All DJ Entries

Ritual: WTB 12:45am, woke 6am and felt rested enough to do a solid WBTB and WILD attempt. Read LD books for an hour then returned to bed at 7am. I took bacopa, L-theanine, alpha-GPC, and even ventured to add a little galantamine to the mix, breaking open a Galantamind capsule and adding half the powder to my alpha-GPC solution. I lay on my back and counted, also deciding on my intended tasks: muto herbam and my lucid dare. For the hell of it I added in a short mantra on the off-counts: inspired by the DC's weird question last night ("Who is your mantra?") I was using the name of an intriguing DC from a prior dream. I started losing the count quickly and after picking it back up a few times, drifted off somewhere in the 30s. Eventually I woke back up, used the bathroom, and checked the time before lying down on my left side to sleep. It was 7:30am. Woke up at 8am with dream.

WILD: I quickly started to feel promising bodily sensations, able to move in ways I was sure weren't "real." At one point I felt my husband's face very close to mine, thought I could feel his breath against my face, and was afraid this distraction was going to wake me. Feeling a bit rude, I pushed him away. After that he got up and I hoped he had understood my reasons—recognized that I was in the middle of a dream attempt—and wasn't annoyed. Of course in retrospect, I'm sure that none of this actually happened; not only does the geography of the bed make it physically unlikely, but my husband was still fast asleep on his side of the bed when I woke up to write this report.

As soon as I felt I had full bodily control, I started trying to get out of bed. I threw caution to the winds because I've started to suspect that a lot of the barriers to transition are self-imposed. So I got out of bed as soon as I could manage it, and although I felt awkward at first, moving very herky-jerkily as I tried to walk out of the room—a bit like a marionette whose puppetmaster is still figuring out the right use of the strings—I soon got back into the feel of it.

I walked into the kitchen, where my attention was caught by what looked like a big wad of gauze or lace, about 18 inches in diamter. In shape it resembled those scrunchies you use in the shower, but it was much larger and made of lacy white gauze with silver sparkles. The texture was wonderfully detailed, more distinct than anything else in my field of vision, so I decided to pick it up and use it for my first experiment. The simpler of the tasks I had planned was to practice a bit with transformation and with plants, so I held the gauze in my hands and commanded, "Muto herbam," envisioning the form of a long-stemmed red rose.

The material was resistant at first, so I repeated the command a few times and intensified my will. Eventually it shrank compliantly into a red flower, but the blossom appeared to be that of a tulip, so I continued staring at it sternly until it manifested more layers of ruffled petals. I studied it to make sure it was a proper rose and not just an ambitious carnation, and when I was finally satisfied with its form, I lifted it to my nose to smell it. It actually did smell like a rose! This impressed me all the more because I so rarely have any olfactory impressions in my dreams. (Then again, I guess I don't spend much time sniffing things.)

I wondered if I should leave the house to perform my next task. I'm still working on my lucid dare, which requires me to find an camp of elves in the forest and join them in making music. My initial impulse was to leave my house and look for the forest, but that hasn't worked well before, so this time I thought I would to try a different approach and transform the environment around me rather than bodily leaving it. I looked around the room for another plant suitable for my experiment and was pleased to discover a spindly sapling with lots of thin twigs tipped with narrow yellow flowers growing in a pot. I went over to it and commanded "Rego herbam," commanding it to grow into a tall tree. Nothing happened at first, but eyeing its numerous twigs I had another idea for how to use it.

The sapling was slightly taller than I was, so I backed up against it and pulled its flexible branches around me to create the visual impression that I was surrounded by a thicket, once again commanding "Rego herbam." The trick worked! The twigs filling my field of vision became a real thicket in which I found myself hiding on a hillside, trying to remain unseen as I peered down at a large camp of about two dozen people occupying a cleared basin just below me. I hoped they were elves! But they didn't seem merry, and I didn't hear any music. They were dressed in muted earthtones and went about their business grimly.

I can't remember if I actually observed the camp being raided, but by some means I understood that this was a camp of rebels whose people were being oppressed and frequently captured and sold into slavery by the inhabitants of a nearby castle. I was aware that had several been taken away recently, and decided that the best way to ingratiate myself with the camp would be to rescue them. So I transported myself into the castle dungeon and began to search for the captives.

The first door I opened led to an empty room, though it definitely looked like a classic dungeon, with rough-hewn and filthy stone floor and walls. Returning to the corridor, I saw that there were lots of identical doors, and I didn't think I had time to try them all, so I let instinct guide me to another door across the hall. At first this seemed promising: there was very little light filtering in through the tiny windows high in the wall, and in the shadows I thought I saw four figures manacled to the walls around the room. As I walked in, planning to free them, I found that either my eyes had decieved me, or the dream had shifted: the manacles were there, but this room was just as empty as the last. It made me wonder if what I had seen were the ghosts of past prisoners.

As I went to leave the room, I was startled to discover that the door was now half-blocked by a chest-high mound of stone rubble. I started to climb over but it was too steep, and afterward the blockade looked even higher, taller than I was. If I didn't act soon I would be completely walled in! So I mustered my concentration and simply pushed through the pile of rocks. The stone felt very resistant and I had to use all my strength, but finally burst through into the hallway. I was surprised how exhausted I felt after this feat. Given that it was a dream, it shouldn't be any harder to move "rocks" than anything else, but I felt completely spent. While I paused to regain my strength, I heard people approaching from around a corner to my left. There was no time to get away, so I simply held very still in the doorway and concentrated on being invisible to them.

There were three people in all. One person passed by without giving any sign of seeing me. Two others followed, walking together, and to my consternation they stopped at the door, right in front of me. Although they didn't seem to see me, something appeared to have caught their attention (the dislodged rocks?) because one of them pulled out a handheld device and started waving it in my direction as though scanning something. I wondered what would happen if they tried to walk through the doorway. I still seemed to be invisible, but would they be able to pass right through my body? Or would they bump into me? I decided not to risk it, and I was also a little worried that the scanner might detect my presence, so I reached out and grabbed one of the people with each hand. I willed them both to fall unconscious, and they slumped to the ground. The one to the left was a woman dressed in "business casual," while the guy to the right appeared to be a uniformed security guard. I immediately knelt down and hastily stripped the latter of all the tech I could find on his body: earpiece, cellphone, and a few other little widgets that I didn't recognize. I thought I heard another person coming down the hall, so I transformed into a bird and flew out one of the small barred windows high up on the walls.

The castle was on a gently sloping hillside, and I was now flying over a wide rural landscape. At the base of the hill was a wooded region, and far beyond that I could see the curve of the ocean shore. I figured I would still be able to find my way back to the camp, since I had just come from there, so I let memory or instinct guide me. Meanwhile I focused on making sure I was flying properly, since I haven't spent much time in bird form. I alternated between flapping my wings and holding them stiff and outstretched so that I could glide on the wind. I felt like a large bird of prey, and I was clutching the tech I had just stolen in my talons.

I flew over the forest until I saw a clearing below that looked familiar. Descending felt very realistic, because I was circling just like a raptor would, wide at first and then in a narrowing spiral until I landed. To get the attention of the people in the camp, I decided that I should not be an ordinary brown eagle, but a white eagle. Apparently this drew a little too much attention, because on the way down I discovered that someone was shooting arrows at me. I decided I could use this to make my entrance particularly impressive, so at the very moment that I touched the ground I not only turned back into a woman, I also grabbed an arrow that was about to hit me right out of the air.

Earlier I had not made sure whether or not the people in the camp actually were elves, and now that I look around at closer range, I see only round human ears. I approach a couple people who are talking authoritatively, like leaders of the group. One is a capable looking woman with short, dirty-blonde hair. I ask her if there are any elves in the camp, thinking to myself that if I do find some, I'll give them the tech I stole as a friendly gesture. No one can specifically point to any elves, so I ask, well, who was shooting at me? I figure that if there is an elf, it might well have been the one lobbing arrows. The woman points across the camp. Following her gesture, I notice a slight figure huddled on a bench, completely wrapped in a dark grey blanket.

I walk over and lean down in front of the figure, trying to gently tug the blanket aside to reveal its face. It seems shy, hiding its face under the blanket like this, but I soon discover the reason. As I begin to reveal its features, they are the last thing I would have expected. The head is made of molded transparent plastic, with a suggestion of human features on the outside and circuitboards within. It is an android!

The android has a high, almost childish voice, and evidently feels very bashful about its unusual appearance. It tries to prevent me from pulling back the blanket, protesting, "I look repulsive."

I completely disagree, and tell it so: "No you don't. You look amazing." It reluctantly lets me tease aside the blanket to reveal its whole head.

At this point a man walks up to us. He looks to be in his forties, balding, a bit stocky in build, and with rounded features, kind of resembling Rob Corddry. From his dress and demeanor, I immediately intuit that he is the creator of this android. I realize that he would be the ideal person to give the tech I stole from the castle guard.

"I have something for you," I say without preamble, and fill his hands with the little pile of objects.

He looks delighted. "This will be really useful."

We start chatting a bit about the android, and I ask if he knows where to find any elves. He's not aware of any in the camp, but I overhear a snippet of conversation from people standing nearby that I think might be relevant to my question; one of them mentions a place called "Junkyard Bay" and I resolve to check it out.

"What's your name?" I ask the inventor. I feel a bit silly always asking this of DCs, but I like to know.

"Dira," he says. That's how I assumed it was spelled, but from the pronunciation it could just as easily be "Deera." He asks mine, and I tell him.

Dira is looking at me like he finds me really familiar, but can't figure out where he knows me from. "We haven't spoken before this? No beer? No comfort?"

I am perplexed by his laconic queries until I realize that he's asking if he might have met me in a bar or a brothel. I might have been offended at the implications if I weren't so fascinated by his distinctive manner of speaking, so unlike my own speech patterns. How could a DC, a projection of my own mind, demonstrate linguistic traits so utterly unlike my own, to the point where it took me a moment to make sense of what he was saying? It was one of those moments that make me wonder if my reductionist assumptions are correct, but I'm not ready to go down the path of madness without better evidence than this.

I shake my head, since I'm pretty sure I've never met him in either dream or waking life. He asks my name another time, and I repeat it. I've been using my WL name, having forgotten my former resolution to use an alias with DCs.

Dira starts explaining something about the locals: "What's particularly important for the native Ukaran communities is the..." there was more, but it was complicated, and I was still trying to figure out what was going on.

"Ukaran?" I ask, to make sure I heard correctly.

"Yes, the Ukaran and the Utankaran."

I had the impression that he was implying that the Ukarans were the people in this camp, and I'd already seen the problems that they were facing—oppression and human trafficking on the part of the people in the castle. I wondered if the oppressors were the Utankarans. The similarity in their names suggested that they were closely related but (in the manner of such things) probably deeply opposed social groups.

I came across a mirror lying on the floor, remembered the TOTM and went lucid. The mirror's rather small for this - I take hold of the edges and pull it wide enough to stretch out on top of it. Initially, unusually, the mirror showed me my reflection - I focus on the background behind it, and it goes black. I briefly imagine stars in that blackness, but don't actually see them; that acts as a trigger, and I sink into the mirror as if it's liquid.

On the other side, I'm walking out of an apartment building into an alley. I have a thought that this is supposed to represent somewhere in Wyoming; but looking around at the buildings, the vending machines, this definitely looks like Japan. I wonder if that's just my mind filling in the setting with familiar memories, or if this is actually meant to be Japan; I keep walking, figuring it'll work itself out, and I had no particular goal here anyway.

I cut through a shopping area where people are eating, listening to them talk, no one saying anything particularly interesting to listen in on. I'm uncertain whether I'm visible to others; my initial impression had been that they couldn't see me, which is how I preferred it, but there do seem to be a few people here and there who notice.

Out of the shopping area and onto a main street, there are Christmas lights in the trees here. I cross the street and find the sidewalk's lined with little garden plots, blocked off by ropes - some kind of display, or some kind of competition maybe. One such plot holds a tree that fascinates me - it's white, not much taller than I am, gnarled, no leaves, and covered here and there in pale green moss with small blue flowers. Very beautiful.

(The dream is a "Mix." I don't know where it started and where it ended.)

I was in a forest-like area where there are people gathering. It turned out to be a gathering of humanoid birds. They look very human except that they have feathers and wings.

I was watching a guy (who looks like Nara Shikamaru) and a short... bird-doll-like person hiding. Shikamaru had to hide under a.. horse? He put on a wing-like object behind him so he won't be seen. He blended nicely. The other person became a female humanoid bird. The (real) humanoid birds (or birdlike humans) were male.

The (real) humanoid birds spread out in a circle and missed them, then they started moving counter-clockwise with their eyes closed. Shika and the other person thought it's safe to walk away now, but somehow, one of the bird-people bumped into the female bird-person. The male bird-person kissed her (eyes closed?). Female-bird person probably thought it was Shika and kissed back (eyes closed?) and then realized it wasn't. The resulting commotion brought the rest of the bird-people's attention and they opened their eyes.

Somehow, the two were just knocked out and thrown somewhere. I watched them dumped near a broken bridge (or else the bridge is still being built). It was starting to rain, so the head of the bird-people left them some cover. The "female bird-person" is now the doll-like creature again. I guess it's an ability.

It turned out that they were doing a mating ritual, where a group of bird-people (all male?) go out in a faraway area and form the circle we saw, moving slowly at first and then flying away in a bigger and bigger circle (eyes closed). I don't know when but when they finally open their eyes, the first person (other race?) they saw will be their mate. On the other hand, the two idiots were there for revenge against the race. In a battle where the bird-people were involved, one of the doll-person's friends was killed. I don't know how.

Next thing I know I was watching them walk on the bridge. It was a bridge for a super highway. It looks unfinished rather than ruined. I think they're still just building it. They walked and jumped over gaps while talking about a naive boy who died. He's a friend of theirs. He died young. One of them said maybe it's for the better. With his naive mindset, he would have died anyway. The other one said he would have been there to protect him. I thought of a gift.

I was under one of the super-highway bridges. There was water down there. I think I was on a motorboat, but I wasn't the one driving. I was just directing it somehow. I thought of making a game but that I don't have the system for it, especially if I want to make 3-D games. The surrounding area looked like some place in EDSA (the part between Guadalupe and Taft, at least), but instead of the EDSA Avenue, there were water everywhere. The buildings are still there though.

I directed the boat to a huge gate that opened. I thought of confronting a dragon. I was then inside a "dungeon" or a dungeon-like area: small corridor, small entryways, like in the old first-person D&D computer games. Someone was with me. Gerard (from PKPH). He suddenly bumped into the entryway of the dragon's hoard and he's inside. He shot flames towards us. The "door" was wooden and so I said it wouldn't hold for long. I jumped back and towards the edge of the "balcony." I hung on there so I can avoid the explosion of the door and the flames. Below that, there's an old arena of sorts, like where gladiators fight. Gerard was still up there, thinking the door would hold. It didn't. When the door was about to blown to bits, he jumped down and landed on the arena floor. I climbed down instead. I couldn't yet jump from a higher place and land safely.

The dragon flew down on us. It has a smaller body compared to its head. Its skin was dried-lava red. The body size was human like, the wings were wide, and the head probably the length of its body. It's "young." We disoriented it (I think) by moving around. Finally, I thought somehow that it has just... 20 HP? Other PKPH peeps were there. We ganged up on the dragon. We held onto its limbs and huge head. I bit down on its arm/leg. Finally, somebody used a sword to slit its throat, its blood splashing. I caught the splashing blood on my mouth. Nobody else wanted to. This was a human cursed to become a dragon, not a real dragon. Drinking its blood meant carrying his curse. It meant I was going to turn into a dragon. I was already starting to feel the flame inside me and the others pointed out that I might "explode" after seeing the inside of my mouth light up from the flame.

There was a part in the dream where I was playing something like a tic-tac-toe or a board game, except it looked like a fractal-floor-board game. Players jumped from "boxes" drawn on the floor. There were enemies, goblin-like creatures. Water area.



(photo of New Bay Bridge)

---

NOTES:

- No, I wasn't lucid.
- It's an afternoon. 3-6 p.m.
- I went to sleep after drinking paracetamol coz I wasn't feeling well.
- I thought of putting up an alarm but decided against it because it might distract me from remembering my dream.
- Kinda sad that the next dragon I dreamed of was an enemy. At least this time I was going to become a dragon.

Dream - 8:00AM

I'm walking around a place with escalators. I see a guard in my way, I keep hitting him until he moves. He eventually gives in and offers to pull down a leaver which was on the wall, and does it. Im standing near a wall and it opens a special storage box inside the wall. There's brick like things in the way. The scene has changed to my rumpus room sf my house but still see bricks etc. Ben and I begin to take bricks off and as we almost reach last brick Ben gets cautious. He puts a cloth over the area, as If he was expecting some sort of creature to come out. A snake comes out. Ben tries to pick it up and it hisses at him. It's now on the floor. it's small medium size black snake. Ben is dad now. Dad puts a shoe over it and tries to cover hole where it may escape. I try to fix it so the hole is completely sealed but i make it worse. Snake escapes again and it can shrink itself into small blob and still move. It makes it's way under the couch. It comes out again and dad throws something over it again. I put a jacket over it but the snake pushes it's body and head up and it looks as if it's standing with a sheet on its head. I see Rex underneath the snake and snake bites Rex's ear, I freak out and stop it by pulling it away. Rex doesn't seem bothered and is still laying there.

Dream Fragment:

I'm outside and I see people. At a petrol station?

Side Notes:

Neck felt much better tonight but recall was shit once again. I've been putting effort into my affirmations and not getting rewarded. Not sure what's up but will just keep on keeping on.

A woman has another woman tied to a tree, and is spreading caviar on her face to attract animals to eat her. She's interrupted by some panic among the people she's working with. People are transforming into creatures - from what they're shouting, I have the impression that it's mostly insects, but when I switch to first person, the only transformation I actually see is a bird emerging from a woman's shoulder and flying away. Mostly I just see panicked people running away.

I'm leaving too, with several others, at a calmer pace. I look down at my bare feet, and notice that the girl whose body I'm possessing has decorated her toenails in Satanic symbols - not just painting them, but actually growing them into horn-like shapes. I comment on this to one of the people I'm walking with, although I'm careful to phrase it as if I'm the real owner of this body, not something possessing her.

Still in that body, I'm at a club with a woman named Pepper. I'm wearing sunglasses - it's night, but I need them to protect myself from the electric lights. I'll take them off when we're outside. We're leaving, waiting by a coat check or something similar, when we're approached by two men, one of them hitting on Pepper, the other hanging back. At first I'm irritated, but then I remember that I'm using a female body at the moment, and I realize the other guy is playing wingman. I'm amused. Since Pepper seems interested enough, we all leave together.

We briefly stop by my IRL house, and when I look in a mirror, I see my IRL self, although my reflection isn't mirroring my actions. Pepper calls for me to hurry up, calling the name of the girl whose body I'm possessing for the first time - Julie. Outside, it's dawn, the clouds are starting to change colors, so I put my sunglasses back on. There's a large car parked outside - wingman's in the driver's seat, Pepper and the other guy are in the back. I get into the passenger seat.

We drive past several rundown-looking houses, and the guy in the back seat asks me if they're haunted, this being my neighborhood. I say sure, a house that looks like that has to have a few ghosts around. I'm not being serious, just humoring him. He goes on and on about the dead, and he's beginning to irritate me - he's attempting to show off his knowledge, but it's not particularly impressive. He says that he can speak to the dead more easily than others because he still has all his canine teeth - I have an image of one tooth behind another, like adult teeth behind baby teeth, though he's an adult. He says they make a point of telling you that they're dead. And he asks me something about dead and dreams - I didn't catch most of the question, too much background noise, but I assumed he was asking me if I'd ever been visited by the dead in my dreams. I say, sure - I may not know much about talking to dead people, but dreams I can do.

Wingman calls my attention away, asking for directions - left or right here? It's not even really a fork in the road, the road we're on just curves right and another road splits away, but I guess it might look confusing if you're not used to it; I tell him to bear right. The guy in the backseat offers me and Pepper beers from a cooler, and asks if we find him creepy, with all that talk about dead people. I say no, the talk about dead people's fine, it's the way you talk about getting me and Pepper to drink that's creepy. Pepper agrees, but she's laughing about it. I was only half joking. Even the wingman agrees - the guy's phrasing is odd, as if he's trying to get us incapacitated. We hit a bump in the road and he spills some of his own beer on the upholstery; I tell him he better clean that up, although I'm not at all sure who owns this car. I'm certain it's not him.

I walk into a room where I have to complete some challenge, a kind of game. I have a vague sense of danger, it's not quite a nightmare but it feels similar, as if it has the potential to become one. I'm semi-lucid, in that stage where I'm aware that I'm dreaming and can easily control my surroundings, but still following the dream storyline. Small rings of light form around my wrists - at first I'm not sure what this is, then I think of it as both something that this room provides for the challenge, and something that I summoned myself. I decide that the user has to make the light take a solid form before it can serve its function. Focusing on it, the light condenses into a metal cuff around my right wrist; the left one fails, it remains light. Looking at the right cuff, I decide it represents a kind of shield, a personal force field. I focus on the left one again, without looking at it this time, trying to make it condense into the other cuff, and I decide that it's worked, though I don't want to risk looking down to check; I can now feel the shield working in the air just around me. I move further into the room and start the game, which involves running a course and using the shield to deflect small projectiles. A woman's voice keeps score. At the first curve in the course, everything goes black.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

Due to a conflict with someone else, an immortal has been forced to enter another immortal's territory. Although they appear to be different species - the one the territory belongs to is a sphinx, the other one looks like a human man - they're still similar enough to require separate territories, so this has led to a confrontation, although on the surface it looks like a casual conversation. It's night. The one that looks like a man is saying something about how anyway, this isn't the same city he agreed to stay away from - it's partially joking (the city's changed names in the years since that agreement), but it's also partially serious, grasping at straws, looking for an out. The sphinx has no particular ill will towards him, and understands his situation, but nonetheless can't permit him to stay here.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

A vampire guy's in a subway car, picking out a meal. There's a small group of others with him, people he'd turned, but he's the only one doing the hunting. One of the others, recently turned, is impatient with him. Finally she says to him, come on, let's just take the whole car, let loose once in a while, please? The other vamps are a little annoyed with her - they're impatient too, but she's being childish - but he's considering it. I'm in first person now, though I'd started out in 3rd and I have no sense of when I switched; as one of the other vamps, I look around at the number of people in this car. There's a lot of them; the car's not full, but there's enough that they outnumber us. I'm thinking about crowd control. I notice a couple of them looking this way, starting to pay attention to the conversation between our leader and the new girl. Without saying anything, I get up and move to stand by the door to the next car, to block the exit. I look through the window into the next car, and consider the number of people in that car, too.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

There's a man I think of as a legendary king riding on the back of some enormous reptile through a completely black space. He's not human, at least not anymore, and this isn't a physical space; he's something that is sometimes summoned into the physical world. The creature he's riding is covered in trunks and carpets and cages piled so high that I think of it as a moving mountain; I can't tell how much is luggage and how much is the body of the creature itself, but the whole thing is maybe four times the height of the man riding it, who is sitting cross-legged just behind the creature's head, front and center. At the very back of the creature, the king's servant is opening the top of one of the cages. It contains a small and unhappy creature that they've just captured, something very rare; the top of it opens up like a flower and contains a kind of liquid, which contains some 'essence' that the king is after.

There's three people riding a motorboat through a river in a jungle. They stop when they pass a man standing waist-deep in the river, working at something, and one of the guys in the boat talks with him about a foreign researcher who's made some big discovery that's driving up prices in the area. The guy standing in the river is saying that pretty soon they're all going to be out of a job. The guy in the motorboat says it wouldn't be the first time they've had to live out of tents; they'll survive.

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Lucid #187: The Hybrid

I have a false awakening in a strange bedroom that I think is some kind of condominium. Wife is here along with my two young kids E and R. I wonder whether I can go back to sleep and try to have a lucid dream but then realize that I’m having one right now.

I charge toward the window but feel someone short grab onto my arm. “Who is that?” I ask, looking down to find my 2-year-old son R clutching me. “It’s [R], Daddy. I want to go with you. Daddy, let me go with you!” For a moment I consider it, but once I think about my Task of the Year goal (turning into a fish-man and acting out The Little Mermaid), I decide no way. I’m way too nervous about bringing one of my kids’ DCs into the ocean.

R’s grip slips off of me as I phase through the window. I feel a little guilty for a moment, but I remind myself that this isn’t really him. I’m wound up in my backyard during what looks like mid-morning. I jump up into the air, imagining that there will be an ocean where my eastern neighbor’s yard ought to be. But when I get up there, it still looks like waking life.

I have some momentary flight trouble, but I psych myself up with a few phrases until things are going the way I want them to. I fly west for a bit, slowly turning southward and expecting to see water until… I see the ocean just ahead of me!

I pop up into the air and then plunge straight downward into the water, happily swimming about beneath the waves. The water’s darker than I’d like, but I try not to get too nervous or worked about this. I imagine my lower body turning into that of a fish, swim around that way for a bit, then look down to check my handiwork. It’s close, but not quite right… each leg is still there but all scaly like a fish’s body with a fin on the end.

I look away again, swim around a bit more, trying to make it all feel natural. I check again and it’s looking better, just about right, but now I’m feeling paranoid about my breathing. I feel like I can’t breathe underwater and need to surface. Panicked that something is wrong with my breathing in waking life, I push for the surface and fall into the void. I keep doing repetitive swimming motions, though, trying to hold onto the dream. After a while of this, I wonder if I’m making swimming motions in bed. This finally transitions me into...

… a false awakening where I’m lying in a large bed next to Wife. The room’s not my own, though. I recognize this as the condominium from the beginning of the dream, and realize that I’m still dreaming. I roll over to Wife’s side of the bed and start getting frisky. She murmurs sleepily but when I tell her that “this is all a dream”, she becomes more engaged. We make out for a little bit, but the dream hits the void.

After a moment, though, there’s a transition into an office environment. Wife’s still here with me so we continue making out.

Spoiler for Sexytime:

I notice one of the office workers, an attractive Hispanic woman in her late 20s, holding a stack of papers and talking to another employee. I tell the woman that she wants to join us and she responds, "Okay, good idea," and begins to undress while still sort of continuing to work. I guess my attention wanders, though, because after a moment she walks off to do some work thing, still partially undressed.

After that Wife and I enjoy some sexytime before…

… the dream ends.

A scene ended with me getting into a car and driving away. While I'm driving, however, something goes wrong, I keep weaving into the other lane, and I wind up getting pulled over by a cop. I'm thinking, good thing this is just a dream. And I'd rather not stick around for this, so I go incorporeal and float through the roof, invisible. I look down at the cop being surprised by the car without a driver, and then I decide to bring the car with me: I turn it into water droplets, which collect in the palm of my hand.

There's a memory gap, but I doubt the semi-lucidity lasted long after that. Next scene I remember clearly is non-lucid: a woman is consulting a witch, asking her to do a spell or divination for her. When it's over, the witch asks the woman what that looked like from her end - meaning that during the course of the spell, the witch realized this woman's got some magic of her own. And the god this witch works for may or may not have an interest in this woman. The witch asks her a question, about why she's trying to (do something) when she's got too much on her plate already. The woman explains: there's a guy who loves her "pretty bad" - no mention of whether it's reciprocated - and she "can't hear him anymore," by which she means hear him in her head - it's a vampire thing - and she's worried about him.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

I'm temporarily working for a doctor with a small private practice, I'm in training. The doctor's showing me a patient's chart and is asking me if anything jumps out at me - I say the patient's lost 10 pounds, but I'm thinking, that could just be a diet. The doctor points out what she wanted me to see: this patient's been suffering from hallucinations, describing strange sights and sounds. But she lives in the city, and there are all sorts of strange things there; and on the date that she experienced these 'strange sights and sounds,' there was a parade. I'm doubtful. I say, "I don't know, it's pretty difficult to confuse a parade with a hallucination." The doctor admits this is true.

There was a scene where I went to talk with that patient, and by the end of that scene we've wound up talking casually in the waiting room, she's very pretty and very easy to talk to. Then a baby belonging to one of the other patients crawls up into her lap. It's got a dripping diaper. This eventually leads to an unpleasant confrontation with the mother, who denied that the baby was the cause of the mess; the mother becomes so outraged that she takes out a gun, points it at the ceiling and shoots.

I grab the woman's arm holding the gun. The other patients in the waiting room all run out the door, except the one I'd been talking to. I get the gun away from her before she can fire the other bullet - it's a two shot derringer - and I hand it to the other patient. As I do so I say something along the lines of "Hold this for me, honey." Then I think, wait a minute, she was my patient a minute ago, that's very unprofessional, I can't go around changing a DC's relationship to me mid-storyline just because we shared a nice conversation and a life-or-death situation. The woman has pulled out another gun, and I take it away from her and hand it to the patient again - there wind up being 4 guns total.

Alice (of Wonderland) kneels down and waits. I can see movement behind her, something approaching, but I can't see it clearly from this angle, it's hidden behind Alice, until it gets close enough to be standing right behind her: a man and a woman, something off about their eyes. I'm aware they're here to take her to (Purgatory or the Underworld, something like that). I can hear music, a tune that reminds me of vaudeville.

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

Three people from a motorcycle gang, driving down an empty highway surrounded by fields of tall dry yellow grass, passing a billboard where the ad's been scraped off. I can only remember vague fragments of the previous scene, but it had been focused on the leader of these three, and he'd been trying to escape something - fate, his role in life, something like that. The transition to this scene means he's failed to escape. He's thinking something about a murder that happened in the past. There are police ahead of them, waiting for them.

POV switches to those 'police', although they look more like military. Weapons are being distributed, grenade launchers, and one of them exclaims over the model, he's very knowledgeable about it and excited to be using it - he says his father or uncle used this same model in a certain war. Another cop, one who'd been in that war himself, says something sarcastic, along the lines of "Did he? That's nice. Did he bring it home for you to play with?" The cop who'd been excited goes quiet, says "Well, no, but..." The cop who'd been in the war doesn't like hearing it talked about by people who weren't there, feels strongly about those memories being something you should keep apart, not bring home to your family. But he starts talking about it now - he says, "Good war, (he says a year). A single man could've turned the tide by pledging his country to one power or another. And even a warrior likes to hear that."

(Woke up. Back to sleep.)

I'm in the moon kingdom from PGSM. (One of my lucid goals is to travel to the moon - I suspect that inspired this non-lucid.) Chibiusa's here, she grew up here, and I'm thinking, wait, how can Usagi and Mamoru's daughter be living in this time period?

The scene changes with that thought. In the present, on earth, Mamoru's working as some kind of private security, wearing a suit, standing with other security around a limo that's stopped in the middle of the road, having some kind of confrontation. He's in trouble here, and he's aware Usagi's in trouble elsewhere and he won't be able to reach her to help her. He's holding something small and black, and he's remembering when it was given to him by a man who told him some words to memorize in order to use it, to transform. I'm thinking, the fact that he had to memorize the words indicates that he wasn't Endymion at all, he was simply playing Endymion's role, filling in for him; this was also indicated by the uniform that he transformed into, which resembled Endymion's but was much darker, almost black, unlike the real Endymion's much lighter blue. Now that he's trapped, he passes that black object along to one of the other men working security with him. He starts to tell that man the words he must memorize, but as he starts to say them, the man taking the black object finishes the words himself, he already knows them - indicating that, by chance or rather by fate, that black object has finally been passed on to its real owner. Endymion's true, light, uniform appears on him, and he leaves to find Usagi, flying through the air - which I have an incredibly bad feeling about. The real Endymion isn't necessarily a good person for Usagi to know.

The other people Mamoru was with have left the scene, Mamoru's now kneeling in the street, surrounded by cops with a misunderstanding, and a police detective is holding a sword to Mamoru's throat. One of the cops calls the detective away - there's some order over the radio that means both that they're needed elsewhere and that Mamoru isn't guilty of whatever it was they think he did and should be released. The detective is extremely reluctant to follow this order, he doesn't want to let Mamoru go. The cop relaying the orders from the radio phrases those orders in a way that praises the detective's work up until now and stresses how much he's needed, and finally the detective releases Mamoru and he and the cops all get into their cars and drive off, towards a bridge.

(Side note: It occurred to me yesterday, lucidity works best for me when I'm focused on a specific task, as with defusing nightmares, and that's probably something I could put to work for me more. So before going to bed today, I tried typing out one of my dream goals with the heading Task of the Day.)

I was flipping through the just-released final book in a series, the Wheel of Time, when it occurred to me that this series already ended. I get online to explain the discrepancy, and there's some explanation that this new book is an optional epilogue with bonus materials and illustrations and so on. I realize this is a dream. My first instinct is to just continue with what I was doing anyway, but right afterward I think, no, what I was doing was boring. There is no way I am going to waste a dream sitting around my IRL home on the computer. (Although come to think of it, a dream computer could probably do some interesting things too.) That decided, I immediately set out to perform the task I set for myself. (Successfully remembered!) The first step is finding a doorway or other way of changing scenes, so I head for the door.

Before I get there, however, I get distracted: I realize I'm holding the t-shirt I'd taken off earlier in the non-lucid part of the dream. But although I hadn't put on another shirt afterward, I'm fully clothed now, which I think of as a convenient bit of dream logic. I remember a previous lucid dream where I'd tried to transform a shirt into something else, not very successfully, so the presence of a spare now makes me want to try again. I decide to just transform it into a robe, that should be easy, I'll just lengthen it and create an opening in the front. I see there's an opening at the front of the collar now, so I take hold of either side and pull as if tearing it, extending that opening to the bottom, seeing that it's grown longer as I go. I hold it up to look at it - it's got the shape I pictured, but it looks like a poorly-sewn costume, like something a child would make. It's got a piece of plastic sticking out of it, as if a price tag's been torn off, and there's a tangle of loose threads and frayed edges across the opening in the front. I tear that tangle off, then realize I'm waking up. (It occurred to me afterward that both shirts had been specific shirts I actually own IRL. Makes me wonder if I'd have an easier time if, rather than just the general idea of a robe, I'd aimed for something more specific. Still, though: a more successful transformation of an object than the last attempt.)

Fragments: Something composed of metal loops that I take for an art piece, believing it's something to do with male and female; instead I'm told it's a spell for godhood. A scene with a teacher and student. A reference to 'maenad.'

Classic movie monsters. The dream was in black and white, and featured Bela Lugosi's Dracula and Lon Chaney Jr's Wolfman. Through some plan of Dracula's, Talbot winds up becoming a vampire, while Drac becomes the wolfman instead, and essentially human when it's not a full moon. Talbot's not thrilled with any of this. There's a scene in which Dracula springs Talbot from an asylum through the window, before the monster-type switch; and afterward, a confrontation in a swamp in which Dracula is talking about world domination, and how the ability to appear human was required.

I'd been talking to someone about a career change I was considering, when I realize I'm still wearing a change of clothes I acquired earlier in a dream. At first, I think it a marvel, a thing in a dream that carried over into real life - but later on, as I'm sitting around a dinner table having a boring conversation, I realize that actually it must be an indication that I'm still dreaming. I become lucid and immediately start floating in the air; I stopped paying attention to the other characters in the room and didn't see them after this point. Initially I intended to go outside and continue flying, but then I decide to try something new this time. I decide to summon a god - Apollo, since summoning his light for an anti-nightmare technique has been very effective, but he's yet to show up in person. I'm also thinking his association with trance states might carry over into lucid dreaming. I close my eyes so that I can't see the room, and I focus on him, call him. Nothing happens. I eventually give up, open my eyes again. I think a little more structure may be helpful, and I should probably keep my eyes open; I remember a time when a dream fell apart completely after I stopped focusing on visuals.

I go to a mirror, but instead of calling Apollo again, this time I decide to call up an image of my ideal future self (possibly related to the non-lucid talk of career changes earlier). Several options appear one at a time, and I reject each of them. Many of them bear very little physical resemblance to me, and most are wearing glasses (which I don't need). Eventually I settle on one that I approve of (though why I approved of this particular one, I don't know); he looks like something out of the 1700s. When I turn away from the mirror, he's standing next to me. He seems a little confused by this, but he's just here for me to get a more detailed look at him. But while he's here anyway, we decide to fuck. Eventually I remember my original intention to summon a god and I decide that's more interesting than what is essentially dream masturbation, so I leave him on the floor by the mirror and go back to the table. I sit down, then remember I didn't bother to get dressed again; I decide I'd rather have clothes on for this. I try to summon clothing by just deciding I am wearing clothes, but this doesn't work; I think perhaps it doesn't work only because I can clearly see and feel myself not wearing clothes, so I'm trying to overrule the evidence of my senses. My shirt's by the table, but my pants are all the way across the room, so I just pick up the shirt and try to extend it, to use it as a source of materials to create something new. This seems to be working, but very slowly. I don't care to wait; I give up and just walk back across the room for my pants, and start thinking about the 'rules' of dreams - thinking that perhaps it's better to work with what's already in the environment rather than try to create new things from scratch all the time; less wasteful, less effort. I become aware that I'm starting to wake up.

A fragment in which I'm waiting for someone in a subway station and meet an android, though they've been banned. She looks human except for her eyes: they're filled with a constantly-moving white light, and her eyelids are covered in jewels.

Utena's dueling someone, and her clothing's changing as she does so. Other duelists are running up the stairs and arrive just in time to see her win, and Touga says something complementing her on her confidence, that she could trust that the changes going on around her would serve her.

He goes on to say something about those changes reflecting past eras, which transitions into images with some vague connections - something about a limousine, and then something about flight patterns with an image of a witch flying on a broom, which leads into the next scene:

A guy who's just now become a witch is looking out the window at the approaching dawn, and he wants to go flying and feel the world wake up around him; but he has responsibilities to attend to, keeping him here.

This happened after I had determined to not be eaten by Zombies or let Vampires in me. I had been reading "The Power Of Your Subconscious Mind" Prior to dreaming this.

I dreamed that I was in a food court of sorts, And Zombies were there. They said they could eat other things but found flesh to be motivating (Or something like that) and then they started to go after people to eat including me and others nearby, And I tried to make an invisible Zom-B-Gone spray work (EDIT/UPDATE 19-September-2014: Was that a lie? I wasn't holding a can or anything.) but the other people around me didn't go for it (Edit/Update 16-December-2014: The people didn't know what I was talking about and they stayed near the Zombies) and I eventually got away from the Zombies by breaking through a window so I wouldn't be eaten and then I climbed on the roof and became smoke so they wouldn't eat me.

Major rise in confidence during this dream! Got an animal transformation, Advanced TotM, and was getting there on a Task of the Year, too. Thanks to NewArtemis for the dream control suggestions!

Color legend: Non-dream Dream Lucid

Lucid #171: I Am the Wolf

I have a false awakening that places me in my bed at home next to Wife. All of the lights are on and she's fiddling around with some papers in bed, something to do with my new business. "Oh good, you're awake," she says. I grumble about how unhappy I am that this is the case.

"Sorry," she responds, "but we really need to work on this." I whine that it should be able to wait until the morning and that I was trying to have a lucid dream. She turns back to the papers, not bothering me any further. I'm a little worried that I was rude and have maybe pissed her off, but I decide to just take my chance while I can. I roll onto my side and begin my mantra of "The world is yours". I'm shocked to find that almost immediately I start a WILD transition. (Obviously just an in-dream WILD, but I didn't realize it at the time.)

In the transition state, my dream hands are grasping at something rough that's rolling by beneath me. I grasp at it and start clawing my way along. A gravel surface comes into view. It seems like I'm floating while climbing a ladder made out of gravel that's been crudely mortared together. After a bit, the scene solidifies and the gravel becomes a path. There's one more odd little jump as gravity takes hold and now I'm walking along the path in a full-formed scene.

It's dawn and I'm on a path that cuts through a park, not far from a street. Most of the DCs are dressed like it's chilly but it feels mild to me. I remember my intention to be extra confident in this dream and I start shouting my intentions at the passerby. "I can do anything I want! This is all mine!" I shout, interspersing lots of profanity and generally sounding like a total nutjob.

I remember Task of the Month to turn into a white wolf, hide in the snow, and hunt down a meal. I still feel all crazy from my mantra and the insane confidence I had at the start of this dream. I shout in a booming voice that's not my own that "I AM THE WOLF!" Immediately my hands curl into white paws. I practice running a bit on all fours and it's not bad! I kind of get the sense that I'm sort of bent over like a loping hunchback / werewolf thing but hey, close enough!

I go on a brief, profanity-laced tirade about how there's a bunch of snow to my right, and yep there it is. I hop my little wolf-feet into it and crouch down, looking to my left for some prey. Immediately I spy two potential targets: the closest is a large skunk and the other is an orange, semi-spherical alien thing with tentacles. The skunk's closer and the alien makes me a bit nervous, so I pounce on the skunk.

My teeth rip into him and I tear a big chunk away. Fortunately none of this is bloody but the skunk stares at me in shock. The skunk meat tastes atrocious. It's like chewing on a fart. I can't remember whether I'm supposed to eat the whole animal so I take another bite. This time it's more gummy and tasteless at first but after a bit of chewing, nope, this bite's all farty-tasting too. I hope this is good enough because I've had enough of being a carnivore.

I allow myself to change back into a human and walk further into the park. I come to three identical stone buildings with opaque green windows, standing side by side. I think of the Colosseum Task of the Year and shout that the building which leads to the Colosseum needs to light up. No immediate result, so another attempt, more yelly and with more profanity does the trick and the middle building's door lights up.

I move through a series of three automatic glass doors where a steady stream of children is walking in the opposite direction. I say that the kids need to get out of the way and DC parents appear from out of nowhere to pull them to the side as I pass. I emerge in a restaurant area filled with DCs enjoying a meal. An Indian man in his early 40s is playing on a slot machine against the left wall and he turns to look at me with an expression of surprise.

I push through the back door out into the early morning next to a crumbling sports arena. It's huge and looks a lot like the Colosseum apart from some weird details like the rebar that's sticking out of the top of it. I fly up toward the top and as a gust of wind carries me sideways away from where I want to be, I shout and mutter that "this is my world", and things get back on track.

I come over the top of the stadium to see that inside it looks like a grassy version of the Circus Maximus! There's even a little chariot racing by itself around the track. I know I can make this work, so I fly down toward the field, shouting that down there will be someone for me to fight. Before I'm even halfway down, though, the dream ends.

20.11.2013 3/6

NON-DREAM DREAM LUCID

Eu estava passando de carro em um campo quando via um OVNI descendo em um morro. O Ovni disparava um tipo de raio de terraformação como no Spore e no caminho que o raio seguia surgia um riacho com um lago no fim, onde surgiam plantas estranhas e um tipo de coelho esquisito. Eu achava aquela a coisa mais linda que já vi na vida. Eu me transformava em uma mosca e voava. Passava por uma árvore estranha e uma planta carnívora linguaruda me pegava para comer. Eu conseguia fugir.