lucid

20.03.2011

undercover in my old dream school (lucid for a sec or two) (DILD)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

I am supposed to go undercover in my old school as a student even though I have been out of school for quite some time.
The school is not a school I have been to in real life but one that I have dreamed about before.

I arrive at a train station that is one before the last of the line. The school is close to the end station, but I had to leave the train before that. The walk to the last train station is one I remember well from other dreams. I had to get off on a roof-less platform and move forward to its end. Then I have to follow the path along the tracks.
A couple of women walks in the opposite direction - they seem to be mother and daughter. The daughter carried a red backpack with a red rain cover. They don't hurry even though the train is about to leave.

I walk along a road with a few houses behind the end station. One of the houses has a big courtyard with cars on it and a kid playing there. A young man drives slowly in a compact car from the courtyard. I recognise it as a house where a former school mate once lived. I wonder if she still lives here.

I reach the school nearly an hour before the lessons start, but I have to get organised, signed in and receive a schedule. I don't have any information about the school days ahead of me. I feel some trepidation and a bit conspicious. As I enter the building I see a glass box that looks like the teachers lounge. I recognise one of the women there, as I had met her before (in another dream) I have the feeling that she is the initiator of my undercover assignment. She doesn't acknowledge me or talks to me... doesn't seem to recognise me.
Before approaching the glass box I want to put away all the stuff I have in my hands. I set my backpack on a close-by bench and try to sort it all out.
Suddenly, Nancy greets me. She is still a student at school even though she was in school with me years ago. She doesn't seem to think it strange. She says that I am a bit early for my first lesson - music. She likes my sweater and trousers, but asks if it is not a bit dressy for school. Well, I will adjust over time.

I decide that I have procrastinated long enough and approach the glass box. Suddenly, lots of students want to go through the doors near the glass box. I join the queue thinking that they all have to do something at the teachers lounge. But instead the stream carries me through the doors outside to another building. Listening to conversations around me I realise that the new destination houses the cafeteria and class rooms. Since I don't know my schedule this is not really helpful. I leave with a couple of others to enter through another door. To our left there is an open door through which I can see an observation lounge and beyond that a huge swimming pool. It is white tiled with a few coloured tiles for decoration. The entire pool area looks very new and highly sophisticated. My companions see the same room and observe that the teacher and the others haven't arrived yet - so the class seems to be off.

I realise I am still on the wrong track and hurry back to the first building. I have to run as my time is running out. Only a few students can be seen in the corridors and the entrance hall. I approach the counter at the glass box - I talk to the woman there. She seems very nice at first as I tell her that I start school today. I ask her for my schedule. She needs a _VB card so I can sign in at one of the terminals. After I tell her that I don't possess such a card she wants a WerVB card, which I also don't possess. She gets really impatient with me wanting to know how I studied before without these cards. What to say - I don't even know what these cards are for, I have been away from school too long for that. She stomps away to get something.

Looking around I see waiting rooms with comfy chairs along the walls and journal racks on one wall. The people in them don't look like students or teachers.

I do some snooping around (this part is a blurr) - Suddenly I see a black screen with the layout of the building on it. Some circles indicate the people moving around the building. These circles are white. I observe one circle in particular that moves around the building without to be stopped or hindered by the others. It moves much more than all the others.
Suddenly, I become aware of two other circles that bumped into each other and changed colour (red/green) and they stay in one place "a couple has been found"
--> FLASH: I see two teachers who go to bed together to cuddle and sleep, but they leave their clothes on.

Then I am back in the entrance hall. The employees seem to know that I found something. I like most of them by now and want some answers to the question "why".
I talk to one of the teachers (the woman from the couple). We are outside the entrance talking softly. A dog is sitting at our feet. I confront her with my finding - that money indicated for international projects (hotels, hospitals and schools) that don't exist.
She wants to explain everything but needs some materials for this. So we enter the school again. I walk ahead towards one of the waiting rooms. She walks towards the teachers lounge followed by the dog. As I watch the dog transforms into the man (of the couple).
I know now that this is a dream... I walk into the waiting room and since this is a dream I am going to force her to give me all the answers I need.

Suddenly, the room changes to a prop of a talk show or something like that - with lots of red and black couches.

I remember that one of the project was supposed to be located in India.
My location switches to India. I observe (movie-like) a camel driver and his animal. He gets a call to get a customer. He starts to move to the reqested location. The camel is in poor condition. It walks only on three legs - with the right hindquarter slightly crippled.
Seemingly feeling my pity he says that the camel just pretends, so it wouldn't have to work.

13.03.2011

My first lucid dream - preparing for a swim (DILD)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

I decided to try the afternoon-nap thing again. I hadn't been really successful with this one, but I wanted to try it with me staying in bed instead of on the couch.
The first try was not successful. I visualised my dream storage room and chose a previous dream to enter, but it didn't work (the last step - sinking into the chosen dream). After an hour I got up, went to the loo and decided to get another hour of sleep... not really trying anything, just hoping to dream and to recall it afterwards.

I used my fingers to go through my hair and had a tuft of hair in my hand. I laid it aside and looked at it. I was dismayed as it was quite a lot of hair. But relieved to see that it was not full length - so I would be bald, only one side of my head would have shorter hair.
I fingercombed another strand and came away with another tuft.
Then it came to me. I thought "That can't be right. Something like that does not just happen." and I realised that I was dreaming.
And so, I thought "Hey, as this is a dream, my hair will be back on my head and actually arranged in a sleek, long braid that swishes along my back.
I realised that I was not alone in the room and that we all prepared for some swimming contest. So I decided to beat them all in the race. But before that I wanted to wear a great bathing suit. I already was close to the door to leave for the contest as someone asked me a question. She wanted me to do something before leaving. I turned away from the door and saw a mirror. As I looked inside I saw my face - nothing weird or strange about it - and I was wearing a simple black bathing suit.
Then I heard my phone ringing.I woke up thinking, that I couldn't stay in bed all afternoon, especially if someone called to talk to me. So I got up and went to the living room to check who had called. Well, the answer is NO-ONE. My mind was playing a trick making me think in my dream that I could hear the phone through two closed doors.

Damn...
But hey - my first lucid dream - and I had some control over it.

I have been using visualisation to enter dreams for ages, but usually not to induce lucid dreams (as I haven't had any lucid dreams since growing up).
I tried that however this morning. After 9 hours sleep I got up for a couple of minutes and then went back to bed to intentionally visualise my way into my personal dream world. And I was successful - up to a point

Here is what I did:
I got comfortable in my bed. Then I started to visualise...
I entered a big vast room with hundreds of thousands crystal orbs suspended in the air all over the room. For a while I wandered around the room looking into some of the orbs - catching a glimpse here and there. This is my dream storage room!
Because there were so many orbs it would take me ages to look and examine each one. So I looked around to find a way to identify one that I remembered and wanted to enter. And Lo and behold there was a computer touch screen on one of the walls nearby. I moved towards it and discovered that it listed all my dreams. I could select one of them (could even search) or choose to create a new one.
First I tried it with a recent dream I wanted to revisit. I identified it as it was labeled the same as in my dream journal. After selecting it I detected a glowing orb some steps away from me. I walked over and looked into it. It was the correct dream. I knew I had to continue looking into the orb, focussing on it and the pulsating glow to enter the dream. But somehow I couldn't go through with it. I got distracted by other remembered dreams that I could have chosen instead.
So I tried it with a "new" dream. Another orb started to glow and as I looked into it all I could see was white. I focussed on it and the pulsating glow and suddenly with a "plop" (short bursting sound) I found myself falling to the white nothingness. It looked like a white canvas all around me ready to create a dreamscape. I was standing in there and wondered for quite some time what I wanted to create, but unfortunately I couldn't decide among all the different scenarios I had designed in my waking life. Then I was startled awake by some noise outside.

Maybe I should add a "random" button to the screen just to make it easier to enter not-remembered dreams.