dream control problems...

[reverie]

when I have lucid dreams, my dream control isnt that great. During my dreams, I can control about 25% of the stuff that goes on. No matter how hard I try, nothing works. -_- I know what the problem is, I'm not believing in myself enough for things to work. Bleh. Sorry for the lack of clarity. Is there any way I can be more confident in my control powers?

[cnthRyder]

I'm no expert, but in my first lucid dream, I had perfect dream control (even if I DID have a ton of trouble inducing the dream ) What I did was close my (dream) eyes and, basically, I EXPECTED whatever I wanted to happen to happen. I mean, you don't even have to WANT it, you just have to be absolutely positively SURE that when you open your eyes, whatever you wanted will happen. Good luck!

[OldSouthPremium]

My first Lucids I had pretty good control (flying, fireballs, change scenes,...etc.) but my last Lucid which I had just last night I had no dream control at all. I felt so helpless. I tried changing the scene by spinning, yelling, "I'M DREAMING!" over and over while imagining a tropical beach. It didn't work, but the clarity greatly increased though. I tried summoning someone I knew but that didn't work. I tried changing the cloudy grey sky to a bright blue by "wiping" the sky with my hand and willing it to happen but that didn't work either. After a while I couldn't even yell anymore. Every time I tried to yell I just whispered. It was frustrating. I'm just saying you have your ups and downs..

[Callista]

Work on visualizing things. That's a fancy word for "imagining". In an LD, expecting things to happen is a big part of changing them; but knowing *how* they will happen is equally helpful. For example, let's say you want to teleport to an amusement park--maybe to ride a roller coaster or something. If you don't have any inkling what the amusement park will look like before you try, it may be harder to teleport (or even impossible). On the other hand, imagining the scene around you before you try to move yourself there may help make it much easier. This is an exercise I often try, just for fun, when I'm trying to go to sleep or when I'm just bored: Close your eyes and imagine a familiar place. Then imagine yourself in it. Since you don't have visual input from your current place, it is often possible to nearly convince yourself that you are in the place you are imagining. I started out doing this with my childhood bedroom, a very familiar place to me. I've also tried convincing myself that I'm lying on my bed facing the opposite direction that I'm actually facing (i.e., mentally turning my room 90 degrees). Once you've figured that out, you can also create imaginary places, from your usual peaceful meadow to the unusual--in space, in the middle of a battle, or in a completely abstract landscape. Having my eyes closed generally helps me; I often close my eyes when I'm trying to do something in a dream, but I've been told other people have experienced scene shifts, loss of lucidity, et cetera when closing their eyes. I don't think that would happen to someone who, like me, is used to using closed eyes to imagine some result or other taking place, though.

[will1984]

I think it takes a while before u get the hang of things, theres still things i cant do even now and i started becoming lucid when i was 14 my key to control, is just that uve got to realize that in theory ure controlling ureself in ure dream, and sometimes it is down to determination, ure right. The way i view it is that the intance u raise your arm, thats u in control, thats u being able to move something in ure dream, which is ure physical body, now all uve got to do is transcend that abilty so that u could probably go from that to slowing down time, or flying out the window...as long as ure thinking it, not wanting it! sometimes uve got to know how u want it to happen, if u just tell someone to stop, they'll just carry on walking past u...but... if u half imagine it then its more likely to happen i guess thats why i had so many problems on controlling my dreams is because u think its easy, u know ure in ure dream so it should just do as u tell it but if u think about it, even a normal dreamer could want something to go there way and have it change, so thats why we have less lucid people in the world. Even have a world free of nightmares! If ure going to start with control, do telekenisis! its more fun i hope that makes sense

[BillyBob]

Originally posted by reverie when I have lucid dreams, my dream control isnt that great. During my dreams, I can control about 25% of the stuff that goes on. No matter how hard I try, nothing works. -_- I know what the problem is, I'm not believing in myself enough for things to work. Bleh. Sorry for the lack of clarity. Is there any way I can be more confident in my control powers? dont visualize, dont think, dont imagine, just know.... knowing that someone is there or making up a reason in your head why someone or something will be somewhere is the way to go about getting dream control, by making up a reason i mean say if i wanted my friend Jill to appear, im standing in a room with an open door and iv tried many other techniques but none have worked, i simply think "Jill and me were just baking cookies in the kitchen a few minutes ago, she should be back from washing her hands any second now" if you try, its very easy to temporaraly trick your brain intoi believing your little hoax scenerio and Jill should walk through the door when you look up genuinly expecting her to be back from washing her hands, then obviously you immediately begin to doubt your story and there was no foul effects, I also train on expecting people/ items to be somewhere in real life, using the same meathod, just last night i caught an FA with this technique (was laying on bed looking at doorway and thought "theres a hot babe about to walk past, God shes sexy" and sure enough guess what walked into the room cant say i was REALLY suprised though because i always expect her to

[Placebo]

Good advice there, listen to him It's akin to making it easier to believe it will happen. Don't question, doubt, or think too much. Just expect it. It'll happen if you let it. This is the same reason why you should summon things out of sight, and use shortcuts (eg. jetpacks to fly) to make your strength of 'will' stronger.