Thread: JoshMcNaughts WorkBook

What I am currently doing :

5 minute meditation.
Attempt to do 15 reality checks per day.
Observing everything around me, look at an object and seeing what the shape is, if its water I will take note that it is see-through. Paying attention to the noises that I literally pay attention to, like a car in the street, the sound of the engine. Paying attention to how I feel, how my feet feel on the floor, couch, how hot water and cold water feels in my skin.

Dream Recall
When I kept a dream dairy my recall shot up but since I've been forgetting to write them down I've forgot my dreams. Recording then is a must so will do that again!

Don't remember a lot from last night. I remember an object and that was an elevator

Okay so yesterday I would stop still and become aware of things that where around me, I would then question myself 3 times then perform a reality check.

Recall
As I've only just woke up, I remember 2 dreams. As I was writing down my second one in my dream diary I realised that in dream my belongings where outside. Bare in mind when I say belongings, what came to mind was that my ETWOLD was outside or at least in my thoughts it's was outside. This didn't trigger nothing and carried on with the dream.

Hello JoshMcNaught and welcome to the DILD class! My apologies in being somewhat tardy in getting back to your initial posts, I've been quite busy in the waking world in the last week.

I see you've mentioned ETWOLD, do you have this book and have you read it? I highly recommend this as an excellent, comprehensive introduction to lucid dreaming practice.

Meditation is great. As you improve in your ability to calm your mind and hold your focus for longer, I'd recommend extending your meditation time. I think that longer periods are more beneficial than shorter ones, but any time spent is better than none, so good for you!

Attention to sensation is also great. I'd recommend particularly spending attention observing your own mind: emotions, reactions, mood, and clarity of mental faculties [memory] in particular. In many dreams I'm confused and frustrated at my inability to remember something I think I should know, that's a great trigger for lucidity if you can learn to recognize it.

While paying attention, also take a moment to fully realize *why* you're paying attention: in order to recognize the dream state. You want to link your awareness to the desire to be lucid in a dream. Especially: is what you're observing like something that happens in your dreams?

It's important to do an RC whenever you feel the urge/need to do so, not just on a set schedule, so you could do more than 15 per day if you want to. Make each RC a serious attempt to fully evaluate your state, and if you have that "feeling" that you really are dreaming, do not give up after one attempt: do several, slowly, carefully evaluating your surroundings. In fact it's much better to believe that you're dreaming by default once you suspect, and then have to prove to yourself that you're awake (but don't do things that are potentially dangerous in waking life until you're sure).

Some questions that I've had great success with are "How odd is this?" "Is this dream-like?" and "Why do I think I'm awake?"

Dream recall is indeed important to lucid dreaming practice: try to establish a close connection to all your dreams, and this will enhance all your your dreams and make lucidity come more and more.

If you haven't yet, have a read through my dream recall tips.

Above all, be patient, consistent, and positive about your dreaming practice, and you'll be rewarded by a lifetime of awesome dreams, both lucid and non-lucid.

Took a little break. I tried smoking mugwort last week and although it's has it's benefits like increased awareness and vividness, it's pointless, I want to trian my mind instead of using supplements that do it for me.

So, starting all over again.

I recalled about 5-6 dreams last night and wrote them down l, will post them later.

Downloaded the android app awoken. I've set 6 reality check reminders from 13.00 - 18.00pm then I'll set another 6.

Back to training!

Nothing much happening in my dreams. My recall is okay, roughly about 2 dreams last night, non lucid. Will keep practising.

Update, plan to do 15 rcs today.

Nothing much last night recall a few dream snippets

I went for a quick nap before because i am feeling poorly today, had a little dream and when I woke up I was wondering are dream signs necessary? Are they needed in order to DILD because as of right now I'm just practising awareness and doing reality checks in the daytime.

Being familiar with your dream signs is useful, but not necessary. Reviewing your dream signs gets you into the mindset of thinking about your dreams, and about lucidity, doing so is itself a form of raised awareness. Every little bit helps in building up the %age chances for lucidity during the night.

I agree with FryingMan. Dream signs had more effect for me over time but it wasn't my primary method early on, SSILD was (and I still use it). I love the awoken app. It can keep track of your dream signs for you when you are ready to use them. I also like to change the totem sound weekly so that I don't start ignoring the totem. I set a calendar reminder to change it but sometimes change it early if I notice I am ignoring it. By the way, I got to a point where general dream signs seemed to be more prevalent and thus more useful than specific dream signs. Welcome back! Hang in there for the long haul journey!

Am I doing it right? While I'm awake I pay attention to the little things, the things I wouldn't usually pay attention to? Then I do a reality check.

Set the intention to practice ADA every 2 hours for 5 minutes, it's going good so far!

Originally Posted by JoshMcNaught

Am I doing it right? While I'm awake I pay attention to the little things, the things I wouldn't usually pay attention to? Then I do a reality check.

Hi Josh, what do you mean by am I doing it right? Is there more involved in your current day practice?

Originally Posted by fogelbise

Hi Josh, what do you mean by am I doing it right? Is there more involved in your current day practice?

My day consists of ADA and reality checks. I feel like I'm lost like I'm missing something to do here, I'm not sure what

Hi Josh,
I suggest you study the threads linked to in this post: Important / Informative links
There's a lot of reading in some of those threads, you don't have to read every post, but skim and look for the nuggets of wisdom that most strongly resonate with you.

That feeling that you're lost or missing something means to me that you have more research and experimenting to do. It means you haven't yet had that "aha!" moment with regards to what the fundamentals of any LD practice are. It took me about 2 years to get to the point where everything I had read and experienced finally came together and I felt like I "got it" at a deep, visceral level. Not meaning that I knew exactly what to do, but I understood exactly what aspects of my mind I had to focus on in order to result in more and more frequent and better LDs (and non-LDs, all dreams really). Everyone needs to get to that point on their own, and then work on building a specific practice around those fundamentals.

You may get there faster. But the point isn't to rush to this understanding, it is to gather enough theoretical and practical knowledge (lots and lots and lots of dreams) to eventually really understand exactly what you need to do to build lucidity.

That lost feeling also means to me that you need to build a stronger relationship to your dreams. To become closer to them, to become vividly aware *of* them. When this happens, you begin to fully understand the impact that developing the fundamentals has on acquiring lucidity in the dream state.

It's one thing to read Sageous's posts about fundamentals (he of course has been a big proponent of focus on the fundamentals, for a long time), it's another thing entirely to really *get it* and understand that the fundamentals truly are the bedrock upon which any successful LD practice must be built.

What are these fundamentals? Here's my take on them: 1) Self-awareness/attention; 2) critical reflection; 3) memory/recall

If you can train yourself to consistently pay close attention to your life experiences (both waking and dreaming), reflect upon those experiences, and practice recalling those experiences, then as you build these into your life your waking and dreaming lives will become richer and more vivid. The point is to become a lucid person. Once you're a lucid person, lucid dreaming will be a natural side effect.

I think your feeling of missing something indicates your current approach is not the best fit for you.

How specifically do you practice ADA? My recommendation is to study and practice mindfulness rather than ADA. In short, pay attention to your life experiences, learn to live in the present moment. Not focusing on teeny tiny miniscule environmental sense input, but rather to focus on *you*, on your *self*, and how you are interacting with your experiences, how you're affecting and being affected by what is happening around you. Keep your mind vigilant for clues that indicate the dream state (those "wait, what?!" moments are invaluable, learn to find them). And practice recalling your day in the evening as well as your dreams in the morning. Strive to remember more and more detail. Set memory markers for yourself during the day at moments that you want to specifically recall in the evening.

And most importantly, be patient. It takes time to become a lucid person after a lifetime of living on autopilot. Over time, you will pay more and more attention to your experiences and reflect upon them. Don't worry about how much or how long you can maintain this attention. Just start! And slowly, over time, build to longer and longer and more and more frequent lucid moments.

You'll know you're on the right track when your dreams become more and more vivid and present (that feeling that "I am here, now!").

Enjoy the process, that's critical to success. Love all your dreams.

Good luck, let us know how it goes, and if you have any more questions. Now get to reading and experimenting!

Excellent write up FryingMan! The only thing I will add is that I don't think we have discussed WBTB and how great that is for getting some lucid dreaming experience as well. The LD's may give you a little fuel to keep up the fundamental practices that are so important to getting more and more LD's. SSILD is my favorite technique to use with WBTB but I also use straight MILD from time to time. Either way, please do read back over FryingMan's response and check out those links, there is a lot of good meat in both of them!

My daily routine has changed.

Through out the day I've been working on my awareness, doing 2 RCs every hour, then when it comes to night time, I set an alarm for 4.5/5 hours of sleep for a WBTB then attend a WILD, once I fall back asleep I'll let myself wake up nautrally next then perform a SSILD. I figured that it's best to not stick to one technique and to mix them all together to increase my chances of a LD.

It is indeed a good practice to "cover all the bases" as much as you can. Learn MILD/DILD, WILD, DEILD approaches, and just keep trying them. Over time, you will begin to learn the best times to apply each approach based on the conditions of the moment.

I believe that the absolute best, long-term approach is to train yourself to pay attention to all your experiences, critically reflecting upon them, and practicing recalling them. Don't make artificial boundaries between day/waking and night/dreaming: if you can become a 24x7 lucid person, frequent lucid dreaming will be a natural side effect of this.

Dream like night.
I remember playing a game called leauge of legends, I had a sword, and I was waiting for someone to kill.

I remember my mum was staying in some cabin house, it like like I'm a basement and she had a car that was years old. As I was minding my own business I pay attention to how the engine sound while riding away, it was very rusty.

There was a fight and these people took me to court! One of them had a point clear quartz crytal. I noticed that same crystal on the floor later on in the dream.

The dream felt vivid, but once I woke up I planned on staying still trying to remember but I started to drift back to sleep! So that's all I remember.

Dreams have been quite vivid the past couple of nights. My recall is lacking though, I wake up remembering my dreams and when I'm writing one part down, I forget the other parts! Instead of jumping up and writing them straight I will just lie there and let the dream come to me.

I've been missing a big part in my practice, I've been thinking to myself, during my day I'm practising lots of ADA.. doing lots of RCs and checking my current state but the BIG thing in missing is that I'm not paying enough attention to my normal dreams. If you notice with the dream above that I'm not going into detail, I'm not bothering about how my dream effects, how I felt in the dream, what I hear, what I'm actually seeing.

So my goals now are to pay close attention to them, whatever I see I will write it down, what it looks like, what colour is it, what I'm seeing, is it vivid or blury? Take notice to how am feeling in the dream, pay attention to any noises or conversations that might be happening in the dream world. I'll try to make it as much detailed as I can!

All this time I've been focusing more in my daily life and not really when I'm asleep!

Your ideas all sound spot-on. Self-evaluating your practice is a big part of making it work.

I think mentally reviewing dreams, really letting them soak in by reviewing them repeatedly, before moving to record, results in overall better recall. I've been doing this for a while now and find that when I work on it, I can recall most dreams that I recall after wakings during the night all in the morning in full or almost full detail. I think it's a good practice to put off recording until the morning, but there is the risk of some detail fading.

Spending effort on the night is really important. It generally makes the difference in getting lucid in dreams for me. Paying attention to dreams is perhaps even more important than paying attention in waking life. Both are required, but it's attention and awareness in dreams that leads to LDs.

Originally Posted by FryingMan

Your ideas all sound spot-on. Self-evaluating your practice is a big part of making it work.

I think mentally reviewing dreams, really letting them soak in by reviewing them repeatedly, before moving to record, results in overall better recall. I've been doing this for a while now and find that when I work on it, I can recall most dreams that I recall after wakings during the night all in the morning in full or almost full detail. I think it's a good practice to put off recording until the morning, but there is the risk of some detail fading.

Spending effort on the night is really important. It generally makes the difference in getting lucid in dreams for me. Paying attention to dreams is perhaps even more important than paying attention in waking life. Both are required, but it's attention and awareness in dreams that leads to LDs.

Hi.

The more I pay attention to my dreams will make me become aware in them right? So to be able to have some awareness and attention in my dreams I just need to be able to mentally review the things I wouldn't usually review in my journal?

Dream recall was very poor last night did not remember a thing.