Lucid, But...

[Bubble]

I've been trying to attain lucidity in my dreams for a while. I've been semi-lucid in dreams a lot throughout my lifetime, but only recently became fully lucid. I've been fully lucid 2 times in the past 4 months, since I started actively performing awareness-checks, but both times only lasted around 10 seconds. I've kept a dream journal for years, more as a hobby, but it has improved my dream recall. I usually recall between 3-6 dreams per night (depending on if you include dream fragments or not). So, here's the weird thing about last night. The whole "Lucid, But..." part of the post title: I went to sleep last night planning on doing WBTB. I also had some mp3s playing (got up to shut them off, they're all at different volume levels so it was starting to kind of irritate me). I had a dream, as usual, and woke up. When I woke up, I stayed awake for a little bit and then began counting backwards - not because I was necessarily attempting WILD, but because it actually helps me get to sleep. I've struggled with insomnia a lot in the past, and the new-found interest in lucidity has been helping me conquer it. I clearly feel the sensation drifting off, but can't hang onto consciousness. Well, that's fine. A little while later, I become lucid... ...but there's no dream? I wouldn't call it a void, because voids are scary. I would call it more of a palpable blackness. As soon as I become lucid, I'm happy and excited - yay, I'm dream-- wait, where's the dream? I'm aware that I'm asleep, and if I'm asleep I must be dreaming, but there is nothing here. The darkness has a great deal of depth, and it is sparkling - there's no other way I can really describe it. It's as if I were drifting through deep space. I think to myself, "perhaps I should open my dream eyes". I 'open my eyes' and it doesn't really make any difference, particularly as I have no eyes to open. I try to exert any kind of influence or change the "scene" and the blackness glitters and flutters a little, but nothing really happens. I can't spin, because I have no body and there's nothing to orient myself with. I drift like this for a little while longer... I would have expected myself to be terrified, because you would think that it would be a frightening experience, but it was rather peaceful. Probably kind of like being in one of those sensory-deprivation tanks where you float on liquid. After a while, and I couldn't say how long because there was absolutely no sense of time to use as a reference, I lose lucidity. A while after that, I'm in another dream again (non-lucid). What happened?!

[hgld1234]

I think you entered a dream, but it was black. The dream world can be strange.