MrBlonde's Workbook

I guess this is my workbook and I'll be sharing my process along with you all. I remember a dream when I woke up tonight, although I don't know if it was one or three. When does a dream begin another end exactly? Cause they all were in different scenes although they had some connections.

[fogelbise]

I guess this is my workbook and I'll be sharing my process along with you all. Welcome MrBlonde I think this idea of a workbook is a great idea that you can use as a space to track your progress yourself like what is working, what is not working but also to get feedback when needed. I recommend that you specifically ask questions whenever you would like feedback because we may not know what you already know and what you may have questions about...speaking of which: I remember a dream when I woke up tonight, although I don't know if it was one or three. When does a dream begin another end exactly? Cause they all were in different scenes although they had some connections. This comes down to your personal judgment call. If I clearly remember a little mini-awakening like we have through out the night (whether we notice it or not) or if I have an empty gap between "scenes" I count them as separate dreams. Sometimes our dream changes quite a bit within the same dream to different "scenes" and if I clearly remember that change with no gap, I would typically count that as the same dream. Many times it isn't clear, if your memory is fading on the specifics, and for those situations I see no problem going with your gut feeling for your own personal tracking or tally.

Thanks alot fogelbise! I tried the writing down my day and it helped my recall. I remembered two dreams although I woke up between both and so I forgot the first one. My dream memory is getting so much better that I didn't even need to write it down until a couple hours after waking up. The dreams I'm having so far have become far more vivid, I'm feeling alot more range of emotions than I can remember before and I have sense of touch in my dreams which I don't recall ever having(I might have but don't really remember). In one of my dreams I was being chased my motorbike gangs and I noticed that two of them had the Sons of Anarchy emblem on their jacket, which isn't a surprise since I've been watching that show for quite sometime now. Mantras that have worked for me include "I want" rather than "I will". Heck I just asked my unconscious mind to wake me up and what would you know it did. Once I have a LD, I'll make sure to have long convo with side of me as it's given me some really interesting dreams so far.

[fogelbise]

It's great to see that all those different things are improving for you! Heck I just asked my unconscious mind to wake me up and what would you know it did. Nice! Perhaps you were lucid in this example? Or did you mean that you asked it to before going to sleep? On the mantras it is recommended to keep it in present tense, so that is great that you are avoiding "I will" and you might want to throw in some with "I am...". "I want" does seem like it would remind our subconscious of what our goals are but it may be better to expect the desired result.

[gab]

Mantras that have worked for me include "I want" rather than "I will". Heck I just asked my unconscious mind to wake me up and what would you know it did. If this works for you, awesome : ) You can also try to skip "I will" and "I want" alltogether. Replace them with "I am". As in "I wake up at 3am", "I wake up after every dream", "I remember my dreams", "Next time I'm dreaming, I look at my hands and realize I'm dreaming". As if it was a done deal, no question about it. This way our mind understands, that it's already happening for you and it will not be confused if you want it, or when do you want it, now or in the future. It will just comply. Good luck and happy dreams

I really don't know if these mantras are helping me. I haven't had any recall for the past few days(I have remembered a little bit but was too tired to write it down). I'm getting really annoyed and it's seen in my rc as I have a hard time not going through them as rote memory. I mean 3 weeks and in and I haven't once questioned if I was dreaming or not, heck I haven't been able to remember how a dream begin, I'm always somewhere in the middle and then I remember different scenes from the dream. I really am start to doubt whether I can LD at all as you'd think reading about lucid dreaming and everything and doing mantras might slip through a dream but no, all my dreams are a big bizarre mess that have no correlation to reality.

[fogelbise]

Just look back to your post about a week ago on 11/22 and take heart in the progress that you were seeing. It can take a while for things to show up in your dreams. It is normal for recall to go up and down as well. How are you doing your mantras? It's the weekend & if you can sleep in or can afford to give up some of your total sleep time you might want to try a WBTB...even though it isn't required to DILD, it can greatly improve your chances to get lucid! Wake up, write anything in your DJ (dreams or just thoughts), get up for some amount of time. You can drink enough water to wake you up during the night or set an alarm. You can do your mantras and go back to sleep. I have another thing I can suggest for WBTB so let me know if you need more ideas.

Ughh the last few days have been terrible, I've lost the enthusiastic drive I had built up coming cause I keep running into detours. First it was lack of dream recall then improper mantras, and now my drive and self awareness have dwindled. I just give up there's too much stuff I have to learn and keep up with. Sucks too reading some newbie talk about have ld after only hearing about it and I've been stuck without one for the better part of 3 years now.

[fogelbise]

Sorry to hear that MrBlonde I definitely feel that you are not alone. Many people get started and life gets in the way and they restart several times before putting forward the commitment necessary to make it work. May I ask how old you are? Some tips in the meantime: read past dream journals, even with regular dreams you would be surprised what you forgot you dreamt about and allows you to relive the rush of a good regular dream. Any favorites that are on the top of your head, relive those and visualize them. If you can get that first LD it should also motivate you to keep putting in the effort needed. This is not easy, and most newbies that do succeed more than one lucky time are probably putting in more effort than you realize. I enjoyed my process but looking back it has been and continues to be a lot of work. For a possible quick chance for an LD for motivation try out this: http://www.dreamviews.com/attaining-...-lucidity.html ...the trick is to stay still when you hear it and let yourself drift right back into the dream with a much better chance that you will realize that it is a dream if you were in the middle of REM cycle.