Thread: Elaol's DILD Workbook

Congratulations on your Gravity ILD!! Very nice work!!

I forgot to mention…although it might have been mentioned at some point already, but a "just got lucid" ritual, practiced during the day or during awakenings, is also a great way to raise the level of your lucidity. You can mix in your focus on self awareness during the practice. When you become lucid in a dream there is a better chance that you will remember this practice and benefit from it. I definitely agree with FM to not worry about stabilization or even this suggested practice and your primary focus should be on enjoying the dream and pursuing your goals. Do you also have any fun goals set up for your next LD? That is highly recommended.

Thanks guys, I really appreciate your comments

I am practicing meditative walks right now, as I have mentioned, where I focus on word "Dream", I try to become more aware and do GRC and LRC. I also "act" that I have just realized that I am lucid and I raise my self-awareness and try some of my goals.

Yes, fogelbise, I have some fun goals. Idk if you are aware of Lucid Challenge "Journey of 1000 miles". I think it is very fun and I can't wait to try it

Your current practices sound great!

I haven't seen that Lucid Challenge. I should take a look. I don't get around all of the different sections of DV as much as I used to.

OK, guys, long time no posts xD

I have a question I would like to ask you, but idk how to express it.

Anyways, last couple of days, I was practicing walking meditation. After about 20 days, my lucids have started again, I had the best LD so far. This morning I had one more, location induced. I got too excited and it was like I was leaf on the wind, I was flying and lost control and woke up.

I know both of you were telling me I need to improve my waking life in order to have better lucids. What areas should I improve except awareness and reflection?

Congrats on the great LD! In addition to the fundamentals of awareness/attention, reflection, and memory/recall, I think cultivating a grateful/thankful, compassionate, happy attitude towards life is highly effective. It benefits all experiences, both dreaming and waking. The dream yoga authors promote loving kindness recitations as being very helpful.

Have you been practicing a "just got lucid" ritual of some kind? Doing this while awake can help you to remember to do it in dreams, which can really elevate the dream experience. Waking visualization / MILD can also really help with incubation and lucidity and doing particular kinds of dream control.

I think there is a tendency to always be looking for something else, some other different thing to do, that may be the silver bullet. I don't think there are silver bullets in LD practice, beyond the fundamentals. Believe in them and practice them consistently and diligently, and cultivate a happy attitude towards life and dreams. Try to encourage the "perfect storm" of conditions (being well-rested, sleep schedule, stress free, content/happy with life) and practices (mindfulness, WBTB, expectation, intention). Rather, rinse, repeat, experiment, keep careful records, and notice trends to find what seems to work best for you.

Having said that, I think you can find lots of useful exercises in Sivason's Dream Yoga class here in the DVA: diffuse vision, visualization, and so forth.

Hey my mentors Sorry for being away for such a long time.

Since I have started working, I have not been dedicated as before. That, combined with some other major personal issues has prevented me from practicing LDing.

I am back now, and I hope I will experience more high-quality lucid dreams.

See you!

It's great to see you back! Anytime you need to, I recommend simply slowing down. I recommend to try not to stop altogether and look for the joy in as many of your practices as possible.

I'm looking forward to reading about your first LD since returning!

Hey everyone

I have really enjoyed the spellbee2's competition. It has made me thinking. So I have some ideas I would like to share with you, and of course, to hear your feedback.

1. I have trouble sleeping these days, I wake up tired no matter what. So I was thinking of not recording my dreams during the night (I will still write them down in the morning), since I expose myself to blue light and wake myself up even more. That will, of course, influence my dream recall. Do you have any ideas how to remember my dreams without recording them during the night? I know dreams are very slippery and I tend to forget most of them.

2. This is related to the question above. Since most of my LDs are happening after 6 AM, do you think not remembering dreams 12 AM - 5 AM (because I will not voice-record them) will damage my LD practice?

3. I will probably start doing DEILD, since I think it is the best technique right now, because I will not record my dreams. I also plan to make my own meditation that will help me achieve more DEILDs.

4. Since it is very hard doing GRC and teaching people at the same time, I was thinking of doing something similar, constant reality check based on blinking, since we do not blink in the dreams, at least I don't. I will experiment with that some more

So that is about it I am looking forward to your feedback

Hi, Elaol!

Originally Posted by Elaol

Do you have any ideas how to remember my dreams without recording them during the night? I know dreams are very slippery and I tend to forget most of them.

Most of the time I do not record during the night now. I may change that but that's where I'm at right now. Much more important than recording during the night is reaching for the recall every time you find yourself awake. It's up to you how long to do it, since doing it for longer can lead to more wakefulness. I keep a running list of remembered dreams throughout the night, adding to it with every waking. I give each dream a title/tag/keyword, and associate at least one or two visual memories with it. Doing this, and reciting the list of key phrases over and over, I generally make it through the night with most of the recall still intact. Some detail may suffer, especially earlier dreams, but this is a good compromise and I think actually is a very good exercise for recall, and it tends to build recall even higher.

You can avoid blue light and waking too much by using a voice recorder. Easiest and most available is the one on your smart phone. You can keep the lights off, stay still in your sleeping position, and keep your eyes closed except for starting and stopping the recorder. This is what I do when I record and it works great!

2. This is related to the question above. Since most of my LDs are happening after 6 AM, do you think not remembering dreams 12 AM - 5 AM (because I will not voice-record them) will damage my LD practice?

I still recommend reaching for dream memories, at least quickly, every single time you find yourself awake. You can set a shorter time limit, or if the dreams were not all that interesting, maybe skip over them, but I think maintaining the habit of performing recall immediately upon waking (unless you're attempting a DEILD) is critically important.

3. I will probably start doing DEILD, since I think it is the best technique right now, because I will not record my dreams. I also plan to make my own meditation that will help me achieve more DEILDs.

Getting good at DEILDs is a very worthy investment of time and effort, and is good strategy to trade-off at least some dream recall for higher chances of lucidity.

4. Since it is very hard doing GRC and teaching people at the same time, I was thinking of doing something similar, constant reality check based on blinking, since we do not blink in the dreams, at least I don't. I will experiment with that some more

I myself lean towards general mindfulness rather than specific all-day-RC. One reason is that general mindfulness is useful for more than just lucid dreaming. Find what makes sense *to you*, something that you can maintain most of the day including when teaching, and do it. Maintaining awareness and reflection is more important than what specific thing you focus on.

Sorry FM, I just realized I haven't liked your response. I've been practicing everything as usual, but for some weird reason, my sleep is disrupted. I wake up tired and I am sleepy throughout the day. I don't wake up as usual during the night, which is why my DR has decreased. Do you think I can still use techniques for LD even though I have significantly less dreams per night? Now I have 3-4 very short dreams per night.

Could be a sign that you just need to rest. We all have times where that's the top priority. The dreams will always be there once you're ready. Take care of yourself! Healthy diet and exercise helps with fatigue.