Thread: The Dream Lab

This may be my last entry writing in this dream journal, because writing down my dreams again after alerady having written them down in my paper journal is redundant and time-consuming. And even though I had two lucids this morning (none yesterday, so I didn't bother to write), I'm not going to write either of them down in full. I'm just going to give a brief summary of what kinds of things I did and goals I met.

First dream: WILD-ish

Came after a failed FILD attempt followed by a WBTB where I played with Google Sky a lot. I'd also played with Google Sky before going to bed.
Started out having hypnagogic imagery or simple dreams about being on a tippy boat.
Started thinking that those tippy sensations might be sleep paralysis coming on, so decided to surrender to the feelings.
This was soon followed by the classic tingling sensations I get when I'm about to dream.
Repeated to myself, "what I see next will be a dream."
Once I started dreaming, and the dream stabilizied itself, I went for the outer space task again. *Note, before the dream stabilized, I think I felt some discomfort in my eyes, which is rare when I'm dreaming.*
I eventually had some nice pretty space flights with nebulae.
After that, I occasionally talked about odd things being "dreamsigns" and reminded myself I was dreaming.

Second lucid (classic DILD):
Started out a typical missing-classes dream.
Realized I was dreaming when it was 2:18 pm and pitch dark outside. I do not live in the Arctic or the Subarctic.
Met a man, 30s or 40s and with large but sort of East Asian-looking eyes (so could be East Asian, half East Asian, or Central Asian), named Matthew and got him to help me find out if I could feel pain or temperature in dreams. The pain, from him whacking my nose, was fairly intense but dull and a little tingly. The temperature of a cool object I touched was fully felt with the palm of my hand, but not the back of my hand. I didn't try wind or anything. [hmm...that could be what I do next.]
I seduced Matthew into lucid sex, but he didn't do much before he started yammering on about martial arts and picking books off the shelves again. (He was a martial arts teacher.) Like all attempts at lucid sex, this one was botched.

Dustin' off the old dream journal thread...this time I'm probably gonna write down my dreams, particularly my lucid dreams, here and not bother to paper-journal them. I'm a faster typer than I am a writer.

I'm getting back into lucid dreaming with the hope of increasing my sense of control and thus my self-confidence through influencing my own dreams consciously.

Here's my latest in lucid adventure, also posted to the Task of the Month thread:

Type: WBTB/DILD

Dream:
I attain lucidity when this ugly, nasty, sweaty guy, almost like a smaller Fat Bastard from Austin Powers to give you an idea, is fooling around on top of me in my bed. It's grotesque and bizarre, but it makes me confident I'm dreaming, so I'm happy. Elated that I'm finally lucid, I fly through the window and all around outside, sinking at first as I fly, but using effort to lift myself back up again. After having that fun, I decide, Ok, time to go do the Basic Task of the Month from DreamViews and make a snowman. But first I must find some snow, I tell myself. So I look around down on the streets until I manage to find some snow. Then I start rolling up some crunchy but wet snow. I make the base, which is somewhat small. Then I make the middle, which is supported by some paper tube or something. My "dream boyfriend," a much more attractive male character than the one who rudely jolted me into lucidity, makes the head, with eyes and mouth painted on with color. I put it on. The snowman is short, but complete.

I later keep trying to modify the snowman, which is situated near a tent. I tried to reinforce it by putting paper towel around its neck. I soon find it altered, with actual legs carved into its base so it is standing on two legs with an actual gap between the legs, but it seemed to have lost its head or the head became tiny. So I looked for more snow. This snow was much looser. I made a head out of it, but snow fell off the head in a pattern that made it shaped like a bear's head, so the new version of the snowman looked like a polar bear. I tried to carve it but the head kept coming off.

Meanwhile, there was some weird stuff going on in a tent near where I built the snowman, involving politics, religion, and this mysterious orange dog I kept seeing in my apartment but didn't want around. She looked like a Golden Retriever/Labrador cross - the color of a Golden but the short hair of a Lab.

Sometime after I was done fiddling with the snowmen, I lost lucidity and had several "false awakenings" where I (1) tried to write or remember the lucid portion of the dream, (2) found more weird religion and politics stuff going on, and (3) realized that the orange dog, Lilo, was a dream sign - that every time she showed up I must have been dreaming, and that pets other than my familiar aquatic ones in my apartment were a typical dream sign in general. (Of course, by the time I had this insight, I was no longer seeing Lilo in my false-awakening dream sequences, so I never became lucid again.)

An advanced task attempt...not sure whether it counts or not...I tried to do better but it wasn't working in that dream.
.......
I saw a series of strange animals go by: a mother and baby that looked sort of like giant kiwi birds; something that looked vaguely like a wild turkey; and some other strange animal. I wondered if they were a dream sign. Then more people got into the car I was in, and I didn't recognize any of them. Strange animals AND strangers in a car with me? Now THAT was probably a dream sign, I figured. I decided to do a quick reality check by seeing if I could put my hand through the car window. I could, cofirming I was dreaming. So out the window I went, and I flew off, looking for a sleigh to steal.

I could hardly even find snow, never mind Santa and a sleigh. But then I went inside this house, where there was a small, red-painted wooden sleigh next to a Christmas tree that appeared to be a toy, but there was a full-size, live Santa Claus next to it. I figured I'd try hijacking this, by sneaking into the wooden sleigh and off with it while Santa wasn't looking. So I climbed into the sleigh...somehow I could barely sit in it despite its size...and Santa caught me. Uh-oh. I was trying to think of something to say, and ultimately said, "I'm just taking it for a joyride. I'll bring it back." He let me go.

So off I went, looking around for reindeer to fly it. Carrying the sleigh, I eventually came across a statue of a mother and baby of some large deer species - I thought they might actually be moose, but they'll do, I thought. (In fact, they may well have been reindeer because the mother had antlers, and IRL reindeer/caribou are the only deer in which females have antlers.) I brought the mother deer statue to life, and summoned/threw some white ropes at her to attach her to my sleigh as she started running and taking off. Eventually she did fly the sleigh, which was a really fun sensation for me flying in this tiny sleigh from the end of a long rope, but then she stumbled and crashed. I found another statue deer/moose like her, and had the both of them fly my stolen sleigh. As a pair, they also stumbled and crashed again after a brief flight. Either they recommended or I thought myself to try to find a real sleigh to steal, preferably in-flight, and a real set of reindeer that would work better than these defective wooden things (and be a more unambiguous completion of the Advanced Task). So off I went, on my own. I never did return that little sleigh to the Santa in the house.

Sometime during my searches I started to lose my dream scenes, so I said "clarity" and started looking at the fine structures of dream objects, and got my dream scene clarity back. I tried to find the North Pole for a while, hoping a full-size sleigh would be there, but it wasn't happening. So one time, while in a building, I thought I'd try closing my eyes and changing the dream scene. I tried closing my eyes, but I could still see, just as one can often still breathe in a dream where their nose is plugged or they're underwater. Then I tried covering my eyes with my hands. This blacked everything out, but the dream scenery had a hard time coming back, and when it finally did...no North Pole.

I kept looking for a little longer, especially in snowy places I chanced upon and in the sky. I never found the full sized sleigh. And I eventually went into a short non-lucid sequence before waking up. I'd have to leave it up to Ninja's discretion to decide whether I actually completed this task or I'd need to steal a full sized sleigh with Santa in it instead of that little wooden one being guarded by Santa. Even if this counts, I might go after a full-sized sleigh anyway, preferably summoning it instead of searching for it so as to advance my dream powers.

**********

I also remember some non-lucid dream details from before this sequence, and should probably write them own too.

-Before my WBTB this morning, I had been driving a small bus around, by myself, and this bus was kind of open air. I was driving it very poorly. I eventually decided I wanted to try taking a subway. Applying for a subway card required details regarding my driver's license, and I've been living in places with decent public transport all my adult life and happen not to have one yet despite being nearly 30. So I told the lady in the booth that I don't have a license. I would then get a floppy subway card, and an application to fill for that, which included a lot of weird irrelevant stuff like whether or not I would buy the greenest models of certain cars and trucks.

-I was hanging out with my (real) bf in some building with a bunch of people. I don't remember exactly what was going on there...I think it was a point from which I would travel to other places...but my bf and I were involved with those people a lot and he seemed to often be asking them for advice or something.

-This could have been sometime during the lucid sequence, but there was this thing where I had to answer a series of questions on paper that I'd just skip through impatiently to get to the end of whatever it was. I think I had to do it at least 2-3 times.

-I had some lucid hypnagogia for a while. The problem with hypnagogia is that it's so inherently unstable that trying to "do" something in it leads to a change in or fading of the scenery.

Well...had another DILD. Saw lots of sleighs but didn't steal any of 'em...I think the whole thing is that I think stealing a sleigh with Santa in it is mean, and I really don't want to do it. I guess I'll let my first mediocre attempt at the Advanced Task stand, and make for myself some more ethical lucid goals.
************
I figure out I'm dreaming pretty quickly, though I forget exactly what the original dream sign was. It may have had something to do with the fact that I was in a bit of a bizarre, throwback situation: I was in an analog of one of the homes I lived in as an adolescent, with my ex-stepdad, out of my life for 12 years now, among the people present. Eventually, I knew these things in themselves were off. Anyway, I soon start my dream adventure. I come across my real dad, and tell him that he's not real, that he's a dream character, and he gives me this funny look. I do something similar to some other dream character, explaining I'm the only "person" in the dream, and I get a similar response.

I don't remember much of the sequence of the dream, but there are many situations in which I see Santa and his sleigh. In one of them I'm in this big parking-lot-type area. In another I think I'm outside, after having traveled through a closed door and let myself almost fall to the ground. (The old home analog was on the second floor.) I sometimes fly or run toward these sleighs to try to steal them, but I never catch up...probably in bouts of self-sabotage, not expecting or wanting to steal them.

At one point I had a false awakening in the old-home analog, but I strongly suspected it was false. I decided to do a "does the text change when you look at it?" reality check with some writing that was on something stuck to the wall. The second time I looked at it, a letter either appeared or disappeared that wasn't there, confirming that I was still dreaming. I went to look for more sleighs...again with good luck summoning them and no luck stealing them.

Somewhere in this dream sequence I was with a group of dream characters and they had some vintage 80s Uno cards on a table, although they were not like real life ones - they were way oversized and I knew in the dream that something was fishy about their heads sides. (I think I was already lucid during this sequence, and this just served as yet another reminder that I was still in dreamland.)

There's also some point at which I get scared while lucid, but I tell myself that I can control it.

In one of my last ditch attempts to do a better version of the Advanced Task, I finally did manage to catch up with what turned out not to be a sleigh with Santa, but a flying bicycle ridden by an old man. I grabbed onto the back, and I successfully stole the flying bike, knocking off the old man (I don't know what happened to him)...but either the bike or the old man turned into a gray kitten, or else a gray kitten simply appeared. I tried "riding" the gray kitten like I rode the bike for a moment, but, feeling guilty about what I did to the old man and to the kitten, I stopped, returned to the ground, and gave the kitten to a mother cat. Some dream-characters around me thought that was sweet, but I think I expressed in some way that I'd wronged at least one living creature (probably two, since I think it was the bike and not the man that turned into the kitten), and was rather ashamed of what I'd done. I no longer had the will to make more attempts at sleigh theft in that dream sequence, and it soon ended with a series of what I think was hypnopompic imagery, 'cause it did not maintain stability and vividness.

Doing a WBTB now...very early in the night I had what might be called semi-lucids...but they were almost semi-dreams really, very unstable. I tried meditating in 1 or 2 of them, but the dreams and my lucidity levels just weren't stable enough.

Then I had some nonlucid dreams about a bizarre reality-TV family, where there was some skepticism as to whether they were all even a family. The youngest boy was biracial but just looked white with an African-type nose. He hated his nose and wanted to look pefectly white. The mother was wacky. I was supposed to meet up with my own family on the subway. I did eventually but I missed a stop at first. I also learned there were some small red aquarium fish I'd raised and donated that were now viewable through something like binoculars built into a horizontal surface at one of the subway stops.

No lucids this morning. I blame it on two factors: (a) not being that enthusiastic about meditating in a dream 'cause I've already done it, and (b) doing my WBTB an hour earlier than usual. My nonlucid dreams involved...something to do with a company being 40% foreign-owned...and some lady taking over the bed I'd been sleeping in.

I'm now waffling over whether the redemption-of-nightmares-in-dreams project is worth it, or if I ought to instead just try to advance my dream powers. I can redeem the nightmares by being more proactive in real life, which might reduce the number (or at least the nature) of nightmares I have. But if I master lucid dreaming and improve my dream powers...I may become lucid in future nightmares far more often, and become more confident in my ability to control my own mind in general, because lucid dreaming is renewing my interest in waking self-control.

So yeah, I think I'm gonna change my focus. Maybe I'll spend my next lucid dream looking for all the dream signs I can find. Or I'll try that summoning thing again. I dunno.

Had another lucid...but there was a false awakening at the end where a buddy of mine who's a longtime occult practitioner advised me in an e-mail to keep my practices more private. I think it was a message from my subconscious not to prattle on too much about my LD hobby. So, I'm not gonna reccord my lucids on here anymore except when I do Tasks of the Month or Year.

I had another lucid this morning, my fifth since coming back here. And this time around, I've had a remarkably good memory for the DILD-triggering situations.

I think it might be interesting to note the triggers of lucidity for each of these dreams.

Dream #4, mentioned in my last post but not written about, started at my computer, with everything vague and fuzzy.

Dream #5, this morning, started at my grandfather's, with a Jolly Green Giant taking a seat on a bench in the backyard.

Compare those to my first three lucids in the month, and all five started out in a familiar setting from either the past or the present. Two started in my bedroom; two started out in other familiar home settings; and the fifth, from what I recall though I didn't mention it in the dream report in this thread, started out at a plaza that looked an awful lot like one I used to go to a lot as a kid and young adult.

I'm starting to think now that maybe the secret to DILDing is to see something unfamiliar within a familiar setting, and recognize that disparity. Perhaps if I can get myself to dream of such a familiar setting from the past or present, I can get myself to have more LDs.

After discovering that my early January task completion attempts when the thread was still in the Lucid Task Club forum apparently didn't count (I know I failed the Advanced but I thought I had the Basic, unless I failed that too 'cause the champagne tasted like water), I've decided to take a break from DreamViews lucid tasks and try my own, more meaningful, tasks where I explore my own dream symbolism. Something more open-ended, where I can't get frustrated about doing it wrong.

I tried that, and succeeded, this morning, with the personal task of "Bring good and evil together and see what happens." Here's the dream, as I recorded it in a personal electronic dream journal I'm keeping on my laptop:

I’m not sure what triggered the realization I was dreaming, but I was indoors, and I proved it with the jumping test, after which I suspended myself in midair and started flying.

After I remembered my dream goal, to bring good and evil together and see what happens, I tried flying through a window. The first time it didn’t work, but the second time worked fine.

In a field, I eventually met these two people, who apparently represented good and evil. “Good” was a gray-haired old man – gray, not white – with a mustache and beard, wizardy-looking, and “evil” was a sorceress dressed in purple with a gravity-defying hairdo. The sorceress made someone’s flesh come off into chunks and consumed it from a distance, magically drawing it into her mouth. “Good” simply disappeared magically – the two did not confront each other to speak of.

Later on in the dream, I was indoors eating some Skittles-like candy. I regained my lucidity and realized they were dream skittles and therefore “didn’t count,” so I finished them off. I also realized there was a connection between eating and my “evil,” but I continued to eat anyway. I wanted to try getting “good” and “evil” together again. I didn’t succeed.

Had two lucids...both attempts to get an answer to "what is the meaning of pet fish in my dreams." The first one was vaguely remembered and unsuccessful. The second one yielded a nonsensical answer, which was good enough for this exercise - I was simply looking to see what my subconscious came up with for an answer, not whether that answer had meaning or made sense.

Lucid parts are in bold.

Dream sequence #1:

I was working with other students and such, particularly women students, using computers. Occasionally these guys would come along and talk in some silly pick-up-line kinda way. I figured they were planning to rape us, and I would raise the alarm or fight them. I think someone mentioned some of these guys might be gay.

One of these times (after much tossing and turning), I figured out that I was dreaming when confronted with one of these potential rapists, a man with very short, kinda strawberry blond hair and some short facial hair. As soon as I announced that I was dreaming or that he wasn’t real, he seemed to faint. Then I kept trying to think of what my lucid dream agenda was. I then remembered it was to find some aquarium fish. I set out to find some, and I did, but I didn’t get to ask them, or anyone in the dream, what their symbolic meaning was – I’d forgotten that part.

Dream #2:

I saw these huge columns of gray cloud out the window. I told someone next to me how rare and awesome those were. I tried to find my camera but they disappeared before I got a chance to take a picture. Then I wondered, “Oh wait, am I dreaming?” I almost never see stormy features that amazing unless I’m dreaming.

I decided to try flying, and it worked, confirming I am dreaming. “Haha!” I shouted as I enjoyed the sensation of flight across the apartment. Off I went to try to look for aquarium fish and ask what they meant in my dreams.

I spent a lot of time in a large building, looking for fish tanks and talking to people. I tried going up to a fish tank and talking to the fish but it didn’t work. I tried talking to a group of 2 or 3 people, and I mentioned to one of the young men in the group that I was dreaming, and no answer to my question came up.

I went up some stairs and came across a door. I wanted to find someone through this door. Looking through the bottom initially, I found no sign of anyone, but then, when I closed my eyes and looked again, I saw two mismatched feet. I went through the door, and off to the right, a dark-haired, dark-eyed, disheveled, sullen-looking young man was lying on the ground. I thought, maybe he’d know about the meaning of aquarium fish in my dreams. I talked to him, but the conversation was once again unproductive. So I moved on.

I found more fish tanks, including one very large tank with a pair of giant guppies in it and at least one baby guppy, along with maybe one or two other adult fish. Near one of the tanks, I found more people to talk to, one of whom was my little sister. I asked the people in the group what the meaning of aquarium fish in my dreams was.

My little sister finally answered: “Elfs.” (A mispronunciation of “elves” apparently.) “Elfs?” I repeated. “Yes,” she said. My mission done – I finally got an answer, even though it was a seemingly nonsensical one – I said thanks to her, and walked off.

Next thing I knew I’d had a false awakening, and decided to write down the “answer” at the end of my dream in a paper notebook so I would remember it.

More failed shapeshifting attempts...gonna need to create a new strategy. Or somehow banish any thoughts that I can't transform in dreams. Hmm...I wonder what would happen if I tried using makeup or costumes in dreams to make myself look like another form? And then I could get used to seeing something other than the familiar me in the mirror?

Dream:

I was riding in a car with a bunch of people, watching the GPS unit. I saw some of the display change on the GPS unit and wondered if I was dreaming. I saw more of the display change, but I figure digital displays often change. So I did the “nose plug” reality check and found that my nose was stuffy, but I could still pretty much breathe through it.

I decided it was time to try shapeshifting into a cat. I went into a room full of other people. Some of them turned into cats. I tried cuddling up to these kitties. But I looked at myself and saw I wasn’t a cat yet. I crawled on the floor with my hands in fists (though sometimes trying to show my fingers as claws) and looked in the mirror as I walked by, and I was still not a cat. I tried licking/grooming a cat in the room. I still didn’t turn into a cat.

Tried to FILD and had one of those pseudo-WILDS where I dream that I fall asleep and the "dream within a dream" is lucid. I was looking all over the place for an animal suit I could crawl into as a precursor to shapeshifting...but no such luck. The lucidity quality of the dream was rather low anyway.

I think I'll need a traditional WBTB with a lot of looking at cat pics in order to have another shot at this. I'm getting bored/discouraged with this goal, but I'm tired of being a quitter at everything.

I just tried my "dream meditation" idea...and I think I'm gonna keep doing this. It's really just a simple technique to maintain lucidity, and it gives me practice at LDing without the problem of my getting discouraged by repeatedly failing a specific task that I use to keep me lucid. Open-ended lucid dreams with no specific goal can be interesting, just to see what your subconscious dredges up.

Lucid dream report:

Somehow I noticed something that made me figure out I was dreaming.

I soon started my “See the dream” mantra. My original dream scene faded and gave way to another one, with these cartoon drawings on this display that could be “zoomed into” to make a new dream scene. I zoomed into a cartoon of a herd of pink pigs.

At some point, I ended up in my bf’s apartment, still lucid. I would be distracted temporarily from the “see the dream” mantra to interact with him, but then I’d return to it. I flew in my bf’s living room, and my bf noticed it and said “you’re…” and I think I said “Flying” back, emphasizing that it was still all a dream. I tried putting my bf on my back and flying, but it didn’t work. I did a lot of jumping in the air and floating, for fun.