for me (I wonder why we dream of bathrooms so often??), but I'm in the same situation - RCing there IRL has stopped working!

Yeah, I love Hapkido I'm so glad somebody knows what it is.

I think that I'm just too self conscious in dreams. I feel that I'm in RL trying to see if I'm dreaming and I don't want to look stupid trying to fly and embarass myself or run into a wall. However, I will try this tonight to see if it works.

Yeah I thought about taking it up, deciding between that and Taekwondo. I hear Hapkido's better.

Here's something I just remembered... I think it's advice from one of the tutorials on here, I can't quite remember.

Do a RC and then in your head come up with a logical reason for why you are or are not dreaming.

So if you do a nose RC and you can breathe, but you still think it's RL, then come up with a reason why you think it's still RL. With any luck you will realize that you're dreaming!

I've been trying to do that, the problem is, I never notice strange occurrences until an hour after the occur! I'll see something weird, and then think up a rationalization for why it happened, instead of immediately doing an RC. About an hour after I'll think, "Doh! I should have RCd when so-and-so happened!" It's pretty hard. I'm working on it, but it's tough to remember. Of course, if I can't remember in real life I'll never remember to RC in my dreams, haha.

1. Hapkido is much better

2. I think that is an excellent suggestion. I will definitely give that a try tonight as well. Hopefully I can break through the barrier of realizing that I am in a dream and then go on to trying to control my dreams.

I don't know why, but I keep getting the feeling that something doesn't want me to realize I'm dreaming. It's as if our brains are programmed to not let us realize, like it's not natural.

But, it's way too fun not to try.

To Jamoca

I kind of have the problem as well, but trust me, once you get in the habit of doing a RC immediately it really increases the chances of becoming lucid, at least for me. I hope that you have as much success with it as I've had lately. Let me know how you progress.

Yes that's interesting... I've never considered before that our brains might be trying to not let us make the realization! .... If that's true, I wonder why! .... Oooh...

Mes Tarrant:

What do you do to get lucid? What's your technique of doing RC's in real life? Can you please be as specific as possible including what you are thinking while you are doing the RC?

Originally Posted by Mes Tarrant

Yes that's interesting... I've never considered before that our brains might be trying to not let us make the realization! .... If that's true, I wonder why! .... Oooh...

Only guess is so that we don't mix up what happens in a dream with the RL

Originally Posted by hapkidoman

Mes Tarrant:

What do you do to get lucid? What's your technique of doing RC's in real life? Can you please be as specific as possible including what you are thinking while you are doing the RC?

I just do them randomly these days. I think about lucid dreaming often but don't really put effort into practicing it, and as a result I get random lucids every now and then. It's because RL is sort of getting in the way at the moment!

Originally Posted by BigFan

Only guess is so that we don't mix up what happens in a dream with the RL

Ahh... but see.. it's when we don't realize that we are dreaming that we are most likely to mix up dreams with RL, right?

i just do just NP and looking at my hand and counting the fingers and i have at least 1 LD per week. One last night too

think of it this way: I (you) really want to have a lucid dream, so I will continually check to see if it is time to have a lucid dream until it is. Whenever you think about dreaming, check to see if it's time to have a lucid dream (do a state check). Also do this whenever you see anything odd or dreamlike (dreamsign). In addition to this, just try to pay attention to your state of consciousness.

Originally Posted by Mes Tarrant

Ahh... but see.. it's when we don't realize that we are dreaming that we are most likely to mix up dreams with RL, right?

Partially agree. If we don't remember our dreams, then we won't mix them up with RL. Recently, I've had cases where I thought I did something in RL but it wasn't the case and I was pretty confused to what has transpired. If you remember your dreams, then you can write them down in a journal but if you remember one, but, forget to write it down or forget it altogether, then you'll have the same problem as I mentioned before

I didn't have a near lucid dream last night, so I couldn't put into practice some of the advice on new ways to check if I'm dreaming.

However, I have been putting an emphasis lately on constantly looking for bizarre things throughout the day, hoping this thought process will manifest itself in the dreamscape and I will become lucid.

Has anyone else had good success doing this? I have also been supplementing my "plug the nose and breathe through it" with "look at my hand and see if it changes" I am less self-conscious about doing this in RL and hope that I will have the opportunity soon to see if it works in the dreamscape......................

maybe God does not want you to lucvid dream and see the unknown. iT BELONGS TO him, LOL.

i have an idea. as you go to sleep. imagine yourself encountering a dreamsign and doing a RC. as your laying in bed go though all of your dream sign scenarios, doing RC's.

another thing you could do for an RC is to think back to see how you got there, are there any gaps or anything strange

Have you ever noticed though, the harder you try to have a lucid dream the less likely you are to have one?

Whenever I want to have a lucid dream, my dream recall diminishes, and I don't do an RC in the dreamscape.

However, when I could care less about lucid dreaming, my dream recall skyrockets and I do a ton of RC's (which fail)................


UGHHHHHHHHH so frustrating!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

Originally Posted by hapkidoman

Have you ever noticed though, the harder you try to have a lucid dream the less likely you are to have one?

Whenever I want to have a lucid dream, my dream recall diminishes, and I don't do an RC in the dreamscape.

However, when I could care less about lucid dreaming, my dream recall skyrockets and I do a ton of RC's (which fail)................


UGHHHHHHHHH so frustrating!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11

It's so frustrating, it seems God does not want you to pry into His secret world. What do u think?

I don't know if we need to get G O D involved in this thread but that's just my opinion


I definitely agree with the reality check technique of only doing them when something out of the ordinary happens. Also, i think putting too much effort into LDing will result in failure. I am constantly thinking about it and I'm one of the lucky ones who have had lucids all my life (didn't start controlling them until I found this site about 2 months ago) but even if I try too hard and mess up my sleep too much to LD, I fail.

I also wanted to add in another RC technique I use... I write a small "A" for awake on the palm of my hand and whenever I see it I do a couple RCs, in hopes that in my dream I'll see a "D" for dream or at least see the "A" and trigger a RC.

Another thing I do is use a ring I wear. It is a silver ring with a very funky stone in the middle which reminds me of a hypnogogic image so I call it my Lucid Dream Ring and whenever I wear iit and see it, I do a couple RC's. This one worked for me once, I was in a dream and I saw the ring
on the floor in front of me, I put it on and immediately went lucid.