lucid

Foreward
I have only recently, started recording my dreams, thus far it has only been approximately three weeks. I immediately started recalling at least three dreams per night once I made the conscious choice to do so. I haven't practiced any lucidity techniques; though lucidity is, in part, my primary goal; I have found the process very rewarding and entertaining so far. My dreams are often fantastical or in settings that would seem oddly constructed, or vast and otherworldly, and I have found it odd that it would not be enough for me to realize I was dreaming. I am certain of a couple lucid dreams over the years, but if they truly were while I was aware I was dreaming I always acted them out; only once or twice making brief use of fact I was actually dreaming.

I believe this dream was in the first cycle of REM sleep as it was short and the time in the night would support this.

The Dream

I opened my eyes...
I was kneeling inside a dim room, in the far left corner facing forwards. The floors were wooden and there was a large rectangular mirror affixed to the wall in front of me, the mirror just off to my right hand side, it's base sitting roughly half way up the wall. I felt safe, familiar... yet not.
Still kneeling where I had came to, I looked in the dire the mirror and saw my father's reflection. He looked back at me, then it occurred to me I was alone in the room. It was a ghost staring back at me.
But then I realized my father was still alive this couldn't be, and that is when the feeling of panic washed over me.
Simultaneously it occurred to me I was dreaming, but the panic had set in and I could feel my body weakening and the world was growing dark around me. I had felt this feeling before... when I was only a child... I was about to pass out... my body began to fall forwards and the world grew darker still but I was now calm; I was going to hit the wall and there was nothing I could do.
I waited for the impact of my head against the wall, but it never came. Enshrouded and cradled by the darkness I had passed through the wall and awoken lying in my bed staring at the ceiling.

The ceiling above me was the stars, the universe, and I wanted to see it all.
My body started lifting off the bed, up into the ceiling of stars after which I willed myself fast through the cosmos. After, what was probably only a few seconds of travel I decided I wanted to go back to Earth; and experience this amazing feeling of lucidity there. I looked back towards Earth, it was nowhere to be seen; but I knew the direction and slowly my body turned around and started travelling back towards Earth.

This is when I truly awoke in reality, having glimpsed if only for a moment something extraordinary.