Awake to take in the view...

...And the secret was getting 7.75 hours of sleep, apparently. I'm going to try and continue this trend. Regardless of how intense the week is, I will do my best to get enough sleep on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. Which, for me, will be hugely beneficial I think.

So here's a list of all the many dreams I have recalled from last night:

Dream 1: Non-lucid; experienced during first 20 minutes of sleep. I fell asleep at roughly 12:10 AM, and had a dream about hanging out with my sister, my brother or friend (I think?), and a friend of my sister's. My sister went to use the bathroom, and the other guy I was with was talking with me and her friend. We were talking about her, but I don't precisely remember what we were talking about specifically. When she finished using the bathroom, she came out and said "You know I heard you while I was in there", because IRL my sister really does have good hearing. So maybe it was something embarrassing, but I don't really know for sure. I woke up and it was only 12:32 AM, so my brain had apparently launched me pretty quickly into REM again for some reason.

Dream 2: Non-lucid, but very close to lucidity. Good vs. evil! A giant snake was trying to kill me and two other people. However, my stuffed snake, Snakey, my tulpa, and I were destined to save us all! (I actually do have a stuffed snake, and he is actually named Snakey. He is the coolest. However, he is at my parent's house right now. :p In the dream, he had become real.) We prayed that we would be able to triumph over the snake. Then, we felt like we should just will it away, because -- get this -- we recognized that it was only in our heads and wasn't actually real. This one was SO CLOSE to being lucid, because of that realization, but not quite! We willed it away, and it worked!

Dream 3: Non-lucid. This is a fuzzier dream that I experienced during what felt like deeper sleep. Arguably it would've been significantly harder to become lucid during this one because of this fact. This one occurred in the middle of the night, if I recall correctly. IRL, I work part-time as a computer science TA at my university, helping students debug Java and Android programs. In this dream, the other TAs and I apparently "did not want to stop believing OR coding". I believe some malevolent individual was trying to get us to stop believing in God or something and also stop programming. Someone said that he would kill us all if we didn't do this. He had an army of supporters to back him up. Then, it faded and we were in a theme park. I dream a LOT about theme parks. Anyway, we were on the rides, but I was watching from a distance despite being on a ride technically myself. (?) Some of my fellow TAs were riding on a white roller coaster. The evil guy's plan was to hack into all the rides while we we're still on them, and somehow harm us. Maybe shut them down. I don't really know. I was worried for the others. Then, it faded again, and we were on a revolving turntable, much like the turntable by the roundhouse in Thomas the Train, but indoor and stark and depressing. I got onto it, and the evil guys had surrounded us. However, I somehow knew that we were going to be safe, and we were saved. I don't remember how.

Dream 4: Non-lucid. I was in a lecture hall of some sort for artists. The lady teaching was trying to tell us that 3D artists should NOT learn to draw or digitally paint, because apparently it would actually make us worse, since it would take time away from learning how to model and render a scene. I was really ticked because I definitely disagree with that philosophy, and I believe that the general 3D community would agree with me.

Dream 5: The DILD! Sort of. I didn't have a specific reality check that worked this time. But when I sleep 8 hours or close to it, my body starts waking up more and more as my actual wakeup time approaches. I will often physically wake up to use the bathroom or get a drink of water, and then go back to sleep for a while longer. This is the most natural thing for me. As I do this, I have more and more dreams, and more and more REM sleep. Then, I am much more likely to recall dreams, and also much more likely to become lucid. Hard work pays off, guys!

First, I was on the internet. Some girl said that she had recently had a week-long paid internship with Disney, where they were basically paid to ride rides all day long. They were supposed to observe the culture of theme parks, or something. Then, I suddenly found myself on a cart or truck thing going to a theme park. It was presumably Disney, but there were a lot of rides that Disney definitely doesn't have IRL. All these other people were on the truck, too, but they were official interns and wore brown vests. I was there, but I didn't have a vest, so apparently I wasn't an official intern. I was worried I'd get in trouble for being on the truck despite not being officially hired, and wasn't sure how I even got there in the first place. My mom and my brother were there, too. And neither of them had vests. I went to go sit by my mom, but as I sat down beside her, she disappeared. I felt that she was still there, but had no idea why she had just randomly become invisible. Also, the seats were tiny, so my butt barely fit on them. We were in the back of the truck, in the open air with just a pavilion thing over us. So if it would have been raining, we would've been sheltered, but we still got fresh air.

We kept riding in the truck, looking at the rides that we would soon ride. I then realized that I was dreaming, because Disneyland does not look like that IRL. Too many thrill rides. Well, that and my mom randomly disappearing.

So I sat by my brother, and told him, "I think we're in a dream right now." And he said something like "We definitely could be. Is everything out of focus?" I said that yes, everything most certainly was out of focus. So he said that it probably was a dream. Suddenly, instead of being inside of a truck, it was just me and him and the (inferred) driver inside of an SUV or a Jeep Cherokee or something, and there were suddenly windows. So I clambered out the window, which was partially rolled down, and flew towards one of the rides!

It was a water ride with boats that looked like Perilous Plunge, an old ride from Knott's Berry Farm that I never actually went on. It went inside of a brown artificial mountain, and it was super cool. But just as I was about to reach a boat to get on it, I woke up. D: NOOOOOO!

The dream was still fuzzy, too. I wish it was more vivid, but mentally I was so close to awakening that I did accidentally wake myself up. -_-

Also, my notes read "still had sizzle". Nope, no idea what I meant by that. o.o

Dream 6: I tried to re-enter the previous dream, but to no avail. I do have a note that said "she knew I wanted it lol." Don't recall what that means, but I can guarantee you that it was not appropriate.

Dream 7: I had a dream. There may have been a girl but I can't really read my notes. This was more like a fragment. My alarm woke me up before I could get any further.

And that's it.

...and the coolest story idea ever! I only remembered one dream from last night, and sadly it wasn't lucid, but it was still really awesome.

My family and I were going to the Haunted Islands (which is a placeholder name for a foreboding archipelago in my imaginational world that will be used in one of my novels at some point).

But they were significantly different than how I designed them in my conscious, waking life. For one thing, they were more of a theme park or tourist attraction. In fact, as we were going to visit, we weren't sure if the place was really dangerous or if it was just a fun attraction. We went in the evening, when the sun had already set, so it was already pretty creepy.

There were two large mountains that embodied the spirits of the island. The narrative temporarily faded, and instead I was looking at a coloring book with the mountains outlined on it. I started coloring them in with a gray marker. Then, they became real again. One had the head of a snake, with glowing eyes which switched from yellow to blue every few minutes or so. The other was another monster, more mammalian: I can't remember precisely what it was, but I think it was either a bear or a wolf or something. The snake-mountain was really cool. It was almost seductive in the way that it spoke, inviting us to the island. However, it also creeped me out, even though I absolutely love snakes in the waking world. I think I just got a really bad feeling, and so did my parents. Like we shouldn't be there.

The snake gave us one last warning: We had a short increment of time in which we could still leave. The gates to the haunted world were closing, but we had like a minute to rush out.

My sister was really excited by the prospect of exploring this haunted world. My brother usually goes along with her IRL, and he did so in the dream. However, my parents decided to leave. At the very last second, I decided to as well. A silver analog clock read 10:25 PM, and I had a lot of homework to do even in the dream. We rushed out the gates and just got out before they shut. Barely. Narrowest escape in a dream ever. xD

And then I remember vaguely something about Scooby-Doo.

This is oddly symbolic of what's going on in the waking world. Suffice it to say that my sister was doing some rather unhealthy things...think drugs and sex as a high schooler. And my brother isn't doing anything crazy., but he is losing his faith and is really struggling emotionally.

I'm using this dream as a creative idea. Either for a novel or a theme park ride idea, or -- better yet -- both! I'd like to be an Imagineer one day, but I don't think this idea would work particularly well for Disney.

Oh, and I also had two more dreams, but I couldn't remember them. I know I had them, but I had zero recollection of the content upon waking.

So I have an insane amount of crap to get done in the next two weeks. But I had to stop by and write this dream down, because it was awesome. This was essentially my first successful WILD.

I only slept 5 hours last night (usually sleep 6.5-7.5), so I laid down for a nap when I had a spare moment - around 1:30 PM my time. I only had 25 minutes or so to sleep. My body has been really tense lately, so I focused on relaxing my muscles completely as I laid there. As I did, I noticed my body going relatively quickly into sleep paralysis. I let myself descend into the dream that followed.

It was hazy and not super vivid, but it was definitely a dream and I was definitely lucid! I found myself falling until I was on a roller coaster with a very good friend of mine. It was a sunny day as well. This roller coaster was cool because I had some degree of control over where it went and what it did. We went through all sorts of environments. As we rode, there were these giant dinosaurs and snakes leaping up trying to eat us. One smaller theropod did successfully bite my arm, but since I had control, it had no effect on me and I really didn't feel any pain. They were all just part of the ride, in essence! For one portion, we reached an apex and then went backwards (sort of like Expedition Everest in Disney World, only steeper). I think music was playing, but I can't remember clearly. We even passed by a giant image of my friend in the air, and a factory filled with inventions!

Unfortunately, I think I involuntarily moved or something, and woke up after that. D: However, I was able to get myself back into sleep paralysis for a few more minutes, and kept my eyes open this time. I stared at the light right above me (in the real world) and saw what looked like a squirrel sticking out of it, as though it were popping out of a hole on the ceiling. It looked around the room curiously. Reminding myself that it was just a hypnogogic hallucination, I attempted to change it with a limited degree of success. It turned into a few other mammals, then a man's face with a beard, then a lady. After that I woke myself up fully because my alarm was about to go off, and my roommate came in right then too.

Freaking awesome! I need to try this WILD thing more often.

I haven't had a lucid dream in a long time, and it's quite frustrating. I used to be so natural at it. :/

This semester at college has kept me up until crazy late hours (sometimes 3 or 4 AM...) doing homework and working, and it has really screwed up my sleep schedule. Thankfully, it's almost over - just 3 more finals - and I'm trying to get myself back on track. I've been doing more reality checks, and trying a lot harder to get enough sleep each night.

Thus, last night's dreams! I actually got about 8 hours of sleep last night. Unfortunately, my recall isn't as good as it used to be. None of these were lucid. I'll get back where I used to be, though!

First dream: I was walking through this forest on a trail. It was at the edge of the forest, by a cottage. This wilderness guy who lived in the cottage was walking with me. He said that we couldn't stay out too long in the forest, because there would be wolves. o.o I woke up after that.

Second: There was a boa constrictor and another animal. Apparently, they were doing some sort of mating ritual. But the boa started attacking whatever the other animal was.

I had to study this for an art history test: http://instappraisal.quadrixit.netdn...oto%203_36.JPG which is probably where it all came from.

My DJ also says "laundry guns girl and I flew a bit" but I don't remember what any of that means. Yay for half-asleep hazes!

Dream 3: This is where the multi-headed crocodile comes in. I was in the bathroom of some house, and we were attacked by two crocodiles. One was normal, and one had tons of different necks and heads coming out of it. It was the most bizarre thing ever.

Dream 4: I was playing my Pokemon Omega Ruby, and was catching a bunch of different new Pokemon, heh.

That's all I remember. I'm trying to take some good steps in the right direction lol
but now back to STUDYING FOR FINALS :/