non-lucid

I'm back, and hopefully for a while! With the difficulties of school and busy schedules, I think I lost interest in lucid dreaming last year, but I was thinking the summer would be the perfect opportunity to build up recall and maybe start having lucid dreams again! Anyhow, I read through my dream journal last night, and did a sorta WBTB, and ended up having a couple fairly vivid dreams, the latter of which SHOULD have been lucid, had I been paying enough attention. Also, I failed to write my first dream down, so now I barely remember any of it. Oh well, you win some and lose some.

Alaska Cruise (Fragment)

At 6:00 AM, I'm pretty sure I could have gotten a good couple of paragraphs out of this one, but by now... not so much. Basically, I was on a cruise from Vancouver up the coast of Canada and to Alaska with my family. I think I was looking for someone, or exploring the ship for some reason quite a bit, but other than that, I don't recall much.

Pulled Over

This one was a little more bizarre in some ways, and I really should have realized it was a dream. I was at a party, and decided to go ahead and go home early. After saying goodbye to my parents, I started to drive back. After leaving the house, which now that I think about it was more like a small mansion, I began to drive past a small suburb in a valley. The road was one way only (or at least without any yellow lines) and was built into the side of a steep hill. To the left was a decently sized group of houses, small stores, and other assorted buildings. As I drove, I was talking to my dad on the phone (talking on the phone while driving being something I'm sort of uncomfortable with still) who was telling me to come back to the party and help clean up. I told him I needed to pay attention to the road and would call him back, before I broke through a fence into a small industrial/factory area.

This is where it gets a little weird. It's a decent drop, maybe 6 feet or so, but it feels longer, and a lot bumpier. I try to regain control after landing, swerving a few times and dropping down some other small hills, before finally turning myself around and pulling the car back onto the road. At the same time, I find a gun in my car and decide to reload it (???), and when I notice a lever outside the factory I pull that too. No idea what it actually did, though. Anyways, as I pull up onto the road, a cop is driving by, and I accidentally run into them. Predictably, they pull me over, but somehow the scene shifts back to my bedroom.

At this point, the cop is interrogating me about why I had a gun (no idea), why I was driving so crazily (talking on the phone), and why I would decide to pull a random lever on the side of the road. At this point, I express the thought that I might even be dreaming, and ask the cop to hit me to make sure. He does, and then I slap my own hand, but I think I feel pain so I decide it isn't a dream. (Stupid stupid reality test! I know better than that! >_<). My dad walks into the room at this point, and says something along the lines of, "What have you done?" I explain that I was pulled over, then the scene shifts again.

Finally, we end up in the hallway outside of my bedroom. The cop is testing me to see if I've learned my lesson. He places a red, then a green lever in front of me. When I refuse to pull them, he seems satisfied, because I shouldn't pull a lever unless I know what it does. He turns the green lever around, and tells me that if I had pulled it I would have contracted a deadly Elephant STD. (Crazy brain. ) At this point, the dream ends.

I woke up, and was all, "See, I knew it was a dream!" I was more relieved that it wasn't real than disappointed in myself for not realizing that it wasn't.

Last night was finally fairly productive, dream-wise. I have three, maybe four dreams that I fairly clearly remember (I'm unsure of the number because some may have connected together.) Interestingly enough, I didn't try and do anything different sleep-wise last night; no WBTBs, auto-suggestive mp3's, or anything else like that. I just went to bed, said a mantra, "I lucid dream and remember my dreams," until I fell asleep, and slept through until morning. The only thing that I did differently that probably helped quite a bit was, when my alarm went off, I turned it off and laid in bed for another couple of minutes, to see if anything else would come to me. When I thought I remembered all I could, I recorded a few details of each dream, and got up and around. Here's the dreams, organized into what I think is sequential order through the night:

Large Library and Gift Shop

A friend and I are walking through a large library in the middle of the day. There are a few other people around, but not many. From where we're standing, I can look up and see at least three other floors, maybe more. I've been here before, in what I now recall as a dream from a few months ago. My friend and I walk up to a TV which is showing some sort of video concerning the Harry Potter books - a documentary, or history, or making of, or something of the like. We're fairly interested, until we see that to watch the whole thing, we have to spend $95, which isn't going to happen. We begin to head towards the door. On the way, we pass at least one shelf with Harry Potter paraphernalia, such as fake wands and candy from the book. A short, stocky man comes up to us and asks us if we want to buy anything. We mumble a negative and move out of the shop.

Frustration in the Parking Lot

Another friend, or maybe the same one, and I are now driving around a parking lot, trying to find the exit. We think we're almost out, but we see that we have to detour up and over an overpass, which will put us completely out of our way. We're trying to get somewhere in a hurry, and we're really annoyed. The parking lot is enclosed within a square of buildings, and the only way out is a tunnel on one side, but traffic is backed up too far, and we know we'll be stuck there for a while.

Dead Tower

I'm an experienced soldier, and along with a less-experienced person, am assaulting the tower of a sorcerer or evil being. At the top is trapped a friend of mine/ours, locked in a cage, and it is our mission to rescue her. We teleport (my browser dictionary doesn't know that word?) unto a balcony of the tower, on what is about the third or fourth floor. We sneak in through a window, and look around. The less-experienced soldier I am with is very excited, and states that he thinks the job will be a piece of cake. I get angry at his irresponsibility, and ask him, "Do you have any idea what we're up against?" Looking down, I search for something on the floor below it. Finding it, I point out a huge, red-eyed, black-furred, demonic rat to the other soldier. The rat, of which there are several more, is extremely strong and possessed by a dead spirit. He seems to understand the danger, and starts to shake. We move on up the tower, and my recall ends.

Battlefields

This time I'm the inexperienced soldier, and my commanding officer is going off on a general rant on the inefficiency of the training system. He says/yells, "They think that a few months of training in a controlled setting back home is good enough to prepare soldiers like you for the realities of war! Well, it isn't. You need field training, in an actual battle situation, before they should even think about sending someone as green as you out here." Just then, someone comes up and informs us that a battle is about to occur. The officer glares, but permits me to fight. The battle is, for whatever reason, somewhat reminiscent of the first campaign level of a Halo game; the last dream, though in a less conventional battlefield, was like the last campaign level. Going out onto the large field, I have a feeling at least one of our soldiers is definitely going to die, though I don't know where I get this sense.

Yesterday during the day, I felt fairly normal physically, and maybe a little more awake in the morning than normal. I had a few worries and stuff that I was thinking about, but I was able to lay that aside once I was ready to sleep. However, last night was really worse with recall than the previous. I can't even really remember any fragments, and I only have a vague sense of what my last dream might have been about. Here's how the evening went:

I was working on homework and stuff until close to 11:00. By the time I was ready to sleep, it was 11:15, and I didn't really spend any time focusing on lucid dreaming. I said my mantra ("I lucid dream") and watched the images behind my eyes until I fell asleep, which only took a few minutes. Next thing I remember, my alarm was going off at 5:30. I hit snooze, to see if I could remember any dreams, but no luck. The only thing I realized a few minutes later was that I think the dream may have had to do with math, which was what I was doing right before bed, and that I was thinking about first thing when I woke up (thinking about the subject itself, not really any particular facet of it.)

It's a weekday (and a school day) so I'm not getting near enough sleep. As such, with recall that isn't the best anyways, I'm not having much luck remembering most of my dreams. I do remember a couple of fragments from after I hit snooze on my alarm for about five minutes. In the first dream, I'm playing some sort of computer game, while in my pajamas. I think it's supposed to be Starcraft, though I've only ever played the first one, and only for a few minutes. In the dream, I'm trying to hide what I'm doing, though I don't know why. In a second dream, or a continuation of the first, I'm in the kitchen about to enter the bathroom when I realize somebody spilled something all over the kitchen floor. I quickly try to clean it up, so I think that the 'somebody' may have been me. However, a friend of mine enters the room and teases me before helping me clean the rest up.

14.09.2010

Escaping the District (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

Last night broke a relatively dry spell of dreaming for me. It was pretty exciting - I woke up and was getting around like normal, when I realized, "Oh, I remember that dream. Oh, wait, I remember those, too!" It was pretty exciting, because lately my recall has been limited to one, if any, dreams per night. Well, without further delay, here's the first dream:

I'm in a small building, really not much bigger than a shack. There are at least two people in there with me, interrogating me. Something happens to distract them, and they leave for a moment. I escape, running out of the back door I know is there. I keep the building between me and the interrogator's trucks, as to stay out of sight. I look back to see if I'm being followed, but so far, I'm in the clear. I run into some woods, where I disappear out of sight.

I'm running towards a fence which I know to be electrified, keeping all of the people within the District. I poke the fence with a stick, and realize only the top barbed wire is electrified - the rest is not. I try to climb the fence, and somehow balance the stick and use it to climb over, but this plan (obviously) fails. Next, I spot a tree next to the fence, which I climb up, before remembering that there are defenses in place, including razor wire and (oddly enough) shrink wrap to prevent this. I manage to swing around and escape the district.

I continue to run through the woods, which are more tightly packed than inside the district. I'm not sure how I'm going to survive outside, and realize I should have stolen a book on How to Survive the Wilderness, as if such things existed. Eventually, I come out of the woods into a beach, where I meet an old man. Recall ends.

_________________________

14.09.2010

Storytelling (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

I'm retelling the story of my previous dream to another guy who I instinctively know to be part of my church small group, though I've never seen him before. He's not wearing a shirt for some reason, and I note that he looks pretty strong. As I tell my story, he says that he had a very similar dream. I don't remember his face.

_________________________

14.09.2010

Fast Food (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

I'm standing outside in front of a large building, which I assume to be some sort of government building because of it's size and architecture. Next to me is a friend of the family who we went white water rafting with last weekend. We go inside of a nearby fast food restaurant; my mom is there as well. I'm not really hungry, and the cashier is annoying me by throwing gum wrappers at me, so I don't get anything. She apologizes in a robotic, scripted-sounding voice, not sounding genuine at all.

Writing the title out like that, the dream probably looks a lot cooler than it really was, but oh well. Me and my friend D (who has appeared in my dreams multiple times lately) are programming in Java. I'm doing my own thing, maybe working on a project for the fun of it, or maybe working on a previous assignment. I look over to her screen, and I see that she is working on a really cool program. It's not finished yet, but it has something to do with all of the planets. Each of the planets, though, has it's own special keyword. For example, on the screen, it may have been something like Uranus - Neo, or Mercury - Aqua. That's not quite right, but I thought that it was pretty cool in the dream.

The most interesting part of the dream to me, though, was that I had been programming less than an hour before sleeping. I actually had the conscious thought - 'Oh, I know that our dreams often have to do with what we do in the last hour before sleeping, but I doubt my brain will do much with programming. Well, I guess my subconscious proved me wrong!

05.09.2010

Illegal Driving (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

I'm hoping last night marks the long-overdue end of my dream recall dry spell. In real life, I just got my learner's permit a few days ago, so I'm still very nervous about driving, which probably led to this dream:

I have been at some function in my school, but I can't remember what. It may or may not have been actually part of my dream. Anyways, I am pulling out of the parking lot of my school, and onto the main road. Once I get started, though, I realize that I've left my dad back at the school, and I'm (illegally) driving by myself. I panic somewhat, and make a u-turn to go back. Problem is, I somehow get lost.

Now I'm on a road surrounded by trees, at an intersecting. I think that I'm waiting for a red light to turn green, but then I realize that I only have stop signs, so I should have already gone. I know that the other drivers behind me are annoyed, so I quickly turn to the left, towards where I think my school is. The dream ends.

30.08.2010

Various Fragments (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

My recall has been completely shot as of late, and I don't think I've been helping it out too much, between not getting as much sleep as would be ideal at night, and not even attempting to keep a journal. But here's to me jumping back on the wagon, with a couple of fragments. Hey, you have to start somewhere, right?

I'm in some sort of field, doing a military drill. I'm vaguely reminded of the training of District 13 in the book, Mockingjay. A siren blares (my alarm) waking me up.

Sadly enough, that was my most defined dream. Other than that, I just have a couple of images in my head of things I think I dreamed about last night, which are a grappling hook and water. I also think that there was a fairly large dream that I'm not remembering, but it's just out of reach.

So, last night, I had a lucid dream, my second since joining this site. It was somewhat similar to the first one, in that after (or possibly before) a failed WILD attempt. This of course meant that my mind was more than usual on dreaming, and so at some point in one dream I became lucid. After a couple of minutes, lucidity faded, and I don't remember any more of the dream. As for the part when I was actually dreaming... well, that's kind of personal. Sorry. I'll relate a recent non-lucid dream I had, to make up for it.

The dream begins, and I am playing some sort of role-playing game in the house of someone I don't know. The scene shifts to be 'inside' the game, with me being my character. We are all in a big house on the side of a river, near some think woods/jungle. Everyone has their own small room, and I awaken in mine. I know that there's some danger (though the dream is not a nightmare) so I quickly get up and run out of the house, swim across the river, and enter the jungle. For what seems like hours, I wander through the woods, until I'm sure I've escaped. I then come upon a city, in which I hide for a while. A little later, I become curious and head back through the jungle, more sure of my path this time. I can still see the danger from across the river, so I run back away and don't return.

07.08.2010

Island Hotel (Non-lucid)

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

This is one of two dreams I had from last night, both of which happened before 3:30 A.M. when I woke up for a WILD. The WILD, by the way, failed when I fell back to sleep. I hadn't remembered any dreams from the past two nights, so even this is a plus.

I am walking along a path in the middle of a tropical island. My dream-world brother is also on the path, a little ways behind me. I meet up with a woman, and we begin to talk, while still walking along the path. We come upon a tower, that I instinctively know is a hotel, and we go up to the top floor. Along the way, the woman disappears, and I find myself in the top floor room with my brother nearby. I decide to go take a shower, and I do so. The dream ends.

Commentary and Awake
Dream (Non-Lucid)
Lucid Dream

Last night was fairly restless. I attempted to do a WILD around 3:30, but failed and couldn't get back to sleep. Quote from my WILD-1 workbook:

Results: Success, sort of.

Meaning, I managed to have a lucid dream (YAY!) but it wasn't a WILD, and was lot later in the morning than I had intended. Plus, it was really really short, which was kind of a pain. So, here's how the night went: my alarm went of at 3:30, just like I set it to. I was already very close to if not awake, which makes me think I was pretty close to the end of my REM cycle. I got up, used the restroom, got a sip of water, and went back to bed. After that, I did my relaxation techniques, and settled down, ready to have a WILD. Here's where I hit the wall, like always: I couldn't get to sleep. For whatever reason, my body decided that I had woken it up, so it must be morning. I tried to stay mostly still for about an hour, and did a pretty good job, but there was no luck with entering the transition phase. At about 4:30, I decided to just try and get some sleep, however, I couldn't even do that! Part of the problem, I think, was that I was hungry, so that very well may have kept me from being able to sleep, among other things. I finally just got up, walked around for about half of an hour, got a snack, and went back to bed a little before 6:00. After laying another twenty minutes or so, I fell asleep and had one or two very vivid but non-Lucid dreams, which I'll put in my DJ after I'm done with this. I woke up, rolled over, and went to sleep again.

There was no transition, no SP that I recall, and I'm not sure if I lost consciousness or not, which is what makes me doubt this was a WILD. Either way around it, the next thing I realized, I was in my bed again in the same position I had just been in. I did an RC (pinching my nose) and I could breathe! I did a couple of things to stabilize it after I woke up, but it still ended before I could do much of anything. Very exciting, though.

Here's my actual dreams:

1: Out for Dinner

This was the least interesting and least vivid of the dreams I had last night, but nonetheless, it was a dream. I am sitting in a restaurant, chatting with a bunch of my friends. For whatever reason, the restaurant reminds me of my third grade classroom, but it is decorated much differently. I feel somewhat excluded and not a part of the conversation, which makes me sad. Pretty much all the friends that I saw in real life a few days ago at a pool party were in a dream, particularly one of my better friends who is moving out of state very soon. I have a feeling that this dream was a lot longer than I'm making it out to be, but it was mostly talking, of which I don't really remember anything.

2: Oceanfront Retreat

This dream was a lot more vivid and a lot more interesting than the last one. I'll try to recount as much of it as I can, though some of the order might overlap. I'm in some sort of an oceanfront retreat. It's a cross between a couple of places I have been on vacation this summer. First thing I can remember, I'm in some sort of large wooden building. I get the feeling that there isn't really air conditioning or much else like that, and it's very open to the outside. I decide to go walk to the beach. First thing I notice, the waves are ridiculously high- I swear, they have to be a good 20 or 30 feet. They are all a perfect blue with a white crest, really beautiful and scary at the same time. I remember the ocean is, though more rough than probably possible, extremely clear and detailed. It's kind of interesting, because one of the techniques I was using to relax was imagining floating on the ocean.



Anyways, even though the waves were so huge, I know me and all the other people watching are safe, because all of the buildings and the people are on a sort of bluff (small cliff), out of the ocean's reach. I find myself sitting on some wooden stairs leading down to sea level, next to an old friend and someone else that I didn't know. The old friend, C, is crying, and I ask her what's wrong. She says that she doesn't know me and doesn't want to talk about it, so I just try and comfort her instead. I find it a little weird that she doesn't recognize me, until I remember that I'm somewhat in disguise. Just then, I realize that C's friend is really attractive, so I start to talk to her. One thing leads to another... etc. I feel a little bad, though, that I'm ignoring C when she's as sad as she is, but I quickly forget about it.

Next 'scene' in the same setting, a group of people are going out into the rough waves. I overhear them saying that they have to go save the fish. They're wearing bright orange life jackets, some sort of breathing apparatus, and a lot of other safety equipment. When they go into the water, however, the waves suddenly die off, leaving a much calmer, clear ocean. I go out to see what they're doing and maybe help, and I see a couple of them trying to fix a buoy. Somehow, I also find myself just wandering around the streets and alleys of the resort, seeing a couple of people I know, but mostly strangers.

3: Home (First Lucid)

I fall asleep laying on my stomach, which is really weird for me, because I almost always sleep on my back. It felt comfortable at the time, though. I am in my bed, in the same position I fell asleep in. I know that I've been trying to WILD most of the night, so I try to do a reality check by pinching my nose and breathing. I can breathe, and so realize I'm dreaming! I then try to get out of bed, which is a real struggle. I feel as if I'm peeling myself out of my body. Once I finally manage to stand up, I feel no more resistance. I don't look back, though I wish I did to see if my physical body was still there. I go out into the hallway outside my room. I'm a little afraid I'm going to lose lucidity, so I spin around a couple of times to try and stabilize my dream. Everything in my house is a lot darker than it should be, saying this was around 6:30 in the morning. I walk downstairs to my front door, trying to imagine that it is bright outside. I open my door, but no luck: it's still dark. I try to force things to brighten up, which is when I wake up.

So, pretty interesting night. I hope that's the first lucid of many to come!

Awake
Dreaming

So, I attempted another WILD last night, again at 4:00 A.M. I was a little unsure when I woke up and felt pretty wide awake, which usually seems to occur when I'm waking after an REM phase, not before or during. I decided to try anyways, and laid there for a good while, but eventually lost motivation and decided to just get some sleep. I do remember a couple of dreams, though: one fragment I think happened just before I awoke at 4:00, and one more full dream sometime between 4:00 and 6:00. First, the fragment:

I'm trying to hide something, I'm not exactly sure what, behind my dresser, after I wake up and see it sitting in plain sight. I guess you could call this a false awakening, but it really didn't have that feel - I never really thought about the fact that I had just been asleep, and the dream was pretty short with a small focus. Anyways, I take this object, and start to try and hide it, nervous that someone will come into my room and see me with it. However, I realize that behind my dresser doesn't seem to be the best idea, because there's shampoo, lotion, make-up, soap, basically extra supplies for the bathroom already there!

The second dream was quite a bit longer, but not really much more interesting. My mind was kind of being boring last night. Here goes, though:

I am inside a mall with several of my relatives from my dad's side: my grandparents, aunt and uncle, and most of my cousins. When I first become aware, we are in line to eat at one of those oriental style places- the types where you choose one or two meats and rice or lo mein, and they dish it all out on a plate. I remember getting chicken teriaki, which happens to be one of my favorites. After I got my food, most of the rest of my family was still in line, so I decided to explore some. Walking up the mall, I don't really recgonize it, but it seems to be a compilation of a lot of malls I've been to, but smaller. There is a food court, there is at least one department store, there are several other stores that I didn't notice, but all of these seem to be within a hundred or so feet of each other. As I walk past an empty store, I remark that someone should go ahead and start a hat store there. A little after this, right after I enter a department store, one of my cousins runs up, saying that they've all been looking for me because they want to stick together while they walk around. As I walk back, I notice that my grandfather is seeming older than normal, having difficulty walking and going up stairs. When we arrive with the main group, everybody begins to mill around and look at various items, while staying pretty close together. Besides us and the shopkeepers, the mall is empty.

Somehow, I'm at the mall again the next day. A hat shop has sprung up where I said it would be a good idea, but there's no one actually there selling anything. There are a bunch of different types of hats: baseball caps, dress hats, derby hats, etc. A store clerk holds up one fancy hat and says, "I'm not sure where the shopkeeper here went. He was really good, he sold a couple of the most expensive hats here!" Somehow, I know that I'm supposed to be selling hats there, even though I don't want to, because it was my idea to open the shop in the first place. I inconspicuously walk away, which is when I wake up.

Tonight I think I'm going to try to wake myself up closer to 3:30, see if I can hit my REM period a little better.

To be honest, these are really two dreams, both of which occurred last night. I was attempting a WBTB after about five hours of sleep, but apparently I woke myself up too much, as I only really fell asleep twenty or so minutes before I had to wake up. I'm pretty sure both of these dreams happened in that twenty minutes.

I'm driving on a road which is under construction, slowly passing in front of a mansion. I get the feeling I've been driving in circles, watching this mansion for a good while. However, any time I stop my car, the security cameras positioned around the house 'watch' me intently. Even when I try to hide, I can tell they are still watching. So, I drive around the loop in front of the house one more time- I remember one stretch of the road went down a rather large dirt ravine in a tunnel, before sharply pulling back up. Finally, however, I park my car out of sight, crawl under some leafy bushes, and peer through a minuscule hole, escaping the notice of the cameras. There appears to be some sort of party going on in the mansion, and several nice cars are parked out front. Making a decision, I run out through the front gate and steal a limo that is parked out front. As I start to drive away, I notice two things: a man in a pink bathrobe surrounded by several other people, shaking his fist at me; and a group of security guards closing the front gate. However, there appears to be a hole in the bushes surrounding the mansion, which I drive through, making the security guards jump out of the way at the last second. I drive away, security in pursuit, and somehow manage to get my limo flung up into the air, with me inside. (This was after driving up the side of the ravine mentioned earlier.) When I land, I take a much smaller, more practical car, and drive away in it.

I didn't realize it then, but much of that last dream was probably inspired by Grand Theft Auto IV, a game which I own, even though I haven't played it in a while. This next was is relatively more simple, but seems more vivid in my mind. I would say I had this one after the GTA dream.

I'm going back to school the first day of my sophomore year. I'm taking a zero hour class, so I'm at school an hour earlier than most people. My zero hour class is chemistry, which interestingly enough I've already taken, and I know all of my classmates, but not the teacher. We do this class on computers, but I don't think we actually do much, saying this is the first day. Next, we have homeroom, but I don't know what room I'm supposed to go to. I get by the library, where the class listings are, and find my name. However, I also realize that I have no shoes on, even though I did earlier. I retrace my steps, and locate my shoes in the stairwell. I finally go to my homeroom at the guidance office, where a bunch of other kids are waiting, saying that the door is locked.