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I was in a forest, there was a horrible blizzard. I entered my car and drove in between trees until I reached ranger station. I couldn't get there as the road was blocked by a fallen tree. I drove further and lost a side mirror on one tree, then got to my house. I made a nose plug RC and entered my house. In one of the rooms my sister was watching TV. I touched her and swapped bodies with her. The dream became unstable and I woke up.

Another lucid!

I WILD into a dream. A man is sitting at a table with me. I say "Do you have the Portkey to Aldeterune?"
Aldeterune is a name of a place I visit in meditation to relax. He says "Yes, but it is too risky; the dream is too fragile" I appreciate his input. I see the window, and do my favourite thing of phasing through glass and shattering it at the same time. I explore a beautiful city and meadows at night in a chair.

So last night I had a dream that I was lucid. Which really isn't the same thing as being lucid, and I refuse to be satisfied with this...

The Sad Stone Harbor Dream
So Stone Harbor is basically my favorite place in the world to be, and for whatever reason it's pretty common for me to dream that it's the last day of Stone Harbor and I'm wondering where all the time went and trying to figure out how I could've used it better.

This time, I dreamed that mom was making me go to a soccer game on the last day of Stone Harbor, when what I really wanted was to be at the beach, in the sun. This made me so upset that I started crying, and ran upstairs... now I was in the 1319 house, heading for the balcony. I brushed past dad in the hallway, got to the balcony, and jumped off so that I could fly.

This is where my thought process was a bit weird. Apparently, I believed that I was awake, but that by the time I got to the balcony, I would be dreaming, without having to fall asleep. At the same time, half of me was considering the possibility that I would simply plunge to my death off the balcony in my mistaken belief that I was dreaming. I was actually pretty surprised when I practically lifted off the balcony as soon as I stepped off it, and though I was happy to be flying rather than, y'know, dead, I was a bit confused as I tried to figure out when exactly reality had become a dream. Frustratingly enough, I completely discarded the possibility that the entire thing was a dream: I firmly believed that the frustrating soccer situation constituted "reality," but that I had somehow transitioned to dreaming at some point.

So, I won't call it lucidity. Although I believed I was "dreaming," it didn't make any conscious sense. If I had been conscious, I would've realized that the entire thing was a dream, and that it's impossible to transition from awake to dreaming without falling asleep. It was like a nonsensical dream version of lucidity...

Farther along in the dream, while I was trying to survive the local serial killer and his sadistic games, I straight-up thought to myself, "I'm dreaming," while flying. I even repeated it a few more times for good measure, trying to make it sink in... but c'mon. If I'd been actually lucid, I would've realized that I could've blown up the serial killer with a thought, instead of my only ability being flying.

I want to be awake in a dream. I'm barely even awake in real life...

Ritual: After a year or so of initial successes with galantamine, back in 2010–11, it had stopped working very well for me to the point where I hardly ever use it anymore. But last night after going to bed late (around 3am) and waking up just before dawn, I still felt heavy enough with sleep that I thought I might give it a shot. (Galantamine is a stimulant, so the main risk is not being able to get back to sleep.) I took one of the red pills from a bottle of "Dream Leaf," which I had nearly given up on since it had never worked for me before, possibly because I only tried it long after I had gotten "over" galantamine. I know the red pills contain galantamine from the distinctive effects, but I must say that it greatly bothers me that this supplement neglects to identify the presence of galantamine on the label, or even on their website, much less clarify the actual dosage. In fact, I would go so far as to call this obfuscation shamefully irresponsible and borderline criminal. Galantamine is a powerful substance that should never be given to people without their knowledge. So for ethical reasons I dislike this particular supplement and definitely would not recommend it, but galantamine is galantamine, and on this occasion it actually worked. Woke and wrote at 9, so I'm a bit underslept with a slight galantamine hangover, but it's been so long since I've had this sensation that I'm almost enjoying it.

I've always found galantamine dreams a bit superficial, but that's not always a bad thing. My recent attempts to force dream events to unfold in a detailed and realistic way, in the name of quality, often prove counter-productive. Sometimes a little "cowboying" is necessary to get the job done, especially in the inherent instability of the dream environment. So tonight's dreams were ultimately successful, but not exactly Masterpiece Theatre.

WILD, "Fading Gift": I was lying on my back in bed, and recognized I was in dream even as I started making elaborate sweeping gestures with my hands, but continued gesturing for a while to increase my sense of motor control. At one point I closed my eyes and scratched my scalp, and I was amazed that the sensations felt exactly like like waking life. "I am the dreamer," I murmured a few times, as if to fix the idea in mind.

I recalled how often I make unnecessary difficulties for myself at this transitional stage and told myself that if I was already dreaming, I didn't need a ton of preamble before getting out of bed—I should just get up. So I did, and it was fine. I've really been wanting to do the "finding a leftover present" TOTM, so I started looking around the room. (As has become typical lately, the room did not resemble my bedroom in WL.) I looked under the dresser, on the table... nothing so far. I felt a slight contradiction in my mental outlook: on the one hand, the best way to find the present would be to expect or even to will it to be there, but on the other hand, since it was a present I wanted to be surprised rather than force the issue. So I allowed myself only a vague expectation and kept looking. I found a wooden cabinet much like the one in my office and when I opened the door there were a few presents on the middle shelf. The first two I noticed, very small objects, I rejected as not quite right. Although they were loosely covered in wrapping, it wasn't taped down, so it looked like they had already been opened and then put back.

I kept looking and on the left side of the shelf was the perfect gift: a wide cylinder about six inches high wrapped in red and white paper with a red ribbon rising vertically on four sides to form a neat bow at the top. The paper looked familiar at first so I studied it for a moment, but it was not any pattern I've seen before. It consisted of thin white lines on a red background, but they were awkwardly curving and abstract, like an elaborate doodle.

Just as I started to open the present, I felt the dream begin to fade. I moved quickly, trying to open the box in the little time I had left. When the top came off, I plunged in my hand and felt... tissue paper. I was almost awake now, and as I reached past the tissue paper I felt like I crossed that indiscernable border between dreaming and waking consciousness. Or maybe it is not so indiscernible: what had just disappeared was my sense of touch, without which the dream had lost its tangibility. Vision lingered a little longer, and I saw my hand pull out a thick gold chain the length of a necklace, sparsely ornamented with tiny flowers that were each composed of four thin petals of white enamel. I was dissatisfied, however, not only with the gift itself (I don't care much for jewelry and this was definitely not my style), but with the fact that the dream was fading so fast that I couldn't determine to what extent dream imagination or waking imagination (not that I clearly understand the difference!) had determined the nature of the gift.

I went back to sleep, resolving to try to get lucid again and complete the task in a more satisfactory way.

DILD, "Elephant Ride": I was lying in bed but felt uncomfortable, realized I was still wearing day clothes, including a bra. Ugh, had I passed out last night? As I removed it, I noticed it was a lacy underwire thing that didn't even look familiar. I wanted to get back to sleep but the television was on loudly, so I tried to find the remote to turn it off. There were four or five remotes on top of the dresser, and I pressed the power button on all of them but nothing worked. On a couple, the image would cut out as though it were turning off but then come right back, and other remotes had no effect at all. Fine, I'll pull the damn plug, I thought grumpily, but the TV was mounted on the wall and on closer inspection it seems the wiring was concealed behind the wall. I settled for muting the volume (at least that worked) and turning the screen to the side, which accomplished little but expressed my annoyance with the device. [Possible source: I just got back from visiting my mom, where the TV was on loudly in the mornings, making it hard to read or work.]

I headed back toward the bed, but suddenly realized I must be dreaming. That would explain the difficulty I just had with the televisions, at least! And with the realization came the memory of my earlier lucid episode and my dissatisfaction with the TOTM I had attempted. I was pleased with the chance to try again.

Looking around, I soon spotted a wrapped gift on the bedside table. It was a small square box, around two inches wide and one inch high, made of that shiny gold cardboard that is common in gift boxes, and wrapped with a red ribbon. I started to untie the ribbon and realized that I was wearing gloves. At first I thought it an oddity, but quickly understood that it was just the dream's way of representing the slight awkwardness I felt in my fingers as I tried to complete this fine motor activity. I considered pulling off the gloves but recognized that it would just be a pointless waste of time, and decided instead to ignore them. At least they were thin gloves, and didn't impede me that much in my attempt to open the box. By the time it was open, they were gone.

This time I was very pleased with what I found in the box. It looked like a single confection of some sort. "Perfect, I love food!" I thought to myself happily. I pulled it out and looked it over. It was not very distinguished in shape, light brown in color and vaguely round, but a bit lumpy. There was a darker spot in the center like a piece of chocolate. [Possible source: I've been eating my mother's Christmas cookies, which have a spot of apricot jam covered with chocolate in the center. They have a much firmer texture overall than this one did, though.] The surface was dry but felt a bit pliant between my fingers, a sort of rubbery texture.

I bit into the confection and found the mouthfeel similar to what the outer texture had led me to anticipate. There was just the hint of a thin crust, and then the inside was soft but chewy. It reminded me of mochi but was firmer and easier to chew. At this point I was analyzing it with the idea of possibly attempting to recreate it in waking life. I knew that it would have to be based on glutinous rice flour. However, the overall taste was lightly chocolatey and fruity. I looked where I had bitten and distinctly saw raisins, both black and gold. There were also pieces of another fruit that was harder to identify. It had faint striations that reminded me of the fresh jackfruit I had eaten last night in WL (so that was probably the source), but this had the texture of a dried fruit. Can jackfruit be dried and baked into cookies? I couldn't say. If not, I thought that dried apricot might work just as well. The taste could have been either; it was hard to tell with all the other flavors going on. I finished the confection and found it very satisfying. If I ever do manage to recreate something like this, I'll have to post the recipe here!

I felt that I had now completed the TOTM satisfactorily, so what next? I looked around the room, and wondered if I should just leave through the door and go exploring. But somehow that is never very satisfying; I usually get better results when I am pursuing a specific idea of some sort, even when the results are not what I expected. The dream felt reasonably stable, so I wondered if I might attempt one of the TOTYs. I recalled the "riding" theme, but unfortunately, I hadn't looked at the list lately and couldn't remember the specifics very well. There was a window here... maybe I could summon a bird and ride it through the night sky? That sounded fun, but I didn't think it was on the list. The only one I could clearly remember was the elephant ride, because my studies have given me such a distinct impression of how elephants were used in battle in pre-modern Siam. I had always planned to try that one, but how do I get from my dream bedroom to pre-modern Siam?

I tried to remember the transportation spell from Harry Potter, but the command wasn't coming to me. All I could recall was "flue" something, and anyway there were no fireplaces in this bedroom (unlike my WL bedroom, which does have one!) I decided my best bet was probably the window. I knew you needed to mount an elephant from someplace high, so if I could summon one over, I could probably just descend from the window directly to its back. Then once I was on the elephant, it would be easier to get to Siam. On the way to the window, I felt impelled to opened the middle drawer of the dresser as I walked past. It was nearly empty, with just a few stray pieces of clothing... but in the far right corner was the gleam of gold. It was a pile of chocolate coins! You know the ones, disks of chocolate wrapped in gold foil stamped like currency. These were a few different sizes. I realized these might come in handy if I ended up having to buy the elephant, so I grabbed a handful and put them in my pocket.

I opened the window and felt the cool night air. The window was on the second storey, as I had anticipated, but looking out, I actually recognized that this looked nothing like my house. To the left, I could see a garage door extending perpendicularly to the wall my window was in. The house appeared to be painted beige. Across the driveway, which ran next to this wall to meet the garage, there was a wide grassy yard bordered by trees. I looked up at the night sky above the trees to see if there were any familiar constellations, and immediate recognized Orion. Of course... it seems anywhere I go, I see Orion, even in a dream. He was at an angle, almost on his side, just over the treetops... but not exactly the same in WL. At first I counted four stars in his belt, instead of the usual three. The more I looked at it, the more stars accumulated, but only in certain areas, so pretty soon Orion appeared to be wearing not only a belt, but also a brassiere, which amused me, and a crown. The crown had spikes pointing upward, like the common representation of crowns in modern iconography, but matching spikes adorned the brassiere and belt. At this point the whole shape of the constellation was getting a bit thin and stretched, and while I'm sure these transformations could go on indefinitely, right now I needed an elephant.

I knew my husband was in the next room, probably working, and even though I suspected this was dream logic, I hesitated to shout lest I annoy him. (Though I suppose it is still reasonable not to want to annoy the dream husband.) So I tried to summon the elephant quietly. Nothing happened. After trying for a bit without results, I decided to take a more dramatic approach. I stepped through the window and jumped, setting my intention for there to be an elephant down there, so I could land on its back.

There wasn't. But the results were promising nonetheless... from unconstructed dream space, I managed to conjure something plausibly like the interior of a palace in Siam. It was a bit of a hack job, without much detail, and I confess the throne was far too low (must not have been the formal audience hall), but it was sufficient for my purposes. There were various ministers standing around (another embarrassingly inaccurate detail; no courtiers would stand in the presence of the king in early nineteenth-century Siam! Good gracious!) and the king was on the throne, but a bit vague. My initial impression was that he resembled the recently deceased Rama IX, but that troubled me because I was going for an earlier era. I tried to make him look more like Rama III, but it wasn't working very well, so in the end I just didn't look too closely. At any rate, the king was vague enough that he didn't quibble when I handed over my handful of chocolate coins and requested an elephant. I didn't feel like getting into complex negotiations; I just allowed myself assume the success of the transaction and walked away.

As I exited the interior of the palace and momentarily noticed the bright sunlight reflecting off the whitewashed arch of the doorway, I felt a flash of familiarity. Of course, I thought to myself, This must be the Grand Palace, I've been here a few times. I let my memory conjure something akin to the elephant-mounting station I remembered observing there, and walked over to it. There was no elephant there presently, so I waited for someone to bring it around... and started getting impatient. No one seemed to be doing much, or paying attention to my repeated request. They must not understand English, I considered. I'll have to try it in Thai.

"Chang!" I shouted, the Thai word for elephant. "Ma nee!" I realized how rude I must sound: while "ma nee" would probably be correctly understood as "come here," or, given the contextual clues, "bring it here" as I had intended, it was a terribly rough and simple way of speaking. It was the sort of thing you might say to call a dog. I hadn't even appended a perfunctory "kha" at the end. But then I started wondering what level of politeness would be proper in this situation. I was in the palace, which made things more difficult, because royal Thai is another ballgame altogether. But what was my own social standing here? In speaking roughly I was assuming a great deal of authority... maybe that was not so bad in this situation. Fortunately, I saw my elephant being brought around before I was able to go too deep down the rabbit hole of Thai honorifics.

It was a disappointing elephant, by any standards... not only small but kind of flabby and soft, a cartoonish cross between a real baby elephant and Dumbo. Moreover it was completely unadorned, with no harness or howdah. I momentarily wondered if the lack was due to an inadequate mental impression of what a howdah should look like? But no, I could picture it clearly enough in my imagination... it just wasn't on the elephant. I guess that's what I get for being rude to the staff. To add insult to injury, they didn't even properly lead the elephant to the mounting station—though it was probably too small to get on from there anyway—they just dumped it on the stairs, where it crumpled over weakly. On the bright side, this made it easy to clamber up on its neck, so I did so and prepared to forge on.

I knew I had to enter a battle, so we promptly exited the city. I had thought to do this properly on a magnificent war elephant with a howdah and a driver and four soldiers to guard the legs—I've seen plenty of paintings and movies of proper war elephants in action—but instead I was alone, bareback with no weapon, on the most pathetic elephant I've ever seen. But at least in dream there was no risk of actually falling in battle, so I figured I could make do.

We had barely gone past the city walls when I saw the invaders approaching from the jungle. That wasn't much of a stretch; it seemed like Ayutthaya was always under attack. (I had originally envisioned myself in Bangkok, but had already slipped back to an earlier era more appropriate for elephant combat). The invaders were on horseback, I noticed, and I was relieved to see that they were only coming in ones and twos, given that I was going to have to take them on alone. They had long black hair and Asian features, and naturally I assumed that they were Burmese... until I got close enough to swing at one and saw the pointed ears. Elves?! Last night I was playing Witcher II and Pillars of Eternity, and the portrait of Aloth in the latter game closely resembled these invaders, but I wasn't sure why they were showing up here. Also, I'm fond of elves and felt loathe to fight them. Fortunately, our combat was more play-acting than anything. I had a good mental image of the kind of long-handled glaive I should be wielding, but though I swung it toward the elves and they gamely mimed being struck, the weapon did not visibly appear in my hands—and I was thankful that it drew no blood.

So I marched forward on my pathetic elephant, going through the motions of bashing the elves (elves?!) with my invisible glaive, while they went through the motions of being knocked aside, until the jungle started to coalesce into a new kind of space, a kind of wide passage under an increasingly low ceiling. The texture of the ceiling interested me, and from my position atop the elephant I could reach up and just touch it. It was covered with a kind of thick cloth, like a yellowish patterned felt, and I reached into the seams between two pieces and felt something hard and smooth. I pulled it out and found an object streaked with yellow and brown that resembled a wild bird's egg, but it was too hard and irregular, so I thought it must be a stone. I slipped it into my pocket. The felt overhead was gaping at the seams so I grabbed it and tore it off, revealing a kind of wide hatch with a knob for a handle. I wondered what it might be concealing so I pulled it open... and found the dream space deconstructing, muffling me in a soft blankety texture. Instinctively I tried to protect myself by putting the stone I had just found in my mouth, but I was still being enveloped in the stuff. I tried to pull at it with my hands, and as my fingers sank into it I was struck by the familiarity of the texture, like coarse sheep's wool—not the clean feel of a fleece, but the dirty, oily texture it has when it is still on the sheep. That was the last thing I felt before waking.

So here I am, hanging out at the T house with my buddies, when suddenly there are soldiers in the woods. They have machine guns. Thomas gives the word, and we all start making gun noises and firing back. It's working, it's stopping them. We take most of them down this way. Soon a pair of girls in this crowd just walk in. They aren't playing along and dying when we shoot them. I ask them to leave, but the taller of the two just shows herself in further. She starts asking questions. She wants to buy the place. I tell her the price and say it's not for sale. Conflicting actions, I know.

Then, the allied forces of the Persian empire come up the hill. They charge upon us, and we fend them off with our Jewish forces, the Hebrew cavalry. The king retreats and we capture his army. Looking out over the hill, I decide I will conquer all the earth with this stolen army.

I return to the T House to relax. Sitting next to the front wall, the glass slid open and a beautiful cold ocean breeze coming through, I am in perfect peace. Absolute comfort.

1. I was on a mission to find out more about myself when I was going through a maze of structures that will be hard to explain. I chuckled at one point because it reminded me of a lab rat. It reminded me of buildings with rooms and several levels up and down which at one point took me into what seemed like different dimensions (through worm hole) in order to continue my search. I had to think about every move I made so I was actually feeling I was getting exercise when I slept. At one point I had to hang on a bar for a while as it swung across to the other side and today my arms are sore. This dream was exhausting. I never saw a person and it was all telepathically communicated to me that this was what I was to do lol. Unfortunately after all of that it never had a answer other than I never gave up :-). I woke up by my husband going potty.
2. I am standing in line at a grocery store when woman dressed in 60's clothes glasses and all, she is holding a little Chihuahua dog, and doesn't fit in with all of the other people is staring right through me. She moves around in awe looking at me never taking her eyes off me. I watch her also and I smile at her and she has no expression at all. Then I have to check out and when I am done, I look around and the woman was gone.
I don't know if that is common but I get it all of the time where people just stare at me expressionless but in awe? Like I have two heads or something.

I dreamed that i was back in my old boarding school again. We were having some kind of feast.

01/11/2017
Dream Fragment One
Untitled
The only thing I remember are some vague images of sex, and then my landlord coming by and giving me shit about something or other. I just did what I could to avoid him, while he was hanging around.


Dream Two
"Cancelling the Apocalypse"
(Lucid)

I was with two other guys, and we were being stalked by the Marvel supervillain, Apocalypse. We were in some tall, unfinished building, surrounded by a cage of unfinished walls and concrete pillars. Apocalypse had this very Jason Voorhees type of way of following us, slowly and almost casually, before just "appearing" nearby, to try and attack us. (I had been watching beta gameplay from the new Friday the 13th game, not long before bed, which I believe inspired the way he gave chase in the dream.)

On about the 3rd floor of this hollow building structure, Apocalypse appeared and snatched up of the guys in our party, disappearing with him and reappearing somewhere down on the first floor. We could see him through the many openings in the incomplete floors beneath us, holding our ally up by the throat, with his back against one of the support columns. I can't remember exactly what he did to our guy, but I remember it being very vicious and gory, as if he just ripped him apart, with his bare hands, in a shower of blood. Knowing it was too late to do anything about it, we started running again, and before I had a chance to even know where I was going, Apocalypse was back on the third(ish) floor with us, stepping out from behind a corner just as I passed by, and coming straight for me. Having no time to think of a safe escape, and after having seen what he just did to the other guy, I immediately lept from the ledge that I was approaching, still about 3 storeys up - basically resigning to the fact that I was Not going to enjoy the landing.

In a panic, while careening toward the ground below me and preparing for the inevitable onslaught of pain and possible broken bones that awaited, I instinctively realized that this couldn't really be about to happen. This had to be a dream!! Without a moment to second-guess it, I pushed my feet straight down and braced for impact, relieved when I stuck the landing in an almost effortless crouch. I knew that Apocalypse would soon follow behind me, though, so I instinctively lunged backward, throwing my right elbow back and cracking him in the face with it, when he predictably showed up behind me. (Not sure if he was always going to be there, or if my anticipating him being behind me caused him to just 'be there'.)

I didn't stop there, though, immediately turning around and rushing him with a barrage of punching combinations to the head and gut, confidently and aggressively driving him back with each solid hit. While in mid-attack, I wondered if I should not get too carried away and try stabilizing the dream before it ended or I lost my lucidity, but I was fired up and didn't want to stop hitting him. It was only a matter of seconds, though, before the dream fell apart and I woke up.

A dream like this came as no surprise given my circumstances the previous evening. I dreamt that my good friend picked me up from a Campus Christian Fellowship event, which actually did happen the night before. Only in the dream, there occurred a disturbing turn of events. He exited his car and entered into the facility in which the occasion was being held. I had already left the building, but after he had been in there for a little while, I noticed several members of the fellowship program leaving with very sad and offended expressions. In my mind, I felt that he had spoken harsh and offensive words to them and greatly disturbed these people. I, in turn, was quite upset, and we proceeded to have a fairly significant argument over the matter. He did not drive me home, and I was stranded into the night.
Now, some things about this made sense, and other things did not. My friend does not consider himself a Christian, but he is not very critical of those who do profess to be, and he would certainly not intentionally carry out offensive and hurtful actions to strangers in the community, but this was the case in my dream. I was disturbed by this dream upon awakening, and I wondered what this was trying to tell me, if anything.
I cannot remember the circumstances surrounding this next dream, but I remember the feeling of it, and one image in particular. I’m staring at a face that bears a striking resemblance to that of my former lover. In the dream, I am experiencing the exact emotions I had when I was with her. It’s weird that I cannot recall these exact emotions now IRL, but in the dream, they were very real. It’s as if I can only recall my true emotions of the past in my dreams. The reasons behind this dream I could point to fairly easily. I introduced my friend (The same friend in the first dream) to the show Twin Peaks last night. We watched the pilot episode last night, and needless to say, he’s hooked. But there was an odd moment when we realized he looks quite a bit like the show’s unfortunate victim, Laura Palmer, to the point that it actually freaked us out a little. I have no doubt this instance is what influenced my dream, but I cannot explain how I was able to relive the exact emotional state in the dream as when I was with her.

Non-Lucid: I was in a flea market that I've never seen before & I was stealing things, mostly jewelry & eventually got caught but talked my way out of it. For whatever reason this dream was very long & boring really. I stole a whole lot of stuff.

I decided to do a graph of my lucid frequency in Excel since I started DV!