Your advice on WBTB

Ok, so my question about WBTB is pretty simple.

What I wonder is whether it is very important to remember a dream when you wake up during the WBTB-period. Last night I woke up after about 5 hours of sleep, but I didn't remember any dreams. Then I fell asleep about 1 hour later, and had some dreams in the morning hours (non-lucid).

So for my next time, do you think I should attempt to sleep maybe 6 hours to increase my chances to wake up during REM, or doesn't it matter so I could sleep 4 hours? My fear about sleeping 6 hours or more is that I'll be too awake after that many hours of sleeping.

Thanks,
Martin

In my experience, I found that sleeping six hours is easier. Of course, I use my WBTBs with WILDs. I figured that If I set my alarm 6 hours past getting in bed (given about a half hour for me to fall asleep) then my alarm should wake me up right before my REM cycle, giving me optimal conditions for WILD.

But if you are going for traditional WBTB where you wake up, stay up for a bit, then go back to sleep intending to DILD or MILD, you might want to try sleeping 4.5 hours instead of 5. The reason is that each sleep cycle lasts around 1.5 hours. After 4.5 hours, you would have waken up directly out of your third REM cycle and a dream, as opposed to sleeping another half hour of NREM sleep without any recall. Everyone is different, so your sleep cycle may be longer or shorter than 1.5 hours, but this is a reasonable estimation. As far as I know, remembering a dream is an essential part of WBTB if you are using LaBerge's traditional method outlined in EWOLD.

So unless you are attempting to WILD with your WBTB, I suggest sleeping 4.5 so that you wake up directly from a dream and can recall it for your WBTB.

Hope this helped.

Thanks for the answer!

Yes, I am now experimenting a little with WBTB, and DILD was in my mind although WILD would be very nice to learn. I think 4.5 could be good also for DILD since it will probably be easier to go back to sleep faster.

If I wake up without remembering a dream next time, I could alway do an attemp to WILD ;)

Yeah, my first intended lucid dream was actually from a WBTB/WILD combination. the trick is to get yourself to wake up just before or directly after the onset of REM. It's a bit tricky, but it can be done. good luck with your WBTBs!