Hello everyone, my name is Rendar.
I am a 34 years old and have been on the journey towards lucidity for a little over 6 months. I am a practicing Buddhist so meditation and questioning my reality are a daily thing. I am also a certified Hypnotherapist, so Im very familiar with the subconscious, the hypnagogic, etc. I think that might be part of why I have been having a difficult time with Lucid Dreaming. Someone in one of my other posts mentioned its like surgeon trying give himself surgery. Im too familiar with the nuts and bolts, so I kind of get in my own way.
My Daily Practice looks something like this.
Upon first waking up, I always try not to move, and spend at least 10 minutes focusing on remembering my dreams. The method that works best for me is to remember the most recent dreamscape, then constantly trying to remember where I was right before that. Its a decent method for me and I usually end up remember 2-4 dreams every night in detail. However after recording my dreams for the last 6 months, I have yet to really discover any repeatable themes of dream signs. My dreams seem to be all over the place and dont repeat stories, moments, or themes very often.
During the day I follow what Charlie Morley calls the Weird method. Anytime something odd or out of place happens, I take a step back, and examine everything. The goal is figure out if you are dreaming. Hopefully this will make it into the dream state and when something out of place happens, you will catch it and begin to question if your dreaming. I usually check by performing a hand RC check (such as counting fingers, or pressing a finger through my palm) and at least 1 non physical RC (such as willing myself to float).
I also meditate twice a day for about 20-30 minutes. 1 of those times will be mindfulness meditation, focusing on my breath. The other time will be Guru yoga or Deity Yoga.
When getting ready for bed I do some stretches and work out any tension in my body. I will start the page of my dream journal for that night by putting the date, and always write out a 1 or 2 sentence of my intention to lucid dream. I will continue to relax my body and when I feel the hypnagogic sensations (basically the onset of Sleep Paralysis) I start to chant a matra in my mind. My go to one is usually "When Im dreaming, I will remember to realize im dreaming". Then I let myself drift to sleep.
I naturally wake up 3-4 times in the night for a minute or two. Usually the second to last time I do this (around 4.5-5.5 hours after going to bed) I will do WBTB. For me 20 minutes is the sweet spot. Any less and i fall asleep too quickly, any more and I usually never up going back to sleep. I then perform an induction technique of some sort, usually sticking with one technique for 3 or more weeks.
I have yet to have luck with any form of Induction technique. I have tried WILD by looking at the HH behind your eyes, FILD, MILD, and lately SSILD. So Im going to switch gears and instead work on DILD. My only hang up with DILD is it is VERY FREQUENT that in my dreams, I will notice something odd and think "hmmm this is a dream" and then just continue dreaming. Its like the conscious me is very motivated to LD, but the sleeping me could care less. I have even had dreams where I recognized I was in a dream, did a RC, the RC failed, proved to myself I was dreaming, and then just went "cool" and lost all sense of lucidity and let the dream continue as normal.
One last thing I would like to add is to talk about Dream Yoga. As a Buddhist, this is actually why Im trying to learn to LD. I have tried following the traditional methods of Dream Yoga, and the instructions laid out in The Tibetan Yogas of Dream and Sleep. But so far I have not had a full Lucid Dream. I am actually taking the online seminar with Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche next month, so perhaps I will see some growth in the future.