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The "Maybe Means Yes" is my variation of SAT (Sporadic Awareness Technique). SAT is a daytime awareness practice similar to ADA and reality checking.

What is ADA and SAT?
ADA stands for All Day Awareness and is the practice of being aware of whether or not you are dreaming constantly throughout the day.

SAT stands for Sporadic Awareness Technique and is the same as ADA, but an easier version of it. Instead of awareness being constant, you can simply be aware sporadically (randomly) in moments throughout the day. You can still gain a high rate of lucitity by doing SAT even though it's not constant.

What is awareness, though?
Awareness means you know something or are perceiving something. You can be aware of anything, such as that you're reading this guide, that the sky is blue, or that you're sitting in a chair. You are constantly aware of many things all at once, both in your environment and in your mind.

With daytime awareness practices for the purpose of lucid dreaming, there is only one thing you need to be aware of: are you awake or dreaming? You don't need to be aware of the sky or your feelings, only this one question. To do awareness practices, ask yourself this question.

But how do I ask myself if I'm awake or dreaming?
To do this technique, earnestly ask yourself this question: "Am I dreaming or awake?" There are three possible answers.

1. "No, I am awake." The waking experience is the easiest to identify. This is something many lucid dreamers learn on their own through experience, but I will tell you right here from the get-go: you know most easily when you're awake.

2. The next possible answer is "Yes, I am dreaming." If you're doing reality checks, be mindful of whether you're already at the "yes" answer, as you don't need to complicate it with a reality check. You're already lucid.

3. The third and most game-changing answer is "Maybe." Many people use reality checks here, but it's not necessary to RC due to a funny little secret about lucid dreaming: maybe means yes.

Any time you're seriously asking yourelf if this is all a dream, you're very likely dreaming! When dreaming, our brains work differently. We're more prone to accepting absurd scenarios. Being unsure whether you're actually dreaming is one of those absurdities. This is the very thing that causes non-lucidity to begin with and you can use it to become lucid through awareness. The way dream brain makes you uncertain of your reality is itself a clue that you're dreaming. By being aware of your own uncertainty and being critical of what your uncertainty means, you become lucid in dreams.

What about reality checks?
Now you're probably thinking, do I need to do a reality check? The answer is no. If you're already aware that you're dreaming through techniques like SAT, there is no need for reality checks.

Reality checks confirm whether you are in a dream by being critical of things in your environment. For example: if you look at your hands, they will look normal when awake, but you could have an impossible number of fingers in your dreams. There are many different kinds of reality checks that all do the same thing (pushing a finger through your palm, trying to breathe through your nose while plugging it, etc.)

Reality checks are commonly used and highly effective, but it's important to remember that what makes you lucid is the awareness and criticality that comes before them, not the check itself. If you are at the point of seriously asking yourself "Am I dreaming?" then you already know (because maybe means yes) that you are in fact dreaming.

So you can do reality checks if you find them beneficial, but they aren't required for 100% accurate results that we can get from awareness alone.


Reminders & Timers
Daytime awareness practices should not involve setting timers or alarms to remind yourself to be aware, since you won't be able to use those in your dreams. If the timer you set doesn't go off in your dreams, you won't know to do it and you won't become lucid.

Sure, you could set yourself up to dream about an alarm going off, but there is a much easier and more effective way of reminding yourself to do SAT in dreams: enter DILD hooks.


What about DILD hooks?
DILD hooks are often talked about in relation to daytime awareness practices and can be incredible useful. But what are they?

DILD stands for Dream Initiated Lucid Dream, which means that you become lucid at some point in your dream. Any technique that's not WILD is technically DILD, so ADA/SAT is also technically a form of DILD. The "hook" is the reminder part.

DILD hooking is the same thing as SAT, but with a reminder. The reminder/hook must be something that occurs in both your waking life and dreams (usually not phone reminders, timers, or alarms).

For example, if you dream about dragons often, you can train yourself to do SAT every time you encounter something related to dragons in waking life (doesn't need to be an actual dragon, just the idea of one). By training yourself to remember to do SAT every time you think of dragons, you can become lucid frequently in your dreams whenever dragons appear—especially if you train the criticality behind recognizing that living dragons only exist in dreams.

Realistic Hooks
DILD hooks can also be realistic or mundane things like cats, bananas, certain family members, seeing the sky, or the simple act of moving. As long as the hook occurs in your dreams, it can work as a reminder to do SAT.

As described above, you don't need a reality check (like a dragon) to do SAT—all you need is to mindfully ask yourself if you're dreaming and be aware of the three possible answers. This is why realistic DILD hooks work.

Emotions can also be DILD hooks. Children who become lucid from nightmares (a frequent backstory of natural lucid dreamers) unknowingly do DILD hooks by training an association between feelings of fear, and questioning their reality. Negative emotion is an ideal DILD hook if your goal is to stop nightmares with lucid dreaming. It can be trained deliberately by practicing daytime awareness every time you experience the negative emotion in your waking life, even if just from harmless exposure such as watching a scary/unpleasant movie.


Now that we're done explaining the techniques, here's some examples of how they can be put into practice!

The Talking Cat Example
Let's say you have a cat and every time you see him, you greet him with a heart "Hello!" You do this every day that you see him.

Then, one night you see your cat in a dream. Without thinking, you say "Hello!" just like you would when awake.
But rather than staring at you like you have two heads or meowing for food, he responds "Howdy partner!"
Hold up.
...Mr. Whiskers is a cowboy?! Tch. Funny cat!

If you're not practicing awareness, you'll likely gloss right over the fact the cat just spoke. Something may feel off, but you might just shrug it off and move on, failing to notice that you're dreaming despite the obvious sign.
This is where awareness comes in. You can set yourself up to become lucid in this situation by turning your conversations with your cat into a DILD hook. Every time you greet the cat, you remind yourself to ask the question "Am I dreaming?" By developing this habit, the reminder becomes ingrained and will transition into your dreams.
The next time you encounter your cat in dreams, you'll have the awareness to ask yourself whether you're dreaming.
Now this is where you could use the cat as a reality check. If he talks, it's a dream. If he doesn't talk, it's not a dream. This can work just fine sometimes, but if you find that reality checks aren't getting the results you want, remember that maybe means yes and fallback on your awareness. Be aware of your uncertainty of the dreamstate, and you will get lucid from just asking the question no matter your cat talks or meows.



Frequently Asked Questions

Q: I thought you were supposed to pay attention to details in your environment for ADA? Like details in the grass, eye movements, the feeling of clothing, etc.
A: This is fine if it works for you. If it's not working, make sure you are being critically aware. If you only pay attention to details in your environment without being aware and critical of whether you're awake/dreaming, you may trigger more detailed dreams instead of lucid ones.

Q: I can't find guides on SAT, only ADA?
A: Because ADA and SAT are the same (other than how much you you do them), guides for ADA and SAT are interchangible. As long as you keep in mind that SAT is the sporadic version of ADA, you can use guides for both. It is a matter of All Day VS Spodic timing of your awareness, but otherwise they are the same practice.

Q: I still don't understand what awareness is.
A: If you read this guide and still don't understand what it means to be aware, you might be overthinking it. Are you awake right now? If so, then you're aware that you're awake. If you've ever had a lucid dream before, you were aware that you were dreaming. Bingo! Now you got it! Go do more of that.

Q: What is the "most effective" DILD hook?
A: Effectiveness is higher for things you dream frequently about. Also, things with an emotional impact also seem to be extra effective.

Q: I can't remember any dreams. How do I know what happens frequently in my dreams for a DILD hook?
A: For this, I recommend either doing SAT without a DILD hook, or using a common DILD hook (like the sky, something you most likely are dreaming about but just can't remember). Also, you need to work on your recall, otherwise you may not remember any future lucid dreams you have.
Here's my recall guide: https://www.dreamviews.com/blogs/ner...l-guide-94405/

non-dream dream semi-lucid lucid FA / AP

At a future scenario that feels a lot like a Myizaki's movie. We have colonies in distant planets but there are also vintage looking people and cities on Earth. One of those planets looks similar to one I know from a sci-fi book I read as a kid. It has big whale like animals that swim in the atmosphere. For some reason a rebel faction starts a war and someone shoots at these animals accidentally. This plays on the news and everyone is shocked.
This rebel group turned ludite and wants to destroy our civilization, but everyone else is pacifist and doesn't want this war at all.
I am on this planet and I receive a notification that we're in danger and we need to gather at a sports stadium nearby that also doubles down as an evacution site. People sit on floating cocoons that serve as private balconies to watch the games, when there are sports events, but which are also emergency pods that can close and leave the planet to one of our colonies on other planets. While we wait for developments, they keep us entertained by projecting holographically a game that happened on some previous occasion. It is undistinguishable from reality. One of the persons in our coccoon is a kid that lived with the ludites but is pacifist so he left them. He doesn't know our tech, so he keeps asking questions. He asks how do we distingiuish something real from an hologram. I explain it isn't easy and it is almost like telling th difference between a dream and waking life, some people just have that ability and others have to train to recognize it. I am one of those with the natural ability. I also have heightened senses and can hear what other people can't. And as I say this, I do hear something dangerous approaching. I warn others and we fly the coccoons above the stadium and see a fleet of rebels attacking one of our ships and coming towards the stadium. Luckily there are guardian drones that sit on the perifery and shoot anything getting too close. But any way, our pods close and take off immediately. The drones recognize our pods and don't shoot us, instead they make a formation to protect us from any incoming threat and clear a path so we can leave the planet safely.

With my dad's family side and my mom, all gathered at some house. It looks like my grandma's house but it is also different. The kitchen looks pretty much unaltered, but in the place of the pantry, there is a cabinet with a TV and a VCR and I am rewinding some tapes looking for some shows I supposedly recorded, but I can't find them. My uncle Fernando comes in and tells me to quit. My two aunts are sitting there, just observing me and say to him that this is important to me. But eventually I give up and we all gather in a living room. It looks like the dining and living room of my grandma's together, but on the wrong side of the hallway. People are all sitting around the room on chairs and sofas sitting against the walls. My cousin Cris is also there, but so are other people I never met. I feel like my current self, but I am myself as a kid and I am on the floor playing with dolls. I think my mom told the family that I am autistic, so they are all observing me and not asking me questions or mocking me as usual. But I also find strange that they don't ask any questions about the autism. I also brought my present cats along, so then I freak out when I notice someone leaving a window open. I go around checking all the windows and asking people to please keep the windows shut. I then spot a cat, that could be Ginga but looks different, jumping to a ledge of a window through which some family member is talking to someone outside. Fortunately the cat is wearing a vest and I manage to grab her by the vest on time and pull her back in. Then back in the living room by uncle Carlos also keeps a window just slightly open and I explain to him the cats can still escape through there and he gets pissed when I close it. Then I do another tour and check the bathroom. All is fine.
My mom then comes by and says they are announcing on the news that the Health Minister is dead with covid19 and I am shocked. But my mom is even more shocked and I wonder if this will get her to finally go vaccinate.
Then I follow an unknown lady going to a balcony on the back of the house, where I believe she is going to smoke and certainly open a window. Actually when we arrive there, the window is already open. I take a peak outside, we are strangely located on like a 10th floor and I see on a roof down below a black cat and a black and white cat which I can't tell if they are dead or alive. The black one looks like Cuscus, so I call for him and he gets up. Both cats are alive but stuck on that roof. He immediately tries to jump up, but it's too high, so I wonder what is he doing. Then I see there is a metal structure on the wall for putting little pots for plants and it forms some sort of ladder that is climbable. So he climbs it and when he is close enough he jumps into my arms. The other cat also managed to get out of the roof in the meantime. So I take the black cat inside, not even yet sure if it is Cuscus, but I go look if there is another black cat in the house just to be sure. Then confusion ensues when some other guest arrives bringing some 3 other cats. I lose count of the cats.

I tried to do a WILD. I focused on being aware as I fell sleep and almost immediately felt the rush of falling into sleep and the metallic noises of hypnagogia. When I open my dream eyes, I am in some scenario that looks like a hospital and I am meeting a friend who works there and another one who is being released or something. It feels like they are very familiar, like Riverstone and Nighthawk, but not looking like anyone I know and instead look like some american boys in their twenties. I also have a different look. And there is another girl in the group. I think the boys are a gay couple but I also love one of them. Anyway, once the one being discharged is with us, we all go walk down the street and I have kept my awareness all the way through, but just been watching everything unfold. The boy on the lead says something like "Where are we going?" or what is going on, and I use the chance to say that we are all dreaming and none of this is real. They react calmly and accepting. I suggest we just try to be mindful and rest in that awareness. So we all just sit on the floor and we meditate together. Whenever I feel the awareness fading, I focus on them and it really helps that they also look calm and focuse. I almost fall out of the dream a couple times, but I conjure some tokens with mantras and Buddha images and put them in front of us, saying we can look and touch them as a way to revive lucidity whenever it is starting to fail, and it works for some time, maybe more than I ever managed to stay lucid meditating. But eventually the dream fades and I feel my waking body. I don't move and I focus on getting back. I do go back but this time I land on a beach in what seems like ancient Mexico. There are some native ladies in their long skirts tending to some bonfires. I try to get back to my friends, but all that happens is that, like a mirage, a wall and a room within a room, appear to my right, where I can see the place we had just been sitting together, but I don't see them. I try to teleport there by just snapping my fingers and for a few seconds it works, but then I fall back to the beach. Tried again, wemt there a few more seconds and then fell bavk to the beach and the image of the wall and rooms disappear entirely and I can't seem able to summom it anymore. Then some kind of demon appears on the beach from behind the bonfires. It looks like an old womam with crazy hair walking on all fours and all the native ladies run away in fear. But the demon is after me. First I hide behind some shelter made with twigs sticking out from a pit in the sand. But she will eventually find me, so I decide to fight back instead. I fly a bit above the ground and wait for her to come. She has a kind of ax made of bones and I hope to snatch it from her and use it against her, but when we clash, in the middle of the struggle I just grab something else and hit her with it. Not sure what happened to the demon, because she dissapears and in her place come dozens of cave men figures running from all directions. Again I the mirage of wall with a door and I manage to cross it, landing on some backroom shit kind of place. that I feel I've seen before. It actually looks like a really nice office, but I sense a dark presence and know this is not a safe place. I try to cross it quickly, but all it's doors and windows just lead to more rooms. Until I spot a window to outside and focus strongly on it staying that way as I open it. And it does and I manage to reach the outside. Then I enter some normal dream in the time of Portuguese King Carlos I and the story is that he went on a balloon trip and had an accident due to bad weather and is lost in the countryside for 8 days until he gets back .

I woke up with my second alarm and went straight back to lying down attempting to MILD again. I must have dozed off for a little bit as I come back to awareness with a bright white rectangle close to my face. I imagine it as a computer screen and sure enough, I start to focus on the URL at the top of the screen repeating to myself that I am dreaming. I feel my body start to enter sleep paralysis and I hear some strange noises. I try to wake myself up out of panic by trying to think of my bedroom, but I can only think about work and sitting at my desk looking at my computer screen. I let it happen and suddenly pop into the dream by WILD

It's difficult to move at first, but I get out of the office chair I'm sitting in and do a reality check. My fingers pass easily through my hand and I feel that I am already more aware because of WILDing instead of DILDing. I want to get outside so I walk to the stairwell and find it blocked by a vending machine. It swings out of the way without effort, though, and I walk down. The stairs get very narrow with more blockages along the way, but I finally make it out into a grassy hill. In front of me are mountains with many homes built around the base. To my left it looks like some plains with a dust devil or small tornado. I sit down cross legged in the grass to boost my awareness. I once again perform a reality check which I do easily. I then say out loud, "Clarity now", in a calm but commanding voice and my vision becomes pixelated-like for a split second and a sound like a high pitched ring occurs. It subsides leaving me with a much clearer vision and more awareness, and I'm stunned for a minute that it worked so well. I decide I want to talk to my subconscious so I start walking down a street with houses on both sides. I imagine a bench on the left side while looking at my hands and sure enough, I look up and a bench is there, although a little lopsided. I sit down and ask to speak with my subconscious. Out of the right side of my vision, a blonde girl walks towards the house that I'm facing. She greets me and walks in some side entrance to open the front door for me. I thank her and walk inside. She starts talking to me but I'm trying to focus on staying aware and I tell her this. I remark that I need to work on making my awareness - boosting routine get my awareness in the dream to last longer. When I finally sit down, she starts talking to me again, but the dream fades out quickly.

I am always dreaming, even in the waking time I am dreaming, daydreaming, dreaming at nights and dreaming in dreams. My mind is too far away from being lucid for most of the time, I have to do something about it.

I remember that the best recall and few lucid dreams were products of my sleeping on my back (usually I sleep on side), so I will try to make a habit of sleeping on back, last night I did it, my sleep monitoring app even said that as it didn't notice ANY movements it can't analyze my sleep!

Starting from today, I will try to go to bed before 21:00, wake up after 4.5 hours of sleep, analyze the dreams or read this forum for 20 minutes and try WILD. I hope it will help...

Summary for to-do:

Sleep on the back
Stay for 20 minutes awake after 4.5 hours of sleep and try WILD
Record everything

I'm lying on my back on a strange boat that fits one person. I steer by moving my feet; there's no steering wheel or anything like that, the boat just obeys me. I'm in my hometown, on a very familiar and small road. It's raining heavily. The scene is unnatural, apocalyptic even - the entire town is underwater. I see no other soul. It's dark and silent, other than the constant rain making noise.

I steer the boat forward with my feet and mind. On some level I'm aware that I am causing this flood. I start thinking "What should I save? What should I let the flood destroy." and think this is good for the whole world. A fresh start. Pretty dark.

I steer the boat towards an apartment made of glass walls. I go through the glass into the flooded apartment. I see several beautiful women in other rooms of the apartment, silently staring at me. They looked sad. The scene is weird enough for me to finally start questioning my state. I become lucid and try to get up from the boat. I haven't moved my upper body the entire dream and can't do it even lucid. I lose the dream.

I no longer count lucid moments as lucid dreams, so I won't tag this as such.

Fragmented sleep with lots of wakes in hrs prior to final wake

The dream begins in a version of our current home, FA style. I wake up and look out the window seeing the new day begin. Some unusual transportation already on the move.

Couple of moments later, I find myself walking down the street with much higher awareness. I decide to act out this moment as if it were real life, creating a continuous stream of awareness from the dream to waking and the actual walking on the street much later. I look around, soak in as many details, also looking at DCs passing by. A woman with a red leather jacket stands out. My bf's DC is also accompanying me. We continue our walk down the street to cross when some cars speed towards us. I feel like I need to quickly jump ahead to avoid the impact. The motion seems to destabilize the dream or it could just be the fragmented sleep and the dream soon fades.

After waking up, I initially forget my dream idea to hold that awareness on my way to work, but recall it later on. As I go out, it's a beautiful cold sunny morning and I take in all the little details around me. With this state of mindfulness, it feels the same way it did when I had the lucid dream walking down the street.

I'm outdoors on a lush, green landscape. It's like a park that is being gradually infiltrated by warehouses, factories, barns, and public buildings.

Everything is very vivid. The light has a strange, beautiful quality, as if the light itself is full of possibility.

I know that I'm dreaming.

In the middle of the landscape is what might be a children's playground or what's left of an industrial plant. It's hard to tell, but I swing on a horizontal bar like an athlete, having fun.

I drop down to the ground, thinking that I was supposed to do something the next time I was lucid, but I can't remember what it was. I don't want to waste the entire dream trying to remember, so I decide to fly. Predictible, yes, but a great feeling and not only is it less effort than ever with more control, but I also feel no anxiety as I rush up into the air.

Ahead, there is a green hill with a tunnel going into it. Now there is some anxiety, as I wonder it was going to come out of the entrance.

A large bus/short train comes speeding out and I jump high into the air to avoid it. It is yellow and reminiscent of a child's drawing of a bus/train. It has passengers.

Then I recall that I was thinking about meditating in a lucid dream, which I've done once before and had a great experience.

I close my eyes and I feel that I'm inside a tower. Opening my eyes intermittently, I see the translucent skeleton of the building's internal framework.

Eyes closed, I rise up through the tower, hovering up what feels like about 40 floors. Hovering in the middle of this semi-visible building, I enter a deep meditation.

I feel myself in bed, lying beneath the covers.

I feel myself standing in the dream.

I feel myself hovering in the middle of the building.

I am the building too. I'm the structure, the beams and frames, stretching up and surrounding myself.

When I hear footsteps, I open my eyes and my friend is quietly entering a kitchen in a fluffy white dressing gown.

"I'm just making myself a drink," she says. "I can't sleep. You want one?"

"No," I say and close my eyes.

I stay in the dream, lucid, deeply meditating and just experiencing the various states at once for what feels like a few minutes, until my 'in bed' state feels very uncomfortable - I feel like all my weight is on one arm - and I wake myself up enough to turn over.

It was a short lucid event...as mine tend to be...but encouraging nevertheless (and anticipated). Yesterday, for the first time during the day, I managed to jerk out of my daytime “dream” on about 10 occasions (the “dream” that isn't “awareness”) I usually get so caught up in daytime living that I only manage a few.

I only practiced the awareness for a few minutes each time...looking around, thinking “this is a dream,” noting body sensations (particularly the feet) but the real breakthrough was the fact that the “trigger” occurred much more frequently. Maybe reading about the brain is helping...”use it or lose it” as the book says and I'm much more aware how neurons, axons and dendrites work and how critical it is to stimulate the brain by repetition.

I think I really pushed my brain sections when I first learned the dream routines. I remember how tired I often felt, how sometimes I awoke feeling really ill and (what I called) the “flashing” in my eyes. I now know that neurons were being frantically sequestered from other tasks to cope with my new demands. The basics are now firmly implanted so hopefully, when health problems etc are resolved I'll be even more back on track.

I was dreaming about a town and I had somehow entered a place where I sensed I shouldn't be and I was poking about in some equipment and I broke a piece off. I retreated apparently still clutching a bar of metal and decided to return to the (hall?) and replace it but I couldn't find the place again. That's a major DS for me and might have started the LD process. The dream was more vivid than usual and I remember tossing the metal into a nearby bush then thinking “I'm dreaming!”

By now, I can keep the excitement at a reasonable level and I resolved to look around and not dash off (another first really). Then I thought “RC” (good) and decided to levitate. I had resolved to try 2 or 3 RC's and maybe suddenly change the order (further validating the lucidity) but I'm happy that I full-filled most of my training.

I rose cautiously but started to go out of control a bit so I abandoned that and focussed on a nearby pub. It was beautifully clad in small bright green tiles and all there was a small war memorial alongside it. Then I felt the dream ending. Damn!

I have same old 2 problems...the shortness of my LD's and the fact that they are generally at the top of the night (usually after at least 7 hours sleep + a WBTB). I assumed it was lack of melatonin but I now have 1.9mg tablets which I've occasionally taken at various times throughout the night with no effect so far. I'm going to try 2 tabs one night (although the Spanish chemist was apparently shocked when asked for 4mg tabs and, knowing how even Spanish painkillers are at higher strengths than allowed in the UK, I'm understandably cautious)

Hopefully, the “awareness” trigger is here to stay and I can further extend the periods of awareness. So...a good result for me and maybe a sign of more to come

P.S. I had a “romantic” dream 2 nights ago...not sex...but hey! that's over-rated (I can afford to say that at my age) But, I'd rather have a romance with a good plot than a quick “wham bam thank you DC” but can I have it lucid next time?

Now that my extensive travels (Paris, Rome, Montreal, Montana) of this month have ended, and I'm back home and gradually returning to my normal sleep patterns, I find that dream awareness is stirring again, though so far it falls short of full lucidity. I had no trace of it while on my journeys, and I didn't even have any dreams I judged worth writing down. This was not overly disappointing because I was not actively engaged in any kind of dream practice and too busy to spend an hour updating my dream journal every day, so it felt okay to take a break.

A couple days ago I had a dream that was atmospheric but not very interesting plotwise, so I didn't write it down at the time. However, one detail is notable: there was a giant white USB cord on the ground, at least twenty feet long, and arbitrarily I found myself wondering if I could bring it to life. I focused my attention on it and sure enough, it raised its "head" (the USB plug) and began to slither and writhe like a snake. This gave me an eerie sensation, because I found myself thinking, "This better not be happening in real life!" I decided I'd better check to see if I was dreaming. I levitated and was relieved to conclude that yes, indeed I was. However, true lucidity did not emerge because even though I now knew that I was dreaming, I did not stop and think what I could do with the dream state but unreflectively continued to go along with the dream events, which largely involved trying to take a good photograph of a distant landscape. It was a classic case of awareness without agency.

Last night's dreaming included one of my classic dream signs, a public restroom of questionable functionality. Although I did not recognize the dream sign, I did find myself wondering if the facilities would be clean enough to use. Then I remembered, "I can keep them clean and functional by maintaining the right mental attitude." Though I fell short of actual dream awareness, I still recognized the causal link between my will and the surrounding environment.

I find it interesting that, though I have still not done any sort of LD practice since early in the month when I left on my travels, simply returning home and restoring my ordinary sleep schedule has been enough to reawaken the potential for dream awareness that felt very distant while I was on the road.

#382 - DILD - 4:14AM

Daytime awareness
Meditation
Determination

I am driving and thinking about a conversation I had with someone. MP's (from work) husband had a baby with another woman and I feel bad for her because her religion wont let her divorce. While I am driving and have some quiet time I quickly do some awareness. Suddenly, I realize that it is supposed to be late at night, but the sun is shinning brightly. I think this must be a dream and instead of doing my usual nose plug, I pull back on the steering wheel.

The car lifts into the air and I know for sure that I am in a dream. I see that I am on a country road and continue down in though I am hovering several feet above it. I start thinking about goals and for some reason I repeat from my last dream. I think I need to find a DC and at that moment I spot a farmer in overalls on the side of the road next to his pickup. He seems to be messing with a gate that leads into a pasture. I go too fast and pass him before I can stop so I try a hard U-turn. The laws of inertia seem to apply here and I hover sideways a bit before getting the car around. I quickly get to the farmer and, instead of my usual car phase I actually use the door. The act of physically getting out of the car seem really taxing.

I ask the farmer, "What is the nature of reality?"
He immediately starts saying random words that don't form any coherent sentence. It sort of reminds me how I sometimes do that to help me fall asleep.
I ask again and this time he says, "Hyperdimensional continent."
I am not sure this makes any sense so I ask, "Can you put reality into another word?" I really meant to ask a deeper question about reality and see if I can get and idea of what is behind it all. At the very least, I was going to ask him to tell me a story and see what happens.
Anyway, he replies with more nonsensical reply than before, "Presidential candidate." Then he suddenly he lets out a moan of pain, "Oooooh!" I look down and notice that I am rubbing my thumb into the backside of his elbow. This spot is hurting me in the dream and I truly think that I have been massaging my own pain while we were talking. I apologize and explain all this to him. I start to turn away from, but the dream begins to crash. There is darkness, then a few random and fleeting images, some voices, then I wake up. I have a really tough time recalling the dream for several seconds.

non-dream dream lucid

Once again, I was awake to some insane time. Went to sleep around 5 in the morning.

I am in some yellowish transparent tunnel. I walk through for a bit until I somehow teleport to my sister's kitchen.
I look around, and the kitchen is a bit larger than waking life.
There's carpet on the floor and a sink next to the fridge (fridge is on the back wall in waking life).

All of a sudden I become lucid. I increase awareness, and it feels like real life. I look into the living room, and the carpet is gray, and it looks like a DC is watching TV? The window curtains are closed but you can tell its day out.

I walk into the living room and all of a sudden I'm walking a dog on a leash in a park of some kind. It's day out, and there's a few trees around but for the most part it's clear.
I'm walking on a road, with some kind of ditch running along side it.

All of a sudden I see a bunch of cats in the ditch.
They're all playing with each other.
I kind of lose lucidity at this point, but I still have a bit of awareness.
I look at the cats and it seems most of them are white.
There's a few kittens around here as well.

I then see dog shit on the path.

This is all I can remember.
I recall other images, too fleeting to actually integrate with the plot.
I recall becoming lucid another time but can't remember it.
I also seem to remember something to do with SNES games.

I would like to note that when I had woken up from the dream, I remembered all this much more coherently, but if you could get me out of bet at that moment to DJ it I'd be impressed.

despite all that, this is the most immersive dream I've had a loooooong time.

I might edit this post later if I remember something new.

All of a sudden, I was at my school during an athletic event. Swimming in partic-tac-ular. I was sucking except for the basketball portion in which I aboslutely killed at. Basketball in the water, except you use a floating beach ball. This competition was inside btw. I thought "Hell or high water, I'm going to get a medal TODAY." Just then, the water rose for more in-depth competition. A dialogue box popped up that said "At this altitude of water, there may be sharks. Be on the lookout." Then I thought
"Why would there be sharks in an indoor competition?" This was my first clue that it was a dream.
I finally did an event correctly. Swam 20mph in the sprint. Then I thought "Wait, I'm not even athletic, what's this?" I wanted it to be my turn so bad, that it actually came true. The rotations had smiled upon my liking, and I showed them who's boss.

I talked to the kids post-game. There's this one who's the hotshot of the school; athletic, smart, cool, etc. He doesn't want me near him in real life because "I'm not worthy of his presence" or something like that. Since I had showed my brightside to him, I thought he'd look the other way. Nope. He said some snobby stuff, but then I said:
"This is a dream, Ethan. We can do whatever we want. I can do whatever we want."
He replied "Bullsh*t."
I raised four miniature geysers of lava and shot ice crystals at his feet from nowhere. Not one of them hit.
"Jesus christ, this IS a dream!"
"Yes, didn't I tell you?"
I saw the fear in his eyes.
"Everything is wrong here. Nothing is right, but that's what I need to fix. If I grant you powers, the dream will become unstable, I'll leave and live my normal life, while you're here, stuck with the tyrannic rulers."
I had his full attention now.
"Omnipotent rulers?"
"Yes. They're using you as fuel. You are slaves to them. I'll clear them out so you can go back to your life, or stay here if you desire. Stay safe."
The truth was stranger than fiction though. I had unplugged myself [woke up] and found myself in a whole new setting. The world was dark, and people were handing their electronic devices to men that looked like Agent Smith from The Matrix while they sat in cars with guns. I ran straight into the school as sentinels flew above me.
"Mrs. Swenson, what's going on?"
"Come with me."
This part of my dream skipped out, but I knew it. I had the power. to test this, I went into an elevator. I pushed 1 "ground level" and said "Cut power to elevator"
The elevator sparked and warped a bit. I was then actually afraid as I drifted back into naivete. I almost lost my grasp on my lucidity.
I found myself no-clipped out of the world. Much like in Half-Life 2, or Portal. When you can fly around and through objects, and see the entire map in a grayish blue box-ish outline full of objects.
This was frightenting. The force at work here was much stronger than me, so I warped home. I immediately looked out my window. An agent in a red tie in a black buggy looked up at me. I saw the coldness and emotion, or lack thereof, in his eyes. He drove away.
I then woke up AGAIN, to find that I was on Newgrounds. The endeavors I experienced were a Newgrounds Flash Animation. But I knew there was another level to this.
I went to World's End, an ethereal location in the game Magicka. World's End is what it sounds like. Barren floating islands with a very beige, green background. There was a path. I had a showdown with the Beast himself. My inner demons. He wielded a large club, and I made myself twice his size. I couldn't stomp on him. I couldn't block him. I had to wait until he was out of breath, and land the finishing blow. I punched him off the barren island into No-Man's Land. He fell down into the deep, foggy abyss.

I'm much happier now, tbh.

July 23, 2014

No supplements or sleep aids used.

Rating: 5/5 For first LD

Break through! First Lucid!!!!

It was short lived but great! It was also on one of the first REM cycle, if not the first. It felt so far back after I woke, and it was the first dream that happened out of a series of many. I did it without needing a reality check. I was outside my friend Jacob's house at night standing next to his dads truck when I saw a flying picture and thought to myself thats not right, I must be dreaming! I got so excited, almost woke my self up instantly but calmed down. It felt as though I was losing my grip on control as well the more the dream almost stopped. I tried to spin but couldn't so i mentally calmed it down. I walked out into the street under the street lights beam if light. Once it got a little better I immediately started flying over all the houses. I still did not have a good grip on the dream as it was my first time. I saw a lot of other houses, different than what would normally be there. The street was not there like normally, just back to back houses with yards separated by fencing, some white picket sone black steel bar. I decided to land in the back yard of one and go inside. I went in trying to summon a DC. I tried the light switch and it came on, so i didn't try to mess around with it anymore. The house was dimly lit with yellow light bulb light. It had dark brown trim and beige walls. I walked through trying to summon a specific DC but a different one ended up coming. but unfortunately, I woke up then due to excitement of finally having a lucid dream. I put all my thought into this, so I only remember small fragments of a few later dreams.

Quick note: I think I have been using MILD as a dream incubation technique, and that using it actually causes my dreams to be weirder, as well as inserting elements that are meant to be incongruent. For instance, focused on the statement, "I want to be lucid in my next dream" and fell asleep. First thing, a friend of mine approaches with a book on "How to be lucid in your next dream." I promptly ignore this information and proceed along my non-lucid path to delusion.

I am in an auditorium with my friends, talking about lucid dreaming. One of them presents me with a pillow for light sleepers. The packaging says "cundams." I chuckle at this, look away and look back. It changes to something else, and I figure I read it wrong the first time! I explain to my friend what I thought it said, and laugh a bit. She says that "is gross, please stop."

Another friend explains that he wants to increase the frequency of lucid dreams he has. He has only had one 20-minute experience (in the dream). I explain to him Waggoner's variation of Castaneda's stabilization technique (looking at your hands). I then proceed to hold my hands in front of me and stare at them. I am wearing black mesh workout gloves; never occurs to me that that is odd. I then repeat, "The next time I see my hands, I'll notice I'm dreaming."

Then, finally, I am at work. A colleague comes in to stress about something. I do a reality check, then assure her that we are dreaming, and not to worry about it. I do not have a care in the world. She leaves.