Originally Posted by
FryingMan
Hi Iriba,
If you did a RC in your dream, you were (and are) sooooo close to lucidity! Can you write a bit more about that part of your dream? What were you thinking and doing at that time that made you do the hand check?
I myself use nose pinch as my primary RC, I prefer it to hand check, which I only use when actually already lucid as a secondary confirmation, when I think of it (which is not very often). You may want to try practicing nose pinch during your daily practice, so that you use it first in dreams. Nose pinch is considered by many to be the #1 most effective and reliable RC.
It's great that you're doing meditation. Building mindfulness and self-awareness takes time. Keep doing it, without expecting instant results. Results will come over time.
I think a very good book for you to read is "Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness Meditation In Everyday Life." Learn to be happy with where you are now, not placing your hope of contentment in a future of lucid dreaming, but be happy to experience and be present in ever moment. Not only will this increase your joy in life, it will lead to the mindset that is very conducive for lucid dreaming -- being aware in the moment, learning to observe and to be aware of your thoughts and feelings and reactions, being patient, stopping throughout your day and just following your breath, looking around in amazement at the world, actively living, not just coasting through life on auto-pilot.
There is a lot that goes into lucid dreaming practice. One of the main ingredients is a positive attitude. I've found that feelings of frustration hinder my own practice, so I do my best to avoid them. Don't focus on your count or other's counts, just keep working on self-awareness during the day and dream recall by night.
I'd like to understand your dream recall practice, if you could write here in more detail everything you do to recall dreams, we can start there and expand to other subjects later. Dream recall is really important to lucid dreaming, spending effort on it is well worth it.