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Following my previous blog entry, I formulated a guess about how my lucid dreams have been induced all this time, strangely enough. This morning I had another lucid dream with a unique twist.

It was a another DILD following a WBTB wherein I recognized I was dreaming but as usual, didn’t hold the dream for more than 10-20 seconds. I woke up shortly afterwards with my eyelids still lit up with vivid hypnagogic imagery such as a playing cards twisting and spinning and even the word “RSAtouble” was seen. I believe I was reading the word as “Roundtable” - just poorly misspelled.

I wasted no time in trying to gain entry into the dream world again and tried to do the FILD method while waiting for the opportune time to move my limbs again, do a reality check, and explore the dream world. I was certain I was dreaming but I was still in my place of rest so I got up, did a nose-pinch reality check but could not breathe so I lied back down and tried once again to get back into the dream scene using the FILD technique.

The thing is, in retrospect, that reality check should have failed because that entire FILD sequence was a dream, I now realize. But because I thought I was fully I awake, I expected the reality check to succeed and thus it did.

Expectations are huge in the dream world. I am not talking about these forced expectations that are induced via mantras. I am talking about expectations as natural as you expecting a light to come on when you flip a switch or when you turn a doorknob. They are not consciously thought about, you just passive anticipate the usual result after countless repetition. A routine essentially. Anyway, back on track.

It wasn’t till after I had woken up one last time to get ready for work that I realized what had happened, I had some inception-style lucid dream.

I noticed a pattern in when my lucid dreams have occurred:

1. I sleep for 4-6 hours then wake up for 45-60 minutes.

2. I go back to sleep with awareness of the time and the intention to awaken at a later time. Why? Because it would be absolutely dreadful to be late for work trying to lucid dream.

3. I expect to have a lucid dream but I don’t try to force anything. My priority is to get as much sleep as possible within the 2 hour time frame I’m allowed.

If the second item is the reason for my lucid dreams, then I may be on the cusp of mastering the induction of lucid dreams. After that, it is only a matter of training stability and control.