Thread: Inheritedlaughs's Workbook - DILD

Welcome to the workbooks!

Since you mention that WBTBs get you results quickly (I also find them very powerful), but you get burned out on them, perhaps we can figure out a way to do them so that you don't become burned out. Have you tried saving them for only times where you can sleep in? Have you tried finding something you really enjoy doing while up for them? Perhaps short WBTBs are still effective for you? I personally need longer ones.

You listed some very good goals, both the short term and long term ones. They are all very achievable with the right amount of effort and planning.

Good luck sticking with it long term. There are so many benefits and adventures to be had, so I really encourage everyone to consider it a wonderful journey of lucid living and dreaming with beneficial milestones uncovered along the way.

With WBTB, I've decided to start out very conservatively...like, one attempt a month. And then perhaps try once every two weeks or so. Disrupted sleep makes me feel very resentful/cranky, irrationally so, and that contributes heavily to me giving up. So I'm going to try the slow but consistent approach. Twelve WBTBs over the span of a year is much better than giving up after only a few, and is a regular reinforcement of the lucid dreaming habit. Or so I hope.

Even this morning, I'd planned on sleeping in a bit to allow plenty of time for dreams. No WBTB even, just an extra hour of snooze. But my cat woke me up very early. And I got all irritable, like of course that would happen when I'm trying to get back into lucid dreaming. Quite silly.

So, no dream recall for this morning, but tomorrow is another day.

That sounds like a good way to approach your WBTBs.

I don't know how playful your cat is, but if at all possible I recommend treating any morning cat or people greetings as possible hypnagogic/hypnopompic hallucinations or even a false awakening dream. Even if it is your actual cat waking you, you may be able to drift back off into a DEILD. It is common to have scenarios of someone, or a pet, waking you up or coming into the room in such hallucinations and FAs. If it is HHs or an FA and you are treating it as such you will be lucid, or on your way into a fairly easy DEILD. It is much easier to transition from HHs into REM later in your sleep and I think assuming you have already made the transition and are already dreaming is most effective. If you want to be sure before moving then you can do a motionless reality check.

Since I last posted, I've had 12-15 LDs. About half occurred while I was actively trying to LD in Aug-Sept 2019 (using WBTB). They're still quite short, however. And as before, I still find myself only able to maintain active interest for about 3-4 weeks at a time. As ever, the pattern that tends to occur: I try to rush the process, then I get discouraged by loss of sleep or lackluster results, and then life events inevitably distract me from further efforts.

I'm going to once again attempt to make the pursuit of LDs a consistent part of my life. I've maintained a dream journal for over a year, so it's second-nature to write down anything I remember each morning. However, I should aim to be more emotionally invested in said dreams. I'll pretty much ignore them once they're recorded, and that doesn't exactly encourage more vividness.

My plan for now:

- Do reality checks every day for 90+ days and practice ADA.
- Attempt WBTB periodically -- once a week or every two weeks? But while maintaining DILD as primary LD strategy.
- Recall my dreams throughout the day, focusing on sensory and emotional details.

If I do all this consistently until at least April 14 (to build the habit), it'll be interesting to see how far I can get.

Logically, LDing is a skill that will take consistent practice to master, but I've been treating it with the mentality of crash dieting. If I want this, then I should pursue it as a sustainable lifestyle change.

I practiced ADA for several hours yesterday, with a focus on auditory and tactile senses. This morning I recorded the most detailed dream I've had in several weeks, if not months. I'm also aware of the transitions between scenes. I can actually remember how my confusion and lack of attention in a moment allowed the dream's focus to change to something else. So instead of believing that I just forgot a bunch of stuff in between two scenes, there's an understanding that there was actually nothing. Just an instantaneous shift.

Hello inheritedlaughs, and let me give you a fairly late (my apologies!) welcome to the DILD class!

It looks like you've had some good results since you joined, congrats! I also am not a fan (that's putting it MILDly, I pretty much hate it haha) of get-up-and-stay-up WBTB, and have had decent success in LDing without it. I love LDs, but my emphasis is more on dream recall and vividness of all dreams. In the peak of my LD practice I'd average an LD about once every 5 days (they usually were more clumped together, though, reflecting times I believe of increased/focused intent), but could recall at least 5 dreams per night of decent detail over multiple wakings. So WBTB, while without a doubt a key ingredient to LDing, must be considered within the frame of your preferences, dreaming/sleeping style, etc. If you don't like it, then don't do it -- the resulting positive feelings you'll have will help your dreaming, as opposed to the resentment that might building up with doing WBTB, which could have a negative influence on dreaming overall.

I recommend general mindfulness (LD-focused, I'll explain this below) over classical "King Yoshi" ADA. I believe the awareness we want to cultivate for dreaming is human high-level self-awareness, not the minute sense detail-focused attention of ADA. ADA is, IMHO, artificial, and exhausting. Mindfulness, however, is much more natural, and can be practiced for a lifetime. ADA brings results, yes, because while (IMHO) it emphasizes the "wrong" kind of attention, it is nonetheless focused, purposeful attention, and that is always good for dreaming. It's just that mindfulness is much better, and sustainable.

LD-focused mindfulness: what I mean by this is classical mindfulness -- constantly bringing your purposeful attention to the present moment experience -- with a "subtext" of lucid dreaming. This subtext means making reflection on your present state (waking or dreaming) part of your mindfulness's recognition of the present moment. It also includes remembering your intent to be lucid in dreams. Part of this subtext means generating a "feeling" that it's time to do an RC, even without any external stimulus. Of course, when a dream-like event occurs (something startling, amusing, unexpected, weird, different-from-routine, etc.), doing an RC and holding a reflection/intention moment (ala LaBerge in ETWOLD) should become second nature.

Logically, LDing is a skill that will take consistent practice to master, but I've been treating it with the mentality of crash dieting. If I want this, then I should pursue it as a sustainable lifestyle change.

I like to say that what most people get wrong about LDs is that they focus on "techniques to have lucid dreams," where the real success lies in "becoming a lucid person, 24x7." The transformation of the brain from a typical mindless, non-lucid state, into an increasingly attentive, self-aware, reflective state, takes time, and happens gradually, with consistent effort. The brain is a highly adaptive organ, it literally physically changes (growing/strengthening neural pathways) to get better at what we do on a regular basis. Live mindlessly, and the brain gets really good at being non-lucid. Live lucidly, and the brain gets really good at being lucid, thus enhancing chances for lucid dreams.

The dream state is a challenging state in which to be lucid with its impaired access to memory and increased "haze/fog," so it requires a high level of working awareness/attention/reflection to give a hope of any kind of frequent lucid dreams. This is build with consistent mindfulness and LD practice over time. LD practice is overall a marathon, not a sprint. You can of course and should incorporate sprints, just how like a well-rounded athlete will include short, high-intensity training, and not only rely on long, slow cardio. But sprinting too much can result in burn-out. The benefit of occasional sprints is that you can build and maintain a high level of excitement and intent for a short while. I've very often had clumps of LDs in a week following a week of very strong intent and focus on LDing.

It also helps to maintain a "beginner's mindset" -- don't assume that you know all there is to know about LDing. Review the LD literature, and look for hidden nuggets of wisdom. I will periodically re-read ETWOLD (chapters 1-3 are basically all you need, especially for DILD [and I don't think LaBerge is the best resource for WILD anyway]). ETWOLD is a perfect workbook (especially if you have his companion ACILD, "A Course In Lucid Dreaming", that puts all his recommendations into step-by-step exercises) for lucid dreaming. I always get something new about it, or find renewed excitement/intent when I re-read it. Reading a LD book is sometimes all it takes to have a LD that night!

Check out some of the links I have in my signature. There are some posts of mine there that go into much more detail about 24x7 lucidity ("Unified Theory of Lucid Dreaming"), dream recall tips, etc. Also check out the sticky posts in this (DILD class) group, there's a LD bibliography there and a collection of other helpful links to very useful/interesting dreamviews discussions.

One last note -- I find that having concrete LD goals goes a long way in promoting LDs. Maybe try participating in the dreamviews "TOTM" (task of the month) group. Many of my best & longest LDs involved pursuing and performing TOTM tasks.

Good luck, and let us know if you have any questions, and let us know about your progress!