How can I capitalize on this dream sign?

Hi everyone,

I want to ask some advice about a particular dream sign. My most common and frequent dream sign is that in most of my dreams (nearly all of them, actually) I am in an unfamiliar place. Sometimes it is an unfamiliar version of a place I frequently spend time (for example, it looks like my apartment, but the layout is different. Or it looks like my workplace but again, the layout is not familiar to me) and other times it is a completely foreign place.

My problem is that I don't know how to associate reality checks with this dream sign because I spend most of my waking life in places that are familiar to me: work, gym, home, local bar... :)

Does anyone have advice on how I can use this dream sign to induce lucidity? If I was able to do this, I could have lucid dreams almost every night because nearly all of my dreams are in a strange place.

Thanks to anyone who responds! Cheers.

Are you focused on the unfamiliarity of the place during the dream or after the dream? This is important because you first have to be focused on the unfamiliarity of the place during the dream before you can catch it as a dream sign.

That said, what you should do is immediately after waking up from every dream and recalling it, reimagine the dream only with you realizing the unfamiliarity of the place and becoming lucid from it. Then go to sleep. Don't try to force yourself to catch the dream sign during the next dream, just let it happen automatically. Trust that you're teaching yourself and learning how to catch the dream sign by doing what you're doing. You don't have to do anything during the day.

I am almost never contemplating the unfamiliarity of the place. I pretty much carry on with the dream unaware I don't know where I am. Only upon waking do I realize I've never been there before.

dolphin, thanks for the advice. I will try this next time I recall a dream. However, I am currently using mantras to increase dream recall. If I try and reimagine the dream while falling asleep, will this get in the way of a mantra? Or can I do both side by side?

On one hand, taking the effort to do both would be good exercise for your brain and would help you to be stronger in the future.

On the other hand, the more you effort you put into it, the weaker you get until you recover. You want to be mentally strong enough during the dream to avoid the distractions you're experiencing now.

Then again, you need to be mentally strong enough to avoid the distractions in the first place.

I would first try doing no mantra and visualization while falling asleep for a night. If that's not working, use visualization and/or mantra to exercise. Only use the mantra if your recall isn't good enough and visualization if lucidity isn't good enough. Alternate nights where you use the mantra/and or visualization while falling asleep and nights where you don't. Do this until you have a night with good enough recall and lucidity without using the visualization or mantra. When you get to that point, don't do visualizations and or mantras while falling asleep anymore unless you find you need to do more strength training again, so to speak, at which you point would repeat the process.